What He Promises (3 page)

We stepped into his apartment, the air-conditioning
hitting my warm skin, a welcome relief after the air outside, which was muggy
and hot.
 
It was one of those days
that hinted at what was to come, the first day that made it clear that summer
wasn’t just an idea, but a promise.

“Maybe it’s because of what you’re wearing,”
Noah said huskily.

A blush rose through my body.
 
I’d put on a sexy little dress that
morning, black and low cut, made of a soft material that clung to my ass and my
breasts. I usually didn’t dress so provocatively.
 
But I’d been excited to pick up Noah,
and I’d wanted to look nice for him.
 

“I didn’t know you’d noticed,” I said, heat
pooling in my belly.

“Are you kidding?” he breathed, pressing his body
up against mine until my ass pushed into the marble countertop behind me.
 
“You are so fucking sexy.”
 
His eyes drunk me in, taking his time,
his gaze roaming over my curves as my blush deepened.
 
He pushed my hair back from my face with
his palm, and shook his head in wonder. “How the hell am I going to keep my
hands off you?”

His fingers grabbed the thin fabric of my
dress, pulled it up just the slightest bit as he rubbed his hands along the
back of my thighs.
 
Fireworks
exploded through my body, leaving goose bumps in their wake.

He pulled me closer against him, pushing his
erection against me as he claimed with me with his kiss, his tongue sliding
past my lips and into my mouth.
 
He
kissed me until I was breathless, until my knees were weak and my body was
ready to surrender to his want.
 
His
hand moved from my thighs to my hip, dipping further up under my dress,
stroking the small of my back, his fingers skittering over the top of my
tailbone.

His tongue rubbed against mine, and I hooked my
hands up and over his shoulders.
 
He
felt so broad, so strong, and I reveled in the familiar feeling of him, of his
body, of his presence, his kiss, the way he was able to make me feel delicate
and beautiful.

The thought that I’d almost lost him was too
much to bear, and I didn’t realize I was crying until I felt the tears in
between our lips, mixing with our kisses.

“What is it?” Noah asked, pulling back and
looking at me.
 
He took his hands
out from under my dress, put one on each side of my face, his eyes searching
mine.
 
“Charlotte, what’s wrong?
 
Did I do something?”

“What?” I asked, confused for a moment.
 
And then I realized he was nervous that
he was pushing me too fast, that perhaps I didn’t want to be touched and kissed
like this after what had happened with Professor Worthington.
 
But nothing could have been further from
the truth.

I wanted to be touched and kissed by Noah.
 
His touches, his kisses, they reminded
me of the good in the world, of the good in him.
 
They soothed my soul after what had happened
to me, they made me feel like things could be normal again.

“I need to be sure you’re okay,” he said.
 
“I need to make sure I don’t…” He
swallowed hard and shook his head.
 
“I cannot push you to do things you’re not ready for.”

“You mean like the control stuff?”

He nodded.
 

I shook my head.
 
“Noah, it’s not about that.”

“But the things he did to you…”

“This isn’t the same,” I said, a shot of panic
shooting up my spine as he took a step away from me.
 
“The things you and I do, those things
are about love and trust, about giving and taking control, pushing boundaries
and exploring the line between pleasure and pain.
 
The things Professor Worthington did,
those things were depraved.”
 
I
shivered.
 
“Those things have
nothing to do with you and me.
 
Nothing.”

The side of Noah’s mouth twitched into a grin.
 
“Well, well, well.
 
Look who’s giving who a lesson on the
finer points of the Dom/sub relationship.”

“Yeah, well, I had a good teacher.”

“God, you are so beautiful,” he said.
 
“Come.
 
We need to do this properly.”

He took my hand and led me to his bedroom.

I paused for a second outside the door,
remembering the first night I’d been here with him, the way he’d carried me to
his bed, how I’d had the feeling that something was about to shift, that I was
about to cross some invisible line that I could never turn back from.

It had all been true.

 
My
life had shifted completely and totally, all of it for the better.
 

I had found Noah, and he had changed
everything.

He laid me down on the bed and stared down at
me, the lust and want
in his eyes burning bright.

He inched my dress up off over my body, taking
in the tiny cream-colored push-up bra and panty set I was wearing.

“Very nice, Ms. Holloway,” he said, grinning at
me as his hands roamed over the expanse of my cleavage.

He stood and pulled his t-shirt off in one
quick movement, exposing his gorgeous chest, his ripped biceps,
the
ridges of his muscles all taut and tan.

He
laid
down next to
me, and I reached out and traced the outline of his bandage, running my finger
over where it was taped to his skin.
 
“Does it hurt?”

“No.”

“Liar.”

“It was well worth it.”

“What was?”

“Even the most excruciating physical pain could
never have come close to the amount of pain I would have felt if I’d lost you.”

A lump rose in my throat as I remembered the
things he’d said to me, about how he wanted to spend his life with me, about
how I was everything to him.
 
Did he
still feel those things?

He certainly
seemed
different.

I couldn’t explain it, but it was like
something had shifted between us.
 
It wasn’t just that things were more real because we’d gone through something
together, had traversed a dangerous canyon that could have killed us both.
 
No, it was more than that.
 
There was a lightness between us, subtle
but
there
, chasing away the normal heaviness that
seemed to cloud our every interaction.

I wondered if perhaps this was the real Noah,
the way he usually was, if maybe the stress of being accused of murder had
taken more of a toll on him then I’d even realized.

“You saved me,” I breathed, pulling my gaze
from his taped up wound to his dark eyes.

“No,” he said, pulling me toward him.
 
“No, Charlotte.
 
You saved me.”

He kissed me, his hands cradling my face, his lips
and tongue moving expertly, making my skin burn and my body feel as if
fireworks were being set off in every one of my cells.
 
Noah slid his hand down, skimming it
over my waist, pulling my leg up over his hip.

He kissed me until I was breathless and dizzy,
until every single moment of the past few days had been erased from my memory,
until all I could think about, all I could see, taste, touch, was his mouth,
his kiss, his hunger for me.

His fingers dipped into the front of my
panties, probing my folds, rubbing against my clit.
 
I groaned as a surge of wetness pooled
between my legs.

“You feel so good, baby,” he murmured.

But he took his fingers away, reaching up and
sliding the straps of my bra down slowly.
 
The fabric brushed against my skin, and he grinned at me wickedly as his
mouth found my cleavage, his tongue sliding against my bare skin, dipping
underneath the cups of my bra, getting dangerously close to my nipple.

Searing heat flooded my body.

Even when he was being soft and romantic with
me, it was abundantly clear that he was in
charge, that
he was in control of everything that was happening.

“Please,” I gasped.

“Please what?” he asked.

“Noah, I need to feel you inside me.”

He stood up and undid his belt, shucked off his
jeans and boxers until he was standing there completely naked.
 
I
laid
there
and took him in, admiring the smoothness of his six-pack, the V of his hips,
the planes of his chest, the soft line of hair that started at his belly button
and slid down to his cock.

His cock was rock hard already, thick and
rigid, and I groaned.

 
I
hadn’t realized I’d put my hand on the outside of my panties until I felt him pull
it away.

“No,” he said.
 
“I will be the only one touching you.”

He sat down on the bed, then picked me up and gathered
me in his arms, pulling me toward him until I was sitting on his lap,
straddling him.

His lips found mine, his hands kneading my
breasts through the lacy cups of my bra.

He tugged gently on my hair, forcing my head
back a bit, then brushed his other hand over my cleavage before skating it
around to my back and expertly unhooking my bra.

His mouth found my nipples, his tongue probing
them gently, sucking them between his lips and nibbling on them with his teeth.

I groaned.

“Charlotte,” he said.
 
“Fuck, baby, you feel good.”

Then his fingers were back at the crotch of my
panties, pushing the fabric over to the side before spreading the lips of my
pussy apart and sliding one, no two, fingers inside of me.
 
He moved them in and out, fucking me
with his fingers while he sucked on my breasts.

My body was so hot I felt feverish, felt like
his touch was almost melting me.
 
I
relaxed into his body as he varied the pressure, sucking harder on my nipple
while going softer on my pussy, his thumb making little crescent moon swirls
over my clit.
 
The whole time I
could feel his cock under me, pushing against my pussy and ass, hard and ready.

I tried to tilt my pelvis up into his fingers,
but he moved his other hand from my hair and held my hip tight under him,
holding me still.
  
All it did
was make the pleasure more intense, the feeling that he was in control of me
heightening the pleasure of the work of his mouth, his tongue,
his
fingers.

“I’m going to come,” I gasped.

“No, baby,” he said.
 
“Not yet.
 
I need to feel you.”

“Please,” I begged.

He pulled away from me, taking his fingers from
my pussy and his mouth from my breast.
 
He looked me in the eye, his chest heaving, his eyes heavy with emotion.

“Charlotte,” he breathed.
 
He shook his head in wonderment.
 
He gathered my hair softly in his hands
and pushed it back over my bare shoulders.
 
I shivered as it brushed against my skin, goose bumps breaking out all
over my body and a rush of heat radiating through my core.

“Noah,” I said, putting my palm against his
chest so I could feel his heart beating.
 
I buried my face in his neck for a moment inhaling the scent of him,
something primal and male and Noah.
 

Then I reached up and touched his face.
 
The gesture was intimate, the kind of
gesture he would have shied away from in the past, the kind of thing that would
have made him shut down and immediately turn the tables on me, flipping me over
and dominating me even more than he already was.

But now he let me touch him, his eyes locked on
mine as something so powerful passed between us it felt like the earth was
moving underneath me.
 
He bent my
leg gently and slid my panties down and off my foot, then did the same with my
other leg, leaving us both completely naked.

He grabbed my ass cheeks and lifted me slightly
until he was poised at my opening, then slid me down on him, soft and slow,
letting me get used to the feeling of him being inside of me.

I was so wet and ready for him, but his shaft
was thick, and I felt myself spreading around him, felt him pushing deeply
inside of me.
 
I’d never been on him
like this
before,
never felt his balls nestled against
the crack of my ass, his cock skimming against my clit with every slight
movement.

I moaned with pleasure.

He drew a finger down over my lips and then
kissed me again, hard and wanting, his desire invading my mouth.