Chapter 15 Twenty Minutes
Bailey
This kiss is messy—all teeth and tongue and hot breath and skin.
Silas’s hands are undoing my jeans, and his statement “I have to know which pair” is punctuated by the sound of my zipper.
For a moment I can’t even remember what he’s talking about. And then the jeans are shoved down from my hips and he’s leaning back and staring down at my body.
“Fuuuuuck, the blue ones.”
Oh right. The panties I wore just for him.
He stares for a beat and then tugs me forward, and I’m laughing while he pushes me away from the door and guides me to bend over the arm of his couch.
And then it’s not funny anymore.
Silas kneels down, his hands on my ass as he spreads me apart. These panties are cheekies with lacy edges and I can feel Silas’s exhale on my bare skin.
“This part, right here,” he says, and then I whimper when his fingers trace the lace all the way down the back to my puffy, swollen lips. He encourages me to spread my legs further and he works his hand in to cup my pussy. “This part is so fucking hot.”
He presses harder, rubbing a circle until he finds my clit through the fabric, and he zeroes in.
My eyes roll back and I bite my lip, already feeling an orgasm starting to build.
It’s probably been building since Silas put his hand on my back at On the Rocks, fed by our incessant teasing all night long.
Oh god.
Suddenly Silas’s hand is gone. “Wha—”
And then he’s back, peeling the damp panties from my body, just pulling them to the side, and I hear an obscene wet sound before something presses inside me. A finger—his thumb, I think?—slicked from his mouth.
“I want to feel it.” And then pressure’s on my clit again, rubbing me hard and fast, and I tumble over the edge, pulsing around him and collapsing against the arm of the couch. He keeps rubbing, and I squeeze my thighs together, trapping his hand, but don’t stop him.
Then his body’s over mine and fuck he’s still fully clothed while I’m a sopping mess beneath him. His erection presses into my ass through his jeans and his breath is hot on my back.
“What do you think, temptress? Can you come again? I know you’ve earned it. You’ve been a very good girl for three long weeks.”
It takes a few minutes of squirming and panting (on my part) and cocky dirty talking (on his part), but I come again, my scream muffled by the couch and the slickness dripping down my thighs.
“Fuuuck, Bailey.”
I turn my head so I can get more air, and my gaze connects with Echo’s, who is staring at us with wide eyes. I burst into laughter.
Silas’s head raises from my back and I feel his laughter too. “Hey, baby girl, did we traumatize you?”
“Yep. And we’re about to do it again.” I glance at Silas over my shoulder and his grin is wicked.
“Oh are we?”
He helps me up, but then we’re kissing once more and I want him inside me so badly that I’m the one dragging him back to his bedroom. I stumble because my jeans are around my ankles and he helps me out of them, tossing them over his shoulder and fusing our mouths back together.
Finally we make it to his bed and we’re both naked and I’m on top and rubbing myself against his hard cock.
Silas reaches for the bedside drawer.
“I’m on birth control,” I say. “Also I haven’t been with anyone since my last test, which came out negative.”
Silas’s laugh is pained. “I got tested last week. Drove to my doctor in Kingston.”
I reach down, lift his cock up, and sink onto him.
Silas grips my thighs, staring up at me with wide eyes. He fits so perfectly inside me and I rock my hips against his. He squeezes me one last time and then puts his hands behind his head. It makes his biceps bulge and I bend forward and grab them.
And then I grind and bounce and find the exact right spot that feels so good and through it all Silas and I stare at each other.
He struggles to keep his eyes from rolling back, from breaking the contact, and so do I.
His jaw clenches, my hips stutter, and then I’m chasing another orgasm and Silas’s tossing his head back and coming inside me and I’m still chasing, chasing, chasing . . .
“Please, Bailey, fucking come again, I need it, I need you so bad, you’re so fucking hot—”
My whole body clenches and I curl up and my orgasm hits me hard, blurring everything out but Silas’s words.
I’m sprawled on top of Silas, both of us sweaty and breathing hard, my cheek pressed against his chest. His heart is still racing under my ear, gradually slowing to something approaching normal.
Well, that escalated quickly. Three weeks of pent-up wanting will do that to a person.
His hands trace lazy patterns on my back, fingertips drawing invisible designs across my shoulder blades, down my spine, over the curve of my hip. It’s soothing and arousing at the same time, which is unfair considering we just had extremely athletic sex.
“That was . . .” Silas starts.
“If you say ‘nice,’ I’m leaving.”
He laughs, and I feel it rumble through his chest. “I was going to say ‘worth waiting three weeks for.’”
“Better answer.”
A soft thump announces Echo’s arrival on the bed. She picks her way delicately across the disaster zone of tangled sheets and discarded clothes, pausing to sniff my bra with deep suspicion.
“Seriously?” I say to the cat. “You’re judging my underwear choices now?”
Echo responds by flopping dramatically across Silas’s face.
“Mmmph,” Silas sputters, trying to breathe around the faceful of cat.
I burst out laughing. “Your cat just cock-blocked round two.”
Silas gently relocates Echo, who protests with an indignant meow. “Echo, I love you, but your timing is terrible.”
“She’s asserting dominance.” I reach over to pet her, and she purrs aggressively while giving me a look that clearly communicates her opinion on our life choices. “Making sure I know who the real woman in your life is.”
“She’s used to being the only girl in my bed,” Silas says as Echo settles between us.
“Aww, is someone getting territorial?” I scratch behind her ears. “Don’t worry, I’m just visiting.”
The words come out lighter than I feel. Just visiting. Temporary. Getting it out of our systems.
Except it doesn’t feel temporary. Not when Silas shifts Echo to the side and pulls me back against him, fitting us together like we were designed for this. Not when his lips press against my shoulder and he murmurs something about how good I feel.
Not when my chest does this painful, swooping thing that I’m pretty sure means I’m completely screwed.
“We should probably move,” I say, even though I don’t want to. “I’m crushing you.”
“Don’t you dare.” His arms tighten around me. “I’ve waited three weeks for this.”
And there it is again. That swooping thing.
We resettle with Echo banished to the foot of the bed, where she curls up with her back to us in a display of feline disapproval. Silas and I end up face-to-face, his arm tucked under his head, looking stupidly content.
“So Echo has a vet appointment next week,” he says, “and I’m dreading it because she howls the entire car ride. Like, biblically. The last time, the lady in the car next to me at a stoplight looked genuinely concerned that I was torturing a small child.”
I smile, watching him talk. He’s so animated when he tells stories, his free hand gesturing, his eyes crinkling at the corners behind his glasses.
“And then—get this—the second we pull into the vet’s parking lot? Complete silence. Like she’s saying ‘oh, we’re here already? how delightful.’ The vet told me she’s the best-behaved cat they see. Meanwhile, I have scratch marks on my arms from getting her into the carrier.”
He keeps talking about Echo’s duplicitous behavior, about a photo shoot he has coming up for a local family whose toddler apparently has strong opinions about whether or not he’ll smile (“spoiler: he won’t”), about how he’s been repainting this vintage dresser he found at an estate sale and discovered there are approximately seven hundred layers of paint to strip off first.
And somewhere between the dresser restoration and him explaining some obscure furniture refinishing technique, it hits me.
Oh no.
Oh no no no.
I’m in love with him.
Not just wanting him. Not just enjoying his company or thinking he’s hot or appreciating that he’s patient with my body image issues.
I’m in love with Silas Montgomery. With his terrible cat stories and his enthusiasm for furniture restoration and the way he touches me like I’m precious. The pebbles he drops for me, his endless patience, the way he looks at me like I hung the moon—all of it.
I’m in love with my brother’s best friend. I’m in love with a man who lives hours away in a town I swore I’d never move back to.
I’m in love, and I’m completely fucked.
“You okay?” Silas stops mid-sentence about wood stain, his brow furrowing. “You’re doing that thing where you overthink. I can literally see the gears turning.”
“I’m fine.” My voice comes out steadier than I feel. “Just . . . tired.”
He studies me for a long moment, and I think he’s going to push. Instead, he pulls me closer, his hand cupping the back of my head as he presses a kiss to my forehead.
The tenderness of it makes everything worse. Or better. I can’t tell anymore.
“I can’t do three weeks apart again,” he murmurs against my hair. “I barely survived this time.”
My heart stutters—part joy, part terror.
On the nightstand, my phone buzzes, shattering the moment.
Hunter
Wrapping up at the bar. Be home in 20.
“Oh shit.” I sit up so fast I nearly knock Silas in the face. “Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Hunter just texted. He’s leaving the bar.
He’ll be home in twenty minutes.” I’m already scrambling out of bed, following the trail of discarded clothes like breadcrumbs while I get dressed.
“I have to beat him there.” I find my jeans draped over his lamp in the living room.
How did they even get there? “Where’s my other boot? ”
“Under the couch.” Silas is up too, helping me search. “Okay, so you’ve got maybe twelve minutes—”
“To drive ten minutes, park, get inside, and look like I’ve been asleep for hours.” I yank my shirt on, realize it’s inside out, and don’t care. “I’m so screwed.”
“You can do this.” He hands me my jacket. “Just—drive safe, okay? Don’t speed.”
“I have to speed!”
“Then speed safely.”
Despite everything, I almost laugh. Almost.
My phone buzzes again.
Hunter
Actually leaving now. Morgan’s closing up.
“That’s it. I’m dead. I’m so dead.” I grab my keys, my phone, shove my feet into my boots without tying them.
Silas catches my hand. “Hey. Look at me.”
I look. His hair is sticking up in every direction, his glasses are crooked, and he’s standing there in his boxers looking concerned and adorable and I’m in love with him and I have approximately eight minutes to get home before my brother figures it out.
“It’s going to be okay,” he says.
“You don’t know that.”
“I know you. You’re resourceful. You’ve got this.”
He pulls me in for a kiss that I don’t have time for but take anyway because I might not get another chance if Hunter murders me.
Or Silas.
“Go,” he says against my mouth. “Text me when you’re safe.”
“If I’m alive.”
“You’ll be alive. Just grumpy,” he teases.
I’m out the door and in my car in under thirty seconds. The engine roars to life and I peel out of his driveway like I’m in a Fast and Furious movie.
The streets of Here are deserted. Just me and my panic and the very real possibility that I’m about to get caught because I couldn’t keep my hands off my brother’s best friend for one night.
I make it to Hunter’s street in seven minutes. A new personal record.
His truck isn’t in the driveway yet.
I park on the street—quieter than the gravel driveway—and sprint to the front door, fumbling with the spare key. My hands are shaking so badly it takes three tries to get it in the lock.
Inside. Lock the door behind me. Shoes off, left in the entry hall like I would have hours ago. Jacket on the coatrack.
I’m halfway down the hall to the guest room when I see headlights sweep across the living room window.
Shit.
I dive into the guest room, yank off my jeans, and burrow under the covers mostly clothed. My heart is pounding so hard I’m sure Hunter will hear it from the driveway.
His truck door slams. His keys jangle in the lock. The front door opens.
I close my eyes and try to breathe normally, which is impossible when you’ve just run a sprint and your entire relationship with your brother is about to implode.
Footsteps in the hallway. They pause outside my door.
Please don’t come in. Please don’t come in. Please—
The footsteps continue. His bedroom door opens and closes. I hear my brother moving around, the low sound of him talking to Raven, a TV turning on and then the volume turning down.
I wait several minutes, barely breathing, before I let myself relax even slightly.
My phone buzzes under my pillow, and I nearly jump out of my skin.
Silas
You okay?
Made it. By like 30 seconds.
I knew you would.
I’m never doing that again. My heart can’t take it.
Worth it though?
I think about his hands on my skin, his laugh, the way he said he couldn’t do three weeks apart again. The moment I realized I was in love with him.
Silas
Yeah. Worth it.
Can’t sleep. Thinking about you. When can I see you again?
Maybe tomorrow?
Feel like sneaking out in the morning?
What do you have in mind?
Sweet Persuasions opens at 7.
You’re ridiculous.
You love it.
And god help me, I do. I love it, and I love him, and I have absolutely no idea what I’m going to do about it.
I hear Hunter moving around in his room—brushing his teeth, getting ready for bed. Normal sounds. He has no idea I wasn’t here. No idea where I was or who I was with.
My phone buzzes one more time.
Silas
Good night, Bailey. Dream of me.
Arrogant.
Confident. There’s a difference.
I’m smiling as I plug my phone in to charge, still fully dressed under the covers because I’m too wired to move.
I’m in love with Silas Montgomery.
And somehow, against all odds, I’m getting away with it.
For now.