IOU Sex Part 2

The fire snapped and popped like my insides. The sizzling sensation between my legs was almost unbearable. I knew he could provide the relief I needed, and I found myself wanting to ask him to do just that. h.e.l.l, I was almost ready to beg for it. The words were there, on the tip of my tongue.

As he leaned forward that last inch, so that my b.r.e.a.s.t.s pressed to his hard chest, I was nearly a goner. The arm along the back of the sofa now draped over my shoulder, holding me to him. His other hand rested on my bare thigh, right at the hem of my short skirt.

"You make me hard," he said, filling the silence I'd left because my train of thought had derailed. "Just by looking at you and thinking about all the things I want to do to you."

I swallowed down a moan. How easily he swept me away. When his lips grazed mine again, my eyelids made their final descent, closing as my mouth opened. His tongue delved deep to tangle with mine. I reached a hand up and twined my fingers through his thick, silky hair. My other hand slid around to his back.

I let him kiss me the way he had the first night we'd gotten together. It was hot and demanding. A purposeful kiss that conveyed how much he wanted me. Impossible to miss.

When I finally dragged my mouth away, he groaned.

"I want to be inside you," he said as he dropped featherlight kisses along my neck.

My fingers were still in his hair, my b.r.e.a.s.t.s still pressed to his chest. My head fell back as he continued to tease the skin on my throat with his lips and tongue.

I let out a sigh. One of want and need. One of obvious frustration.

Oh, if only I could say to h.e.l.l with my good girl ways and be bad with him. Right now. For one night. But I knew that come morning, I'd regret having to leave his bed. I'd want more. I always did when it came to him. Thankfully, he'd given me quite a lot when we'd gotten together in the past. He'd wanted me night after night.

By the third week, I'd realized I'd held his attention longer than any other woman I'd known of, and that's when the panic had set in. I'd instantly started to doubt my ability to keep him satisfied much longer and had begun obsessing over when, exactly, he'd start cheating on me. I'd had to end it before he did, or before he slipped. My fragile ego-thanks to The Lying, Cheating b.a.s.t.a.r.d and my sister-couldn't take another beating.

These memories were like throwing water on a fire. I moved away from Michael. Unfolded my legs and stood. I grabbed my gla.s.s and took several sips of wine as I put both physical and emotional distance between us.

He scowled at me. "Running away? Really, babe?"

"Yes. And maybe you shouldn't call me that. We're just friends."

"Are we?" he challenged. A legitimate question, but one I didn't dwell on.

"Yes. Go be bad with someone else. My heart can't take it."

His scowl vanished. "You know I'd never hurt you."

"Not on purpose, no. But let's face it, you're...into women. A lot of them. Whereas I'm...in need of focusing on my career. Building my business."

A hollow laugh from him told me what a crock he thought that excuse was. An easy scapegoat I'd created for myself. "You're terrified to date. I get that."

"We're not talking about dating. We're talking about s.e.x. And I just can't have it one time with you and not feel used."

He stood as well and pushed a hand through his hair in apparent frustration. "You're the one who believes it'll just be a one-time thing. What if I want more than that? What if I want to try a relationship with you again? Only this time, you don't get to step out of it simply because you're afraid I'll cheat on you."

I stared at him, dumbfounded. My mouth even gaped. Not only did he stun me into silence with his talk of a relationship-this from Michael Houston?-but he also shocked me by calling me out.

I'd been perfectly honest with him come week three, when I'd explained I couldn't continue to sleep with him because I was too fearful of winding up in the same boat as I had with Seth. Walking in on him and another woman would be the death of me, for sure. Knowing that had alarmed me back then-it alarmed me still. It meant, true to his point, he was more to me than just a friend.

But again, that was dangerous territory to navigate.

"Look," I said as I crossed to the wet bar and poured more wine for myself. "I'm not sure what's gotten into you tonight, but all I want is for you to attend a party with me tomorrow. In Napa. Three o'clock."

He crossed his arms over his wide chest. "You realize you're the one who's always putting a wedge between us, not the other way around?"

"What does that have to do with anything? Are you available for the party or not?"

"Depends. First, answer my question."

"Michael."

He didn't let me off the hook. "You claim I'm the one with the fear of commitment. Maybe it's the other way around. With good cause, I'll admit," he was quick to say. "After Seth, and also knowing my track record with women."

"Your track record, indeed." I laughed. "What's the longest relationship you've ever been in?"

"Nearly three weeks. With you."

As I'd suspected. His affairs had a very brief shelf life.

He continued on. "Ever consider we might still be together if you hadn't gotten cold feet?"

"Oh, please. Any day into week three, you would have decided you were bored with me. I did us both a favor. I gave you an out and saved myself from getting dumped. Again."

d.a.m.n, that hurt.

I lifted my gla.s.s and took a long drink. Tonight was not going the way I'd expected. Somehow, I'd gotten caught in his trap. I still couldn't figure out why he'd set it. What was he getting at, exactly?

"You know, Fiona," he said as he carried his gla.s.s across the room and refreshed his beverage. "You're really good at accepting the chemistry between us when I force it upon you. I mean, that one kiss made me rock-hard, and I'm pretty sure I made you wet."

I was taken aback. Not because he was so direct, but because he was so right. About everything.

He said, "If I'm not constantly riding you about it, you completely deny that we've always been attracted to each other. And that I still want you, even after I've f.u.c.ked you."

"Mi-"

"A year later, no less." This seemed to be a revelation to him because he quickly added, "Don't you think that means something?"

"You've lost your mind?"

He smirked at me. It was d.a.m.n s.e.xy.

"Is it possible you just haven't gotten a piece of a.s.s in a while and you're willing to say anything to get it tonight?" I continued.

His look this time was not quite so s.e.xy. In fact, it bordered on lethal. "You'll say anything to jack this up, won't you?"

I sighed. He didn't miss a single trick. "Can we please just focus on why I came over tonight? Are you going with me to Napa or not?"

"Whose party?"

f.u.c.k. That question was about to change the course of this conversation. Again, not to my advantage.

"Please remember I brought over two-hundred dollar Scotch."

"Whose party, Fiona?"

Clearly, I was p.i.s.sing him off, as babe was no longer part of his vernacular.

"It's Lizzie and Seth's engagement party." I didn't bother using my sister's formal name, as requested by my mother. It'd be one more thing I'd have to explain to him and, by the tense look that crossed his face, I wouldn't be positioning myself better for this favor if I did.

As it was, he demanded in an angry tone, "Why the h.e.l.l are you going?"

"Michael." My heart sunk. Perhaps I was wrong. Quite possibly, this was one favor he wouldn't grant me.

He drove that point home with an unexpected outburst. "The guy cheated on you. With your sister!"

"I am all too aware of that fact," I said, my own temper now sparked. "Thank you very much for reminding me."

He pinned me with a serious look. "Now who's lost their mind?"

"d.a.m.n it." I threw my hands up in the air. Thankfully, I wasn't holding my wine at the time. "This isn't easy for me, and you're making it even harder. I have to go to this party. It would be really helpful to have someone with me who's-"

I lost my breath as those stupid tears filled my eyes again.

Michael sighed. His look softened as he lifted a hand to my face and brushed away the drops rolling down my flushed cheeks.

In a quiet voice, I continued. "It'd help if I had someone with me who's on my side."

"Oh, Jesus." He wrapped his arms around my waist and pulled me to him.

I didn't fight the tears this time. I let them all out, crying on Michael's shoulder the way I had a year ago. He'd never hold my hurt feelings against me, whether my bruised pride was Seth or my family's doing. He'd always been sympathetic and understanding of my sensitivity to these particular slights. One of the many things I adored about him.

I had no idea how long I sobbed. In fact, I truly had no idea what I was so upset about. Because Seth was happier with Lizzie? That my little sister was getting married before me? Or was it because I felt trapped in my own life, unable to escape my family obligations even when they tore me apart?

I'd proven I was strong enough to move on after the affair. That I was strong enough to forge my own path by starting a business outside the legal profession, the customary field for Carlisles.

Why wasn't I strong enough to stand up to my family and just say no when it came to this engagement party?

Because they're your family. A catch-22 I couldn't escape.

When I was doing little more than sniffling and hiccupping, I pulled away from Michael. "I'm sorry."

He shook his head. "Don't be."

"I know I'm asking a lot, but-"

"You're not," he said as he wiped away more tears with a c.o.c.ktail napkin. "You know I'll go. Of course, I'll go. It's just that your family..." He shook his head again, in obvious angst.

"I know."

Yet, he felt compelled to say, "They don't get you."

"No, they don't."

It was an uphill battle I'd fought my entire life. Everyone expecting me to be just like them. Me wanting to stand on my own and be the person I wanted to be. I was fairly certain that was why my mother always took Lizzie's side over mine. Even with the glaring facts of my sister's twisted, immoral nature staring her in the face.

As though he knew the direction in which my thoughts ran-and I'm sure he did because he was that perceptive-he said, "My guess is, your sister wanted Seth from the beginning. She was jealous you got into Harvard and she didn't. She hated that you were dating someone from a more prestigious family than her boyfriend's. And...you were happier than she was. Of course, she had to make a play for Seth."

I rolled my eyes at how shallow my sister could be. "I never threw any of that in her face."

"I'd never take you for the type to do that. No one would. Regardless, she couldn't escape it."

"Yeah, well," I said as I went for the wine again. "It takes two to tango, as they say."

"Lizzie is a looker."

"Michael." I slammed my gla.s.s down, surprisingly not breaking the stem.

He speared me with an honest look. "I didn't say she's as hot as you, but come on. She's a pretty little redhead who knows how to bat her eyelashes and pout. And I'm certain that's not the only way she uses her mouth to get what she wants."

I suddenly felt sick to my stomach. I remembered when I'd walked into my bedroom on that fateful afternoon my sister and Seth had been in the sixty-nine position. She'd given him one h.e.l.l of a b.l.o.w.j.o.b as I'd stood there in the doorway watching, shocked into paralysis. They hadn't even noticed me as they'd changed positions and he'd f.u.c.ked her a.s.s.

"Oh, my G.o.d."

I couldn't even begin to process how their affair had come about. But I couldn't lie to myself. It was obvious by how familiar they were with each other's bodies that they'd been together many times before. My stomach roiled at the thought.

"I think I'm going to be sick."

Chapter Four.

When I came out of the bathroom, he was standing in the oversized archway of his bedroom, a shoulder propped against the frame. I'd run to the restroom in his master suite because it was the only one I'd ever used. I had no idea where the guest bath was.

My stomach, now empty, wasn't twisted in knots anymore. I'd used a spare toothbrush acc.u.mulated from his dentist visits because he used an electric version instead. I'd also swished some mouthwash to make me feel better.

He said, "You're not going tomorrow."

I gave a half laugh, half snort. "I'd never hear the end of it if I didn't go."

"I don't care. And you shouldn't either."

"It's not that simple," I said.

"Of course not. But still...don't go."

I sighed. "It's not just about doing what my family expects or wants me to do." I crossed the hardwood floor to his king-size bed and sat on the corner of it. "I have something to prove."

"No, you don't." He moved away from the archway and sat beside me. "You got screwed by your sister and Seth. Neither were the least bit contrite or apologetic about it. And your parents overlooked the slight because of how desperately they want to merge two powerful families."