Josephine probably shouldn’t have put on the movie 300.
Going in, it seemed like a happy medium.
Action for Wells. Shirtless Spartans for her.
Right?
But she had forgotten about the scene. The sex scene. When King Leonidas is leaving for battle and makes very passionate love to his wife beforehand. An unbridled, slow-motion masterpiece that, frankly, she might have rewound a few times if she were alone. But she wasn’t alone—and the atmosphere surrounding her and Wells was growing more charged by the second.
What was going on here?
Sure, they’d had their fair share of chemically confusing moments, where his closeness made her blood pressure spike and curled her toes in her shoes—the man was certifiably gorgeous. Sure, she’d stared at the incendiary picture of his hard-packed backside until her hormones had forced her fingers down the front of her panties. Before she knew it, said panties had come off completely. She might have been in the process of masturbating to a picture of her boss when he’d knocked on the door. Acting natural had been a challenge on par with pole vaulting with a piece of asparagus.
They’d settled into what could actually be a successful partnership. Some mild flirting, fine, but overall a respectful working relationship. More than she could have hoped for, actually! But sitting beside him on a couch in the near-dark hotel suite—tucked up against his well-muscled side like they were on a date—while watching Leonidas put it down on his old lady was making pulses pound in places they had no business pounding.
Good lord. Don’t think about pounding.
Was she making a bigger deal out of this than it was? Golfers and caddies tended to bond, didn’t they? Many of them were best friends or even family, because of the trust factor being so important. Perhaps . . . they’d simply gotten closer, she and Wells. This was what they did now. They snuggled up and watched movies like a couple of ol’ pals.
Merely hoping to confirm that plausible theory, Josephine snuck a quick glance up at Wells’s face and found his expression strained, his gaze trained on her face instead of the movie.
Oh boy. Okay. Not just pals.
“I’ve been thinking,” he started, in a low rumble that she could feel deep in her belly. “We’re pretty good at this flirting thing, right?”
The temperature of her skin rose, face to fingertips. “Actually, I feel like I’m kind of bumbling my way through it.”
He hit pause on the movie while arching a brow. “That picture you sent me was not bumbling. That was expert level.”
“Oh.” She bit down on a smile. “Good.”
“Good?” He made a sound in his throat. “Belle. The earth moved.”
The smile just kind of exploded across her face.
She heard him swallow. Loudly.
“Anyway, we have flirting momentum now. We should keep going. Do you agree?”
This man kept surprising her. She had to be on her toes around him, yet she also had this very distinct intuition that it would always be okay to let her guard down. How unique. “Yes. I agree,” she said, trying not to sound breathless. “It would be irresponsible to let the flirting momentum drop.”
Wells nodded, took his time looking her over, his attention eventually returning to her face. “What makes you smell so goddamn good, Josephine? Is it lotion? Perfume?”
“Lotion,” she managed, bumpily.
“Thought so.”
“It’s a vanilla-lilac mashup. Very seasonal.”
“Very distracting.”
“How?”
“You show up smelling like that and I immediately think of you . . . applying it.” Never had the word “applying” sounded so filthy. “That’s how.”
“Yes, I put it on in slow motion, slowly stretching each freshly shaven leg out in front of me, toe in a perfect point—”
“Don’t shatter the illusion,” he teased, reaching over and tugging on the lapel of her robe, turning her body to face him more fully on the couch. Her knee left the confines of the robe to rest on top of his thigh and they both stared down at the contact for a breath, until he said, “You like the way I smell, too?”
“Yes.” She couldn’t seem to get her voice above a murmur. “Lotion or perfume?”
His lips twitched. “Aftershave.” Gaze never leaving her face, he brushed a thumb over her bare knee. “Why don’t you come sit on my lap and smell it up close?”
There was no oxygen to be had. “Okay.”
Wells leaned toward Josephine, movements unhurried, his mouth stopping a hairsbreadth away from her own, his big arms locking around her middle and dragging her back with him to the other side of the couch. And now, she was sitting on Wells’s lap in her robe, her butt on his muscle-packed right thigh, her exposed legs draped over the left one. “Go ahead.” His mouth moved in her hair, his hand fisting the belt of her robe. “Smell me.”
Was the couch tilting? “Is this how you usually flirt?” she asked.
“Josephine.” He lifted the hand wrapped in white terry cloth, using it to nudge her chin higher. And he looked her in the eye. “I never flirt.”
What did that mean? She couldn’t really find the wherewithal to decipher that statement, because she was nearly salivating with the need to smell this man. Up close like this, his aroma went from attractive to appetizing and she was powerless to do anything but dip her nose into his neck and inhale, notes of eucalyptus and almond oil rolling her eyes into the back of her head. Meanwhile, his hand, still fisting the fabric of the belt, was sliding up and down the valley of her thighs, stopping just at the border of indecency.
“Well?” he asked, his breath stirring her hair.
“I like it,” she whispered, inhaling again.
A satisfied sound turned over in his chest. “I know something else you like, Josephine.”
His gravelly tone made her shiver hotly. “What is it?”
Slowly and deliberately, he picked up the remote control on the arm of the couch and hit rewind, returning to the start of the movie’s love scene. And then he hit play.
Josephine swallowed hard, trying not to be obvious about sneaking her knees closer together. Had he noticed she was paying a little too close attention to the scene earlier?
It started from the beginning, moans and drumbeats filling the living space.
Wells rested his mouth against her temple. “How hard he’s fucking her. You like that, don’t you?”
Arousal snaked through Josephine, starting at the buds of her breasts. They pebbled and grew sensitive inside the white terry cloth. And then lower, her stomach muscles knitting together one by one and drawing taut like shoelaces. She ordered herself to slow down her breathing and act normal, but Wells shifted in this sensual animal way beneath her, his right hand tilting her chin, his lips ghosting up the side of her neck—and the breathy sound she made in response to that featherlight touch more than answered his question.
He wasn’t done asking questions, though.
“Did you pack your vibrator, belle?”
If he’d asked her that in broad daylight, she wouldn’t have answered. Or she would have asked him if he’d packed his sense of privacy. But in the intimate darkness of the suite—with shadows playing on the wall and her backside planted in his lap—nothing seemed off limits.
“No,” she whispered. “I didn’t think it would be . . . necessary.”
“Didn’t expect me to send you pictures of my juicy ass, did you?”
Her laugh sounded more like a gasp. He knew exactly what she’d been doing when he arrived, the big jerk. Why was it so attractive that he’d said nothing until now? “Shut up.”
The knuckles brushing her jaw firmed and there was no mistaking the hunger bracketing his mouth, his eyes. “Make me, belle.”
A moan issued from the television. Maybe. It could have been inside her head or out loud, too, because God, she wanted to be kissed. Hard. Messy. Frantic. She was a bundle of concentrated nerves that were asking for appeasement. Friction. The touch of another person. And not just any person. Wells. “Just so we’re clear, you want me to . . .”
“Make the first move and I’ll take over.” Their mouths were touching now, lips damp from their mutual heavy breathing. “Or tell me to leave. And I will. But I need you to know there’s no pressure, Josephine. You kick me out and you’re still my caddie tomorrow and nothing changes. Not a damn thing. Understand?”
Had Josephine ever met someone who made her feel such a variety of emotions? Frustration, gratitude, belonging, anger . . . lust. “I understand,” she said, sighing when his thumb traced the hollow of her throat, those glittering eyes studying her mouth like he was forming a strategy. “What happens after you take over?”
His chest vibrated, his mouth traveling along her cheek to rest against her ear. “After we’re done kissing, you mean? Don’t you dare skip past that. Finally going to get that taste I’ve been dreaming about.”
“You’ve been wanting to kiss me? You’re not even nice to me.”
“You say that with a straight face from inside the presidential suite, belle?” He raised an eyebrow at her. “I already called ahead to the next place to make sure your room has the biggest bathtub—”
She kissed him.
A firm acquainting of lips that turned into three, four, smaller kisses. Like sampling each other and loving every taste even more than the last. Was that her imagination or could she hear his heart booming? Leaning into the kiss, she flattened her left palm on his chest and found the racing organ beating triple time and that turned her on more than anything. Proof that beneath his often jerk-like exterior was vulnerability. Need that matched hers.
They were kissing. Making out.
She was making out with Wells Whitaker.
Her boss.
But he wasn’t really any of those things to her now. Not after getting to know him better. Now he was just Wells, her infuriating teammate who was also thoughtful and jaded and protective and hot-tempered and sexy. And he kissed like he wouldn’t mind either of them running out of oxygen. He kissed her like she was a meal and he wanted to memorize every single flavor on his palate.
“I take over now, Josephine,” he rasped, kissing her thoroughly. “You want it like that?”
Her answer was fervent and clear. “Yes.”
“Good girl.” He trapped Josephine’s waist in his hands and turned her in his lap to face the television, which she could barely see now that she’d entered some sort of lust fog. “Lean back against me. I’m going to open this robe like a fucking Christmas present.”
In the past, when it had come time to take off her clothes in front of a man, there was always a layer of self-consciousness. Wondering what they were thinking, not just about her body in general, but also the small gray circle on the back of her arm. There were none of those thoughts when Wells untied her robe with shaking hands and peeled it open, painting her nude body in the muted television light. God. She was hot. An inexcusable temptation. His rough groan told her so, along with the thick bulge beneath her butt.
She could feel him looking over her shoulder down the length of her body, could hear his breath growing thin in her ear, his hips pulsing upward slightly, grinding against her bottom, as if the moves were involuntary. Necessary.
“You let me into your room with no panties on?”
“I didn’t think you would find out.”
“Thank you, God, for Josephine’s inappropriate movie selection.” Her laugh turned into a whimper when he suctioned his mouth to the side of her neck, yanking the robe open wider, his fingertips dragging slowly up the sides of her rib cage. “You need me to be nice? I’ll be the nicest person you ever met. Just to you. Only you. Jesus Christ, you’re so beautiful.”
That’s how she felt. Totally and authentically.
Lusted after. Safe. Free to abandon any and all constraints.
Needy and daring all at once, she spread her legs into a V, draping them over Wells’s hard thighs, encouraged by the groan that gathered in his chest.
“Fuck yes, belle. Is that an invitation to pet it?”
She let her head fall back against his shoulder and nodded. Ready to feel. Dying for it.
Not that he gave it to her right away. Wells took his sweet time, turning his head and licking into her mouth, luxuriating in every kiss. His palms scraped up and over her breasts, cupping them gently at first, the massage growing rougher and more adept with every slow, reverent squeeze of his hands.
“Were you rubbing yourself out when I interrupted? Were you on your tiptoes bent over the bathroom counter so you could look at my picture, fingers all slippery on your clit?”
“Yes,” she admitted on a gasp.
His chest rumbled appreciatively. “Bet it’s still wet, isn’t it, belle?” He paused mid-kiss. They breathed hard into one another’s mouth. “Go make sure.”
Josephine’s head swam, heat torching her body.
She couldn’t stay still on Wells’s lap and he really didn’t seem to mind, grunting every time she moved her backside on top of his erection. She tilted her head in invitation and moaned as he took her permission, bathing her pulse with his tongue. She trailed her fingers down her stomach, delving the middle and index ones into the valley of slippery flesh, sucking in a breath when she encountered her swollen clit, no choice but to rub it. Rub it fast and tight.
“Wet,” he said.
“Yes.”
“Show me.”
That directive might have been confusing if their bodies weren’t speaking some kind of undiscovered language. Or maybe they were inventing a new one, unique to the two of them, because Josephine lifted up her fingers, seeing them glisten from beneath heavy lids, her eyes rolling back into her head when he bit her shoulder—hard—in response.
Approval.
She was given only a second to enjoy the perfect sting of pain before the robe was ripped away completely and she was thrown down, face up on the couch. Naked. Completely, blissfully naked while Wells was still fully dressed. So hot. So hot. Why was that so hot?
“You like being filthy with me?” he growled, before stripping off his hoodie, leaving him bare chested in sweatpants. This was not the man everyone saw on the golf course. Sure, he was still his hardy, rough-around-the-edges self, but he was dialed up to ten. His muscles were inked with WHITAKER across his collarbone, an all-seeing eye between his pecs, a snake slithering low on his right hip. His chest and abdomen strained with an almost furious energy. In short, Wells was magnetic. Harsh. Sleek. Beautiful.
He stroked the enormous ridge trapped inside his sweatpants, all while licking his lips and leaning down to drag his mouth side to side over the mound of her sex. Razing her inner thighs with his bared teeth.
“Oh my God,” Josephine breathed.
Okay, she took it back. He was dialed up to fifteen.
“Tell me how you want to come,” he rasped, kissing the inside of her right knee. Then left. Eyes blazing with need. “I can jerk off while licking this pussy. Bet I come quick as a motherfucker hearing you whine, Josephine. Or you can get it hard and fast on your back. What’s it going to be?” He palmed his shaft through the sweatpants, squeezing. “Decide quick—I’m fucking starving for you.”
That made two of them. It went both ways.
Her hips were restless on the couch, her nipples in pain from being so hard. She usually required more exploring of her imagination to get this ready. Like, she had to think of something arousing instead of simply being turned on by the reality of touching another person. But not with Wells. Every erogenous zone she possessed was gasping for air, especially her stomach muscles, which were tied in knots, pulling more and more taut by the second. Decide quick—I’m fucking starving for you.
It was simply the nature of their relationship—and her nature in general—to challenge him. Throw in the fact that she’d never been more sexually empowered and Josephine found herself crooking a finger at him, melding their mouths together slowly, sensuously, when he came closer. “No sex. Not tonight.”
His head dropped forward, but he nodded. “Okay, belle.”
“But if you don’t lose your temper for the next two days and you finish under par . . .” She raked her fingernails down his chest and over his nipples, making him jerk and shudder. “You can come inside me.”
True power was watching his pupils bleed into the brown of his irises, turning his eyes all but black, his right hand shoving into the waistband of his sweats to masturbate himself hard and fast. “Are you fucking kidding me, Josephine?” He growled behind his teeth. “God, I’ve never wanted to spank anyone so badly in my life.”
“I’ll let you do that, too,” she whispered.
Wells cursed. “No condom. Nothing?”
“If it’s safe for both of us?”
“It is. I’m up to date.”
“Me too. And I have an IUD. It’s the only thing that works well for me.” She razed his jawline with her teeth. “It can work well for you, too. Really well.”
“Ah fuck.” He moved in a blur, dropping down to his stomach and pushing her thighs open, his mouth moving over her flesh like a pilgrim in prayer. He wielded his tongue like a sensual weapon, breathing filthy words and praise in between hot strokes, two of his fingers alternating between firm strokes of her clit and pumps inside of her quickening sex.
When had the ceiling of her hotel room been painted like the Sistine Chapel? Her inner thighs were the consistency of jelly, but they were tight at the same time, her sex pulsing faster, faster, until she had to clutch at the couch and grind her back teeth. “I’m close.”
“Don’t be afraid to wrap your legs around my head and grind on that tongue, understand? It was put there to lick this pussy. Finish hot.”
Josephine’s back arched off the sofa, tingles crawling up her shoulders, invading her scalp. Her nipples were throbbing, core flexing, robbing her momentarily of sight and sound; all she could hear was her own rapid heartbeat and shallow breathing. And then pleasure was washing over her in a terrible mind-blowing rapture of muscle spasms and bliss, her disembodied voice calling out Wells’s name hoarsely.
“I’m here, baby. Baby, just let me put it in your mouth, just for a second.” She opened her eyes to find him straddling her hips, sweatpants shoved down around his knees, his grip choking up and down those blunt inches without gentleness. “I’m one stroke away, swear to God. Please. Just need a little suck to get through the next two days.”
The raw need in Wells’s voice brought Josephine up onto one elbow, even though her vision was still hazy from her orgasm. And no sooner did she give Wells permission with her eyes did he walk forward on his knees and pump the smooth thickness of himself between her lips, groaning at the ceiling, then louder as she accepted more, more. But his voice cut off completely when she drew on him with enough suction to hollow her cheeks—
And with a vile curse, he pulled himself quickly out of her mouth and stroked a rope of moisture onto her breasts, followed by another, another, his abdomen flexed taut, his thighs shaking on either side of her and his eyes squeezed shut. It was the most erotic scene she’d ever been a part of or witnessed. In real life or in the movies.
King Leonidas had nothing on Wells Whitaker.
He dropped down on top of her, using his elbow to keep himself slightly elevated, his gaze unfocused as both of them struggled to catch their breath.
“Well,” he said moments later, his voice like gravel as he scrutinized Josephine. “I guess this complicates the shit out of everything.”
And with that, he got up and rearranged his sweatpants, then handed Josephine the robe. He jerked his hoodie back on over his head, paced around for a few moments while finger combing his hair and looked at her long and hard. What was he thinking? Had their impromptu hookup met his expectations? “You’re not going to be weird with me in the morning, are you?”
She sat up, belted her robe, and ordered herself to be a grown-up about this. They’d exchanged pleasure and now he was leaving. He obviously wasn’t a cuddler or an afterglow type of guy—and that was fine. She usually wasn’t that type, either. If Josephine kind of wished he’d held her for a little while afterward, she would get over it. “I’m not going to be weird. Are you?”
“Me?” He scoffed. “No.”
Then nodded once and left the room.
With his hoodie on backward.
What . . . the heck had just happened?
