🔥STEAMY ALERT—it's a borderline "2 fires" BUT... not quite ;) 🔥

♫ I'm not the kinda girl who runs around like this,
Caught up in a kiss,
Best friends with benefits, no ♪
(Ashley Tisdale—Hot mess)

"You good, Cora?" Nikita stood in the doorway to the control room, her layers of flowery skirts whooshing over the threshold. With one brow arched, she peered at Coralie as if questioning her sanity.

Coralie, her lips glued to the microphone, broke from the trance she'd been in. Her tongue was so close to rolling around the microphone's tip as if it were something else—Chester's penis, for example—that she gasped and jumped off her stool. "Oh, man. I'm... sorry. Can we start over?"

"We can, but..." Nikita slid farther into the studio, her bare feet padding over the white-wood floorboards. "Are you sure you want to keep working on that song? You're zoning out. Maybe it's too slow." She scratched her chin and squinted. "Something more upbeat, yeah? That, or we need to get you more coffee."

Coralie's eyes widened as she adjusted her slouched posture and resumed her spot on the stool in front of the microphone. "No more coffee, no." The last thing she needed was to be jittery on top of distracted; and she'd already had too much caffeine that day. The more coffee she drank, the more the taste reminded her of the meet-up with Chester at the coffee-shop. Which reminded her of his eyes, his scent, his hands, his body pressed to hers—

"What is up with you, today?" Nikita appeared beside Coralie, but she hadn't sensed her sneak over. "Are you sick? Or unfocused? How can I help you? Do you have any songs that have faster tempos? Or lyrics to get you going? We only have so much time allotted, because a more prominent artist reserved the space." She checked her neon pink watch. "For thirty minutes from now."

Though her stomach was unsettled and she'd been nauseous most of the morning, Coralie wasn't sick, no. Not clinically, at least. What she suffered from was intense, insufferable lust towards someone she couldn't and wouldn't give in to, but whose proximity made her ill with desire. Whose features wouldn't leave her mind and haunted her through every daily activity.

How could someone she'd gotten over a long time ago and rarely thought about in years be so suddenly engrained in her thoughts and unable to forget? A reunion over coffee, an evening with drinks, and a close encounter in an elevator couldn't be enough to justify her hunger, right? Not when she had Ryan satisfying her every physical urge—even those she didn't know she had—and Michael filling her heart with care and kindness and affection. What room was there for someone like Chester in her life, even if she were allowed to have him? And what could he provide that the other two didn't?

Thrills. Risks. Adrenaline.

"I'm good... but I think I haven't been sleeping right." It wasn't a lie; since Chester had re-entered her life she'd been restless, and she anticipated that that night, she wouldn't get much rest either. All she could think about was stripping her clothes and waiting for Chester to come in and ravish her. Or singing some sappy, sexy song to him as he watched her through the glass, in the control room. That idea prompted her to realize what she needed was to let it all out—to belt out her emotions through a tune. "And actually, I've had some other lyrics in my brain lately, but we haven't put them on a track, yet."

"Which ones?" Nikita cocked her head and crossed her arms as she analyzed Coralie's facial expression, reading into it as if thumbing through the pages of a delectable novel. "Have you submitted them to me or Andrew?"

Andrew was Nikita's counterpart, though he usually worked with the bigger singers at the label. Coralie was intimidated by him, as he was himself a well-known performer, and had accompanied a few of her songs when she first sang them. He was older, but had a handsome, silver fox-like appearance, and he radiated positive energy and a sunshine aura at all times. Coralie didn't doubt that he and Nikita slept together, though he was married. But she didn't want to ask questions that would bring animosity to the office atmosphere.

"To you, yes," said Coralie, adjusting the microphone. As she gripped it, she once more pictured it as a penis, and recoiled, deciding it was best if she didn't touch anything feeling similar to a man's sexual organ for the rest of the day. "The one called Tasty."

"Tasty?" Nikita blinked, and the corners of her lips quirked into a sly smile. "Really? Feeling frisky, are we? That one's steamy, yeah?"

Sensing her cheeks flaring with heat, Coralie glanced at her shoes. "Yeah. I'm in a... mood, I guess."

When she imagined Chester's beat-up black Converse shoes sliding between hers, and his knees touching hers, and his hardened member against her lower half, she jerked her chin back up to view Nikita re-enter the control room. She said something to the sound engineer, who nodded and motioned at one of the guys that had been chilling on the leather couch in the background.

Nikita reemerged, followed by said guy, who carried an acoustic guitar. He sat on a chair a few feet from Coralie and began strumming the strings.

"This is Mark," said Nikita, as Mark parted his long, greasy, green-tinted hair and flashed a grin of greeting at Coralie. "He'll accompany you, but he'll follow your lead, however fast or slow you want the tempo to be. Once you figure out your rhythm, we'll start recording. But make it quick, yeah?" She peeped at her watch again. "Time's rolling."

Coralie pulled up the lyrics on her phone—she had a folder with all her compositions in it—and reviewed them. She reread each verse in a low whisper to get reacquainted with the rhymes, the alliterations, the prose. With each word she muttered, she recalled how she'd written these lyrics for Ryan. But now, they were more inclined towards Chester and her growing urge to see him naked again.

"I feel dizzy..." She licked her lips. "You make me shake. My most beautiful mistake..." She swallowed, ignoring the pulsations in her lower abdomen. But as she moved her legs, the friction from her pants against her labia sent a horde of sultry shivers up her spine. She crammed her mouth shut not to moan in delight.

Why hadn't she finished pleasuring herself earlier, in her office, before the studio session? She'd touched herself, yes. She'd felt the wetness pooling there, and considered flicking her fingers around to get off real quick before having to record. Maybe that satisfaction would have helped her now, despite being temporary. With that relief, she'd be able to focus, to stop plunging into this dream-world where she and Chester could indulge in whatever fantasies they wanted to without reprimand.

"Tasty like red wine..."

She groaned as images of her and Chester sipping from wine glasses resurfaced in her brain. Real images, depicting that night at the rooftop bar, where they'd stood side by side and peeked out at the courtyard and rehashed old parties and revisited memories that made them smile. But then the image morphed into something else. It flashed to him shoving her up against the glass, lifting her ruby-red dress up to her hips, and easing a finger under the hem of her lacy panties. The picture blurred as he inclined into her, his tongue tracing the length of her jaw, from earlobe to earlobe, while his breaths tickled from her neck to the drop between her breasts. And then the sound of his pants unzipping—

"You all right?" Nikita tipped in from the control room, her glance inquisitive, her voice impatient. "Mark, did you catch a rhythm from her?"

"Yeah," he grumbled, fumbling with a few sounds until he discovered something that made him perk up. "Yeah, she was whispering the words, but I figured it out." He twisted to Coralie. "This sound decent to you?" He played several notes that spoke to Coralie right away; as if his neurons had connected to hers and written the melody she'd always envisioned for the lyrics.

"Wow," she said, acquiescing to his music. "I didn't even realize I was speaking loud enough for you to hear."

Mark tucked a strand of hair behind his ear and leaned over his guitar. "I'm trained to hear stuff most people don't."

She applauded him, then got cozy on the stool before throwing a thumbs' up at Nikita and the sound engineer. "We got it."

Coralie allowed Mark to strum up an intro, then he counted her in, his foot tapping to the floor in tempo with her words. They were in sync, and she was impressed by his skill, his ability to pluck up a tune with only a few verses.

At first, she remained concentrated, entranced by the melody, still shocked at how well it fit the atmosphere, at how it devoured her words with such allure, such passion, it was as if they were always meant to meet. But soon, her sentiments caught up to her, and her downwards spiral of trying and failing to resist the appeal of Chester restarted.

"Turn me upside down, pin me down..."

She gripped the microphone, gritting her teeth, doing her hardest to stop picturing the musical device as something it wasn't. As something long, firm, fleshy, tasty, like the song's title implied. But if she didn't hold on to something, if she didn't keep her hands busy, she'd be tempted to let them crawl into her pants and resume what she hadn't dared finish earlier.

"Wrestle with me under the sheets..."

By the time she'd finished singing, her face was hot as lava, sweat had gathered at her temples, and she was certain she'd need to change her underwear. But if anyone had noticed her messy self, they said nothing, and clapped after her final notes.

Nikita almost appeared as flustered—the song was shocking, for sure—as she hurried out into the studio, praising Coralie's effort. "Now that was something else," she said, ushering Mark from the area while sneaking a peek at her watch. She then patted Coralie's back, implying she needed to leave, too. "Different from your usual. Not that you're shy with your other songs, but this felt... personal. Like you were into it, like you were eating someone up with those lyrics. Like the night of your gig... ah, I get it." She winked as she nudged Coralie through the control room. "It was written for that same guy, huh? The one you left with that night."

Coralie's cheeks couldn't possibly get any hotter, yet they did, as if the sun had caressed them with its deadly rays. "Uh... yeah. Yeah, it's true." She fanned her face, unsure what was making her so flushed, so uncomfortable. Was it the fact that she had, indeed, concocted these words for Ryan? Or the fact that she now thought of Chester as she sang them?

Once in her office, she locked the door and hastened to her chair, that she turned to face the wall. Her body was melting, screaming, begging for a reprieve, and she no longer had any choice if she didn't want to keep embarrassing herself at her place of work. So right there, surrounded by corridors full of co-workers going about their business, she pulled her leggings down and pushed her underwear's linings aside.

As expected, she was welcomed by a warm moisture that caused her lips to part into a relaxed smile. She should have been stressed or worried about being discovered, but she'd sealed the door. And most of her colleagues would be going to lunch by that point, anyway. Why fret over them when she desperately needed to fret over herself?

She didn't hesitate to rub her most sensitive spots, slowly at first, with her eyes closed. Then once she located her favorite, most erogenous area, she flitted faster, faster, rattling her chair with her movements. As she fixed on the blank wall before her, she imagined Chester there, admiring her, chewing on his lip, stroking his penis in arousal. Or on his knees in front of her, his tongue in place of her finger, flicking and flicking and flicking—

"Oh, fuck," she said, trembling in pleasure as she reached her climax. She couldn't move, with one leg up on the arm-rest, the other hanging limply off the seat, her toes grazing the ground. "Fuck, fuck, fuck." If she didn't have to get back to work, she'd have stayed that way, continuing to envision the naughty, nasty turn her life had taken.

But instead, she cleaned herself up, and got to typing up and submitting songs as if nothing had happened. And she kept her door locked... in case another urge snuck up on her.

***

The day droned on, and Coralie fought between wanting to touch herself again or take a nap at her desk. Staring at the screen for hours had left her restless and exhausted. When the clock struck four-thirty and Nikita told her to leave, she was almost too eager to get home and into a cold, frozen shower.

But to her dismay and absolute horror, her crazy day wasn't over yet. She had to share the elevator with the one person who wouldn't fade from her brain; the one whose existence had tortured her all day.

Two seconds into her descent to the ground floor, the doors parted and Chester came in, sporting a massive smile the instant his eyes met hers. "Cora," he said, his voice low in his throat, tempting, tormenting. "Seems we can't stay away from each other, huh?"

Inadvertently—or maybe it was on purpose, she couldn't tell—she glared at him. "Unfortunately."

His eyebrows scrunched, and he fluttered forward, likely intent on pinning her to the wall like last time. But she skidded out of his perimeter before he could.

"Hey," he said with a pout. "What's up with that?"

"Stop it." She gulped and hopped to the other side of the elevator, distancing herself as much as the small space would allow. "You can't keep pushing into me, or spying on me, waiting for us to bump into each other again."

"Whoa." He chuckled, then pinched the bridge of his nose as he spun to examine her. "You think I've been spying on you? Sweetheart." He bit his lip in that impossible-to-resist way that Coralie hadn't been able to stop thinking about. "It's coincidental, every time. This is fate, baby."

"Fate? Baby?" She sneered; she had no clue how else to mask her worsening hunger for him. "No."

Averting her gaze, she realized all too late that she shouldn't have let him out of her sight. Because as soon as she looked askance, he wormed up to her and planted both hands on either side of her head. He leaned in, took a deep breath, then pressed his lips to hers. And though she wanted to kick him off, to claw at his cheeks, to weasel out of his trap, a fickle, famished part of her forced her to stay in place. That craving for him, that fantasy of them being able to give in to their desires... there it was, happening in real time. And she didn't want to stop it.

So as his tongue prodded into her mouth, and his surprisingly soft lips continued to crush hers, and his hands wandered all over her body, she enjoyed it. She drank in every bit of him, knowing this adventure couldn't last, that the elevator doors would soon crack open, and she'd be back to reality. Whatever occurred in that elevator—in this case, him smashing her to the wall and slipping his tongue down her throat—had no means to escape out into the open, and to reach Ryan's, or even Michael's ears. No one would find out, and she wouldn't tell.

And she also wouldn't tell that, as Chester disconnected from her and crept out of the elevator before she could interrogate him on his daring decision, she wiped her lips with her thumb and smirked. That she'd found a certain ecstasy in the risk, the danger of being caught. And that as she walked out of the building, she was dripping wet in her underwear, and unsure how fast she could get home and away from the perilous impulse that was Chester Chase.

♥♥♥