Total Abandon (4 page)

“I’m a scientist. I have my own lab in the physics department at Origins.”

One of the local bioengineering companies so successful it had recently branched out into other fields. The woman was a flipping genius. Madeline
really
ought to have mentioned that. “Okay, so you’re a brainiac.”

“I wouldn’t have mentioned it except I need your help with an experiment.”

He could only stare at her. “Not as a subject in your lab, I hope.”

“Of course not.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “You must have noticed I have a problem.”

“You mean the orgasm you didn’t have,” he said. “That’s not
your
problem. It’s your lovers’.”

“Like you?” She stared at him as if he were an idiot. “You’re a professional.”

“I can give you plenty of orgasms.” Damn, his voice was getting loud. “I will. Lots of different ways.”

“Not the right kind.”

Now this was going from ridiculous to bizarre. The right kind of orgasm? What the fuck was she talking about? “Would you like to explain that?”

“I’ll be coming into my sexual peak in a few years.” She started walking up and down in front of him. “I should be having several orgasms with every encounter, and not just with oral or digital stimulation.”

Great, digital. She’d made him sound like a computer.

She continued pacing. It appeared she had several nervous habits. “It’s a scientific fact that women are more sexual than men. If I’m to achieve my true potential, I simply have to improve my performance.”

His jaw dropped. Literally. He had to close his mouth before he resembled a moron. “I don’t believe it. A woman with performance anxiety.”

She stopped pacing and glanced at him over her shoulder. “I wouldn’t call it
anxiety
.”

“Oh, really? You’re pacing, avoiding eye contact, and biting your lip.” She was, too. She’d just done it again. Every time she did that, she reminded him of how her mouth felt under his: sweet and soft.

Of course, the moment he’d said something about the gesture, she stopped. She also turned to face him directly. “I am not anxious.”

“Sure. And if I were to put my hands on your shoulders, I wouldn’t find any tension?” Not a bad idea, actually. A massage might loosen her up.

Once he’d called her on the tension in her body, she managed to force herself to relax, more or less. Her shoulders went down to where they belonged. “You’re not helping matters.”

She was probably right about that. Most people didn’t respond well to psychoanalyzing their sex lives. He ought to stop wasting his breath and come up with more productive courses of action. Especially if they involved running his hands over her curves and kissing her everywhere.

“So, anyway,” she said. “I want to take this opportunity to make a systematic study of my sexual response. It could take several clinical trials. I hope that’s agreeable to you.”

“Depends.”

Her eyes narrowed. “On what?”

“What, exactly, is a clinical trial?”

“The scientific method.” She made a big ta-da gesture with her arms. “You manipulate a variable and measure the results.”

“And I’m the variable.”

“Not exactly.” She started to pace again, but he caught her hand and pulled her to sit down beside him.

“Stay put for a minute, would you?” he said. “You’re giving me a kink in my neck.”

“Sorry,” she said. She didn’t look sorry, though. She looked about to burst with energy. He should have let her keep walking. “What I thought was the two of us could come up with some hypotheses about why I don’t have the right kind of orgasms, and then we could try some things, systematically testing those hypotheses to see if my response improves.”

“There are so many things wrong with what you just said that I don’t know where to start.”

That won him a frosty glare. “Why not start with number one and go from there?”

“Okay.” He ticked off “one” on his index finger. He’d probably need all ten to get through this morass. “There’s nothing wrong with your response.”

Her glare turned glacial. “I disagree.”

They’d leave that one for later. He’d prove to her before the night was out that she responded perfectly well if only she’d let herself. He moved to the next finger. “Two. I’m not going to hypothesize about the wrong kind of orgasm because there is no such thing.”

“All orgasms are created equal?”

“Not exactly.” Any idiot knew some climaxes made you smile and others blew the top of your head off. Like the one he’d had a few minutes ago with this woman, even though he could hardly recognize her now. Then, she’d felt like sin and heaven all mixed up. Now, she was all starch and intellect. “But don’t you think it’s pointless to sort orgasms into good enough and not quite up to snuff?”

Her brows furrowed as if she’d never considered the possibility that any orgasm might be a good one before. “It’s not pointless to want the best. I’ve worked very hard for everything I have, including a very demanding career.”

Oh, one of those. “You drive a fuel-efficient car, belong to a gym, and only drink good wine.”

“I have to drink bad wine to qualify as a human being?”

“You’re missing the point,” he said. “Sex isn’t an acquisition. It isn’t an accomplishment. It sure as hell isn’t an achievement.”

“Are you done?”

“Not quite.” He ticked off “three” on his ring finger. “You said you want to try some things and measure the results. What things?”

“That’s where I thought you could suggest some exercises. You know, to get me over my inhibitions.”

“I can do that, all right. But I’ll give you my main hypothesis right now.” He tapped her head. “You know how they say your brain is your most important sex organ?”

Her eyes narrowed again. “Yeah.”

“That’s where your problem is, not your body. We have to figure out how to turn off the analytical mind in there.”

“I don’t think that’s possible.”

It’d be a challenge, for sure, but he still had a few tricks at his disposal. Her own body would serve as an ally. And he’d spent years learning how to give women really good climaxes. Still, they could talk intellectual matters later.

“You’re going to have to leave things to me, Angela,” he said. “As you pointed out, I’m the professional.”

She heaved a sigh. Good Lord, you’d think he’d suggested a root canal. Maybe he
would
give her something to worry about.

“And as the professional, I’m going to require that you follow my directions.” That was laying it on pretty thick, especially given that she was the one writing the check. But maybe she’d recognize his expertise the same way she did the letters after her own name. “My first direction is this: I want you to stop trying to climax.”

“What?” She stared at him. “That doesn’t make any sense. How am I going to become more orgasmic if I don’t work at it?”

Lord, give me strength.
“Work at it?”

She made an angry gesture with her hands. “That’s how you accomplish everything worthwhile in life.”

“Not
this
everything. In fact, sex is the one sure thing you can ruin by overthinking it.”

“Do you have something against intellect?” she said.

“Listen. We’re going to make love again, and when we do, I want you to think of nothing but how good it feels.” He put his hands over hers. “I want you to stay in your body and out of your mind.”

“Oh, I’m out of my mind, all right,” she said. “Paying all this money for that bit of advice.”

“Trust me.”

“I don’t know.” She jumped up, and this time he let her pace. “I like my approach better. We can vary the amount of time you spend giving me oral sex, the coital position, the speed of your thrusts, and so on, and we can measure my response.”

“With you doing your damnedest to
make
yourself come,” he said. “In some preconceived manner of how you ought to do it. Isn’t that just the most romantic way for us to spend our time together?”

“Romantic?” she repeated. “Nothing about this is romantic.”

“You’re wrong there, too. No woman wants to be fucked by a machine. She wants to be seduced.”

She put her hands on her hips. “So, now you’re an expert on women.”

“Unless you’re a lesbian, I’ve spent more time making women happy in bed than you have.”

“Very funny.”

He lounged back on his elbows and stared at her evenly. “We can do this my way, or we can call Madeline and have her send you another man. A couple of the younger guys can keep it going all night. You can manipulate all the damned variables you want with one of them.”

That would pretty much amount to using a bunch of sex toys, as she’d have to realize. She could have done that on her own without spending a huge sum to come here, and the whole exercise would be pointless. He could help her, and damn it, he wanted to. If only she’d trust him.

She tapped her foot for a moment, the wheels in her mind whirring and humming the whole time. “Madeline said you’d be good for me.”

“And I will, if you’ll let me take over and do my job.”

“Okay. We’ll do it your way.”

A
WARE THAT SHE
watched his movements, Brent set everything up for Angela’s massage, setting the oils on a nearby table and then moving around the suite’s living room placing numerous scented candles everywhere.

Still wearing the club’s robe tightly belted at her waist, she lounged against the threshold to the bedroom. “Is all that really necessary?”

“Would you rather we go to your lab? We can dress in lab coats and fuck under a sterile hood,” he said.

“I don’t know why you have to mock what I do.”

“I’m not. It’s great for what it is. It’s just not the right setting for a seduction.”

“That’s right,” she said. “You’re going to seduce me.”

“With your permission.” He’d put on his own robe before ordering the massage materials, and now he reached into the pocket for the butane lighter. He lit each candle and then hit the light switch, throwing the room into a pleasant, warm glow. As the flames flickered, the scents of the forest filled the air around them. With everything set, he gestured toward the massage table. “My lady.”

She straightened and removed her robe, once again giving him a view of her glorious body. Her legs went on forever, graced at the juncture with the dark curls that covered her pussy. Lyre-shaped hips and nicely rounded breasts suggested she was all woman. In the dim light, her hair appeared blacker than its true brown, framing her face and making her look like a goddess. Venus, of course. His own symbol of love and lust for the next hours. She moved gracefully as she crossed the room to the massage table. Then she stretched out on her stomach, adjusting her head so her face would fit into the hole at the top.

Brent opened a bottle of oil and took a sniff. Too floral. The next had a more citrus tang, which wouldn’t drown out the perfume from the candles. He poured some into his hand and worked it between his palms to warm it before spreading it on her shoulders. As he’d suspected, she held quite a bit of tension there, and he worked his fingers into the knots. “Tell me about your first sexual experience.”

“Not much to tell,” she said. “Dorm room. My boyfriend paid his roommate to get lost for an hour.”

“You waited until college?”

“I went to college at seventeen. Before that, my life was all advanced placement science classes and lab work.”

As he’d suspected. A brainiac for sure. He continued with the muscles of her shoulders, and they softened under his fingers. “How did it go?”

“Fast.”

“That’s all there was to it? Fast?” She sighed, and he moved his hands lower to her shoulder blades and below.

“His was the first erect penis I’d ever seen,” she said. “I thought it was huge and it would never fit inside me.”

“Was he really big?” He continued, splaying his fingers over her ribs and pressing his thumbs into her spine.

“Thinking back now, I have no idea. But the whole thing hurt like hell, and in a minute it was over,” she said.

“I’m sorry. It should have been better.”

She turned her head and glanced up at him. “The first time’s never any good.”

“I beg to differ,” he said. “Now resume the position.”

She huffed but did as he’d ordered. He continued massaging her, moving lower. When he got to her ass, he stopped for more oil. Flesh this amazing deserved nothing but the best. He was in the process of kneading one buttock with both his hands when she cleared her throat.

“Was your first time good?” she asked.

“I’d never felt anything so wonderful in my life.”

“Tell me about it.”

Most of his clients didn’t express interest in his personal life, but occasionally one would. Most of the guys had a rule that clients could ask anything, but they’d answer only what they wanted. The story of how he’d lost his virginity was safe enough and rather funny, when you got right down to it. He might as well share.

“Mary Ellen Rorhardt,” he said. “She was a year ahead of me in school.”

“Ah, a cougar.”

“Most definitely.” He moved to her other buttock, this time taking more notice that the lips of her pussy lay only inches from his fingers. He could easily stroke them to see what she’d do. Would her engine rev up into high gear again? Would moisture seep out onto his fingers? If that happened, he’d become erect as he’d been before. Already his cock was thickening. It wouldn’t require much more to start tenting his robe.

“. . . did she do?” Angela was saying.

“I’m sorry.”

“Mary Ellen Thorndike—”

“Rorhardt.”

“Mary Ellen,” she said. “How did she seduce you?”

“Her parents used to leave her home alone a lot. She asked me over to help her with math.”

Angela twisted and glanced up at him again. “I thought you weren’t any good at math.”

He swatted her bottom. “What did I tell you?”

“Sorry.” She turned her face back into the hole.

“Inviting me over had nothing to do with studying.” Before she could think up any more questions, he gave in to temptation and slid a finger between her pussy lips. In response, she stiffened, but as he stroked her, gliding along the seam between them, she relaxed again. And sure enough, she dampened. Just this contact could elevate her temperature a bit.