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She writhed against him, dizzied by waves of pure animal wanting. She slid her hands around his neck to steady herself, then across his shoulders, down his back. Feeling his muscles clench beneath her touch only made her dizzier. His hands went to her waist, tugged her T-shirt upward and, with it, the camisole she wore beneath. It seemed absolutely essential to get him out of his clothes, too, but when she felt his lips against her bare breast, she lost interest in everything except what he was doing to her, outside and in.
His lips demanded and promised, took and gave. Her head fell back, and with a moan she resigned herself to savoring the feel of them, the sensations in her breasts as he caressed them, circling her nipples with his tongue, then tugging them into his mouth. There suddenly seemed to be plenty of time. She wasn’t even close to losing her nerve. Just her mind.
Her breasts ached when he slid down between them, slid farther down. Last time she’d noticed, she’d been wearing a skirt. What had happened to it? But a second later she was delighted it had vanished. His fingertips stroked the silk of her panties, and a few strokes later, they seemed to have disappeared, too, and his mouth moved against her stomach, down through the mound of curls, generating the white-hot heat that flamed inside her. She arched her back to make the wonderful thing he was doing to her easier for him, so easy he would never stop, not even when, eventually, she begged him to.
But that moment never came, while Blythe did, over and over, crazed by the touch of his tongue, his lips, his smooth, firm fingertips, until at last she had ripped his black briefs off his body and convinced him to thrust himself inside her.
The resulting frenzy of mutual plundering left them crossways on the bed, her straddling him, his head and feet hanging off. As he pounded into her, she flipped them over so that he was on top. He thrust into her again and propelled them into the footboard, which obligingly fell off. They crashed to the floor on top of it.
From beneath them came the unmistakable sound of a broom handle knocking against the ceiling of the apartment below, the universal sign to quiet down. It distracted her just enough to allow a fleeting concern that Max was still conscious, but all her senses told her the only part of him she cared about at the moment still plunged into her and withdrew, plunged and withdrew. If it was merely a neurological impulse at work, she didn’t care; it felt just as good. If he stopped, then she’d worry about restoring him to consciousness.
But he didn’t stop, didn’t even pause. A driving force built up more intensely inside her with each thrust. She was going to explode. With a shriek, she did, spasms shaking her from head to toe, tentative at first, then escalating so ferociously that she collapsed against him, wet with sweat, having barely enough energy left to observe that he still had plenty.
“The footboard wasn’t holding up anything structural, was it?” His voice was rough, although his mouth wasn’t as it nibbled at her neck. “We’ll resume play on the field.”
She emitted a small moan of protest as he rolled himself off the flattened footboard, picked her up in his arms and deposited her onto the tangled sheets. His skin was hot. “You’re burning up,” she said, stroking his chest. “You need to cool off.”
“Someday.” His arms tightened around her.
“I have an idea,” she whispered, sliding out of bed, feeling him try to tug her back.
“A kinky one?”
“I have a personal fan,” Blythe said, starting to search the darkness of her closet.
“Me.”
She turned to direct a smile at him, even though she knew he couldn’t see it. “Thank you,” she said. “You’re going to be a bigger fan in a minute.”
“I’m already a bigger fan. Come back to bed.”
But she’d found the battery-operated fan and turned it on herself as she took it back to the night table. “There. How’s that?”
“Ahh, ohh,” he moaned, and he must have stretched out his arms and legs directly out to his sides, because when she tried to climb in beside him, the only room in the bed was on top of him. “A dream come true.”
“Uh-huh,” she said as she settled herself over him, melting like frosting on a hot cake.
3
AT SOME POINT IN THE LONG, lovely night, Blythe made tuna fish sandwiches, which they fed to each other in bed. During another brief respite, Max limped to the kitchen in search of the cookie tin. When the fan ran out of battery power, they opened all the windows and took a cold shower together, Blythe’s puckered nipples warming to the heat of Max’s chest and his arousal undiminished by the icy spray.
There were forays for water, forays for fortifying fruit juices, but mainly there were forays into each other until, at last, too exhausted and sated to care about the stray bits of tuna fish and chocolate chunks, Blythe fell asleep in midkiss.
When she woke up, Max was propped up on one elbow, gazing down at her in a brightly lit room.
“Electricity?” she murmured sleepily, trying to burrow back into the hollow of his shoulder.
“Sun,” he said, his voice low and warm. “It’s after ten o’clock.” His fingertip trailed lazily over her bare stomach, and Blythe instinctively tried to make her navel touch her tailbone. “How do you feel?”
“Fantastic. How do you feel?”
He hesitated a moment, still tracing her skin. “Fantastic…and surprised.”
Blythe frowned into his shoulder. “What kind of surprise? Good surprise? Bad surprise?” He’d mentioned that in Candy’s phone call, Blythe had sounded like a person with a lot of nerve, and admittedly, she’d put all the nerve she had into last night, but what if he’d expected more assertiveness? More imaginative ideas? More leather? Some, anyway?
There was a raspy chuckle in his voice. “Good surprise. Definitely. I mean, I’d hoped this would happen. You have to admit I came prepared.”
“For an orgy,” she muttered, thinking of the endless supply of condoms he’d reached for during the night, “but of course, a person in your position would have taken extra precautions. Besides, they were probably tax-deductible. Or maybe you get them free from salesmen.”
He gave her an odd look. “Why would I get them free?”
“Because tonight, or last night, was business-related.”
He found a bit of chocolate on her ear and licked it off, making her shiver. “I suppose you could call it business-related.”
She grew very still. “Did it feel like more than business to you?” The words came timidly. “Because it did to me.”
He buried his face in her neck. “It had nothing to do with business. In fact, if we’re going to be working together, we have to keep this totally separate from business or I won’t get any work done.”
For the first time, Blythe felt that something might be a little bit wrong. She came fully awake.
“Yeah.” He was talking to himself now and sounding nostalgic. “When you called—”
But she hadn’t called him. Candy had.
“—and offered to welcome me personally to New York—”
Blythe stiffened. Ooh. A whole lot wrong.
“—I asked Bart about you and he said—”
How did he know Bart?
“‘Candy Jacobsen? It should be quite a welcome.’ So Bart’s already expecting hanky-panky in the office and it would be a shame to disappoint—”
Blythe spun into a sitting position before she interrupted him. She needed to feel more on top of things. “Candy? You came here to do this with Candy?”
He sat up even straighter than she had and stared at her. “No, I came here to take you out on a date. Things happened. Like a blown transformer. And why are you referring to yourself in the third person?” With one foot he began to fish for something on the floor. In a second or two he brought those little black briefs up with his toes and slid them under the covers. The violent thrashing of the sheets and blankets was a dead giveaway that he was putting them on.
Blythe fished with her toes, too, and brought up the peach silk boxers and camisole he’d tossed to the floor the night before, which was beginning to feel like a lifetime ago. She struggled into them, babbling. “Because I’m very much afraid there is a third person! You were coming at seven o’clock. To help me get over Sven.” She leaped out of bed, darted to her closet and pulled out a pair of flowered capris, tugging them clumsily up over the boxers, which felt as if she’d put them on backward.
When she turned back to face him, he was out of bed with one leg in his jeans and his arms folded across his chest. The black briefs had a ripped seam down the left side. She had a feeling they hadn’t been ripped until she had ripped them off him. “Candy,” he said slowly and grimly, “who’s Sven?”
“I’m not Candy,” she said desperately.
“Then who the hell are you?” He almost yelled the words.
“I’m Candy’s roommate. You’re supposed to be Candy’s old friend, the sensitive psychiatrist from Boston who was coming here to shrink my sexual insecurities.”
“I’ve never met Candy, and I am for sure not a psychiatrist.” His eyes widened. “You were planning to do this with some other guy?”
“No, I wasn’t, but then I met you and decided I would, and after last night, the other guy isn’t necessary anymore. After last night—” she lowered her voice to a whisper “—I don’t think I have sexual insecurities.” She cleared her throat. “Ah, what line of work are you in, because I’m sure a psychiatrist couldn’t have dealt with my problem any more sensitively than you did.”
Glaring at her, he stepped out of the pants leg he’d just gotten into instead of putting on the jeans completely. Blythe was sure he had no idea he wasn’t wearing anything but his ripped briefs while he gave her his full credentials, or that while his voice sounded cold, his erection persisted. “I’m Max Laughton, political columnist, formerly with the Chicago Observer, and starting Monday, with the New York Telegraph. And I should have guessed the Telegraph was a congenial place to work when Candy called and invited me out. I just couldn’t believe it would be—” his voice deepened to a growl “—quite this congenial!”
The growl had almost built to a roar when a sound came from the living room, a sound that chilled Blythe to her very bones. The whoosh of the door opening and closing, followed by Candy’s voice, which although it was a little out of breath, somehow projected across miles. “Come on in, Garth. I’ll make the introductions and then I’ll get cleaned up and skedaddle back down the frigging stairs so you two can go for it. Blythe?” It was a shout. “We’re here. You okay?”
No! Not anymore! She’d stolen Candy’s date, and there would be hell to pay.
She swallowed. “I’m fine,” Blythe called. “I’ve been so worried about you!” With Candy safe and sound, she was considerably more worried about herself.
“I spent the night in the frigging office,” Candy yelled. “Garth got caught on the wrong side of the Triborough Bridge and the frigging state patrol put him in a homeless shelter in Queens.” Her voice seemed more distant. “He asked for a hotel and they said, ‘Whadda ya think we are, a frigging travel agency?’” Blythe heard her laugh. “Hey! Good news! We bought coffee from a guy on the street cooking on frigging propane.”
“Candy, really, your language.” That must be whatshisname, Garth, speaking. He had a pleasant-sounding voice, but it didn’t stroke her the way Max’s voice did when he wasn’t yelling at her.
“Is she coming in here?” Max crossed his hands over the crotch of his ripped briefs.
“I’m sure she wouldn’t.” Blythe suddenly snapped out of her stupor. “I’ll be out in a minute,” she shouted, making wild gestures at Max to “keep quiet” and “get dressed” and “keep quiet” again for good measure. “I, ah, overslept,” she improvised. “Just throwing on some clothes.”
While Max scrambled through the small bag he’d gotten the condoms out of—oh, Lord, the condoms they’d used—emerging with a pair of wildly patterned boxer shorts and a different pair of pants, tan slacks this time, she tugged a peach tank top over her head, then snagged her fingers in her tangled hair.
“Don’t dress up for us.” Garth again. “We look like we’ve spent the night in jail.”
“Did you hear anything from my date?” Candy yelled. “I couldn’t reach him. Did he show up here?”
“I’m very much afraid he did,” Blythe said in her normal voice, sending a condemnatory glance in Max’s direction, which was lost on him because he was concentrating on the buttons of a tan-and-blue striped shirt. One flew off. He snarled and reached into his bag, coming out with another shirt, this one navy.
“What did you say?” Candy yelled.
“I said we’ll talk in a minute.”
Blythe took a peek at herself in the mirror and groaned. She looked like, and undoubtedly reeked with, the scent of sex. She should have worn a bra under the tank top. Her nipples were sticking out through the camisole, but there wasn’t time to do anything about her appearance. Directing another set of pushing and lip-slashing “stay back and keep quiet” gestures at Max, who was still ignoring her, she inched open the door and went out to face the music. Or rather, Candy and the psychiatrist, a pair she’d spent the night wronging.
“Hi,” she said, smiling brightly.
“Oh, there you are,” Candy called from the kitchen. “Garth, say hi to Blythe. Then would you light the frigging stove so we can keep the coffee warm? I’m doing something wrong. Blythe, what were you saying about my date?”
Blythe felt the blood draining from her face and realized Garth was staring at her, so she darted a glance at him. He was attractive, just as Candy had said, but his face didn’t have the character, the punch Max’s did. She scanned the rest of him while she tried to think of an answer to give Candy. His blondness was accentuated by a pale beige summer suit, badly creased, a light blue-striped shirt and a blue tie patterned in yellow—she squinted at it—ducks.
He didn’t seem to notice how distracted she was. A sensitive man would have taken one look at her and called 9-1-1. Instead, he said over his shoulder as he went to save Candy from blowing up the building, “Wow. Candy told me you were a great-looking girl, but that was an understatement.”
“Did he?” Candy said, stepping out of the kitchen as soon as Garth stepped in. “My date, Blythe. Did he show up?” She sounded impatient.
Candy also looked the worse for wear. The toes of her pointed shoes curled up and wrinkles made her linen skirt even shorter. There were deep circles under her eyes. She must have had a hard time getting back to the office and an uncomfortable night sleeping there, just to assure Blythe’s privacy with Garth. Blythe’s guilt grew and compounded.
Feeling the blood rush back to her face, Blythe said, “I…well, he…”
“All lit up,” Garth said, returning to the living room.
“It just wasn’t fair for that transformer to blow up yesterday,” Candy said, pouting. “I had a date with Max Laughton, a dreamboat who’s coming to the Telegraph from the Chicago Observer. Soon as I found out he’d been hired, I decided to get dibbies on him, because if he’s half as hunky as his picture—”
A loud crash from Blythe’s room caused both Candy and Garth to swivel their heads toward the closed door. “Who’s in there?” Candy asked in a hushed tone.
“Well,” Blythe said, “I think it might be somebody trying to fix the bed. See, the strangest thing happened…”
“You broke your bed?”
“My, oh my, oh my,” Garth murmured, gazing ceilingward.
“While I was trying to get Garth here to mend your psyche, you found somebody to break your frigging bed?” Candy’s expression wavered between shock and admiration.
“Not exactly,” Blythe mumbled.
“Then who—” Candy’s eyes widened. “Oh, no. It couldn’t be.”
She whizzed past Blythe toward the closed bedroom door. Just as she reached it, it opened and Max strode out, wearing a navy blazer over his shirt and slacks. The crisp-cut outfit was a little incongruous with his unshaved face. Through the doorway, Blythe could see that he’d made up the bed and somehow put the footboard back on—upside down.
“Good morning,” he said in a jarringly hearty tone. “Wow.” He looked at Blythe, who stood quivering beside the sofa. “Either you slept on the sofa in your clothes or you sure were quiet when you came in to get them. I didn’t wake up until I heard all the yelling.”
He was a terrible liar, embarrassingly bad at it, but Blythe felt that was a point in his favor. He held out his hand to Garth. “I’m Max Laughton.”
“Garth?” Garth said in a tentative sort of voice. “Garth Brandon? Dr. Garth Brandon.” The title seemed to make him feel more secure.
Max shook Garth’s hand briefly, then turned to Candy. “You must be Candy. We had a date last night, and you’re late.” He gave her a totally engaging, disarming smile. Blythe would have died to be on the receiving end of that smile.
And was dying anyway, she was so touched to realize he was lying so unconvincingly in an attempt to save her reputation. A not-too-bright ape—and that would be according to ape standards—could have seen through him.
“Too late, apparently.” Candy’s chin firmed and her baby blue eyes flashed. “You slept together. I can see it written all over your faces. How could you, Blythe? You’re my best friend.”
In fact, a person could die from the sheer weight of the guilt Blythe felt on her shoulders.
“Let’s have coffee!” Garth said. He smiled at all of them. He had a nice smile, but it didn’t sock Blythe in the tummy the way Max’s did. “We can sit down, have a cup and talk things over.”
“There always were times, Garth,” Candy snapped, “when your perfect manners made me want to frigging barf.”
“Well, I’m sorry, Candy,” Garth said. “I feel used by the thing that has obviously occurred, but it makes me feel more in control to act like a civilized human. Besides, as a psychiatrist I’m always open to understanding the deeper motivations of people in times of stress, so I think…”
“I’m warning you, Garth. Stop being so frigging nice or I’m going to upchuck,” Candy said.
“Thank you for sharing your feelings,” Garth said, escaping to the kitchen. “Cream, sugar, anyone?”
“I’ll help,” Blythe said. “Oh, look, you lit the oven, too. There’s a coffee cake in the freezer. If I wrap it in foil, it will thaw in no time. And we have orange juice. Lots of sugar to jump-start the…”
“Listen to them,” Candy said. “They’re made for each other. And you had to come along and mess it up.”
Max, who didn’t want Blythe—that was her name, and it suited her—alone in the kitchen with this Garth person, was on his way to chaperone, but Candy’s voice brought him to a halt with one foot in midair.
He settled it down to the floor, slowly turned back to her, and for the first time took a good long look at Candy Jacobsen, with whom he’d thought he was spending the night.
