Birthday Wishes - The List: Book 1 Read online

  I slumped against the door and Luca turned my body and scooped me into his arms before I collapsed completely. His solid chest muscles were suddenly at my fingertips, free to explore, but I was too wiped out to take advantage.

  This, I thought, was how brazen women felt. Women who took until they were sated, wanted without remorse. I added my name to their ranks because, God help me, just finished or not, I most certainly was not done.

  He pressed small kisses into my hair as he carried me across the room, then set me gently onto the bed. I'd never known a man to move so precisely, so caringly, while sporting such an enormous erection. In my experience, being that turned on added a level of urgency. Luca acted like he had all the time in the world to make sure I was comfortable.

  "Okay?" He kissed me and smiled, such a simple gesture. My insides melted.

  "More than." I nodded and smiled back stupidly. I imagined that same smile would be there days later and I would have to explain it to other people. For now, though, I was happy to give it room to grow on my face.

  "Good." His eyes darkened. "I'm going to fuck you now."

  "Please." I officially sounded like a simpering idiot as I lay there helpless, clutching my thighs together and wanting nothing more than this man, this beautiful man, to finally push inside of me.

  "None of that." Luca gripped my ankles and pulled my legs apart, stretching my feet as far apart as his arms would reach. "Like this. Or I'll tie you up."

  I whimpered. God. This man turned me on to the point of brain dysfunction. The growing knot of tension in my stomach flared out and my clit literally twitched. I thought that was an expression reserved for bad stories in porn magazines. Turned out, I was wrong. How many other things would Luca teach me before the night was over?

  The air conditioning kicked on as I lay there stretched open and exposed, and the cool air flowed over my skin. It prickled against the heat of my cunt and I wanted badly to draw my legs together, to protect myself and to place just a little bit of pressure on my growing need. Bumps rose to the surface, covering my stomach and breasts. I felt a delicious, contradictory mixture of overheated and artificially cool.

  He stared down at me with a tight smile on his face, a look of amused wonder in his eyes. I squirmed, but kept my legs open as he directed, and he finally started to move. Rather than coming to me, though, he walked away from the bed. It was official. Luca drove me insane.

  "Condom," he muttered. He pulled one from the front pocket of his pants and held it up like a victory showcase. "Found it."

  "Thank Christ." Seriously, I'd reached the point where if I didn't get him inside me RIGHT FUCKING NOW, I might have exploded. And not in the good, you-make-me-feel-so-sexy kind of way, but rather in an I've-reached-toxic-frustration-levels kind of way.

  Then he rolled it down his length with this sexy, intense stroking motion that made me clench and I struggled to keep my legs open. Two steps and he was upon me, still holding his cock hard against my cunt, but not breaching the opening. He held himself over me on one elbow, his body close enough to almost touch, but not quite. He circled his tip at my opening, spreading my arousal and just barely slipping into the gap.

  "Okay?" His voice strained with gritty need, but he waited until I met his searching gaze with my own.

  I gripped his shoulders, my fingers scratching into the muscled flesh and leaving marks he'd see in the mirror for days to come. He winced and hissed, his eyes flashing with dark intent. I adjusted my grip and scraped my nails over his shoulders hard and deep, not caring if I left furrows of blood drops in the wake. He groaned deep and low, his pupils fully blown, but still he didn't stroke forward.

  "Mari?" He circled his penis, moving it with slow, controlled precision. "Tell me."

  "Yes, God, yes." I angled my hips a fraction higher, straining to pull him into me. "Please."

  He nodded, the movement tight and rigid, and pushed his length ever so slowly into me. He moved with incremental precision, giving us time to bask in the feeling as it happened, to savor the building pressure of filling and being filled. I gasped when he reached the back wall of my vagina and still pushed further. He forced himself deeper, stretching me open to accommodate the full length of his erection.

  "Still okay?" He held himself still again, filling me with pressure deeper than I'd ever felt before. He strained against me, his legs trembling with the need to fuck. He thrust just a little deeper, a jab to let me know there was still more when I was ready.

  I clutched him, fingers digging in deep to match his penetration, and wrapped my legs around his waist. I dug my heels into his ass and pulled him closer. The feeling of him inside me was painfully, blissfully, overwhelmingly too much, but I wasn't ready to release him yet. My body wanted more. Release was close, just a few heavy, purposeful strokes away. I could feel him pulsing inside of me, heavy and panting, like his heartbeat lived inside his cock, inside me.

  I nodded with desperation. I was so far from okay I thought I might never find it again, but if he'd stopped at that moment, I would have cried. Full on, wailing with despair, big, wet, sorrowful tears. I needed him inside of me, but I also needed a moment to adjust, to settle into the weight of his body over me, his cock penetrating me.

  "Yes, ready." I flattened my palms against his chest, bracing myself.

  Luca withdrew just as slowly, moving with excruciating care. I was torn between spurring him into action and simply taking the pleasure of the moment for what it was: simple, unadulterated, and impossibly raw. Every nerve in my body screamed for more, more, more, and still I let him dictate a crawling pace.

  He retreated until just the very tip remained inside and I cried out at the loss. My cunt felt empty and abandoned. "Please." I begged without pride or reservation. I flexed my legs, drawing tight around him, inviting him to reclaim me.

  "Yes," he gasped. "You're so open. . .so wet." He swiveled his hips, his cock teasing at my entrance.

  "Luca. . ." I could think of no other words. His name meant everything. I wanted to be filled completely with him.

  He stroked in, swift and firm, bottoming out only to pull back fractionally and slam in even harder, making me cry out in pain and completion.

  "Again." He demanded, his hip bones pressed into me, jutting and bruising my thighs. "Say it again."

  "Luca." He pulled out and stroked in again in a heartbeat. "Luca." He stroked in and out again, punishingly hard and my body quaked. I wouldn't last long at this pace.

  I called his name over and over, a constant, needy litany. His hips kept pace, finding home with ravaging need each time his name passed my lips. I stayed with him as long as I could as the heaviness inside me built to a point of complete consumption. The pressure knotted tight and billowed out, overtaking every part of me. I was left limp and completely spent, and still he continued.

  "You feel so good. I can feel you, pulsing around me, sucking and releasing, drawing me in and easing me out. God, so good." He held himself above me, once again rigidly still.

  I could feel him inside me, thick and quivering, and still so very full. And as soon as my body subsided, it rose to meet him again. That impossible fullness, the pressure, built with alarming speed as he circled his hips slow and tight, massaging every part of me inside.

  "Oh, God." I pleaded, unsure what I wanted, what I needed, but knowing that Luca held the answer. "Please."

  "Again?" He continued the maddening slow circles. His cock drilled deeper, then receded like the tide, still present without overwhelming me.

  My insides clenched at the thought. This man inside me, over me, taking care of me, he waited until I was ready to continue. I nodded unsteadily. I would take all he offered. "Yes."

  "I want you to come again, Mari." He eased out and back in, like a gentle, intimate caress. He repeated the motion with that same slow patience. "Can you? Can you come for me again?"

  I continued nodding, unsure what more I could give as reassurance. "Yes, Luca, please."

 
His eyes glinted as I said his name and he changed his pace in an instant, his movement no longer languid. He moved his hips with drill-press precision and intensity, driving through rather than in to me.

  "I won't last long." He grunted, his breath hot on my face.

  "Yes." It didn't matter. I was already spiraling, building to crescendo, so close to orgasm for the third time in just a few minutes. My body drew tight, an aching sphere inside me fracturing beneath the constant pounding pressure.

  "Luca."I gripped his shoulders, trying again to leave my mark, and whispered his name as I came apart beneath him. "God, yes. . .Luca."

  He stroked in hard once more, then shuddered, his hips arched hard into mine. He collapsed on top of me, my name on his lips. "Mari, Mari, Mari." He whispered it over and over as he emptied himself, quivering and jerking between my thighs.

  He kissed my lips gently, my name moving from his lips to mine, as I slipped into darkness with his weight pressing me heavily into the mattress.

  Chapter 3

  "Well?" Rachel stood before me, hands on her hips as she tapped her foot. She looked every bit like a demanding school teacher waiting for an unruly child's homework.

  I continued reviewing our schedule for the upcoming week. "Well, what?"

  "Oh my God! Mari, tell me what happened with Mr. I'm Too Sexy for My Clothes!" She stomped her foot as extra punctuation.

  I took mercy on her and looked up from my work. "He is pretty hot, isn't he?"

  "Thermonuclear. Damn." Rachel fanned herself with a stack of menus. "Where the hell did you find him?"

  "I told you, online." I wasn't particularly proud of that detail. In the past, I'd made fun of others who did the same with no-holds-barred ruthlessness. I thought the whole concept absurd. Exactly how desperate does a person need to be to trust the Internet in the role of Cupid? I braced myself for ridicule from Rachel. After all, I deserved it.

  "It's just so romantic." She hugged herself and spun in a circle. When she finished, she flopped onto the sofa in the corner of my office with Scarlett O'Hara flair.

  "If you say so." I laughed and rolled my eyes. Romantic was not a word I would apply to the things Luca did to me Saturday night. Not by a long shot.

  "When are you seeing him again?" She perched on the edge of the couch and leaned in like the extra six inches would make a difference in how well she'd be able to hear me.

  I shrugged. I left while Luca was still sleeping since waking up together wasn't on either of our lists. I sent him a brief email that was the modern equivalent to "I had a great time, babe."He responded with the classic "I'll call you" blow-off line.

  Realistically, our meeting could have been a one-time deal and I was okay with that. There were a lot of things left on my list, but I wasn't going to start complaining about how hard Luca made me come any time soon. That man had mad skills. Okay, so I wasn't totally fine with not seeing him again, but I was going to continue to work on being fine with it.

  "What does that mean? You are going to see him again, aren't you?" She looked on the verge of heartbreak. She really was a sappy romantic deep down.

  "I don't know. It's not like I woke him up to talk about it when I left in the middle of the night."

  She squealed and kicked her legs like a thirteen-year-old girl. "What did you do? Tell me."

  "Jesus, Rachel, calm down, okay? Do we really have to have this conversation? We have work to do, business to run. Sound familiar?"

  "We can take five minutes and talk about your previously non-existent sex life."

  I gave up. She wasn't going to let me get anything done until I answered. I closed my laptop, faced her fully, and folded my hands together on my desk. I looked at her with my Fine! You win! face. "What do you want to know?"

  "Where did you go when you left the party?"

  "The Heathman."

  "Straight to the hotel? You didn't go for drinks first? Nothing?" She looked appropriately scandalized, but it didn't quite override her apparent fascination and jealousy.

  "No. Why would we? He wasn't supposed to be at the party in the first place." I totally sounded like a slut just then. The defense that I'd been celibate since the divorce did not help.

  "That's where you were headed when I intercepted you? The Heathman?"

  "Yes, God, Rachel, it's not like we're going steady. We met up specifically to fuck. Jesus." Her refusal to acknowledge what I knew she already understood was starting to piss me off. She just wanted to hear me say all the dirty little details. It appeared her strategy was to embarrass me rather than crucify me as I had originally suspected.

  "It's just so. . .not you." She stopped acting like a school girl with that statement and started acting like my friend. "Are you sure you're okay with this?"

  I asked myself that very question more times than I can count, starting with my very first posting on the adult hookup site, and then each and every time I contacted Luca directly. I forced myself to stop asking it long enough to get through last night, but truth be told, I still didn't know the answer.

  "I was certainly okay with it last night." Deflection seemed like the safest course, even if it sent Rachel back on a track I'd rather she not explore.

  She smiled patiently, a clear message that she wasn't going to chase the bait. "If you really want to dish, we can do that later. Right now I want to know how you are."

  Before I had to answer, my phone chimed that I had a text message. Normally, I'm not one of those rude bitches who thinks that whatever is happening on my phone is more important than the person in front of me. In this instance, however, I was grateful for the distraction. I glanced at the display. "It's Ricky."

  She relaxed into the sofa. "I'll wait." She spread her arms over the cushions like she had all the time in the world, which I knew wasn’t true because she and I have the same work demands.

  I opened the message from my brother.

  Mama wants to know when you are bringing Luca for dinner ;)

  I typed out a response since it was cheaper than pitching my phone across the room.

  Never

  Once again, he’d created a mess that I was going to have to clean up. Forget that I was the one who initiated the illicit affair. In my plan, Luca never set foot in the same building as my family. And it was foolproof, too, until Ricky inserted himself like a jackass. I typed out another quick message and hit send before he could respond.

  Ass

  His response came almost immediately.

  She's not going to like that. I'm going to let you explain why.

  I sent the Ass message again for good measure, then put my phone in my desk drawer. I had no interest in hearing from Ricky again.

  "Done?" Rachel didn't wait long enough for me to get distracted. "Answer my question."

  "I don't know, Rach." I shrugged. "I think so." But I sounded uncertain.

  "Then why do it?"

  "Seriously? My hymen was going to reseal itself if I didn't do something. Gah." Even after a positively brain melting good time with Luca on Saturday night, I still felt that pressing I'm never going to get laid again desperation. I wondered how many times I'd have to have sex in order to convince myself.

  "You couldn't just date like the rest of us?"

  I rolled my eyes again. Of course she didn't understand. "I could, but that didn't go so well for me last time, did it?" Last time I dated ended in a too-long, unhappy marriage and subsequent divorce. I liked my husband better as an ex than as a current.

  "You don't have to marry every man you date." She rolled her eyes right back at me.

  "No, but I really don't want to go through any of the dating crap right now." I just wanted to get laid, which could totally happen as part of dating, but it would be awkward as fuck to say, "Hey, I really want to fuck you. Are you disease free?" or "How do you feel about me tying you up then sucking your cock down my throat?" Somehow that all came out much easier over email. It was much easier to hammer out the intimate details of sex without the pe
rma-blush that resulted every time I thought about the things I wanted to do, let alone said them aloud.

  "That dating crap? What does that even mean?"

  "Why do you even care? You said yourself that Luca is dream worthy, so why are you worried about the details? What difference does it make how we met?"

  Her eyes narrowed. "Tell me something. If Ricky hadn't invited him to the party, would you have ever told me about him?"

  I shrugged. "Probably not."

  "That's why I care." She threw her arms up. Apparently she was finished with being calm and wanted to revisit theatrical. "I'm your best friend. This is the kind of thing you should tell me about."

  "Enough. Rachel, I love you. But this is exactly why I didn't want to tell you. I shouldn't have to justify my decision."

  "I don't want you to justify it. I just want to know that you're okay."

  I understood her point, I did, but I wasn't entirely comfortable with this. Discussing it out loud brought all the reasons I thought it was a bad idea screaming to the surface. In order for this arrangement to work, I had to be goal focused. The whole point was to have lots and lots of orgasms. As long as I kept that in mind, I was fine.

  "I get it,” I said. “And like I said before, I'm fine. I had some truly amazing sex on Saturday and that was the whole point." I couldn't stop myself from smiling. My only hope was that I didn't look quite as goofy as I felt.

  "That good, huh?"

  "Amazing." In the moment, I would have easily said it was the best sex of my life, hands down. With the distance of a couple of days, I was more reserved. My brain was functioning now, so it made sense that I could compare more objectively. Still, with the clarity of non-gelatinous thought processes, I couldn't come up with another time when I'd come so hard for so long and certainly not that many times. I took a deep breath. "Luca is really, really good."