“Cool place,” I say, stepping through the entryway and into the big living room.
I mean it. Owen’s apartment looks as perfect as a page from a lifestyle magazine, only with the lived-in coziness of somewhere familiar. The furniture’s all antique. Real, aged wood sitting beside patterned, natural fabrics. A couple of battle-scarred guitars dotted among the artwork on the walls, a high ceiling, and a bookshelf that’s both too big, and too obviously well-used, for the amount of time I presumed he spent in the gym.
Owen tosses his keys loudly onto the coffee table and walks behind the counter that separates the room from the kitchen.
“What were you expecting?” he says.
“I don’t know,” I say, stepping onto the woven rug, trailing a hand over the woodgrain of the desk near the large window. “Something between the musky dimness of a mancave and those horrible, mostly-empty, techy bachelor pads? You know the ones—all glass and black surfaces. Like your dorm at college.”
Owen laughs as he starts working on the coffee.
“You’re not the only one who’s grown up in the last few years. I guess I should be flattered?”
“No, you get enough of that, I’m sure,” I say, striding back to join him in the kitchen.
I watch as he grinds the beans, leaning over to settle my elbows on the counter top, my uncomfortable drunkenness settling into a light, playful buzz. Owen glances at me quickly, his eyes roving my body, then looks away quickly.
“Hey,” I say.
“Yeah?”
“Were you just checking out my ass?”
Owen grins. “What’d you say? I didn’t quite catch that.” He whirls the grinder, effectively drowning out any further questions.
I laugh a little. “I’ll take that as a guilty yes.”
He stops spinning the grinder and smiles as he puts his palms on the counter, turning to look at me slowly. I keep my eyes on his.
“Or am I wrong?” I ask teasingly, still a little too drunk to be sure whether I’m just joking around, or trying to start something with Owen that I might not be able to finish.
Something in his expression changes. A shift from the easy smiles and dry, provocative humor we’ve been trading all day. A shift to something more intense, more real.
He raises an eyebrow, looks back at my ass as if to check something, then back at me. “You’re bent over my counter wearing leggings so tight I can see your panty line. You’re lucky I just checked it out and resisted the urge to smack it.”
I drop my mouth open in mock-horror. “Excuse me? I’m not one of your date night airheads, you know. You even think about slapping my ass and you’re in trouble.”
Owen looks at me keenly, eyes full of mischief. “That sounds like a challenge. Are you daring me?”
My mouth falls open again. “Don’t even think about—”
Owen’s hand hits my ass so loudly it seems to echo around his kitchen like a thunderclap. I let out a yelp that’s more a breathy moan than a cry of pain, and as the sharp sting subsides I remain there, eyes locked on his, my mouth still open mid-sentence. Owen’s smile is gone, the sweet, warm face of a friend is gone. In its place are the narrowed eyes and tightened jaw of a man who’s just made up his mind. My pulse kicks up a few notches.
Incapable of thinking straight, stunned into the present moment, all I can say is, “Your hand is still on my ass.”
“I don’t see you rushing to move away,” Owen says, his voice different, somehow darker with the low graininess of intent. “Though you’re more than welcome to.”
I don’t move a muscle. His hand moves across my ass cheek, slow and deliberate, fingers achingly close to my pussy. He squeezes and I try to remember that this is wrong, try to remember that we’re work colleagues, try to remember that we’re just friends, but all that stuff feels as irrelevant as a past life. All I want is this, his hand searching my body slowly, up over my hip and then back down. My breath catches in my throat, my eyes close involuntarily, and as I push back against his palm I realize I’m still drunk—or at least I tell myself that, because this feels so good I need an excuse not to stop.
His rough palm moves under my shirt, thumb exploring the concave of my spine. I arch my back and feel sparks exploding, an electric shock from his touch. When I let out a deep sigh of pleasure, he pulls me toward him so fast that my eyes are still closed as I feel his lips press on mine—urgent and demanding and so hot I can hardly stand it.
I’ve never been kissed like this before. The way Owen tongue-fucks me makes my heart thump in my chest, heat gathering between my thighs, my breasts swelling against his imposing torso. He presses me back against the counter roughly and I grasp at his sides, pulling his shirt from his jeans to run my hands up the planes of his abs. Sirens explode in the depths of my mind telling me to stop, but they’re drowned out by our heavy breathing as we suffocate on each other, they’re drowned out by the rustling of his shirt as I claw downward at the indents of his hips.
Voices wrestle in my head as Owen wrestles with my ass, pulling me closer, crushing me against him as if he wants to feel as much of my body as he can at once. Even as my mind pulls back, my body decides otherwise, and I wrap my legs around him, Owen’s hands sliding under my thighs.
He pulls his lips away, stopping for a moment, and I feel like I’m hanging by a thread. He sets me on the counter and takes a half step back.
“Wait,” he says.
“What?” I gasp, half-angry with him for stopping, my hands still reaching for him.
“Maybe we shouldn’t…we’re drunk. You’re drunk. I don’t want you to—”
“Shut up, Owen.” I don’t let him finish, pulling his mouth back onto mine, holding the sides of his face tight in my palms, sucking his tongue like an ice cream cone. I move my lips to his ear and whisper, “I want you.”
Owen responds by guiding his mouth down to my neck as I throw my head back. In a low voice that sounds like a tremor he murmurs, “Then I’m gonna fuck you til you scream.” The low tone of his voice, so close to my neck that I feel it as much as I hear it, makes the tightness in my stomach shatter like glass. I gasp desperately for air as his hand reaches under my top, pinching my nipple through my bra.
“Oh yeah?” I say in a stuttering whisper. “Make me.”
Owen pulls back again, leaving me sitting on the counter, breathing heavily. I look at him, his head down, gazing at me with hard, possessive lust. The last remaining hesitation that I have about this happening disappears from my mind.
“Come,” he commands, taking my hand as I ease off the counter and then leading me to the bedroom.