Damn, knowing Jude was touching himself right now made my body spiral out of control in a familiar way. It wouldn’t take much “touching” to get me the rest of the way there.

“I suppose that dumb smile on your face should have given that away,” I said, sliding my hand into place.

“There’s my girl,” he said, his voice husky.

My eyes closed at first, as my body rushed from my touch.

“What in the hell are we doing?” I said, my own voice raspy.

“Doing the best we can with what we’ve been given tonight, Luce,” was his immediate answer.

“And giving French vanilla a run for its money,” I added, gliding my other hand up my stomach before giving the tie a suggestive tug.

“Shit,” Jude breathed, the muscles in his shoulders picking up speed.

Dropping my head back, I started kneading my breast, rolling the nipple between my fingers.

“Holy shit.” Jude’s eyes couldn’t have gotten any wider. “We are putting French vanilla in its goddamned place, baby.”

If it wasn’t for his confidence, combined with the way I’d already started on this train, I would have been trying to talk myself out of this whole thing. But I was too far gone to hit the brakes.

“What are you imagining right now?” I asked, staring into his eyes, pretending it was his hands working over me.

“With the view I’ve got right now?” he said, winking. “Who needs to imagine? This right here, a beautiful woman touching herself the way you are, is the American dream, Luce.”

His words sent another pulse of pleasure to my body. “Let’s just say you were here tonight . . .” I began. “And you’d just walked into the apartment. What would you have done?”

“Are you wanting me to talk dirty to you, Luce?” he asked with a smirk. “Because all you ever have to do is say the word and I will happily say filthy, filthy things to you.”

“The word,” I teased.

“If I wasn’t about to come, I’d be lecturing you about your backward progress in the comedy department.”

“Wait for me,” I said, sinking my teeth into my lower lip. That always drove him crazy.

“Always, Luce,” he said. “Always.

“Okay, so I just walked through the door,” he began, his shoulders slowing. “And there you are, naked except for that fine-ass tie around your neck, touching yourself and looking at me with those screw-me eyes.”

One of Jude’s many gifts of his lady-killer DNA was his voice. It was deep enough to make a woman’s insides vibrate, but still clear enough to cut right through her. However, whenever we were intimate, that voice of his went as deep as it would go, vibrating in all the right places.

“I’d be across that room in two seconds flat, and have you up against the nearest wall two seconds after that,” he said, the muscles of his neck popping to the surface. He was forcing himself to hold off.

He wouldn’t have to for much longer.

“I’d slide that tie from your neck, hold your wrists behind your back, and cinch them together so tightly I could do whatever I wanted to do to you, however I wanted to do it.”

“Oh, God.” I sighed, kicking my leg up on the table to give myself better access.

“Then, in the time it would take you to wrap your legs around me, I’d have my zipper down and my mouth on yours. And then, baby,” he said, his own head rocking back, “I wouldn’t give it to you until you came and got it.”

At this pace, with those kinds of words, I wasn’t going to make it much longer.

“So, my wrists tied behind me, my legs tied around you, I’d lower myself over you, teasing you until I made you come and get it.” Had those words just come out of my mouth? At this point in fast-approaching ecstasy, I couldn’t be sure.

“And you’d be so ready for me, I’d bury myself so deep inside you I could come right then,” he continued, groaning through the end. “But then you’d start moving, doing that little hip swivel thing you know drives me nuts, and then—”

“Like the two-pump chump you are not,” I interrupted, feeling my climax building, “but like the sexual goddess I am, I’d whisper a few dirty words in your ear at the same time I tighten around you, and you’d come so hard you’d put me over the edge.”

“Oh, God,” he moaned, his face lining. “I can’t wait, Luce. I’m going to come hard,” he said, his eyes staying on me. “And I’m going to imagine it’s you I’m six inches deep in when I do.”

That was all I needed. The final push before I followed him.

My body tightened as much as it could before it let go, and then I was shaking from the intensity of my orgasm ripping through me. “Jude.” I sighed again and again as he did the same with my name, paired with a couple other four-letter words.

As the last ripples of pleasure were going through my body, I rested my leg back down on the floor. My lower half was trembling and my breath was ragged at best.

“I might have been wrong, Luce,” Jude said after both of us started breathing normally again.

Adjusting myself in the chair, I gave him a postorgasm smile. “Wrong about what?”

“Your dancing being the damn most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

My smile went a notch higher. “Oh, yeah?”

“Oh. Yeah,” he emphasized. “Because what I just had the pleasure of watching for the past five minutes was on a whole other playing field.”

I laughed. The expression on his face was that serious. “And I want to say kudos to you for improvising and managing to turn a sucky night into something . . . not so sucky.”

He leaned forward. “Kudos to you, Luce,” he said with a wink.

I flushed more than I already was. I was a physical wreck. The good kind of wreck. My inner thighs were still shaking, my left nipple was sore from the pain I’d unleashed on it, and my neck felt sore from all the rocking and tossing around.

“So,” I said, “same time tomorrow night?” I was partially kidding, but mostly serious.

Jude’s eyebrow lifted. “Who says we need to wait until tomorrow night for a repeat?” he said, leaning back against the truck’s seat again. “I’ve got all night, Luce.”

Grabbing the phone, I started for the bedroom. I was going to get comfortable for this round. “Me too.”

SIX

I’d slept in. I knew this because I awoke with that panicky feeling, consulting my phone for the time. Instead of showing me that, though, the picture on my phone was of Jude’s room. The Face Time count was still going, in the six-digit realm.

Crashing my head back down on my pillow, I exhaled. For the first time since last September, it seemed, it was acceptable for me to sleep in. I didn’t have an early class to be at, or a rehearsal to squeeze in before breakfast. Other than my summer class, my schedule was open to fill as I chose.

Turning on my side, I stared at his room. He must have left his phone behind so I could wake up to this. It was a small gesture that felt kind of grand.

The team had put him in a hotel during preseason training until he found something more permanent, which I guess some players complained about due to the lack of space. From the looks of it, Jude’s hotel room was almost as big as our apartment. Plus, it was about five times as nice and a tenth as old.

Following round two last night, Jude suggested we keep the Face Time on so we could fall asleep together. Well, it was more of a demand, but it was one I was eager to go along with. By the time he’d driven back to his room, I’d almost fallen asleep, tired from the day of running around, the double feature of orgasms, and arguing with him about how expensive his phone bill would be if we did this whole Face Time thing all night, every night, like he wanted.

He said he didn’t give a damn about the bill, or the money; he cared about watching me fall asleep every night. Yeah, I melted and caved right then.