53. God Bless Presa Little

I rolled over in Carter’s bed and stretched, kicking off the covers, the smell of coffee dragging me out of sleep. I smiled, remembering the night before. It had officially been the Greatest Sex of My Life. I had the perverse urge to go online and gloat, hashtag SuckItVic. Instead, I eyed the bathroom door, hearing the sound of a shower. Glancing at my naked body, I wondered if I had time to run to his kitchen for a cup of coffee before he got out. As great as my three pilates DVD workouts had gone, I didn’t feel up to a naked dash in front of Carter’s ripped ass.

I ran for it, spilling some coffee in my pour and stealing a piece of toast off a plate in the kitchen. I was darting past the fridge when I stopped, distracted by a ticket stuck under a Mets magnet. What the … I peered closer. Yep. A Presa Damn Little ticket. A ticket that matched the two stuffed in my wallet, which I’d received from Nicole. I heard the shower turn off and booked it, my butt hitting the bed just in time to pull the sheet over me before the door opened. A barely covered, dripping wet Carter stepped out, a towel wrapped around his waist. “Good morning.”

I took a sip of coffee and smiled, still trying to work through the ticket I had just seen. I hadn’t even wanted to go to the event, preferring to avoid Nicole at all opportunities. But on the other hand, this was Presa Little. One of the most revered and most private artists of the century. She hadn’t been photographed in public since Lady Gaga wore meat. An opportunity to meet her wasn’t something I wanted to give up.

I swallowed the sip of coffee, watching him walk to the closet. He opened the door, and my question from our first hookup was answered. Absolute organization. His T-shirts were hung and sorted by damn color. “I saw your ticket to the Presa Little event.”

“Yeah.” He nodded, reaching up and grabbing a shirt.

I tried again. “So … how do you know her again?”

“She’s a friend of my parents. I knew her growing up.” He pulled his shirt on and turned toward me, boxer briefs in hand. I settled further back against the pillows, lifting my eyebrows at him when he reached for the towel. He dropped it, and I giggled despite myself, his face scowling as he stepped into his underwear. “Never laugh,” he muttered, kneeling on the bed and crawling toward me.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered behind my coffee mug. “It’s a nervous reaction.”

“So is this.” He grinned, taking my coffee cup away and pushing me back, his mouth nuzzling under the sheet and nipping at my neck.

“She must have been a good friend,” I mumbled, my eyes falling back on the giant canvas original above his bed. He pulled the sheet lower and I grabbed at it, giggling again when his mouth found its way to my newly exposed breasts. My parents’ friends were all stuffy investment types, not Presa Little—a beautiful older woman who People once called the Most Interesting Woman Alive. She had homes in Australia, South Africa, and Paris. How could she know Carter’s parents? “What do your parents do?” I suddenly realized how little I knew about the man on top of me.

“God, your mind jumps. You really want to talk about my parents right now?”

“I have tickets to the show too,” I explained. “From Nichole. I was thinking about inviting you. You know, since you know her.”

“I’ll go to the show with you.” His mouth moved lower, on my stomach, and I felt his hand slide under the sheet and up my bare thigh.

“Really?”

“Yes.” He pulled the sheet lower and my legs apart, settling between them. I giggled at the scrape of his stubble against my thigh./p>

“One final stipulation.”

“What?” I gasped out the word, his mouth brushing across me, his tongue taking a teasingly slow path over my clit.

“Right now, I get to make you scream so hard the McMullins on the fifth floor will hear you.”

“Why them?” I shuddered beneath his mouth, and his hands held me down.

“They’re deaf,” he whispered, and the hot pass of his words was another sensation I loved.

“Deal,” I groaned, and my hands twisted in the sheets as he lowered his mouth.

When I came it was loud. It was long. It was amazing.

And our date was set.

God Bless Presa Little.

I eyed the truck skeptically. “This is yours?”

Carter leaned over the bed’s side and grinned at me. “Yep. There a problem?”

“It’s a truck.” I said carefully. An old truck. Rusty, with paint peeling from its trim, it had to be from the nineties. I glanced in the window and saw a rip in the bench seat, tan padding pushing through.

“Yes.” He tilted his head. “You can back out. Won’t hurt my feelings.”

I gripped the door’s handle, a thick silver piece with a button on it. Pushing the button, I yanked open the heavy door and looked inside. At least it was clean. I glanced down at my pale blue pants. I shut the door. “Just … let me change. Two minutes,” I promised, backing up from the truck, careful not to touch my clothes.

He chuckled. “Okay.”

I took the stairs, leaving the garage and heading up to my apartment, washing my hands the minute I got inside. I wouldn’t make the two-minute promise, but I tried my best, digging through my closet until I found a ripped up pair of jeans and a Yankee T-shirt. I grabbed a baseball cap, tossed my sandals for tennis shoes, and grabbed some bottled waters from the fridge. By the time I got back downstairs, he’d turned on the truck and I pushed aside any hesitation, opening the door and climbing in.

“Better?” he asked.

“Better.” I smiled. “I think I was a little overdressed.”

The edge of his mouth turned up, a dimple showing. “Nah.”

He shifted into reverse and I buckled my seatbelt, holding on to its strap as the truck jerked into motion. No airbags in sight. I braced my feet against the floor and prayed he was a good driver.

“Turn here,” I argued, looking down at my phone.

“I can’t get around to the loading dock if I go that way.”

“Well the next road is a one-way.” I let out an irritated breath and he laughed. “What?” I growled.

“I’m just curious if you have ever, in your life, been to Long Island.”

I rolled my eyes. “I’ve been to Long Island.”

“Really.”

“Yeah. Really.” Granted, my trips had been a long way from the industrial area we were lost in.

“Let me guess…” He took a left, in a direction that went against everything that Google Maps suggested. “To the beach.” He glanced my way. “And the theatre?”

“There’s also a vineyard,” I pointed out, pursing my lips to stop a smile.

He turned down a side street and parked, somehow right in front of the tile store we’d been headed to. I glared at the sign. Dammit.

My purpose in tagging along with Carter had been to help him pick out materials. I had readily agreed, thinking it would be easy to pair a backsplash with granite, especially for someone as stylish as myself. I stared at the countertop before me, at the eighteen different options I had pulled for review, and my confidence wavered. I glanced out the window, at the truck, where Carter was helping load a vanity. His T-shirt tight, his biceps bulging, he pulled the heavy piece up into the bed. The picture was so utterly male that I almost fanned myself. I watched him as long as I could, my eyes darting away in the moment before he pulled open the store’s front door, his steps echoing across the floor toward me. “Pick something?” he asked, wiping his hands on the front of his jeans and I looked up from the options, my breath catching in my throat as I saw the damp cling of his T-shirt to his chest, the wide grin of his smile, the way his eyes even smiled at me. The man looked at me as if I were something special, a look so foreign that a part of me wanted to cry. How long could that look last? How many women had gotten it?