Any Trope But You

Chapter 17 Margot

17 MARGOT

Thighs .

I’d challenge anyone seated across from Forrest Wakefield in a sauna to think of anything else. I thought I’d been strategic in sitting as far from him as possible on the opposite bench, but only now, faced directly with the spread of his muscular legs and tiny towel, do I realize my miscalculation. Is it too late to move to the bench perpendicular to his? What would I say? Sorry, I have to move before I accidentally beg you to crush me between those thighs like a grape!

Forrest also seems to be questioning his decision to stay. His eyes keep landing on random parts of me before hastily jumping away like my body is a game of Floor Is Lava. Which, honestly, isn’t too far off the mark. To put us both out of our misery, I finally hazard a “So…”

The only problem, of course, is that I have exactly zero follow-up thoughts to this brilliant segue except the word “thighs,” or possibly “chest.”

“So,” he repeats, clinging to the word like I’ve tossed him a lifeline.

“Why couldn’t you sleep?” I manage eventually. It seems my brain is, in fact, capable of words that aren’t body parts if I keep my eyes on my own knees.

“I could ask the same of you,” he deflects. My traitorous eyes look up in time to see him running a hand through his damp hair. “Did Savannah make you cry again?”

I let out a half-laugh. “What gave it away? My existential ennui or panda eyes?”

He lifts a burnished shoulder. “That letter with the Halloween Polaroid nearly made me cry, and I didn’t even read it.”

I roll my eyes fondly. “That’s nothing. You should see her when she wants something and becomes the physical embodiment of that sad song they sing in ASPCA commercials.”

“I think you’re referring to ‘Angel’ by the great Sarah McLachlan.”

I smirk and cross my legs. “Top song on your workout playlist?”

He leans his head back against the sauna wall, exposing his throat. “Nah, I only work out to Taylor Swift.”

My surprised laugh turns into a cough.

“Here,” he says, passing his water bottle.

“Thanks,” I say, taking a long, grateful pull of icy water while trying not to get hot and bothered over sharing a straw.

“I didn’t take you for a Swiftie,” I say. “Savannah’s going to adore you.”

I catch what I’ve implied only after it leaves my mouth and spend the next few seconds trying to evaporate into the steam.

“She sounds like a fun roommate,” he says mercifully. “Do you keep tissues in every room?”

I stick my tongue out at him as I pass the water back, but the homesickness I’ve been wading in ever since arriving in Alaska seems to rise up like the tide around me. When I say, “She’s the most fun,” it comes out less like a snappy retort and more like I’m wishing myself condolences.

Forrest stares at me through the humid air, his eyes soft on my face. “You miss her.”

The way he says it, tender as a bruise, doesn’t make it sound like an understatement. I cross my arms across my towel a little tighter. “I’ve never been away from her this long,” I admit. “Ever.”

“Is that why you couldn’t sleep?” he asks. “Homesickness?”

I brush away the sweaty baby hairs curling around my face. “Not exactly. I needed to hit my word count, so I was working late. I saved reading her letter as a treat.”

“No reward like a good crying jag,” he says with a half-smile, reaching over to ladle water over the hot rocks and setting every one of his shining muscles into motion. When the hiss of steam clears, he sits back, adjusting his towel over his flexing thighs. “Saving your letter for after work, though: your self-restraint’s impressive.”

Forrest-slash-forest-scented steam swirls around my face, and a punch-drunk laugh nearly skips out of me. You have no idea, buddy .

I clear my throat. “I’m trying to finish my manuscript before I leave,” I explain, crossing my legs tighter.

“And how’s the story coming?” he asks, picking up his gaze from where it accidentally dropped into my lap. “Writing another bestseller?”

The question catches me off guard. “Honestly?”

He nods.

“I’m not sure.” I exhale, leaning my head back with a soft thunk against the cedar planks. “I sent the first half off to my agent, and I’m not usually nervous about feedback, but I’m writing in a new genre, and I guess…” I swallow, and sweat that’s been collecting in the dip at my throat makes a ticklish escape down the center of my chest. “I guess I’m worried I sent her a trash fire and she’s trying to figure out how to put me down gently.”

Forrest makes a scoffing sound, and I look up from where my eyes have drifted to the planes of his stomach. “No way,” he says, shaking his head.

“You seem awfully confident for someone who’s never read my work,” I say.

At this, Forrest takes a long drink of water. Shifts a quarter inch to the left, like it might remove his giant body from my line of sight.

“ Have you read my work?” I ask, astonished.

His gaze lifts to mine, and for the first time since I met him, he looks nervous about something other than my lack of wilderness know-how. His already flushed cheekbones deepen in color, and he rubs the back of his hand across his sweaty brow.

“You have read my work.” I gasp, clutching at my towel like I’ve been exposed. “Which book?” I demand. “ Between Two Worlds ? Warmest Regards ?”

For a moment, he bites his lips together, studying me. “Honestly?” he asks, echoing my own uncertain question from earlier. I nod, feeling like I’m standing on the precipice of something I’m too scared to look down at.

He sighs, and his expression turns apologetic. It’s my only warning before he takes that final step off the ledge and pulls me with him.

“All of them.”

My stomach bottoms out, but the initial shock soon crystallizes into an unfamiliar anxiety. I’m not ashamed of my work. I carefully craft stories designed to provide escape, hope, and pleasure to a well-deserving audience I’ve been missing more with every passing day. But I never imagined Forrest, aka Dr. Serious McEyebrows who casually pulls in $2.5 million research grants, would take the time to read all my smutty romance novels. It makes me feel like I’ve been caught with my pants down, except worse, because I’m not even wearing any.

It begs the panicky question: Has he read all of my work? As in my Happily Never Afters too? Does he know about my fall from grace?

“And by ‘all of them,’?” I say delicately, hoping he doesn’t notice the pulse racing in my neck, “do you mean all of them?”

His eyes never leave mine. After a very loaded pause, he says, “Yes,” and I can hear it in his somber voice. The regret for having pried into the tattered remnants of my career. For finally figuring out why I ran away to Alaska. But there’s something else in his voice. A ringing edge to that “yes” that almost sounds angry.

“And?” I ask, my voice barely above a whisper.

That small opening is all he seems to need. His fists clench, and even through the steam, there’s no mistaking the rising anger in his eyes. “It’s bullshit,” he declares. “It’s no one’s business what you write for yourself, and it’s no one’s business to punish you for what you’ve obviously been through. That list of Happily Never Afters was honest and raw, and your readers should have fucking applauded you for it. They don’t deserve your words after what they’ve done, and if your new book is half as good as your other ones, you’re giving them way too much.”

In the silence following this—outburst? proclamation?—it takes me a few moments to pick my jaw up off my lap before I can even think of responding. Forrest has read my entire backlist. Forrest loves my words. But somehow this is nothing— nothing —to how it makes me feel that he loves those words too. The ugly, mean, and wounded ones that I tried hiding away from the world.

In the low, misty light, he’s staring at me like a sweat-streaked warrior ready to do battle for my right to tell the truth about chronically limp dicks and late child support. I blink as the corners of my eyes begin to sting. Ever since I arrived in Alaska, I’ve done my best to shove the fallout of the HNA leak into a tiny box so I could focus on my new book. Until this moment, I hadn’t realized how truly exiled I’ve felt from the world. But having another person in my corner—having him in my corner—makes me feel braver. Like I’ll be able to leave this retreat from society with my head held high.

“Forrest, I—”

But I stop myself, because the last thing I want to do is accidentally reveal the dangerous rush of emotions that are making my insides feel like a wind turbine. Instead, I say faintly, “I can’t believe you read romance novels. You seem more like a Scientific American kind of guy.”

The tension breaks, and he laughs in surprise. “I am a Scientific American kind of guy,” he confirms before his smile fades slightly. “But I guess I’m a Margot Bradley kind of guy now too.”

I let out a breath of disbelief as my ribs tighten around the sudden unfurling, unspooling, and unfolding happening in the center of my chest. I pull my towel tighter, afraid it might come undone from the expansion happening inside me.

“You never answered my question,” I say suddenly, latching on to anything that will take his focus off me.

“Your question?” he repeats, dragging his eyes away from where my hands grip the towel beneath my cleavage.

“Why you couldn’t sleep.”

His lashes lower. “It’s nothing,” he says. “Just leftover work stuff from back home.”

My insides twist a little. He’s been honest with me, hasn’t he? On the mental scoreboard I’m keeping, there’s a solid one in his column and an unacceptable nothing in mine.

“It’s the grant,” I say, leveling him with my gaze. “Isn’t it?”

It’s Forrest’s turn to look like he’s been hit in the gut with a rubber mallet. “How do you—”

“I saw the email. And before you accuse me of snooping, I’ll have you know it was just up on the computer for anyone to read. I didn’t go searching.”

Forrest wipes a hand down his face. Rubs it across his broad chest like he’s checking for a heartbeat. I do an involuntary Kegel.

“Well, shit,” he says flatly.

“Is that why you couldn’t sleep?”

“Yes,” he admits, exhaling. He brings his feet in closer toward the bench, spreading his thighs a little wider. My gaze drops to where the small towel is slung like a hammock between them. He seems unaware that the opening has parted into a slit up his inner thigh, barely hiding him from view. I know I should look away, and yet, I’ve never tried so hard to develop telekinesis.

After seeming to weigh his words, he goes on. “I asked for more time to make my decision, but there’s… pressure. The organization behind the grant is very eager to make an announcement.”

At the revelation that he didn’t immediately turn the grant down, the bright, unwieldy feeling inside my chest feels like it’s beating its wings against the dark box I’ve crammed it into. A small, selfish voice inside of me begins chanting, Take the grant. Take the grant. Take the grant , like I’m casting a spell.

“What will you do?” I ask, trying so hard to be impartial that I sound like a too-cool teenager asking if my crush is going to the mall this weekend.

Forrest’s throat works in a hard swallow. “I have to turn them down.”

“But your work,” I say, a hint of desperation bleeding into my voice. “It’s important, Forrest. I’m sure there’s a way to help Trapper and—”

“Would you leave Savannah?” he cuts in.

I feel the trapped thing in my chest crumple in on itself, cringing away from the question. “No,” I whisper.

He nods tightly, and I don’t fully understand why my disappointment is so crushing. I already knew this was the decision he’d make. More than that, I understand probably better than anyone why he has to make it. The heat is obviously getting to me. Even if he did move back to California, it’s not like we’d be anything more than we are now. I have Savannah and the burning trash flotilla of my career to take care of.

But for once in my life, even that doesn’t feel like enough.

“I guess it’s settled, then,” I say, wiping a rolling bead of sweat from my temple. “You should email them back tonight. No point torturing yourself.” I look at the door of the sauna, suddenly wanting to escape. “Anyway, I should probably head back. It’s late.”

I stand, leaving a wet, ass-shaped stamp on the hot planks of wood where I’ve been sitting. To my alarm, Forrest stands too. My head swims as I stare at him, watching rivulets of moisture snake down his torso with every breath he takes. His high cheekbones are flushed, his eyes dark.

“Work isn’t the only thing making it hard to say no,” he says in a low rush. Like it’s been yanked from him.

I’m lightheaded. It has to be the heat. Still, I make no move toward the door.

“What is it, then?” I say as my pulse begins pounding in my ears. I swear I can feel every individual bead of sweat on my body. The feeling in my chest is putting up a fight again, pushing against the walls I’ve constructed around it to protect myself.

Forrest shakes his head, jaw muscles jumping. “It doesn’t matter. I’ll have to settle for my own Happily Never After.”

My eyes lift away from the contrast of his olive skin and the bright white of the towel. How tightly he’s gripping it. I can barely hear myself think over the throb of my blood. I want him. I want him to touch me so I’ll forget about losing him. We have three weeks left together. Isn’t that better than nothing? I’m desperate. High on his ridiculous evergreen-scented sweat and his big romance hero body and his forest-green gaze and every other silly trope he puts to shame. It’s why my hands are sliding up the warm terry cloth of my towel, almost without my permission.

“There’s another option, you know,” I say, my heart beating against my chest like it’s trying to make a prison break.

“Tell me,” he says hoarsely, taking a step closer.

I hook a shaking finger into the spot where my towel is tucked above the swell of my breasts. The fabric is tight and damp from my sweat and the steam. All my red tape is waving like banners in the wind behind me, but all I can see is him. As the fabric gives a little, the thing in my chest flares hot enough to burn down every wall around it. Forrest’s eyes drop to my hand, his full lips parting like his entire future depends on what I’m about to do. Heart in my throat, I give one firm tug, and the towel falls. “Happy for right now.”

“Jesus Christ,” he rasps, his eyes roaming over me wildly. He moves in close, and I’m struck anew by how much larger he is than me. “Happy for right now?” he repeats as one of his hands comes to cradle my upturned jaw.

I nod, my breath shortening to small, quick gulps as his thumb glides over my cheekbone. “Just till I leave,” I negotiate. “We’ll keep it simple.”

“There’s nothing simple about this,” he argues, but his thumb has moved to the corner of my mouth. His long fingers are trailing down my neck, making my nipples pinch. “We said we wouldn’t do this.”

“I did try to walk out,” I say, shifting closer to him. I watch a bead of sweat slide from his throat into his chest hair as his thumb begins stroking my bottom lip, and I know the scales have tipped for him too. That the pain of fighting this has become more unendurable than the fear of giving in. Still, I ask him, “Should I try again?”

“No,” he says quickly, stepping in so close, my breasts brush beneath his chest. We both suck in a harsh breath, and as my lips part, a sudden nonnegotiable need to taste him coaxes my tongue out. I tentatively lick the salty pad of his lingering thumb, and the sound he makes is tortured.

Slowly, I close all remaining space between us, looping my arms around his toweled waist. Forrest curses as he looks up at the ceiling slats, but he doesn’t pull away. Instead, the thumb I’m kissing eases slowly but purposefully into my mouth. Lightning cracks through my stomach, striking hard and hot between my legs. Looking up at him through my lashes, I raze my bottom teeth against his calloused skin before sucking slowly. He makes a deep, soft groan as his other hand slides to my lower back, pulling me tighter against him. I can feel whatever he’s working with angled down against the towel between us, pressing hard into my belly and beyond my hip bone like a steel bar.

I gasp lightly around his thumb, and he drags it from my mouth down to my chin. He pinches it firmly and tilts my face up, his eyebrows drawing together as if they could summon thunder. When he speaks, his voice is deep and coarse. “You really think ‘happy for right now’ will be enough? Three weeks of this and then nothing ?”

The wild, untamed feeling in my chest escaped the moment he touched my face. Now it’s vibrating in every cell of my body, throbbing with two words: never enough. Never enough. My teeth skim my bottom lip, trying to scrape the last taste of him into my mouth. “It has to be enough.”

His eyes search mine, moving back and forth between them like he’s looking for another option. “Fucking hell,” he says with a desperate catch in his voice. The hand on my back becomes a bracing forearm, and then he’s jerking me up on my tiptoes, bending me backward as his mouth comes down against mine. My arms go up, circling his warm neck to pull myself even closer. The last week without his kiss has been a torment. The last thousand weeks without his kiss have been a torment. The hand that isn’t gripping my waist slides into my hair, supporting my head and neck, and my knees turn to liquid. For all his strength, I feel him trembling too. Like a man deprived, he catches his lips against mine in quick, frustrated presses, unable to get what he needs fast enough. I open up for him in response, needing him deeper, and every stroke of his tongue and sharp nip of his teeth is like a warning: You asked for it, so now you’ll get it.

Hot lips and scraping teeth move down my neck, and I throw my head back, letting him support me completely. When he reaches my collarbone, his tongue dips into every smooth hollow, and my hips jerk against him. The towel is a frustrating barrier between us, and I realize I’m not beyond trying to hump it off him. But then he’s pulling me up straight again, and before I can protest, he kneels at my feet.

“Oh God,” I breathe, sucking in my bottom lip as his beautiful face comes level with my breasts. I’m a shaking, sweaty mess in front of this man, who’s looking at me like he knows exactly what I need and is honored to give it to me. Of course he is. I went on an unsuspecting pilgrimage to the Alaskan bush and somehow found the holy grail of hot, considerate men. For once, I don’t feel like rolling my eyes. I’m delirious with wanting every mind-blowing, back-to-back, soul-freeing climax that romance books have taught me to expect from men like this, or my money back.

When his lush mouth brushes over one nipple and then the other, my whole body spasms. “Jesus, Margot,” he grinds out. “Just look at you.”

And I do. I can’t stop watching the way he moves over me, my hips grinding helplessly against his thick chest when he finally sucks me into his mouth. My toes curl painfully against the hot slats as I arch and gasp.

“Fuck,” he hisses when he releases me, licking his way to the other side like my salty skin is the most delicious thing he’s ever tasted. “ Fuck, ” he growls louder, his hands sliding to roughly grip my ass before he pulls my other nipple deep into his mouth.

“ Forrest, ” I gasp, my hands struggling to slide into his coarse, tangled hair. “Please…”

He draws me out before letting go with a soft pop and looks up at me. He’s breathless, every line of his body tense and hungry for me. “You need me lower, sweetheart? Just tell me.”

Sweetheart . God, why do I love that so much? Maybe because no one’s ever thought of me as sweet. But the way he’s staring at me makes me feel like molten sugar, and I nod frantically, making a sound like uhhn that will have to pass for yes. His hands slide back to my hips, and to my faint surprise, he guides me gently away from him. I take two wobbly steps back before my ass hits the hot door, and I’m surprised it doesn’t sizzle.

“Oh,” I say faintly as the distance between us allows me to get a good look at him on his knees. His chest rises and falls quickly, his abdominals contracting with every breath. Below them, the Little Towel That Could seems to be clinging to his hips by sheer will alone, but has split open to partially reveal him. I’m not sure what sound I make. As I take in every thick inch that’s worked its way free, I have only one thought: Dax . My most generously, beautifully endowed character. Staring at Forrest is like looking at my most improbable dreams come to life, and suddenly, my self-consciousness springs into action.

Just like the heroes in my books, he’s too perfect. I’ve never been with someone so gratuitously attractive. It’s why romance heroes need to stay safely within their pages, where they can’t take innocent, horny women unawares in Alaskan saunas. My arms cross over my body as I squirm under his gaze, and the drunken, glazed look in his eyes vanishes.

“Margot, no,” he pleads, coming slowly forward on his knees.

“Don’t you dare grovel! It’s too much,” I protest as he gently peels my hands away, pressing kisses to every area I’ve tried to hide. “You’re too much for me.”

“Christ, how do you think I feel?” He inhales and glides his nose against my belly. “So beautiful,” he murmurs so low I barely hear him. “Can’t fucking breathe when I look at you.”

My own breath hitches in my chest as his tongue catches a bead of condensation slowly rolling between my breasts. His hands tighten on my hips, his thumbs drawing slow circles on my slick skin.

“Please, Margot,” he whispers, looking up at me. “Please let me.”

I don’t need clarification. His hands are already tugging, drawing my hips off the sauna door. My shoulder blades press harder against the scorching wood as I tilt for him, nodding my permission. “Yes,” I say. “ Yes. ”

Forrest exhales his relief against my breasts before slowly sitting back on his heels. As he does, the towel finally gives up its valiant efforts and falls away. I can only gape at the sight of him, completely naked and kneeling before me. But then he plants open-mouthed kisses on my trembling thighs, on the creases of my groin, everywhere but where I need him, and all I can do is hold on to his shoulders for dear life.

“Please,” I beg in a hoarse whisper, my hands sliding up his neck into his hair, gripping.

He doesn’t seem to hear me. His slow, teasing licks and kisses continue, and I’m about to repeat my plea when one of his big hands wraps completely around my right ankle. It begins to slide up slowly, making a light, teasing trail up the back of my calf while his kisses draw ever closer to where I ache the most. I’m panting, arching my hips to no avail, when his hand finally reaches the back of my knee. When he smoothly picks up my leg and places my foot on the bench beside the door, I can’t help my gasp.

“Is this okay?” he asks, looking up at me from where he’s licking my newly opened inner thigh.

Is it okay ? Is oxygen okay? It feels incredible, and he hasn’t even touched me yet. I’ve never felt so vulnerable, exposed, or powerful in all my life.

What comes out is a breathless “Uh-huh.”

He smiles like he’s heard my thoughts, and then his hand is back. This time it’s moving up my other leg, as slowly as before. It’s just like him to approach foreplay with the same careful attention he gives everything else in his life, and if it didn’t feel so maddeningly good, I’d probably slap him to go faster. When he finally places the softest kiss on top of where all my need radiates from, I’m so worked up I nearly buck into his face. “Oh my God,” I say, eyelashes fluttering at the ceiling.

“Fuck,” he says in a reverent voice. “You’re so ready for me, aren’t you? So fucking perfect.”

He kisses me again, but this time he lingers. Gently rubs his full lips back and forth across me until I feel myself open for him. His slowly sliding hand is up to my midthigh when I begin to tremble. I’ve never been teased like this before—until I’m almost feral with need. At the first hot stroke of his tongue, I have to bite back a scream. When he sucks my clit tight between his warm lips, I ascend to a higher plane. In my delirium, I swear I’ll let us both die of heat exhaustion before I ever let him take his perfect mouth off me again.

Thankfully, he isn’t a man built for half-measures. When I arch even farther off the door, grasping his hair, calling his name, the lid on his own hunger blows off. He buries his gorgeous face against me, breathing me in, lapping me up. With every rough grunt, he tells me he fucking loves this. That he would happily drown in this. I think, This is it. This is when we both lose our everloving minds , but then his hand betrays him. His fingers, which have been steadily moving in their upward journey, finally tease the outside of my opening with the barest featherlike stroke, and I realize he’s in complete control.

My sharp cry severs the last threadbare wisp of restraint I’ve been holding on to. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I realize I don’t need to hold it together anymore. All this time, I’ve been running constant risk assessments, worrying about what will or won’t happen next between us. But tonight Forrest has taken all of it out of my nervous, desperate hands, and when I let go at last, my bent knee falls open even wider for him. It’s like he planned the whole thing. He probably did. In one thick push, his fingers fill me, and every thought in my brain contracts to a sharp, silent white dot before my world detonates.

My entire body arcs with a hoarse, wild cry, but Forrest only works me harder, praising me for being so good, so sweet, so tight . His hand is a blur below me, his mouth humming against me with his own low moans until the rhythmic pounding of my orgasm begins to wane and I’m jerking limply against him, small, hiccupping gasps escaping on every other breath. And still, he doesn’t stop. He licks me clean like I’m his favorite flavor, and when I can’t take it anymore, he pulls his fingers from me and cleans those too.

I can’t speak. I can barely breathe. I’m drenched, my hair plastered across my face and body like I’ve survived a hurricane. I feel myself slowly collapsing into a heap. But because romance heroes always catch heroines, I’m gracefully scooped and pulled into his lap with one smooth movement. Cradled against his warm chest, I’m a woman transformed. Never again will anyone catch Margot Bradley scoffing at a trope. If I were wearing a bodice, I’d rip it myself.

As I slowly float back to earth, I realize Forrest is kissing me, pressing slow, adoring lips to my sweaty hairline, my temple, my still-panting mouth. In his arms, I’m a shoelace being untied with one long, slow pull. My heavy eyelids open, and I find his gaze. What I see there should scare me, but when his deep voice asks, “Have you had enough?” the only thought pulsing through me is the same one that thrummed through me before.

Never enough. Never enough. Never enough.