The One In My Heart

“What kind of straight shooter do you take me for? Someone as skittish as you needs to be manipulated into my apartment.”


I looked back up at him, half smiling and all predatory. I think I may safely call him a shark, your son. Now the shark was circling me. By habit I clung to my raft—but a part of me, maybe most of me, longed to be devoured. “How are you going to do that? I could easily have this cab let you out and then drive me to my house.”

He leaned a little closer. “Would you like to see the engagement ring I picked out?”

Had I been dropped on my head, I couldn’t have been more stunned. “Wh-what? Why?”

“I’ll tell you if you come up.”

It’s a trap, shouted Admiral Ackbar from Star Wars.

It’s bullshit, said my common sense.

Who gives a fuck? countered the woman who couldn’t wait for the shark to drag her into the waves.

When I didn’t answer, Bennett took my hand in his and traced a fingertip along the edge of my palm. I bit a corner of my lip, embarrassed by the heat that speared into the crook of my elbow. He grazed the pad of his thumb across the back of my hand. Inside my high heels, my toes curled.

The urban canyon that was Park Avenue became quieter and emptier as we drove north. Our reflections were visible in the window of the cab, a man and a woman ostensibly behaving themselves: He looked down with the concentration of someone staring at his phone; my eyes appeared glazed, as if I already felt the lateness of the hour.

Except I was anything but weary. My heart drummed. My nerves sizzled. I had to count so my breaths wouldn’t come in too quick, too shallow. Bennett’s touch roamed along the lines of my palm, slowly climbing toward the tip of my index finger.

The next thing I knew, his palm had cut into the vee between my index and middle fingers. I almost gasped at the suddenness and, well, invasiveness of the gesture.

Did he hear my sharp, indrawn breath? Could he feel the tremors beneath my skin?

As soon as we were in his private elevator, before the doors had even closed, we were already kissing. At the top we stumbled out. Somehow he managed to get us up a flight of stairs to his bedroom.

He stripped off my coat. My clutch fell with a thump. Still kissing me, he pushed me down onto his bed. The impact of our bodies pressed together, shoulders to knees, made us both emit beastly sounds.

He pulled my dress over my head and made quick work of my bra. His teeth sank into my shoulder, the flood of sensation swift and fierce. I gasped.

“You are so fucking hot, Eva,” he whispered in my ear. “Last time I got home from work I had to get myself off twice before I could go to sleep—I kept imagining you in my bed and kept getting these raging erections.”

The words were as great a turn-on as his touches. Greater—when we were apart again it would be the words echoing in my head, an audible arousal.

I pushed his tuxedo jacket off his shoulders and kissed him below his jawline, an openmouthed nibble that had his hand tighten on my arm.

“You know what I want?” His voice turned raspy. “I want to fuck you before I go to work. And I want to fuck you right after I come back home.”

I might have ripped apart his vest. I definitely heard shirt studs pinging into the headboard. Keep talking. Keep telling me how much you want me.

And don’t ever stop.

“I want to see you naked against a wall again. I want to see the way you look at me. You have such hungry eyes.”

I quaked—I didn’t want to hear about my all-too-visible yearnings. I kissed him, every inch of skin I could reach, as my hand slipped into his waistband and wrapped around him.

He discarded the rest of his clothes and peeled off my panties. We were now skin-to-skin everywhere. He kissed me, deeply, thoroughly. I whimpered in the back of my throat—the kiss was as erotic as anything he had ever done to me.

“When I have to take care of myself I imagine all the things I’d do to you,” he murmured against my lips. “And I think of all the sounds you’d make, from that first catch of your breath, to your screams when you come.”

I didn’t know how much more I could take. This was getting too intimate, and I was again feeling all too transparent. I closed my eyes and plunged my fingers into his hair. “Why don’t you make me scream again? Do it. Fuck me balls-deep.”

It was his turn to breathe harshly.

I nipped his shoulder, as he had done with mine. “You know I like it—every position, everything you do to me.”

His response was a low growl of such arousal that my own already tattered breath grew even more agitated. He pushed off me. I thought he was getting the condom, but he only repositioned himself to go down on me.

I didn’t want it. I didn’t want to be the only one undone, the only one moaning and thrashing with pleasure. I begged him to fuck me. But he didn’t, not until I’d come several times. Only then did he bury himself in me, making me whimper and tremble.

He bit my earlobe. “Do you know what I really want?”