Free The Dirty Secret by Kira A. Gold Page A

at that bed, aware that he was turned on by a piece of furniture, and he hadn’t even imagined her in it yet, wearing her pajama shirt and the tights with flowers. Or less than that, her hair a damp tangle on her head, and her naked mouth and— fuck. Donna Edith was right. He was starved for sex.
    A low table sat in the center of the room, along with another teapot. Two armchairs rested on either side, and opposite was a folding screen blocking a bamboo shade on the wall. He pulled the string and the curtain rolled up, exposing a blank space and a piece of paper with flat-screen TV here? written on it in a curling scrawl, next to prices and dimensions from several stores. Another paper had a drawing—a pencil sketch that ran to watercolor—of a light fixture, a hanging sconce with a lantern, titled Could something like this go over the bed? Already wired with outlet below . Under that, tacked up with a sewing pin, was a list:
    ASK KILLIAN:
    Buy books for shelves?
    Dimmer switch?
    What does he like on pizza?
    He rubbed his thumb over his name and his breathing grew ragged. He left the den like he was drugged, staggering to the bathroom she’d painted, and wrenched the button on his pants that chafed at his cock. His underwear was already wet with pre-come. He was sixteen again, out of control with thoughts of a girl. He grabbed his cock with both hands, one pumping the shaft, the other palming the tip, and in seconds he was almost there, aching balls tight.
    Blind to everything except his vision of her on that bed, he remembered the way she smiled at him. Her eyes glittery, lashes everywhere. Her ass in the air, draped by the dress, so, so round , all the curves defined by the fabric. Her mouth, forming the words spontaneous fuck .
    His release surged through him, and he shook with the spasms, gasping into the empty house. He caught the mess in his hand, panting, the guilty reflex making him look over his shoulder. The bathroom door wasn’t even shut. Killian rinsed his fingers off, refusing to meet his own gaze in the mirror, still unsatisfied.

Chapter Five
    Vine Dining
    Vessa pushed the door open, calling, “Hello?” but there was no answer. She propped the door and unloaded the disassembled table—first the legs, then the extension leaves and the plastic bag of bolts that went with it all.
    A light glowed from the hallway, and the door to the library room was open. Vessa stepped inside. The soft lighting came from a wall fixture very similar to what she’d drawn, and exactly where she’d wanted, above the daybed. The bamboo curtain was rolled up, the blank spot on the wall filled with a flat-screen television.
    Her notes lay in a neat pile on top of the coffee table. In the center was her list of questions for Killian, and in blue pen, after each, he’d written: YES. YES. ANYTHING EXCEPT ANCHOVIES. His handwriting was square, perfect capital letters like typewriting. Underneath was written:
    ASK VESSA:
    DINING ROOM NEXT?
    BEER OR WINE WITH PIZZA?
    She brought in the chairs that matched the table, leaving them against the dining room wall. On the note from the library, she wrote Yes and Rum and Coke and beneath that, Sunday evening? She tacked it to the wall above the table parts and the chairs and left again, stopping at a gas station to top off the tank of Manny’s van, the promised payment for borrowing it. She hadn’t meant to ask Killian out for dinner—she was just going to bring him a spare pie from work—but beer or wine made it an occasion, a dinner for two.
    Vessa had no idea if this was a date or a design meeting over some food. He hadn’t seemed interested in her the other night.
    Well played, Killian Fitzroy, Architect of Clever Houses.
    “Do you have books?” she asked her landlord ten minutes later, reluctantly handing over the keys. His van was as marvelous as he was, with multicolored sparkling paint and plush seat covers. It had personality, too, complaining in reverse and impatient at