Wish List - Sylvia Day Page 0,10
away, taking in the glass-topped coffee table, the flat-screen TV and the bare Christmas tree by the sliding glass door.
“Don’t you have any ornaments?” she asked.
“No.” His voice was a low whisper of sound. “I bought the tree for you and forgot the damn ornaments.”
Her hands stilled. “For me?” Oh my God, I’m going to cry.
“Yeah, I knew from that notepad of yours and the little tree on your desk that you must really like Christmas. I do too, but since I’m going to my sister’s for holiday dinner, I hadn’t bought one for myself. For you, though, I figured it wouldn’t be much of a Christmas wish if it didn’t feel like Christmas around here.”
Wiggling around, she switched from straddling his back to straddling his hips. Face to face, they stared at each other.
“I’m sorry I forgot the ornaments,” he said.
And then he cupped the back of her neck and kissed her.
Unlike the deep possessive kiss he’d given her in her office, this kiss was coaxing, his lips brushing, his tongue flicking softly. Steph wrapped her arms around him and kissed him back with everything she had. In gratitude. In lust. In love.
She pulled away and gasped, “What do you want for Christmas?”
“This. You. Making love with you.” He rocked his hips and she felt how aroused he was.
A gift that required no wrapping. No words. She lifted her skirt, he tugged down his sweats. She sheathed him. First in latex, then with her body. He groaned, she cried out. They moved together, without the haste that had marked their previous encounters. Her hands on his bare shoulders, she took him deep, rising and falling in tempo with the sounds he made. Clenching her muscles to stroke his thick length.
Pulling off her shirt and bra to press her bare skin to his.
“I’ve wanted you,” he said hoarsely, guiding her hips with shaking hands. “So badly… God, you feel amazing.”
Steph made it last, in no hurry for their time together to end. But it did, of course.
Dawn came too swiftly. As the pink light of the early rising sun came into the room through the sliding glass door, she tucked a blanket around Nick and picked up her duffle.
“Merry Christmas,” she whispered, pausing on the threshold a moment before shutting out the view of Nick asleep on the couch.
The clicking of the latch said the goodbye she couldn’t.
* * * * *
“Well, this is a surprise,” Amanda said as she pulled the door wide. “It’s been over a year since you last darkened my doorstep, Nicholas James. And you looked a hell of a lot better then than you do now.”
He gave a curt nod before dropping a kiss on her forehead. “I need a favor, Mandy, and I hope to God it doesn’t make me an ass**le for asking. Do you know where Stephanie lives?”
The petite blonde blinked up at him. “Wow. Okay, hang on a sec. That hurt a little.”
She blew out her breath and stepped out of the way. “Come in.”
Nick stepped inside but hovered by the doorway. Three damn days had passed since he last touched Steph and if he didn’t get to her soon, he was pretty sure he’d go insane.
Mandy stared at him a moment and then walked to the kitchen counter where her purse waited. “I’m over you, I swear I am.” She pulled out her BlackBerry and a pen.
While writing she said, “I still have to ask why Steph’s the one that got to you.”
“Hell. What kind of question is that?” He ran his hand through his hair.
“I don’t know. I guess I’m just wondering if what they say about The Rules is true. Is playing hard-to-get the way to land the great guys?” She came toward him and held out a business card with an address on the back.
Relief flooded him. He tucked the precious card in his pocket. “Maybe in the beginning the chase is fun. Now it just sucks. Thanks for this, Mandy. Really.”
“Hey, Nick.”
He paused on the threshold, his impatience nearly overwhelming. “What?”
“You’re not heading over there now, are you? Steph and Kevin were—”
“Who the f**k is Kevin?” Every muscle tensed at the sound of Stephanie’s name linked with another guy’s.
Amanda’s eyes widened. “Oh shit… You don’t know.”
“Obviously not.” He strode back into the living room. “But you’re going to tell me.”
She sighed. “You better take a seat.”
* * * * *
Nick watched out the window of his car as Stephanie exited her Grand Cherokee and started up