Perfectly Reckless

Five

#chapter Five

I’ve spent an hour going through everything in my closet. Another mixing and matching outfits, uncertain what to wear. Nothing fits right. Nothing flatters. All I have are clothes I hate, and if I don’t feel good about what I’m wearing, how in the hell will I be confident enough when I’m naked?

After all the talk, the hours on the phone or messaging on the computer, after the second time we met at the dance club and ended up making out for hours in his car…tonight, I’m going to fuck Ian for the first time. He doesn’t know it; at least I’m not sure he does. He might be hopeful, but uncertain. Maybe even wary. He might even try to tell me no.

But I’m not going to let him.

Naked, I stand in front of the mirror. No woman stares at her reflection and finds herself without flaws, but this…this is horrifying. Every bulge, every stretch mark, every stray hair and lump and bump, leap out at me like I’m looking at a circus mirror. How can Ian want me when I am so clearly imperfect?

And, closing my eyes, I run my hands over all the places I want him to touch. I think of the way he looks at me. Of his smile. I think of the taste of his mouth, the curve of his lips on mine. I think of his fingers curled against the small of my back and the press of his thigh between mine. The first night we met, he pulled me close and danced with me, and my face found the heat of his neck, the sweetness of his shoulder. I lost myself in him that first night for no more than a few heartbeats, but in them, I melted and I’ve never been the same.

Maybe if I’d let him kiss me that first night, this wouldn’t feel like such a big deal now. If I’d taken that leap just over a year ago, done that bad thing back then, I’d never have spoken to him again. Guilt-stricken, I’d have tied up my tiny secret with ribbons of crimson and black and tucked them deep inside, never thought of them. But no, I’d done the right thing and pushed him away.

“I can’t,” I’d said. I didn’t know I had a line until I couldn’t cross it.

Now my line is toe-scuffed and faded, blurred into oblivion. Oh, I still have a line, it’s still there. At least that’s what I tell myself as I powder and lotion and smooth and stroke and paint and primp. When I slide on stockings and garters and pretty lace panties and a matching bra. There is still a line, somewhere. I just no longer care about stepping over it.

We live about twenty minutes apart, but we are meeting for dinner in a restaurant an hour and a half away. Ian is on a business trip, and I have the weekend unexpectedly free. Chad’s gone fishing with his buddies to someplace in upstate New York. He left Wednesday night, won’t be home until late Sunday. Before he went, he expected me to not only do his laundry but to help him pack his suitcase. We didn’t fight about it, because I walked away before we could.

I walked away from him; now I’m running toward Ian.

I take too long with my hair and makeup and the outfit on which I’ve finally decided. I chose a simple wrap dress in navy with a faint, paler blue pattern of flowers on the fabric. It shows off my cleavage and disguises as it flatters. Paired with a pair of kitten heels and a single strand of pearls —real, my grandmother’s, a necklace I never wear, I’ve done enough. Made enough of an effort without looking like there’s more than dinner on my mind. Still, I’m late now. Later still when I can’t find my keys. The clock is ticking, stealing away precious minutes of time I could be spending with Ian. There’s never enough.

I search the closet hook where the keys are supposed to hang. My purse, the one I’m leaving behind because I’ve switched to a nicer bag for tonight. The last jacket I wore. I text Ian as I search.

Haven’t left yet. Will be a few minutes late.

Take your time, comes his reply. No rush.

He doesn’t understand. There is a rush. I need to be on the road. I need to get to him, before my lost keys and worries about my clothes and hair and face all rise up to crush my determination to make this, at last, the night I finish what we began a year ago on a dance floor.

Finally, I find them on my dresser, where I must’ve left them to reply to Ian's earlier texts with the restaurant’s address and the time of our reservation. He’s taking me to one of those Brazilian steakhouses, the kind where they bring you meat after meat after meat and you can eat until you explode. I clutch the keys with suddenly shaking fingers. The metal’s cold, or maybe I’ve grown too warm.

My knees threaten to give way, and the stuff on top of my dresser shakes and rattles when I put both hands flat on the surface. I bought this dresser from a thrift store because of the handles. They look like seashells. The dresser is Waterfall, an Art Deco style with beautiful inlaid laminate and a huge mirror surrounded by intricate scrollwork. It matches nothing else in the bedroom, but I had to have it. I spent hours cleaning and polishing the wood to its original luster, but I haven’t really looked at it in a long time. I focus on it now to keep myself from thinking too much about anything else.

In the mirror, my eyes are wide and very, very gray. Is my mouth too red? My hairstyle too fussy? A blemish threatens in the corner of my mouth.

“Breathe,” I say aloud. “Breathe.”

If I don’t leave now, I won’t go at all. I push away from the dresser, keys in hand. I take my carefully packed overnight bag, my purse, grab a lightweight trenchcoat from the closet downstairs. There might be rain, later.

In the car at last, I type another quick text to Ian. On my way.

I have an Ian playlist. It’s full of songs about lust and fucking, also about longing. Lots of dance music, but there are a few ballads and hard rock classics, too. The song we danced to, that first time. The song I’d like to slow dance to with him, if I ever get a chance. I crank the music loud. I sing and sing and sing as my car chews up the miles, bringing me closer to him. My fingers tighten on the wheel until they ache. Every exit I pass sends another wave of anxious arousal over me. I’m awash with anticipation.

I drive so fast I should get pulled over, and how would I explain to Chad about where I was going and why? I should be more cautious, but it’s impossible for me to drive slow. I pass eighteen-wheelers and resist the urge to pump the air with a fist, asking them to blow their air horns the way I did as a kid. I am giddy.

And then, I’m there.

I pull into the parking lot and find a space. I don’t see him, though I’m a few minutes late as I’d warned him. My hands shake as I turn off the ignition. The music cuts to silence. I sit with my phone cradled in my palms, knowing I need to text Ian and let him know I’m here and yet unable to keep my fingers steady enough to do it.

I see you, his text says. I’m waiting for you.

Oh god. Oh god. Oh god.

I check my reflection quickly. Run my fingers through my hair. I want to swipe my nose with powder, my lips with gloss, but there’s no time now because he’s heading for my car. I gather my purse and phone, pull my keys from the ignition. I get out of the car.

First, he takes my hand. Leans in to kiss me, but on the cheek. We could be business acquaintances, long-lost cousins, anything but almost-lovers. Hell, he could be my pastor for all the passion in this embrace.

“I hope you’re hungry,” Ian says.

“Starving,” I assure him, though the truth is I’m sure I won’t be able to eat a single bite.

We don’t hold hands in the parking lot as we walk toward the restaurant. An hour and a half from home, I’m still cautious about being seen. Besides, after that initial brief squeeze, he let me go and hasn’t reached for me again. His hand on the small of my back, though, that is typical Ian. Steering and guiding me, making sure I navigate the scatter of broken glass on the asphalt, the smear of rainbow-shimmer oil.

“Careful,” he warns.

It’s too late to be careful, but maybe I’m the only one who of us who knows it. Inside the restaurant, they take us to an intimate booth in the back. Tall sides guarantee our privacy, the curved seat means we can sit next to each other instead of across. Ian, ever the gentleman, lets me slide in first. The vinyl snags my skirt and the metal clips of the garters on my thighs, so by the time I reach my spot, my hem has crept up far too high for propriety. I don’t pull it down.

“Have you ever been to a place like this?” Ian turns his body toward me. The dim lighting turns his hazel eyes brown and hides the glint of silver at his temples.

I shake my head, my voice steady though it feels like it wants to tremble. “Nope. All I know is that it’s a meat-a-palooza.”

He laughs and tugs the menu toward us. “Yeah. Says here, fifteen kinds. Basically, they give you these cards. Turn the green side up when you want them to bring you meat. The red side when you want them to stop for a while.”

“Seems easy enough.”

We stare at each other with no more than a few inches on the seat between us. What would the wait staff do, I wonder suddenly, if I were to straddle Ian right here? Fit myself on his lap, unzip him, push him deep inside me and ride him until we both come? I shiver at the thought of it, my nipples tightening, but I know I’d never do it. If anything, I’m a voyeur, not an exhibitionist. I can’t even hold his hand in the parking lot, how on earth would I fuck him in a Brazilian steakhouse booth, no matter how secluded?

The waiter brings us drinks, and the parade of meats begins. I find my appetite, at least a little of it, and since no single serving of meat is more than a bite or two, we work our way through a staggering array of the choices they bring to our table before I have to admit defeat and turn my card red side up.

“Just try this one more.” Ian slices a bit of garlic-infused steak, rare, from his plate and offers it to me on his fork.

So intimate and sensual, that simple act of taking food from his fork. Flavor explodes in my mouth. I’m way past any kind of physical hunger, but that steak is literally so delicious that I moan. A full-on sex noise, right there in front of him.

“Good, huh?” Somehow we are sitting closer. Touching, now. His thigh pressed to mine. His pupils have consumed most of his iris. Dim light or desire?

I want to devour him and spit out the bones.

“So good.”

I want him to kiss me. I want him to anchor his hand in my hair and pull me toward him. Plunder my mouth. Take away my breath. I want him so much it’s fire.

The waiter, who’s probably at least a little used to interrupting cooing and billing couples in this back booth, offers us coffee and dessert. With a look at me to confirm, Ian declines. Neither of us have moved, and the pressure of his knee on mine is enough to send a pulse of desire straight to my clit. Internal muscles clench.

“You want to get out of here?” Ian asks.

“Oh yes,” I tell him. “Yes, Ian. Please take me somewhere.”

He’s staying in a business-suite hotel. His room has a couch, a fridge, a desk. The bathroom is purely functional, no luxury about it, but the bed…oh, God. The bed is enormous and it’s really all I can see.

He offers me a drink, but I don’t really want to add alcohol on top of all that meat. Plus, I’m already drunk with anticipation and lust. My head already spinning. Here I am in Ian's hotel room. I still have time to leave. He hasn’t made so much as a move to kiss me, much less take me on that gigantic bed.

I can’t look at him. My gaze will be too hungry and greedy; there will be no hiding the desire on my face. Ian talks enough for both of us, and I realize that he’s nervous too. Maybe more than me.

As a kid I used to go swimming at a local lake. There were several docks anchored far out in the water, one with a diving board set a few feet off the surface. One twelve feet high. To jump off that high dive meant plunging straight down and sinking below the first foot or so of sun-warmed water to the frigid depths. If you were heavy enough or jumped hard enough, it was rumored you could actually touch the lake’s bottom, though I’d never known anyone who actually had. Word was a kid had drowned trying and his ghost would grab your feet and hold you under if you ever managed to do it. Kids jumped from the high dive with their hearts in their throats, straight as arrows until they hit the water, when not even the bravest could stop themselves from clutching their knees to their chests to keep their toes from the icy grip of the ghost at the bottom of the lake.

I hated the high dive. I hated the climb up the rusty, narrow ladder. If there was a line, you might have to cling there for a while before you could move up to the platform. I hated the way the earth seemed to tilt away from me when I got up that high. I hated creeping out to the edge, my toes curling over it, and I hated looking down into the water. Most of all, I hated that leap. The final few seconds before leaving the dubious safety of the board and launching myself into the air were always the longest and most horrifying. Worse even than the way my stomach lurched into my throat, or the sting of the water against my bare flesh when I hit. I hated jumping from that high dive, yet I did it every summer.

I hadn’t done it in years, never taken any sort of chance. I’d met and married a man who hadn’t asked much of me, at least not emotionally. I’d settled into a career that provided me with a living but didn’t challenge me. Still, those far-off summer days of childhood had taught me how to leap, and that’s what I do now.

I jump.

Not literally. As a matter of fact, it takes me forever to cross the room toward him, every inch as hard-won as though the carpet is made of tar clutching at my heels. Everything around me goes bright and clear, a picture forced into focus. Every sound amplified. The gust of chilly air from the vent, the sliver of light through the blackout curtains, the faint hiss of static from the clock radio next to the bed.

“Ian.”

He turns from the TV, remote in hand, hazel eyes wide and unexpecting, and that’s when I finally kiss him.

He puts his arms around me immediately. The remote disappears, dropped or tossed away. One hand goes to the small of my back, the other to the base of my skull. We fit together, every line and curve of my body matching a place on his.

We kiss and kiss and kiss until I break it with a gasp. “I want you so fucking much, Ian, do you know that?”

His answer comes with another kiss. I back him toward the bed until he sits on the edge. And then at last I can straddle him, my dress hiking up so that my stockings snag on his leather belt. Ian's hands slide beneath my dress to palm my ass. The heat of him sears me through my lace panties. He presses me closer, grinding me against his erection.

I cup his face in my hands, holding off the kiss for a moment while I try to catch my breath. I see my face reflected in his eyes. My hair’s a mess. My mouth swollen. I lick my lips and the flicker of my tongue against his mouth sends a shiver through us both.

“I want you,” I whisper against his lips. Then against his cheek, his jaw, his throat, where I nip and nibble between the words. Then into his ear. “I want you, I want you, I want you.”

Ian rolls us so that he’s on top. He’s strong. I feel the muscles in his arms bunch when he moves me upward on the bed, and I’m not a small woman, but Ian makes me feel tiny and precious.

It’s not the first time he’s ever touched me, but this is different than grinding on the dance floor or even making out in his car. The weight of him is unfamiliar. The way he moves his hands over me. His mouth. He traces my chin with his lips, moving lower to my throat, where the press of his teeth tips my head back to give him all the access he wants.

I’ve never asked him how many women he’s been with, but this is certainly not the first time at the rodeo for either one of us. And still we fumble, still we hesitate. His watch gets caught in my hair, pulling, and not in the way I like. My stockings run. His cock presses hard in his pants, and I can’t manage to get his belt undone. We are ungraceful in our eagerness, and I love every second of it.

He’s on top. Then I am. He takes off his button-down shirt, leaving him in a slim-fitting t-shirt.

“Well,” I say. “If we’re taking things off…”

I wriggle out of the garter belt and toss it away. My knees pressed to his hips, I run my hands up and over the soft fabric of his t-shirt, feeling the muscles of his chest and belly, eager to get at his bare flesh and yet wanting to draw this out as long as I can.

It’s going to be the only time, after all.

I inch up his shirt, revealing a sliver of skin. Then a little more. I could lean to kiss him, but I’m too fascinated by this slow reveal.

Ian, on the outside, is a businessman. He wears his dark hair short on the sides, a little longer on the top but only a little. Silver at the temples. He uses glasses for reading. He favors solid-colored shirts and ties with tiny patterns. The first time I met him, he wore a pair of plaid shorts in several shades of brown and a matching white polo shirt — total preppy.

But underneath his clothes…oh, my God. I push the shirt higher and higher, shamelessly ogling what he’s got going on. Abs. Not a six-pack, nothing so obvious. Just hard, firm flesh with the ridge of muscle clear beneath it.

His belly button is perfection.

I have to get my mouth on him. First, the tie on my dress. It opens easily enough, and I shrug out of it.

“You,” Ian says, “are so sexy.”

The compliment sends a surge of heat through me. A blush. I duck my head at first, meaning to deny it, but after a second, fuck that. We are on our way to naked. There’s no place here for anything but confidence.

“Thank you.”

My hands are on his belt, and this time, I manage to get it undone. Then his button, the zipper, I’ve got my mouth on his perfect stomach as I ease his cock free, and I’ll get my mouth on that as soon as I can get him out of his jeans. We shift, we struggle, I use my foot to push the denim past his calves and ankles, and Ian kicks them off. I have him in my fist when I find his mouth with mine again. I barely stroke, barely move my fingers, but his cock leaps under my touch and his mouth opens on a gasp.

Still kissing me, he sits, murmuring, “take this off.”

“Take this off,” I order, pulling his shirt over his head.

We keep going and then at last, we’re totally naked. On our sides, his knee between mine, no room between us. Our heads on the same pillow. We stare into each others’ eyes.

This shouldn’t feel romantic. We are not in love. This is lust at its most raw and unrefined, at its most base, and if I’m going to be honest, destructive. I am a married woman. I should not be here. Everything about this is wrong, but when Ian kisses me, all I feel is what’s right.

Ian pushes my hair off my face. “Maura.”

“Shh.” I stop him with my mouth on his. There’s no room here for talking.

We’ve gone too far to take any of this back; I wouldn’t want to even if we could. I drink in every second, every moment. I consume every breath in and out, every gesture, scent, sensation. I memorize him in these moments because I believe this will be the only time this happens. Once I fuck him, this has to end.

Because…how could it go on?

I met him in a night club, and for the past year, we’ve been dancing. Ian pulls me close and pushes me away, and all I’ve ever done since that first night is try to end this, whatever it is between us.

This will end it. It has to. If we can just fuck each other out of our systems, he can go back to his financial reports and business meetings and visits to the gym, his sterile failures at being matched with single, professional, divorced women with kids. I’ll go back to the desert of my marriage and maybe see if things can work out. Maybe not. But one way or another, I believe in my heart that this will be the only chance I ever have for Ian to be inside me.

With the subtlest of shifts, he could be, but neither of us move. I’m wet and hot and ready for him, so turned on I’m not sure I’ll be able to last much longer. At the same time, I want it to last, and I know that once he is inside me it will all happen faster than I want.

Instead, push his shoulder gently to roll him onto his back. I straddle him again, knees pressing his sides. I lean to kiss him, and the curtain of my hair shields us.

“Should I get a ponytail holder?”

“No,” Ian says. “Leave it down. I like it.”

I’ve kissed his mouth a hundred times by now, but each one is still as fresh and new as the first. I love Ian's mouth. His lips. His cheek and jaw, the spot below his ear. The hollow of his throat. His collar bone. I skim my lips and teeth along every line, every dip and curve. His skin is warm and tastes faintly of salt; he’s sweating though the room is chilly.

I kiss his chest and take my time with his nipples until he gasps and laughs, his hand in my hair. I nip at his ribs, counting each with my tongue. I trace his hipbones with my fingertips and follow with more kisses. Down his thighs. The bumps of his knees. Ian's calves make me want to write a song about them.

“Your feet,” I murmur. “Oh, my God. Your fucking feet, Ian.”

He laughs, shaking the bed. “What about them?”

From my place near his ankle, which I’m worshipping with my kisses, I look up at him. I want to mark this sight in my mind forever, me at his feet and him pushing up on his elbow to look down at me. “They’re perfect.”

“Oh, God.” With a groan, he falls back onto the pillows, a hand over his eyes. “You’re crazy.”

“About you,” I tell him and work my way kiss by kiss back up his legs.

I nuzzle his inner thighs. I bite a little too hard in my eagerness and brace myself for a yelp, ready to apologize, but Ian only jerks and lets out a soft sigh. His beautiful cock is so close, but I take my time before I get to it. As my friend Shelly’s fond of saying, if I wanted balls on my nose, I’d be a seal — and yet with Ian everything is so unimaginably perfect and delicious that I use my mouth and hands on every part of him and revel in it.

I can’t hold myself back any longer. I need him in my mouth. I want to make him moan and shift and pump his hips. I want to make him lose his mind. I slide my tongue up his length, and his reaction is immediate and gratifying. A soft, hissing sigh that trails into a little growl. I close my eyes at that last moment, when I take him all the way in. Slow, slow, I work my lips and tongue along his shaft as far as I can — which turns out to be all the way until my lips brush his belly.

I add my hand when I slide up, sucking gently on the head of his cock. Down again. I lose myself in the rhythm of fucking him this way. My hair tangles, getting in the way, and Ian lifts it from my neck to hold it in his fist. The gesture is simple and considerate, and I stagger for a moment.

“Feels so good,” he murmurs.

“Does it?”

“Can’t you tell?” Ian asks with a low laugh.

I kiss his belly, my hand still stroking. I press my face to his warm skin and breath in his smell. “I want you to feel good, Ian. I want you to tell me when I do.”

“You are.” He pulls me up to his mouth.

His erection’s trapped between us when we kiss. I’m so wet for him, all it will take is a tilt of my hips and he’ll slide right in. But before that, of course, I need to do something else. My fingers fumble with the plastic package, my poise shaky since it’s been forever since I even had to think of using a condom. But I am woman, hear me roar. I sheathe him without too much struggle, and when I look at Ian, his mouth is thin. His brow furrowed.

“It’s been a long time,” he says, a hand on my wrist as I grip his cock.

“I’ll be gentle, sweetheart,” I breathe against his mouth, and we both laugh. Thank God for that, for a second I thought it was going to get way too serious.

We both make a noise when I ease him inside me. I lean forward to kiss him, but neither of us move beyond that. Beneath my palm, Ian's heart is beating very fast.

“Maura…” he grips my hips.

“Shhh.” I kiss his mouth, urging him to open for me. Our tongues stroke. I kiss him for a long time without so much as rocking my hips. His cock is impossibly hard inside me, even throbbing, something I’d have said was something made up for stories. But no, I feel his nice, thick cock twitch inside me when I suck on his tongue. When I clench my internal muscles, Ian groans.

He rolls me smoothly so I’m under him. Pushing up on one hand, Ian looks down at me while he uses the other hand to hook beneath my knee, easing my leg up. Opening me to push inside even deeper.

We move together. Slow at first. Too slow. I dig my nails into his back, then his ass. Murmur in his ear.

“Fuck me, Ian,” I tell him. “Harder.”

At first he won’t, and I know why. I’ve grown to understand Ian very well over the past few months. Intimacy grows in strange places, and Ian and I have spent hours in conversation, revealing secrets. There’s been an honesty in this relationship, a lack of pretense, because basically, when you both know there’s no way this can ever be more than what it is, what’s the point in playing games? And maybe because we’ve both needed someone to be honest with.

I know him. I know he’s trying to tease me, and that he’s also trying to be in charge, because Ian doesn’t like to be told what to do. When I reach up to grab the headboard, he reacts at once, shuddering. His expression goes dark.

I tilt my hips, back arching. Breathy voice. “Harder, Ian. Please.”

It’s the ‘please’ that gets him. With a groan, he thrusts a little harder. A little faster. It feels so good, I’m already so close that every press of his belly on my clit sends ripples of pleasure all through me.

“Please, Ian. Please, please, please…”