Parental Guidance (Ice Knights) Read online

  “Fuck.” He sat her down so she was on her counter and took a step back, bringing up his hands palm forward in apology. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t realize where I was. I just woke up and heard a noise.”

  “At least you’re a better guard dog than Anchovy,” she said, setting down the glass in her hand and shoving her long red hair out of her face. “He’s still snoring.”

  Eyes more accustomed to the dim light of early dawn, he glanced back at her bedroom. Bookcases blocked most of it from being seen, but from this angle, he could see the corner of her bed, sheets rumpled, and a dark, unmoving lump that had to be the dog.

  “Yeah, you might want to invest in an alarm system,” he said with a laugh as he turned back to her.

  As soon as he did, his amusement died away, replaced by a jolt of desire that went straight to his dick.

  Like she’d been during their FaceTime conversation the other night, she was wearing a pair of tiny sleep shorts and a thin T-shirt that did nothing to hide the heavy sway of her tits or the way her nipples had formed hard, tempting little peaks. After that call, he’d grabbed his cock and had jerked off to the memory, stroking his dick until he came hard and fast.

  Now, here she was, looking at him with desire dark in her eyes, nipples straining against the cotton of her shirt, her legs spread just enough that his could fit in the space between. Lust fired through him, tightening his muscles, hardening his dick, and making every nerve in his body focus only on Zara. All he wanted was to touch her, take her, make her come so hard on him that she wanted to do it again and again.

  They shouldn’t do this. It may not be against the rules, but that didn’t make it a good idea.

  Too bad it was getting harder and harder each time he was near Zara to remember.

  He moved to take a step back, but she reached out, stopping him.

  “Kiss me, Caleb,” she said, her voice husky with need.

  “What about the rules?” He hated himself for asking, but he was fighting to stick to what she wanted because all he wanted at the moment was her.

  “They said no making love. It didn’t mention kissing.”

  Maybe there were other men out there who would have continued to fight the attraction, to stay above it all. Well, they weren’t him, because she had found the best loophole in the world.

  His mouth was on hers in the next heartbeat and after that, he was lost to her. It wasn’t a nice kiss or a soft kiss; it had to be so much more because it was all they had. Desperate, hungry need ate away at his control as they lost themselves in the exploration of the hard, bruising kiss. Her tongue curling around his, daring him to give her more, demanding it. If it killed him, he was willing to give it all at this moment.

  She moaned, her hands clutching his shoulders as she wrapped her legs around his waist. He didn’t think, just reacted, stepping back and taking her with him, his hands cupping her ass as he carried her across the apartment and back to the couch, their mouths never leaving each other.

  As soon as he sat down with her in his lap, straddling his hips, she rocked against him, seeking the same maddening friction he needed so damn badly. He tightened his grip on her hips, pulling her against him as she undulated, giving them both a taste of what they so desperately needed.

  She arched her back, breaking the kiss and letting out a low mewl of pleasure as she moved against him. Even with the layers of clothes between them, he could feel her heat against his dick. Curling forward, she dipped her head down until their foreheads touched.

  “We aren’t kissing,” she said.

  He could fix that. Cupping the back of her head, he weaved his fingers through her red hair, pulling her mouth down to his, plundering its dangerous sweetness before trailing his lips down her neck, kissing and nipping his way along the low scooped collar of her T-shirt. She shivered in his arms when his lips brushed the upper swell of her tits, and he knew at that moment, the same way he knew the second he delivered a check, what the outcome would be. It wouldn’t be today, and it may not even be by date five, but he was going to persuade her that there was more to this—more to them—than a PR stunt.

  “Zara,” he said, looking up at her as the sun turned the sky pink and gave the apartment a soft glow. “I want to kiss you here.” His thumb brushed over the hard tip of her still-covered nipple. “Can I kiss you there?”

  He reached between them, inching the hem of her T-shirt up as he watched her face for any sign to stop, and when she pulled the bottom of her shirt out of his grasp and took it off, he offered up a prayer of thanks.

  “Start here.” She laid a fingertip at her freckle-covered collarbone. “Go here.” She slid her finger across to the top of her tits. “Then here.” Her finger glided down the side and underneath. “And finally, be sure to kiss here.” She lifted up her breast, her thumb grazing against her nipple.

  His dick strained against his jeans, and his balls tightened as a wave of need cross-checked him right into the boards, but he managed to get out a barely audible, “Yes, ma’am. I’m gonna give you that and more.”

  Then he went to work, because he could follow her coaching, but he could add a little off-the-tongue twists as well. He followed the path she’d laid out for him, and kissing his way over her skin, the freckles becoming lighter and spaced farther apart, he made his way to her pale-peach nipple, letting the overnight growth of his beard brush against the sensitive spot. He sucked the tip into his hot mouth, swirling his tongue around it and grazing his teeth over it, nipping with just enough pressure to make her moan. Her hands were in his hair, pulling him closer as she arched against him, her hands holding on to the back of the couch. Her hips rotated as she rubbed her core against him at an ever more desperate pace.

  She needed relief—needed it bad—and there was nothing more he wanted at the moment than to taste her orgasm on his mouth. Raising his mouth from her, he skimmed his hands down her sides to her hips and lifted her so while she was still grasping the back of the couch, her legs were nearly straight. He slid down so he was underneath the apex of her thighs.

  He hooked his finger in the waistband of her shorts. “There’s one more place I want to kiss.”

  “Yes, please.” She lifted one leg as he brought her shorts down on that side and slipped it free.

  As the shorts slid down the other leg, circling her ankle, he didn’t care that her shorts weren’t all the way off, not when they were both this close. He pulled her hips lower so her hot, wet core was against his mouth. Fuck, she was sweet, so good. He tasted her, licking and kissing and sucking her plump, wet folds.

  “Caleb,” she cried out when the tip of his tongue touched her clit.

  When he circled his tongue around the sensitive nub while stroking his thumb in and out of her slick entrance, her thighs started to tremble. He pulled her down more, burying himself in her as he continued lapping and sucking her clit and fucking her with his thumb, circling her entrance and driving it inside over and over until her shaking thighs stilled half a second before they clamped closed on either side of his head and she came all over his mouth.

  He slowly ran his palms over her ass and up and down her legs until her orgasm abated, then helped her lay down on the blanket she must have given him when he’d fallen asleep earlier. Dawn was full upon them now, the pink-orange rays bathing her in a golden pastel glow. God, she looked fucking delectable, sated and spent with her eyes half closed and the unmistakable red of beard burn on her inner thighs.

  It was almost impossible to remember why dating Zara for real was a bad idea. In this moment, he couldn’t shake the idea that there could be more than an agreement between them. That he wanted that. That it didn’t seem like he had a choice in wanting her. That it was too late to try to fight it even if he wanted to.

  “I think you broke me,” she said, her lips curling into a soft smile.

  Before he could say anything dumb, like me too, his phone buzzed, vibrating on the coffee table. He glanced down at the notification remindin
g him that he had twenty minutes to get to the team practice facility for an early-morning team run. Coach Peppers loved bonding activities—especially if he could schedule one early enough that his players couldn’t get up to anything stupid the night before.

  “Duty calls?” she asked, sitting up and wrapping the blanket around herself like armor. The easy bliss was gone from her expression already.

  He nodded. “Zara—”

  “Don’t say it,” she interrupted, her gaze lowered so instead of looking him in the eye, her gaze was directed at his chin. “It was just kissing. Didn’t mean a thing. I know.”

  She couldn’t be more wrong, but now wasn’t the moment to make his case, not with her chin up at that stubborn angle and her lips flattened into one thin line. He needed more time than the forty seconds he had before he needed to go or risk being too late to catch the subway to the facility—fines and lectures about being a disruptive force in the team would follow that, and he had to do everything he could to keep things on an even keel.

  “We’ll talk later,” he said as he got up and walked backward toward the door.

  “Sure, we still have an agreement, remember?” She gave him a wobbly smile. “Two more dates to go.”

  And that’s when it hit him. She had her own reasons for going on the Bramble dates, and it wasn’t to fall for a guy like him. Maybe what had just happened didn’t mean anything to her, and he was just being a sucker thinking it might be—could be—more. Wiping away the last taste of her from his mouth, he just nodded and walked out of her apartment, his steps heavier than they had been when he’d walked in last night.

  Chapter Ten

  Zara still wasn’t sure about the elephants. Of course, since Caleb had left right after she’d gone to town on his face and she had been avoiding his texts for the last two days, she’d been overthinking everything, so maybe this was more of that. Just a normal, everyday mental freak-out. That was all.

  Perfectly normal.

  Yep.

  That was her and her mini elephants.

  The miniatures scene was straight out of a fantasy, a parade of miniature rainbow-colored elephants marching up a waving ribbon of EEG readings. Each elephant followed the up-and-down path of the brain waves readings. The elephants and the ribbon got smaller and smaller the higher the EEG ribbon went until they disappeared into nothing. It was one of her earlier works when she did an entire series on idioms. She and Gemma were pulling the whole series and more out of her building’s storage vaults so she could pick ten to display as part of the ultraexclusive cocktail party to celebrate the opening of ticket sales for the Friends of the Library ball next month.

  “An elephant never forgets?” Gemma asked as she set another scene on the kitchen island.

  “Yeah, but I’m not sure if it’s right for this show.” Zara looked around, her gut doing a very uncomfortable version of the Cha-Cha Slide. “I’m not sure if any of these are right for the show. I just need to rethink this. Keep working on it. Maybe next year.”

  “What is this gibberish? These are awesome.” Gemma took Zara by the shoulders and turned her so they were facing each other. “This is what you want. What you’ve been working toward—a chance to show the world what you can do, to share this joy.”

  “It’s not good enough.” Every miniatures artisan she followed on Insta showcased work that just blew her away. Each piece was an amazing fantasy. However, when she looked at her own pieces, all she saw was the work that went into it and never the joy she felt when she looked at other artists’ work. “I can do better.”

  “So can we all.” Gemma pulled her in for a quick hug and then walked over to the stove and poured boiling water from the whistling kettle into the two mugs on the counter. “That means your work will continue to evolve and continually be fresh.”

  Zara took out the tea bags from the cupboard and handed two to Gemma. “I want it to be perfect.”

  “If you wait for perfection, then you’re never going to do it.” After adding the tea to the mugs, she handed one to Zara. “That’s not a dig, it’s an acknowledgment of the fact that perfection is unachievable.”

  She didn’t want to admit that. Life was too messy as it was. Part of the reason why she’d even begun working in miniatures was because the ability to control every last detail spoke to the need deep in her soul for order and stability. Exposing that to someone else’s eyes and asking for that judgment when every time she looked at a scene she saw something else to tweak or adjust made her palms sweaty.

  “If I put it out there and it gets shot down, then I’ll have to accept that all of this has just been a silly dream as dumb as my dad’s get-rich-quick schemes.” She took a sip of Earl Grey as she turned a skeptical gaze toward the ten scenes on the kitchen island. “Looking at this, all I can think is that I’m being an idiot for thinking that getting a face-to-face with Helene Carlyle at the ball would make any kind of impact—I’m just not ready.”

  “There’s a big difference between showing your amazing art or talking to an influential collector and your dad’s plan to start a cat-walking business.”

  Despite the emotion making the tip of her nose itch, Zara had to giggle. Her dad had gone so far as to buy professional walker leashes that would let him walk ten cats at once. The first time he’d tried it—with only five cats—had been an epic disaster. Her dad had taken the failing with a shrug and started work on his next scheme.

  Zara shook her head. “That idea was almost as inane as this whole Bramble dating thing.”

  “Well, since you brought it up, have you seen Caleb’s latest interview?” Gemma said with enough fizz-bang excitement in her voice to show just how much she’d been wanting to bring up this topic. “This one was just him and his mom, no Asha.”

  Zara’s tea became incredibly interesting—okay, the smell wafting up from her mug was amazing, but the contents itself were not. It was just that looking down was a lot better than making eye contact with her bestie, who would be able to read her thoughts and therefore know what happened the other night. She could play this cool. She could. Really.

  She didn’t bother to look up from her mug because she knew that was a lie. “I haven’t seen it.”

  “Oh, honey.” Gemma dug her phone out of her purse, brought up the video, and hit play. “Take a look.”

  Zara tried to watch the right corner of the screen instead of Caleb’s face. Then he started talking, and there was no way she could turn away. Her belly shimmied in that good-things-are-coming way as she took in the crooked line of his nose that she’d spent way too much time thinking about while thanking the universe that she hadn’t broken it again when she’d come hard enough to make her ears ring.

  Caleb and his mom sat next to each other, pivoted so they half faced each other, on the couch in the Harbor City Wake Up set.

  “You actually cooked for your third date? I didn’t think you’d go through with it,” Britany said, her eyes wide with shock. “Did you burn the place down?”

  “Very funny.” He pulled a face at his mom. “But yeah, I was a little worried about that.”

  “I still remember that time when you were in high school and the fire department had to come because you got distracted by the hockey draft while making a grilled cheese,” Britany said with a smile. “Of course, I did end up dating one of the firefighters for a while, so that almost made up for the smoke marks that went up to the ceiling.”

  “I’m never gonna live that down.” He said it as if he was laughing with his mom, but there was a tension in his jaw that belied his tone.

  “Doubtful.” She did a good-natured one-shoulder shrug. “So what was it like cooking with Zara?”

  Caleb’s smile went from perfunctory to genuine, and it was enough to make Zara’s heart beat faster.

  “It was really fun,” he said. “She has a way of making things that I would normally not be into really fun.”

  “So dinner and then what? A movie?”

  “Sorta.” The
tips of Caleb’s ears turned pink, and he looked down at the coffee table in front of the couch that someone had decorated with oversize photography books about Harbor City. “We watched some TV.”

  His mom, obviously picking up on his telltale body language, leaned in. “And that’s it?”

  Zara stiffened.

  Hello, Miss None of Your Business Even Though He’s Your Son, you can just back off now.

  Caleb must have been thinking the same thing because he didn’t mince words. “I’m not having this conversation with you, Mom—especially not when it includes the entirety of Harbor City.”

  Britany Stuckey, though, didn’t seem to be fazed. “Because you like her?”

  It was just another invasive question from Caleb’s mom, who didn’t seem to understand personal boundaries very well, but it came out different than the others. Softer. Concerned. Hopeful.

  Zara couldn’t have looked away from Gemma’s phone screen if Anchovy had started eating the just-finished, one-twelfth-size doll of Kamala Markandaya. She held her breath, not wanting to miss a syllable of his answer.

  “Because it’s the right thing to do and, yeah, because I like her,” he said, the words coming out strong and sure. “She’s really amazing. I just want to hang out with her as much as possible, even if that means learning to cook. Zara’s special.”

  For a few seconds, Caleb and his mom just looked at each other, saying so much without uttering a word. Zara’s skin was hot, and her lungs felt ready to burst, but still, she couldn’t look away. If she had, she might have missed the quick one-two-three tap of Britany’s finger on Caleb’s forearm.

  “And to think, I was the one who set up this play,” Britany said with a wink.

  Instead of rolling his eyes at his mom’s outrageousness, though, he just said, “Thanks, Mom.”

  The tip of Britany’s nose turned red, and a bright splotch of color appeared at the base of her throat as she stared at her son for a moment, speechless. It was the first time Zara had ever seen Caleb’s mom like that, but Zara could understand the feeling completely. Her own brain was in meltdown mode while her body was in heat-up mode, a totally inconvenient and unacceptable reaction to watching her not-dating partner talk to his mom about her on a video stream.