Driven By The Hero (Hero Romance 1) (3 page)

Chapter Six

“Hey, what are you doing?” Ethan’s words were a contrast to the deep vibration of his voice that told her he felt just as lit up as she was. He took a left where he should have taken a right onto her street and pulled over next to a clump of bushes.

“Don’t tell me you’re not feeling it. You’ve been holding my hand all night and giving me those wistful looks,” Elaine breathed into his ear as she reached her hand down to feel his strong thigh. She was feeling particularly warm due to the alcohol, and she wasn’t going to waste the opportunity when she hadn’t felt anything toward a man for a long while.

“Elaine,” he told her firmly as he wrapped his fingers around her wrist and gently pulled her hand away. “You’ve had two beers and a shot of whiskey. I’m not about to take advantage of you,” he chastised gently as he turned to her.

“You’re not. I’m perfectly capable of making my own decisions, Ethan, and I’m telling you right now that if you don’t kiss me, I’m going to get out and walk home. This is your only chance.” He seemed to hesitate, and it was long enough that Elaine felt embarrassed and guilty about her actions. She turned away from him quickly and groped for the door handle, but she didn’t find it soon enough.

Ethan wrapped his fingers around the back of her neck and drew her back to him. He pulled her easily over the console and his lips found hers. They were soft, full, and moist. Ethan’s teeth grazed against her upper lip and she felt his tongue trace the seam of her lips. His warm, large hand fell onto the small of her back and her knees fell to either side of his hips, as she got comfortable. Elaine had to arch her head down to kiss him, and immediately opened her mouth to him when he pressed with the tip of his tongue.

Fire shot through her veins and warmth pooled between her legs as he explored her mouth. Their tongues danced around each other and swirled effortlessly. Elaine wondered what it would be like to have him between her legs, lapping at her nub and biting it just like he was nibbling her lips. He caught her bottom lip between his teeth and gave a gentle tug.

They stopped for just an instant to look at each other, neither one of them saying a word. Then she leaned down and picked up the kiss where it had left off. Ethan’s free hand turned off the car and the interior light dimmed, leaving the two of them in the dark. His hand on her back pulled her closer and she could feel the warmth radiating from his erection. She wanted to reach down and free it but wondered if he would stop their antics if she did.

Ethan’s left hand was on her right hip. Gently, as if he were peeling off a Band-Aid, he lifted up the hem of her shirt and his bare flesh touched hers. “Oh,” she whispered at the jolt of electricity that seemed to shoot through her entire body.

After that, everything seemed to become a blur. Ethan’s hand roamed higher until he was fumbling at her bra clasp with both hands. His tongue was doing wicked things to her lips and he was nibbling at her neck in between trying to get the clasp undone. When it finally broke loose, she felt her breasts sigh with relief at being released and helped Ethan pull off her shirt. He took his time and trailed kisses as he removed each bra strap. When she was topless before him, he held her at arm’s length and ran his knuckles gently across her cheek.

“You’re more beautiful than I imagined,” he told her gently. Elaine averted her gaze and felt her cheeks flush at his absurd words. She’d had a child, and she knew that some things were not the same as they once were. “Hey, look at me,” he demanded gently. He used his thumb and forefinger to guide her chin so that she would look him in the eyes.

Words were unnecessary after that. Ethan told her with his gaze just how much he thought she was beautiful, and then he raked his teeth against one of her erect nipples and sent her over the edge. It had been months since she’d even given herself the pleasure of her own hand, so the touch of a real live man’s tongue flicking over her nipple sent her into a premature orgasm. She arched and gasped as her hips writhed on his lap.

Ethan reached between her legs and felt the warmth confirm that she had indeed come without him even having to touch her nub. He seemed both shocked and pleased when she became warm and loose in his hands. He took her hips and pulled her in close so that she could feel the hard length of him poking out of the top of his jeans. The he took her other nipple between his teeth and fondled the free one with his thumb and forefinger, sending waves of pleasure through her body.

Elaine throbbed and squirmed as she tried to pull her pants down, but Ethan wasn’t helping her. He removed her hands gently and put them on his shoulders, never losing pace with his tongue and his teeth. His eager lapping at the pink peaks sent her over the edge a second time and she cried out his name. She had feared the wrong name would be spoken between her lips, but Ethan’s came out clear and loud.

“God, twice?” he asked with a chuckle and had a look of profound gratitude. He pulled away from her and gently helped her into the passenger seat. Her legs were still over the console and he deftly unbuttoned her jeans.

“Oh, yes,” Elaine whispered when she felt him tugging her pants off. Next were her undies, an embarrassing shade of hot pink. Ethan didn’t seem to think they were embarrassing in the least when he tossed them to the car’s floor with her pants. He dropped his seat back as far as it would go and leaned over so that she could feel his five o’clock shadow tickling between her thighs.

Elaine realized she was going to get what she was hoping for and shivered with anticipation. Ethan’s wet, warm tongue swirled kisses down her leg until he was almost at her nether lips. She felt the rough pads of this thumbs as his hands trailed up her small waist and she sucked in a deep breath when she felt his fingers grasp hold of her nipples.

“I want to hear you say it,” he told her gently and she could feel his breath on her throbbing clit. “Say you want me to,” he demanded of her.

His fingers gave a gentle twist and she arched as she gasped for air. “Yes, please, Ethan-” She was cut off as his lips formed a circled around her nub and his tongue gently flicked back and forth across the delicate, erect flesh. Tears of gratitude and pleasure filled Elaine’s eyes and she felt them leaking from the corners as she tried to contain her third orgasm.

The walls of her pussy tightened and warmth sizzled through her, but she held off until the last second. It was an explosion of heat and undeniable pleasure as his teeth grazed against her clit and brought her to her climax. Her hips thrust up and wave after wave of pleasure pulsed through her as her clit throbbed eagerly.

Ethan continued to suckle and lap enthusiastically at her clit until she began to pull away because it was too sensitive. He stiffened his tongue and drove it into her, lapping and diving in and out of her swollen pussy. When he had eaten her out completely, he pulled back and she saw him unbutton his jeans. He leaned over her and pulled a condom from the glove box. Elaine noted how large he was in the dark and bit her bottom lip when he gestured for her to climb on him.

She was hesitant as she hovered over the large, mushroom-shaped head of his erect penis, but Ethan wasn’t having her be shy at that moment. He grasped her hips with his hands and gently lowered her onto him. She was tight and swollen from her orgasms and he hissed as he slid into her. “You’re so fucking tight,” he told her in a deep, husky voice.

“You’re so big,” she gasped as she gripped the door and the headrest to stop her descent. Ethan leaned up and took her nipple in his teeth. He suckled gently and she felt herself relax enough to allow him to slide in all the way.

He was a tight fit, and she couldn’t help but think that no one had been as big as him. There was a moment of stillness and she framed his face with her hands as she looked down at him. Her hair hung in her face a little and she felt her pussy tighten and relax with the after waves of her previous orgasms. Then she began to rock her hips back and forth gently, feeling the way his erection throbbed with each movement.

She had imagined it would be fast and hard, but Ethan pulled her up to the tip with precision and pulled her back down with a cruel, gentle slowness. He pulled his pants down so that she could feel the way her bottom hit his large, bulging sac and her anus puckered each time it was tickled. When she thought she couldn’t take any more of the torture, Ethan reached down and gave her needy clit a small flick. Her gasp of appreciation was all he needed. He thrust into her hard and gave her nub a small pinch, bringing her to her fourth and final orgasm.

His thrusts became quicker and less controlled as he felt her pulsing around him, and she could feel his sac tightening into a hard ball as she bounced up and down. “Ethan!” she cried out as he came inside of her. She could feel his hot cum pouring into the condom and was blissfully aware of his orgasm.

“Fuck,” he whispered hoarsely as he settled her on his still erect penis. “Elaine,” he said as he pulled her in for a deep kiss. Then he helped her off and helped her find her clothes. He was cleaned up within a few minutes, and she wondered if any of it had happened at all.

When they pulled up beside her home, she turned to him and they shared a smile. His was brazen while hers was shy and wicked. “I didn’t get your number,” he told her quietly as he drummed his fingers on the wheel.

Elaine shrugged her shoulder and opened her car door. “You have my address,” she told him as she slipped out of the car. She waited by the driver’s side for him to roll down the window. They shared a deep kiss and she sighed as she pulled away from him. “Goodnight,” she told him quietly.

“Goodnight. I’ll see you around,” he told her as a promise. Elaine felt both sexy and a little confused as she walked up the front steps of her mother’s home. The porch light was off, so she slipped in quietly and closed the door behind her. Then she peeked out the curtain and watched Ethan’s Audi disappear into the night.

She wondered if he meant what he said about not knowing her number. Most guys probably wouldn’t call or show up after a night like they just shared, but she hoped he would. Elaine crept up the stairs to her bedroom and collapsed onto her bed without removing her clothes. She pulled the covers over her head and promptly fell into a deep sleep. The last thought she had before she fell asleep was a mental image of Ethan’s face as he came. He had been so innocent at that moment, so naked and exposed.

It had felt like more than just a random night of car sex. It had felt like the beginning of something.

THE END

***BONUS STORIES INCLUDED***

SHADES OF DOMINATION

Alpha Male Romance

CHAPTER ONE

It was well past midnight and Laura Kimball was already into her fifth glass of wine that evening. She stared at the still open pack of cigarettes lying on her dining room table and deliberated as to whether or not she needed another one. It had been six months since she started smoking again regularly, having given up the habit cold turkey for the four years she was married to Dan; even though she told herself she was quite capable of quitting again, it was always going to be tomorrow - if not tomorrow, then next week; if not next week, then next month. But for now, being after midnight, she wasn’t in any state to make a long-term decision. She let out a sigh, as she lit up a smoke.

It had been a ritual every Wednesday night for the past four months. A couple of bottles of Shiraz, a fresh pack of cigarettes and the ghosts of her self esteem. She couldn’t tell you why she chose Wednesday over any other night to honor this strange pact, both a conscious resignation and wry celebration of her solitude. Perhaps it was the recognition of having passed the middle of the workweek without strangling her immediate supervisor at Palmer and Hall. Perhaps it was the crude, sarcastic but strangely flattering comment she heard from a carload of passing teenagers one Wednesday night back in March (where she had been granted with the title of “Queen of the MILFs”) that she chose to immortalize as the instigator of her “Me Day.” But each Wednesday night, not even the sounds of the endless mix CDs she made for herself in her early 20s or the boisterous and audible gropings of her upstairs neighbors were enough to deter Laura from her obligations. 

It would be six hours until she needed to get up and face the day. Like each Thursday morning, she would have to face it with the dry, dull throb of a hangover. She knew that it meant tending to the affection-and-food-starved needs of Wink, her four year old Siamese before shuffling off to brew her first three cups of coffee. She knew it meant checking her Facebook to ensure she didn’t drunkenly post or message any hysterical or self-pitying missives; she learned
that
mistake six months after the divorce. She knew it meant, at least this time, finalizing and confirming her itinerary for that weekend’s convention
—a process even more nerve wracking, since it meant sharing a room with Gloria, her immediate supervisor. In Providence,
Rhode Island
, of all places, a city she assumed could be driven straight through in less time than it took to blink an eye. The thought made her shudder, as she poured herself a sixth glass of wine and instinctually refreshed her laptop.

Laura tried to avoid looking at the photos on her Facebook page for the umpteenth time, but like the past two hours, simply couldn’t help herself. They were of Dan and his new fiancé Sonia, basking on the beach in Bonaire. Smiling effervescently, drunkenly, romping around the sands like a couple of poorly paid bit models for a tourism commercial. Since taking up with Sonia, Dan had not only learned the finer points of body grooming and cross-fit training, but also appeared more relaxed, carefree and reckless. ‘
Why wouldn’t he?’
thought Laura. ‘
After all, with Sonia’s daddy’s money, he doesn’t have to worry about paying the rent. Both of them can get cosmetic surgery at the slightest sign of a wrinkle. Where does that leave me?
’

Laura got up and examined herself from all angles in the dining room mirror. True, she had put on a few pounds since the divorce—twenty, to be exact—but they seemed to compliment her, giving her a more rounded, sensual physique. Her strawberry blonde hair still retained its hue, even though the ends had been frazzled and arid from stress. If lines showed on her face, they did nothing to detract from the buoyancy of her skin. And her slate grey eyes—if now thick and reddened by smoke and wine—still arched upwards at the corners, giving Laura a sly, feline look. 

True, her job as a Senior HR representative for a national law firm wasn’t as glamorous as the lifestyle of a groomed 26-year old heiress; but she was articulate, cunningly intelligent and possessed of a rapier-sharp wit. At 34, she may not be as young and bubbly as she once was when she first started dating Dan; but she was hardly an old maid, either. Laura was pretty enough, compassionate enough and adventurous enough (in heart, at least) to have her pick of any number of eligible men.
So why have I been drinking wine alone for the past two years
, she thought.

For one, she had resigned herself to the luxury of remaining single. After overcoming her initial skepticism, she ventured into online dating a year after the divorce. It was a move she wound up regretting, since she found herself having to contend with a teeming horde of the perpetually cheating, aggressively creepy and just plain dull. She had needs like everyone else, perhaps even more so. But the few late-night and drunken trysts she spent after meeting relative strangers at a bar left her unfulfilled. The sex was, at best, mediocre—detached of any physical intimacy or connection, merely a rote standard default to friction -passionless, artless, dull friction. It was sweat-stained and humid, perhaps but still—both insensate and ungratifying.

The sole exception—the only possible concession she would have made in those two years—would have been Rick, a patent attorney she worked with side by side. Rick was hardly Laura’s standard physical type; gaunt, pale and almost painfully thin, with a healthy shock of salt-and-pepper hair that was permanently unkempt, he resembled an artist rather than an attorney. Which he in fact was, taking up litigation only in the past ten years solely to help pay for his MS-stricken wife’s treatment. There was a fierce intelligence in Rick, erudition owing to his encyclopedic knowledge of classical Greek literature and philosophy, which he could quote and expound upon from memory alone. Laura admired and respected this eccentric figure, whose brown eyes seemed to burn with an inner torment. But what attracted her to Rick was something unspeakable—a primal magnetism he exuded from each pore, a feral passion she could sense burgeoning under his countless reference books and perpetually furrowed brows. She felt it reverberating in the pit of her stomach, and suspected it was mutual. They had taken to working late hours together, more often than not adjourning to Kelly’s, a nearby Irish bar directly across from their office. Over her proverbial gin and tonic and his proverbial Irish whisky—”
Neat
please, Jim-meh”—they’d shoot the breeze well into the evening, discussing anything from the Philadelphia Museum of Art to their own respectively rocky relationships. He took his marriage vows seriously, all the while admitting that as a man, he also had his own needs; and that where he could once release his frustrations through art, he now no longer even had
that
option.

Laura sympathized with Rick, and felt an even stronger admiration for this man almost twenty years her senior. At the same time, it didn’t do anything to quell her draw towards him. On the contrary, it only fed the flames and she suspected that each time he caught a glance of her pouty lips trembling and her wide-open eyes that the feeling was likely mutual. One night, as they were walking past Love Park at around 10 p.m., she could take it no further. She stopped the taller (by nearly a foot) Rick dead in his tracks and seized him, forcing him to crane his neck down as she kissed him violently, hoping that the force and torpor of her lips would unlock his steely reserve. Her estimate proved correct, for they were soon groping one another furiously, obscured by the trees and serenaded by the rush of the fountain. They leaned back against a tree, their bodies pressed with an urgency that overpowered the both of them. She wrapped a leg around Rick, and pressed him against the tree, knowing full well that they could be caught at any time but not giving a damn either way. Their tongues lolled against one another, and she could feel the entirety of her body—from her shoulders to her calves—grow engulfed in a thin veil of mist.

And then, as suddenly as it occurred, Rick pushed her away.

“I’m sorry, Laura but… I just can’t. Not with Claudia suffering at home. You’re wonderful and if things were different, I… I…”

There was no need for him to finish the sentence. Laura knew. She knew how foolish it would have been, not only emotionally, to act as a proverbial “other” woman, but professionally as well. They both knew that were this to ever make the office rounds, they’d be lucky to even collect severance. Besides, what were the chances of a man as eccentric, brilliant and charismatic as Rick sticking around for the likes of a frumpy HR rep anyhow?

She left that night feeling dejected, but assured. That was nine months ago, and she had only seen Rick briefly in passing four or five times.

She thought of him briefly as she lit another cigarette. She let it smolder, periodically taking a puff.  She finished the last of her wine and closed down her laptop. It was 1:19 in the morning and she had to be up a little over five hours. She fell asleep, as she often did most Wednesday nights, in little more than a pair of sweatpants and an oversized t-shirt.