Page 25 of Friends with Benefits

Her eyes widen, then narrow and grow darker. Her lips part. Then she fakes a laugh and walks, a little unsteadily, to the bathroom.

Ah, Jesus, I really do need to have sex with her. This is the first week in – hell, ten weeks? – that I haven’t had a fix of her body. It’s the first time I’ve realized she’s become a craving.

She closes the door and I hear the shower turn on. Then I stare at the closed door. My heart starts to beat faster in my chest. My breathing quickens. I really want a piece.

I know the rules. I know exactly why we put them in place. But hell, at this moment I’m struggling to think of one good reason why we can’t break them this once.

I strip out of my boxer briefs and head into the bathroom. I pause, my hand on the door handle. Just once. What’s the harm?

Something is telling me this is a bad idea. Something makes me pause. But I open the door. She turns to me. The hot shower has filled the room with steam but I see her beneath the multiple shower heads. Smokin’ hot. Looking at me the way she looked at me moments ago. Those hooded eyes. The slight gap between her lips.

Like a wave, lust crashes over me and hurtles me toward her. I move into the shower, push her back to the tiled wall, and cover her mouth with my own. She groans as she kisses me back just as fiercely.

Words are coming to my mind and threatening to break from my lips. I want to tell her how much I adore her. How good my days are when they’re filled with her. How no one has ever satisfied me like she does.

Holy shit!

I pull back from her and walk backward until my ass is pressed to the wall opposite her. I’m breathing harder now than I was after running earlier. I drag a hand through my hair.

Her eyes are closed, her head resting back against the tiles.

‘This is why we have the rules,’ she says.

I don’t know whether to confirm that statement, or whether to linger on the fact she might have had similar thoughts to my own. Instead, I drag my hands over my face and leave the room without saying anything.

Downstairs, Sarah is stuffing bacon into rolls and making a mountain of food in the middle of the table. I boil the kettle and find one of the boxes of loose-leaf tea I picked up in the airport.

By the time I set the tea on the table, everyone else is seated except for Jess. For a moment, I worry we crossed a line. I don’t want anything to be awkward between us. I couldn’t stand it if that were to happen with Jess.

But she strolls into the kitchen, her bright print kaftan flowing as she walks. As outrageously bright as the sheer material is, she looks beautiful. Her hair wet. Her face makeup free. Her feet bare.

‘Oh, Jess, I adore that outfit,’ Sarah says.

‘Thank you. It’s actually from my summer collection.’

‘You made that?’ Madge asks.

My insides fill with pride as they talk about how skilled Jess is. I already know she is. Not that I blow smoke up her ass. That’s not how we roll.

As I finish stirring her tea, I feel her hand on my back. ‘Are we good?’ she asks.

I wrap my arm around her and pull her to me, pressing my lips to her hair. ‘We’re good. Just a blip.’

She gives me a soft smile, then her eyes fall to the tea pot. ‘Is that my funky tea?’

I chuckle. ‘That’s your funky tea.’

‘Thanks.’ She takes the pot and moves to the table.

‘For the record, you’re like a six. And that’s only because I can see your bikini through that thing.’

She laughs as she sits and everything is right between us.

* * *

We’re all lounging by the pool, reading, listening to music, dipping into the water, having a beer. It must be seventy-five to eighty, which is warm for this time of year. Maybe someone is smiling down on us.

I pull my knees up in my board shorts and bring my hands behind my head, knocking my cap forward enough to shield my eyes as I shamelessly watch Jess move from her lounger to where the music dock is on a table in the corner of the pool area. By magazine standards, she might be considered normal looking, whatever that means. She doesn’t have legs that go up to her neck. She isn’t six feet tall. She doesn’t have blonde hair that’s polished and perfectly straight and runs down to the small of her back. She’s toned but she doesn’t have abs or cut in at the hips. Her breasts aren’t large; they’re just perfectly sized for her body – and my hands. And the bones at her collarbone and sternum don’t show through her skin. So, I can’t tell you why I’m lying here with a semi-on and thinking she is an absolutely sublime human being. But damn it, she is. She’s her own person. She looks her own way. Sounds her own way. Dresses her own way. And these days, she’s confident. She’s come out of her shell in so many ways since we first met.

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