He felt said appendage twitch in anticipation.

“You see, when you kissed and touched me last night, I realized that I didn’t care what anybody thought. I just wanted to be with you and enjoy the moment.”

Jay put his palm on her nape and drew her head closer. “What about your parents? Aren’t you doing this so you can get back at them?”

“Not anymore. Besides, I’d never tell my parents that I just tossed an utterly gorgeous naked man on his bed and sucked his cock until he came.”

Tossed? Sucked? Past tense?

Before the last word was out, Tara pushed against his chest and made him lose his balance. He landed with his back on the bed.

She smiled down at him. “What you and I do is nobody else’s business.” She hesitated. “Now, do you want me to take my clothes off or not?”

“Off,” Jay uttered and watched her follow his hoarse command.

7

Jay looked at her with raw hunger in his eyes, while Tara took her time to pull her tank top over her head and toss it to the foot of the bed. This time she wasn’t wearing a bra. She had to smile involuntarily when she saw Jay’s reaction to her little striptease. His cock twitched and filled with more blood, getting harder with every second.

“Tara?”

She met his inquisitive gaze. “Yes?”

“You sure about this?”

She popped the button of her shorts open and lowered the zipper. “Don’t you want me anymore?” She already knew the answer to the question, because it now curved against Jay’s belly.

He followed her gaze and smirked. “You know I do.” Then he looked at her, searched her eyes. “Just to get this straight: so you’re willing to date a guy who’s got nothing to offer you.”

Tara shimmied out of her shorts and stepped out of the flip-flops. “I wouldn’t say that.” She gave his cock a pointed look. “You’ve got quite a lot to offer from what I can see.”

“Darlin’,” he murmured thickly. “I had pegged you for the innocent kind. Guess I’ll have to revise my opinion of you.”

“Innocent?” She smiled to cover up her surprise at Jay having figured her out so quickly. Because she was quite innocent in many ways. But she was bent on changing that. “I take offense at that!”

He laughed, and the soft sound reverberated through her body. She hooked her thumbs into her panties.

“Well, in that case, you should punish me for making such an offensive remark.” Jay’s eyes sparkled with mischief when he watched her take off her last piece of clothing.

“That’s exactly what I intend to do.”

God, she’d never been so forward. Sure, she’d given the occasional blowjob before, but never like this, never at the very beginning of a relationship. She’d never felt comfortable, but things were different with Jay.

She didn’t have to think of how she came across, what impression she made. The pressure was off. She could simply follow her body and her heart and do whatever felt good. Nobody would judge her. She wasn’t with a man who would weigh up if she was the right woman to marry and bear his children. And she wouldn’t have to worry that he would tell his society friends that she wasn’t that great in bed.

Slowly, she slid onto the bed and placed her hands on his thighs, spreading them farther so she could kneel in between them. She stared at his cock. It stood in a neatly trimmed bed of dark hair, thick veins snaking up its length to the mushroomed head.

“Tara, you don’t have to do this, if you don’t want to,” Jay said, sitting up. He placed one hand at her nape and brushed his thumb along her jaw. “How about you let me finish what I started yesterday in the shower? And then maybe later when you’re more comfortable with me—”

She put a finger across his lips, stopping him. “But I want to.” And now even more so, because he didn’t ask for it, he didn’t demand. Not like her ex-boyfriends had. “I want to explore you.”

Jay pressed his forehead to hers, his minty breath ghosting over her skin. “You’re an enigma. Every time I think I’ve figured you out, you throw me a curveball. You have so many layers. And I’d love to peel them all off one by one.”

She chuckled at his assessment. “I’m really not that complicated. I just want to have fun.”

“If that’s what you want, I promise we’ll have lots of fun. Starting right now.”

He captured her lips, kissing her tenderly at first, as if to give her a chance to pull back if she wanted to change her mind. When she didn’t and brought her arms around him to pull him closer to her, he slanted his mouth and dove between her parted lips, his tongue licking against hers, stroking gently, then with more pressure, more determination.