Air: Elementalist Book 1 by Rebecca Wolf (christmas read aloud .TXT) 📗

“Hey, I was just trying to do my civic duty,” he said.

I continued to stare, not moving from my position by the door.

“Fine,” he said.

We headed towards my car.

“Spoilsport,” he whispered, right before we ducked inside.

My car was an old silver Honda. I had inherited it from my mom when she died, and I didn’t have the heart to sell it.  I found I didn’t really use it much, since I bummed rides to work with Penny, and flew to all my smuggling jobs. After two false starts and some explicit curse words, it sputtered to life, and we started chugging along to our destination.

It was an upscale Italian restaurant on the harbor, and the music they played was classical jazz and swing. I had half been expecting an underground hip hop club from his behavior earlier.

“It is a pleasure to see you again, sir,” the maître de said as he sat us at a little table by the bay windows. Aiden ordered pinot grigio, I ordered iced tea, and we snacked on breadsticks and dip while they waited for our meal to arrive.

“What does your mom do for a living?” I asked.

 “Oh, she’s a proud business owner,” he responded. “It’s her dream that I will take it over eventually, but I’m kind of dragging my feet.”

Just then our meal arrived, and we both dug into heaping plates of Panzanella and Fettuccine Alfredo. I caught him looking at me periodically throughout the meal. And he gave me a mischievously seductive smile every time.  “Would you like to dance?” he asked when we finished eating the main course.

“I thought you’d never ask,”  I said, and went to join him on the dance floor. I was expecting him to do some sort of impromptu leg shuffle. It didn’t take long for me to realize how wrong I was. Aiden knew how to do actual dances, and he was definitely not a novice. In fact, he was good enough to make me look like I knew what I was doing, even though I didn’t have a clue.

He laughed when I asked him about it. “Oh, my mother made me take lessons when I was twelve,” he explained. “She told me no woman can resist a man who can dance.”

“I guess she was right,” I said, laughing, as a little old lady asked to cut in, in Italian. I went back to our table and watched them interact with each other. I was close enough to hear him flirt outrageously in Italian, making the old woman laugh and shake her finger at him.

He was perfect. Maybe too perfect, I mean, he volunteered his time at a soup kitchen, he was attractive, and he kept coming up with these hidden talents like dancing and speaking Italian. A little voice inside me said, “What else could he be hiding?” I told that voice to shut up, I was much more interested in the deep feeling bubbling up inside, filling me all the way up like helium in a balloon. Like any second, it would lift me up off the floor. It felt remarkably like what I imagined love might feel like.

He came back to our table grinning from ear to ear. “Miss me?” he asked as he kissed me lightly on the forehead.

“You’re lucky you snatched me up first Zephyr, Mrs. Romano promised to ditch her husband and run away with me to the Cayman Islands.  If I wasn’t so enamored with you already, I would have been very tempted to say yes.”

I shook my head at him and smiled, “You never told me you speak FLUENT Italian,” I said. “Why didn’t you order from the menu in Italian?”

 “I didn’t want you to feel like I was showing off,” he said somewhat sheepishly.

 “Are you even real?” I asked, poking him with a finger.

He took my finger and slid it in his mouth, sucking gently before growling, “Let’s find out. Shall we order dessert?” The way he said it made me think illicit thoughts of the two of us; sweaty, naked thoughts.

“Uhhh,” was all I was able to get out. He gave me the most insane bedroom eyes and ordered Tiramisu to go.

“The things I’m going to do to you.” he growled low, as we walked out of the restaurant. His hand gripped me firmly around the waist as he steered me towards the car.  He drove like a madman as I slid my hand along his thigh, his hands gripping the steering wheel with white knuckles. I cupped him just to see his reaction, and he groaned with need. “We’ll go to my place, it’s closer,” he ground out. We were there in minutes, I barely had a chance to make it out before he maneuvered me inside, pushing me up against the wall.

“This doesn’t seem like a farm,” I thought briefly, before he kissed at the apex of my shoulder, then behind my ear. Cupping me in his large hands, his thumbs brushed over my nipples. My thoughts flew out the window after that. “I need you,” he said breathlessly. Skimming one of his hands up my thigh, he pushed into my panties. He slid a finger over me rubbing in circles. I ground against his hand, arching back against the wall as I whimpered. “I’m going to make you cum so hard,” he growled into my ear, “you’re going to forget your own name by the time I’m done.” His expression was so intense he looked vicious. He slid a finger inside, pumping it slowly in and out while stimulating me with his palm until I was ready to scream from frustration and pleasure. He slid a second finger in and growled in appreciation, “your so wet for me,” he said, “so fucking wet.”

I reached for his zipper, unable to wait longer and tried to undo his pants. He growled in frustration into my ear. “Let me just get us a condom sweetheart, patience.”

“You don’t need a condom,”  I said breathlessly, “I can only get pregnant with