Courted by Karma (The Adventures of Anabel Axelrod) Read online

  We sat in a charged silence staring at each other for a moment. His idly strumming fingers were the only movement. I was in no hurry, I have until dawn. My bare tootsies started swinging slowly between his outspread legs. He noticed them and his lips turned up. His large hand cupped one swinging foot and his thumb lightly traced a dark pink toenail.

  “And then, no matter what is said,” Luke wiggled my big toe and glanced back up. Gone was the teasing look, and challenging arrogance is all I saw on his face. I caught my breath at his dark expression of unconcealed lust when he went on, “I am going to fuck you until I’ve had my fill and nothing is going to interrupt us tonight.”

  I nonchalantly leaned forward to place my hands on his wide shoulders, but it was an instinctive reaction to stop myself from falling off the desk at the responsive spike of reciprocal lust piercing through me. Every nerve ending on my body was tingling at only his blunt words, from my face on down to Queen Vicky.

  We needed to not waste another minute of our precious alone time, the clock was ticking and so was I. My hair fell forward to curtain us in intimacy. I kissed his wonderfully arrogant nose.

  “Hello Devil. I’ve missed you, too. So answer and ask.” Sitting back, I smiled. “We’ve got until sixish to get everything done on both our lists, assuming the poltergeists around this joint don’t get me first.”

  His warm hands gripped my ankles. They moved up and down my calves, squeezing lightly.

  “I’ll protect you from…Jesus, the poltergeists.” Luke’s voice was full of suppressed laughter, and then he raised that brow again. “You’ve got a list?”

  “Huh. Somehow, that just doesn’t sound like an answer to me.”

  His warm hands squeezed my knees under the trench coat. I noticed two buttons were now undone. ‘Kiss my mouth and then I’ll answer.”

  I shook my head. “No way, I know how that works. First, it’s an innocent request to kiss you on your mouth and then next,” my foot slid up his thigh to rub back and forth, “it’ll be a kiss your coccyx, pretty please.”

  Luke groaned loudly, repeating the word “coccyx” under his breath while he lowered his head. His busy hands have parted my coat midway up. I saw him freeze. Red, silky fabric was clearly visible.

  Without looking up, Luke started answering my questions concisely. “Yes, you are my local, dirty secret for now, give or take, and I know you love that idea so don’t bother trying to pretend otherwise.” As I giggled, his hands traveled a little higher and another button of the trench coat slipped undone. “I took you to my barn so we could be alone, and so you could scream as loud as you like.” It was me who groaned this time and covered my eyes. He pulled one hand away to see my face. His was openly amused. “Hey, if want me to call you ‘Anabel the Cow’ or you want to howl like a dog when I say ‘Bark when I bend you, bitch’, it’s all cool. Just give me the word, Princess. I aim to please.” He leaned back swiftly to avoid my laughing swat and then took advantage to roll his chair closer. He spread my knees slightly with an angled shoulder and a kiss on my kneecap. “I work with Svetlana at the Chicago office and she’s…a friend of the family.” He kissed my other kneecap. “Svetlana needed a place to lay low and arrived a day early.” He turned his head and looked up at me with a ghost of a smirk; it was clear he found my questions funny for some obscurely male reason. “Satisfied, Anabel?” Again, he didn’t wait for a response, “Good, now my first question for you. My parents arrive Wednesday evening for Thanksgiving. What are your plans?”

  Still smiling, I was taken aback at Luke’s unexpectedly practical question when images of being bent and screaming dance in my head. His answers temporarily satisfied me. I wouldn’t need to brave the weather again due to Mr. Secretive having underwear sex parties with crazy commies staying at his house. Her choice of fluorescent lingerie was still disturbing in a houseguest. At least I have the good excuse of being wasted when wearing my bra around the apartment, and it was your tasteful, basic black.

  Otherwise, I was finding it hard to think beyond Luke’s stroking of my thighs. Like limp noodles, my legs were relaxing open from the heat of his insistent hands. The squeezing, rubbing massage of my sartorius muscles left me feeling drugged. He was exploring higher and higher under my coat. A button popped audibly while I tried to remember what he just asked me. The seductive movements of his sorcerer’s hands were enticing my cha-cha to take over the wheel of what little rational mind I have left.

  ‘Umm…I’m having Turkey dinner at the apartment.”

  “This is still my first question; do you have room for four more? I know this is last minute, but my mom makes unbelievable baklava,” Luke murmured, leaning down and kissing the top of my thigh. “A shitload of baklava, Anabel.” He gave my inseam on that side a longer kiss involving his tongue, and then sucked and blew softly. Tingling shivers raced through my body. It was a battle to resist the urge to rip apart the heavy coat and lay back on the desk in total surrender to that talented, upwardly mobile mouth of his.

  “Uh…sure, come over at two. Still in your first question; baklava with each layer of phyllo dough generously buttered with love,” I asked, my faint voice rising hopefully, “and not the chewing forever on gritty sandpaper kind, right?”

  “Great, we’ll be there at two. My mother is Greek. Of course it’s buttery baklava.” This statement was delivered with a mock glare of offense at my insulting inquiry. As punishment, his other shoulder got in on the act. Now my thighs were pushed decidedly apart.

  I moaned on a laugh, “You can’t blame me for verifying the quality of baklava. There’s no way I am taking on four extra mouths to feed in exchange for a shitload of crappy pastry.”

  Luke smiled slowly, “I promise it’s sticky with honey and very, very delicious; which leads me to my second question.”

  Moaning and laughing even more, I realized my coat was now spread open to my waist. His fingers were stroking tantalizing close to the Bermuda Triangle under the voluminous amount of silky fabric pushed up and draping across my legs.

  I felt a teasing finger. Again, Luke froze. He looked up quickly. Leaning forward casually; he rested his forearms on the top of my thighs. He grinned up at me with brilliant, dark green eyes that were outlined lushly in black lashes a girl would kill to have. Outlined against his T-shirt, his shoulders and arms were straining with muscles a girl would die to have holding her. At his wicked expression, I felt something sticky and buttery melting inside me.

  Luke broke our stare by slowly shaking his head back and forth. “Anabel, what am I going to do with you?” His voice growled low with warning when he asked, “Don’t you remember what I told you on our first date that happens to little girls like you wearing short, little dresses?”

  This unfamiliar, meltingly soft sensation of wanting to sink inside a man and never surface was decidedly uncomfortable.

  I determinedly shrugged it off and tossed back my hair while blinking coquettishly at the man between my legs. “Why, Luke, are you comparing this moment to our first date?”

  He scoffed with a frown. “You leave me no choice.”

  I tapped my lips with a forefinger in thought. “Mmm, our first date. Give me a second here while I try to remember a little something…” Watching his brows start to meet in the middle at my vague answer, I felt back in control of myself on the familiar ground of teasing a man. “Wasn’t it more of a show me rather than tell me moment?” I sighed heavily and traced a lazy path down his cheek with my finger. “You’re such a man. Do I need to remind you how it really happened?”

  He gave his permission with a curt jerk of that nose and I bit my cheek not to smile.

  “First, you started our first date by bringing me a little present.” I glanced searchingly around the office. When he shrugged at me with a rueful look, I sympathized, “I know, I know; this was a surprise visit tonight and not a planned date. I guess you’re excused from this part of what I remember you show-and-telling me. Luckily, I was planning. Hand me my backpac
k, please.”

  Luke’s forehead creased, but he slid one hand out from under my clothing and reached for my bag on the floor. He passed it to me without comment, but his curiosity was piqued when I unzipped the pack and looked inside. I pulled out the silver gift bag tied with a red ribbon in a neat bow at the handles.

  I passed the little bag to my Dark Knight. I smiled to see the startled pleasure pass over his face as he accepted the gift.

  “What is this, Anabel?”

  “Are we still in question two?”

  He gave a clipped nod. “Oh, hell yes.”

  I managed to keep my face serious and only said, “Then you’ll have to wait to find out. It’s just a little something I brought for you tonight. You can’t open it,” I felt my cheeks heating, as he continued to regard me with a widening smile, “until we move onto Your Turn with a Cherry on the Top.”

  Luke held the bag another moment. I wasn’t too surprised to see him heft it up and down with a smiling frown of interest before placing it on the desk next to my hip. That move did a lot to enforce my belief Luke reacts different than your average man. The bra test would have to be done later—when I was wearing one.

  His big hand sliding back up my inner thigh had me paying attention again. “Go on, Anabel, and continue answering question two.”

  I closed my eyes, in part to allow myself to picture clearly what Luke had done on our first date. The other part was to hide like a little chicken. It wasn’t as easy as I thought to describe the act out loud to a man. I hoped my cheeks felt hot because of getting babushka bitch-slapped and not from blushing like a girl.

  “And you need to look at me,” Torquemada added in command.

  My eyes flew open and I gasped at the unexpected brush of a finger giving wriggling me an incentive to obey. I usually don’t take to well at being trained to respond, but tonight I could go along with the program of a stroking finger here and there as a Pavlovian prompt.

  “Well, I was only doing what you suggested to make our first date pleasantly successful. I know certain men like a woman who doesn’t always have to be the boss. You plainly stated I was to wear a dress.”

  I felt another feathering tickle. “This is true, I did. What I forgot to state, Princess, was this man likes a woman who doesn’t lure me on under false pretenses too, but please,” He motioned with that nose again, “go on.”

  I laughed, gliding my hands across Luke’s shoulders and down his upper arms.

  “It was a warm night and not too windy,” I recalled dreamily while my fingers traced the swelling curves of his biceps. “I was wearing the sweetest dress. You are right, though. The dress was so short; it barely qualified on this side of slutty. I knew I’d have to be extra-careful how I sat or bent over during our first date. Otherwise, you could be getting a peep show all night!” If his intent eyes on my face and slight smile were any indication, I had Luke’s undivided attention. “My door buzzed and I ran down to meet you at the bottom of the stairs.” Kneading his muscles, I moaned, “There you were, all manly and drop-dead hotness. Then you added fuel to my fire. You swung a little gift bag in front of my eyes! You said, ‘For you, Anabel. I hated leaving you disappointed in me today.’ You insisted I open the present right then and there. No, my Dark Prince, you certainly did not disappoint.” I tapped his grin with my finger, “Those were the prettiest, tiniest, and pinkest panties I’ve ever received on a first date!”

  His fingers had been lightly tracing up and down my legs and steadily moving my clothing up higher while I spoke. Seeing Luke’s gaze on his hands between my thighs, a certain someone may have a front row ticket to his own peep show right now. This wasn’t how I envisioned our night together when I decided to surprise him, but a girl needs to be flexible.

  “Yes, and then what?” Luke prompted, not looking up, but placing another kiss midway up the inside of my leg.

  “Oh, you know, not too much.” I started running my fingers through his hair and softly caressing the sides of his neck. “It was only politeness that had me immediately trying on those darling panties under my dress.” I added breezily, “It wasn’t like I was wearing any others to get in the way. You said they were optional, after all.”

  He made a low noise in response and kissed me again. Tonight was supposed to be about Luke, but I’m a hot-blooded, American female. I love having my thighs licked and kissed by a man blessed with a sinfully luscious mouth made for such acts.

  “It was only because I was raised right that I raised my sweet, little dress and twirled very slowly to display how your gift fit.” I estimated his current, lingering kiss was about one inch from the Bermuda Triangle and sending me on vacation. I continued with a hitch in my breath, “Our first French kiss was in token appreciation for you thinking of me with lingerie made in Paris.”

  Part of me wanted to go on this trip, but I wanted tonight to be about considering Luke’s favorite travel destinations. Maybe taking off and landing several times on the same runway, but with different directional approaches, was Luke’s idea of a fun trip. I decided to go along for the ride on this southerly approach.

  The teasing man placed careful, slow kisses from the softest spot at the inside of my left thigh and then over to my right.

  He murmured against my skin, “Remind me to thank your grandmother for your beautiful manners when we meet. And then what?”

  “Mmm, my grandmother won’t think too much of your manners if she knew you pulled down my new panties right there on the stairway. Burying your face between my legs and kissing me there would not be exactly her idea of a first date smooch, mister.”

  My hands were caressing the sides of his bent head and rubbing his corded neck with more and more restless force, but I think it was an accident when I pulled his face that final inch closer.

  Luke licked with his tricky tongue and inquired, “You mean here?”

  “Oh my GOSH, right there!” I squeaked in a high voice, gripping handfuls of his short hair.

  “Really, Anabel. There?” Time stopped for me, as his tongue did something else incredibly clever. “How about here?”

  I swear I felt Luke’s smile, as I moaned, “Yes, THERE! And there! Oh yes please, everywhere!”

  “And then?”

  From my semi-reclining swoon, I swung one arm and lightly cuffed his head. “And then I continued showing you my good manners by instantly scheduling a second date, so you didn’t feel used, you cocky son-of-a-bitch.”

  On vacation now and flying high above the clouds, I was dimly aware of Luke’s self-satisfied, demonic chuckle. “Ah, so you do remember every second of our first date.”

  I caressed his head and agreed on an intake of breath, “Give or take a nanosecond.”

  At some point, I heard a buzzing noise and realized it wasn’t my cha-cha or Luke’s lips, but his cell reverberating loudly in the pocket of his jacket slung over the chair. “Please don’t ever stop or I swear to God, I will kill you!”

  Luke laughed. He squeezed my ass gripped in his calloused hands and soothed my concerns with a deep kiss placed in a spot so genius that it proved conclusively, without a shadow of a doubt, that smart was definitely the new sexy.

  I screamed the rafters down.

  When I landed on terra firma sometime in the next millennium, it was to see Luke standing between my legs and gazing down at me with heated eyes. I was lying on my back on the large desk. My coat was still buttoned from the chest up, and everything else below was pushed up above my waist.

  Smiling, I blinked up at Luke.

  He said softly, “You should see your eyes right now.”

  “I’d rather see your body without clothes on,” I suggested hopefully. “Tonight’s about Your Turn!”

  I struggled to sit up, but Luke put a hand out and guided me flat on my back again. His mouth kicked up at one corner and he reached inside a desk drawer.

  “Don’t worry, I haven’t forgotten my turn. You seemed feisty, Anabel. I judged you were in desperate need o
f a hello kiss to settle you down.”

  I laughed and felt myself turning red at the same time. I nodded gratefully when he held up a condom with a questioning look, relieved this was a nonissue tonight.

  I nodded towards the drawer, “That’s convenient.”

  He pulled his T-shirt over his head and it sailed over to join his jacket, thankfully now silent, on the chair. He stood before me, a living bronzed sculpture of the wonder that’s the male body. Both hands were resting right above my knees and his fingers were drumming a slow beat on my skin.

  He arched a black brow, “Questioning again? Or complaining?”

  My heart sped up at his tone. I smiled inside thinking someone else was feisty and needed a kiss to take the edge off.

  I reached out a hand and lazily stroked his muscular forearm. The black hairs were silky soft here and thicker at the wrist. I loved their texture against my fingers and how they disappeared as I glided my hand up higher to caress the satiny skin of his inner elbow.

  “Oh, complaining, I guess. But only about how long it’s taking you to strip, my complete perfection of lusty masculine loveliness and virility.” Smiling a little at his lowered lids and dazed, but pleased expression my compliments always brought to his face, I crossed my arms up behind my head. Taking his hands resting on my legs with me and watching his eyes follow, I slid my dangling legs up until my knees were bent and my bare feet were resting on the edge of the desk. “Since you won’t let me help, hurry please.”

  I would imagine most men didn’t need to be told twice to hurry and get naked when standing between the legs of a half-naked woman--the important half--with a condom in their hand. Luke was giving me ample reason to comprehend how unlike most men he really was tonight.

  He didn’t loosen the string of his sweat pants and drop them, but pulled me up to a sitting position. He slid his hands under my hair on each side of my neck while his thumbs stroked my jaw line.

  “Your skin is so soft. Kiss me.” His voice was so low that I wasn’t sure he’d spoken until I opened my eyes and he repeated, “Kiss me, Anabel.”