Chapter 13
Chapter Thirteen
DALTON
C amille fists my shirt tightly, struggling to drag me closer to her, despite the physical impediment her body creates between us. She kisses me with a wanton recklessness and frantic need I’ve only ever dreamed of. An urgency underlies it, the same as what surges through my own veins, heating my blood until it feels like I’m going to boil over.
Our first kiss is everything I thought it would be and somehow more than I ever could have fantasized about at the same time.
Because I’ve never done anything like this.
Never met anyone like her .
Never felt my heart beat in time with someone else’s or experienced this rush of almost panic-laced desire that I do when I’m with her.
She mewls softly against my lips, shifting herself onto my lap fully. Her ass grinds against my hard cock, and I groan, my fingers digging into her hips to steady her before she inadvertently ends this far too early.
None of the trepidation or hesitation that lingered in her gaze earlier today seems to be here with us tonight, but it could just be the fear talking, the lingering effects of the nightmare that woke her so violently, making her do something she’ll regret in the morning.
I can’t let that happen.
No matter how badly I want this and her, I can’t let her do it if she’s not in her right mind, if she’s still reeling from that trauma and only using me as a distraction from it.
Burrowing my hands in her thick hair, I tug her head back, and her eyes fly open, meeting mine in question. “Camille, are you sure you want—”
She leans forward and captures the rest of my words with another brutal kiss. Her tongue glides along the seam of my mouth, and I open for her, allowing my control to slip even further the harder she pushes for this.
Fuck…
So much for trying to be the gentleman.
Whatever happens tonight, we’ll deal with it in the morning.
Because she doesn’t want to stop.
The way she moves in my lap, clings to my shirt, and releases those needy little whimpers against my lips, God knows I don’t want to stop, either.
She is everything.
And I want to give it to her, even when I have no fucking clue how to do it.
My cock aches, and she tries to shift her position, but her belly prevents her from moving or changing the angles. A little frustrated moan falls from her mouth to mine, and I angle her head to better collect those little noises.
I want them all.
I need them as much as I do her.
But I don’t know what to do, how to make this work for her, how not to hurt her or the baby and still give her what she seeks.
The helplessness mixes with her frustration, turning our movements and kisses even more frenzied until she tears her mouth from mine. Wild, lust-hazed eyes meet mine, and she nudges my shoulders.
I follow her command, falling back on the bed and the tangled sheets still askew from her dream.
Camille slides her leg across me, fully straddling my hips and settling her heat only covered by thin, silky panties directly over my hard cock. A searing blaze spreads out from where our bodies touch, seeping into the marrow of my bones and igniting a firestorm in my heart.
In the moonlight filtering in from the window, her dark hair falling around her face as she stares down at me, Camille is the most stunning creature I’ve ever seen.
I take her face in my palm, brushing my thumb across her pinkened cheek. “You’re so fucking beautiful.”
Her entire body shudders against me, making her grind against my hard length in a way that has me near the brink of my restraint. My fingers itch to touch every part of her. To feel her smooth, soft skin against mine. To explore the woman who has so easily stolen my heart .
She shifts back slightly and glides her hand along the hem of my shirt, urging me to shift up enough to let her pull it off. Her appreciative gaze roams over my chest and stomach almost greedily in a way she didn’t allow herself to earlier. Every muscle tightens in response to her assessment, my body primed and ready for whatever Camille decides she wants.
I’m more than happy to give her all of me.
As far as I’m concerned, the woman already owns me.
Her eyes drift to my cock straining against the confines of my jeans, and her lips slide open on a little mewl that makes me twitch in anticipation.
She grasps the hem of her tank top, gliding it up over the smooth expanse of her stomach and freeing her breasts before she drops it off the side of the bed.
Hell…
All the air rushes from my lungs, my hands fisting in the rumpled sheets beneath me.
Good God .
I have always thought Camille was beautiful. Her beauty stunned me speechless almost from the beginning. But seeing her like this—her perfect, full breasts, just begging for me to touch them, to taste them, her swollen belly, her glowing skin in the moonlight…I don’t stand a chance of maintaining control.
Fuck.
Like the young, inexperienced virgin I am, I almost come on the spot just looking at her.
Only by a razor-thin thread of sheer willpower do I manage to wrangle my body back under control. But when her soft, warm fingers slide to undo the buttons on my jeans, I catch her hand, stalling her progress.
I have to give her one more chance to stop before she does something she might regret later. Something I never would’ve rushed her into. Something I never intended to happen at all.
Her eyes lift to meet mine, and she closes her other hand over mine and squeezes.
This is what she wants.
Maybe it’s more than want. Maybe she needs it. Needs me. Needs the connection and the safety and the release she’ll find from all the uncertainty and demons chasing her.
I could never deny her that.
Literally, anything this woman asks of me is hers.
She moves off my thighs so I can shove down my pants and boxers and kick them off, freeing my cock and giving her free rein over my body without the fear that held her back in my room.
Was that really only a handful of hours ago?
It seems like a lifetime since she last touched me. Since I felt her wetness on my fingers and saw her come undone as she rode my hand.
Thinking about it makes my cock ache, and I lower myself down fully as Camille tugs off her underwear and fully exposes herself to me in the silvery moonlight.
Good God…
An appreciative groan falls from my lips as she starts to swing her leg over me again, and I grasp her hips, helping to guide her when she stills, hovering over my waist.
Her brow furrows, her gaze clearing for a moment, long enough to see the concern darkening the blue when all I want to see there is the same unbridled lust overwhelming me. “Your back…”
I push up with one hand and tunnel my other in her hair to drag her down as close as she can get, pushing myself up until our mouths can meet in a searing kiss intent on silencing her trepidation.
If I let her spiral down that rabbit hole, she’ll never come back up.
We’ll never get back to this place without me assuring her that she won’t hurt me.
By the time I pull away, we’re both panting, and my cock throbs hard enough to warn me I’m close to reaching that limit of restraint. “The last fucking thing I’m thinking about at this moment is my back . I’m fine…now tell me what you need.”
She lowers her forehead against mine and releases a rush of warm breath that tickles my lips before she grasps my cock and aligns it, dragging the head through her slick core.
Fucking hell.
Heat slowly engulfs my entire world.
My hips twitch.
And she sinks down on me, her mouth falling open on a silent gasp as I drop my head to the mattress and release a groan that sounds far more animal than it does human.
“Sweet mother of God…” I grip her fleshy hips as she finally settles on me fully, cementing my cock deep inside her with our pelvises perfectly pressed together. Not a fucking hairsbreadth of space separating us. “Camille…I—”
Can’t even talk.
I struggle to even form a coherent thought through the cloud of sheer bliss her hot, wet pussy has created around me.
She clenches around me and releases a little mewling sound that has my eyes drifting open again.
God, I hope I didn’t hurt her.
This is all so new.
So blissful and confusing.
My body urges me to move, to end this erotic torture by finding my release, but I tamp down that urge and cling to her, fighting the spinning in my head to ask her if she’s all right.
Before I can get a word to form at the back of my throat, her eyes flutter open to meet mine. “I’m okay.” She nods, almost as if she’s reading my mind and trying to convince me. “It’s just, God…” A shiver rolls through her, and she squeezes my cock again. “You feel so damn good.”
Thank. Fucking. God.
Instinct takes over, and I press my heels into the mattress, lifting my hips and somehow managing to get even farther into her, until the warm, slick comfort of her core completely cocoons me.
She moans, then braces her hands against my shoulders and starts to move. Her thighs clamp around mine, and she lifts herself agonizingly slowly, exposing my cock glistening in her arousal, then sinks back down, tightening around me with each inch she takes.
How do people do this?
Maintain control.
Keep a clear head when this is the hottest fucking thing I’ve ever seen in my entire life.
I grit my teeth, fighting against that tingle at the base of my spine and the tightening of my balls that warns I’m close to coming already.
No!
Not like this.
Not so fast.
Fuck…
She needs this.
She needs me.
She needs strong Dalton.
The one who helped her.
The one who told her he would give her anything she wanted or needed.
Not the young, inexperienced Dalton, who can sometimes make impulsive decisions without fully thinking them through and lets his emotions take control.
If I let that happen now, I’ll only disappoint her, leave her wanting and desperate without any way to fix it.
And I refuse to be that to her.
I slow my breathing, dig my fingers into her hips, and help her move and sustain the rhythm she seems to need.
She angles herself forward, grinding down against my pelvis when she reaches the hilt. Her breaths fall from her parted lips in harsh rushes of warm air, her fingers curling into my skin as she pushes down so hard on my shoulders that it feels like there might be bruises there tomorrow.
I’d fucking welcome it.
This woman could mark me anyway she wants to, and I’d let her and then find a way to make it permanent.
Because what tonight has made abundantly clear, besides the fact that I’m putty in Camille’s hands, is that I am utterly, hopelessly, completely in love with her. There is nothing she could do that could drive me away or make me question this all-consuming emotion as I watch her ride me.
She rolls her hips almost violently, her belly brushing my abs with every forward swirl and downward grind, and I bite down so hard to keep myself from immediately emptying inside her that my teeth hurt.
Every muscle stiffens and begins to shake, like I’m on the verge of shattering, no matter how badly I try to cling to power over my reaction to her. The longer I watch her, the darker the flush that spreads across her breasts, up her neck, and across her cheeks, the harder it becomes to control what my body wants in favor of what she needs.
Because fuck, she’s beautiful riding me like this.
Taking what she wants.
What only I can give her in this moment.
I feather my fingers across her warm cheek, and her eyes flicker open to meet mine, half hooded under thick, dark lashes. Clouded by the same lust and need I’m feeling.
She keeps gliding up and down my length and grinding against me, and I can see her frustration and feel it in every jerky movement.
“Tell me what to do, Camille…”
If she doesn’t help me, I can’t help her.
That utter sense of inadequacy I’ve tried not to let overwhelm me at times when it comes to her threatens to rear its ugly head. Especially when she clenches her jaw and shakes her head, squeezing her eyes closed again, like she’s fighting it and me.
Maybe she is.
Her body or her mind are unwilling to let go of something still clinging to her and holding her back.
I drag her down to me again, pushing up on one elbow and meeting her halfway so I can ghost my lips over hers and beg. “Please, Camille.” I kiss her hard and deep, slamming my mouth to hers greedily, and she moans as she keeps moving, keeps grinding, keeps seeking it, even as her body trembles as if she’s battling some unseen force working against her. “Tell me what you need and stop fighting it. Let me give you it. Let me give you everything.”
She whimpers against my lips and drags her head back, grinding against me more aggressively, her short nails biting deeper into my skin. “I need—”
Her breath catches.
But somehow, I know.
Just like I knew the very first moment I saw her that she was going to change my life.
* * *
CAMILLE
My body trembles.
Each fiber of my being wound so tightly that it feels like I might shatter with every roll of my hips and decadent sink down around Dalton’s immaculate cock.
The pleasure that courses through my veins and over my heated skin threatens to consume me and bring me to the ecstasy I’m so frantically chasing.
But.
I.
Just.
Can’t.
Get.
There.
I can’t grasp that bright light that’s hovering just out of reach. That relief, that release I need so much taunts me. Toys with me by sending flickers of blinding heat out from where our bodies connect. But never giving me more.
My frustration grows with each jerky movement of my hips as much as the promised ecstasy does.
And Dalton wants to help so damn badly.
His dogged determination to learn what it takes, to get me off before he finds his own bliss couldn’t be sweeter.
But it isn’t sweet I need right now.
I need—
Dalton squeezes my hips, digging his fingers into the flesh there almost painfully, then braces his feet on the bed and thrusts up into me as I come down.
“Fuck!”
The word tumbles from my lips on a rush of air as pleasure spirals wildly.
Yes.
THAT!
“Shift back.”
I open my eyes to meet his. “Wh-what?”
He tries to angle my hips back, and it finally clicks what he’s asking but not why. I need that friction, that angle…
But the insistence in his gaze makes me pull my hands from where they’re braced against his shoulders and lean back, allowing cool air to slip under my belly and across the place where we’re joined.
Dalton slides his hand down across my stomach, pausing with his palm pressed fully against it. His eyes drop there as he caresses me reverently, skimming the rough callouses across my smooth skin in a way that causes tears to pool in my eyes.
But I refuse to let them fall.
I refuse to let them ruin this moment.
The fact that he looks at me with so much yearning, so much appreciation, so much love, and seems to love both my children the same way makes it almost impossible to breathe.
His hand slips lower, and his thumb finds the apex of my thighs, brushing across my clit.
I twitch against him, losing my rhythm, but he holds me steady with one hand at my hip and continues to thrust up into me.
Hitting exactly the right spot.
Over and over again.
I gasp as he increases the pressure and speed of the swirl against the most sensitive place of my body. My pussy ripples and clenches around him, clinging to the feeling of having him buried so deeply.
Right fucking there…
“Fuck, Camille. I’m—”
He’s close, and so am I now.
Dalton gave me exactly what I wanted, exactly what I needed, without even having to voice it. Just like when he arrived and saved me from crumbling alone into the dark abyss I had found myself in on the homestead, he’s bringing me to the light now.
It finally bursts through me.
An epic explosion of pleasure that makes me buck on top of him, clasping his cock as I try to keep moving through the seemingly endless, frantic spasms.
A low, deep groan rumbles through his body under me, and he continues to stroke me through my orgasm with his cock and his fingers. He plunges deep one more time and releases a strangled moan and goes completely rigid, drawn as tight as a bowstring as he comes deep inside me.
My orgasm finally fades, and I sag forward, trying to catch myself with an elbow on his chest. He pulls his hand away from between my legs and wraps it around my back, rolling us onto our sides, facing each other.
We both try to find our breaths.
My belly presses into his that heaves with his effort to slow his heart, the same way I am.
Calloused fingertips trail across my temple and drift down over my lips. “Are you all right?”
That was incredible.
It felt like I momentarily lost six months of pain. All that anguish and torture disappeared in only a few minutes in Dalton’s arms. But the words to express that to him won’t leave my lips.
Instead, everything I pushed down before I kissed him threatens to bubble back up.
Guilt washes over me just as quickly as my orgasm did, and my body tenses instead of relaxing into his arms. I try to shift away from him even though he’s still partially inside me, but he holds me to him with his hand at my lower back.
“Open your eyes, Camille. Look at me.”
I struggle to do as he asks, afraid to see disappointment or worse in his gaze, but it’s too hard to deny him.
My lids flutter open, and the compassion in the emerald green staring back at me instantly helps melt away some of the icy chill threatening to overtake me.
His fingertips move to my chin, holding me there, preventing me from looking away. “Tell me you’re okay.”
I nod. “I am.”
He shakes his head and brings it closer to mine to lower his lips to my forehead. “I can see that you’re not.”
“I’m just…”
Confused.
Lost.
I don’t know how to describe it without hurting him, without destroying the few moments of peace we have managed to find in each other’s arms, without ruining everything—our friendship, the future I have on the mountain with Davey and this baby, a potential for one with Dalton.
God, is that what I’ve done?
Did I ruin everything?
The tears start to burn in my eyes, and he pulls his head back from mine and brushes them away the moment they trickle down my cheek. “Why are you crying?”
“I just feel like maybe…”
I close my eyes again, unable to look at him when my mind is such a dark spiral of uncertainty. He’s so strong. So confident in what he wants.
Why can’t I be that?
“Maybe what, Camille?”
God, this shouldn’t be so hard.
I force my eyes open to meet his again, and understanding lies in their depths without me even saying anything.
He gives me a soft smile, one that’s as kind and genuine as he has always been, and then leans forward and presses his lips against mine so gently it almost makes the tears come harder. “It’s okay for you to love him and want this at the same time, Camille. The two things are not mutually exclusive.”
My heart seizes with his words.
How did he know?
Because he’s Dalton.
Because he always seems to just understand what I need to hear.
He seems to just understand me .
It’s one of the reasons we’ve ended up like this, because things are just easy with him. They have been since the minute he walked onto the property and I aimed that gun at him.
It shouldn’t have been, not with the way I attempted to ice him out, how I tried to decline his assistance, my vain struggle to keep him at arm’s length. Yet, slowly but surely, he managed to work his way under my skin and into my heart.
With how he loves Pops.
With how much he loves this mountain and the people on it and in the town below.
With how he loves Davey and me.
He dips his head to catch my gaze again. “Okay?”
One sandy-blond brow rises, and I nod, then bury my face against his chest. He tunnels his hand in my hair and holds me there, rubbing his other palm up and down my bare spine in a soothing motion that sends goosebumps skittering across my skin and makes me shiver in the best way possible.
His touch disappears for just long enough for him to reach down and grab the nearest edge of the sheet and tug it up over us. Then he presses a kiss to the top of my head and resumes the trickling fingers. “Are you cold?”
I shake my head. “No.” The heat of his body could keep me warm forever. And I want that more than anything right now. I lift my head to search his face for any sort of reservation I’ve been fearing. “Dalton?”
“What?”
It seems so stupid.
Especially after the warning he gave me earlier about what would happen if he ended up in this bed with me.
Because he was right.
But the thought of having to fall asleep again without this is enough to make me ask.
“Please don’t go back and sleep on the couch.”
The corners of his mouth curl up slowly, amusement lighting his eyes. His hold on me tightens, and he adjusts his hips slightly, easing even further into me, as much as the position and the baby between us will allow. “Okay. I won’t…”
I can’t fight the grin pulling at my lips, and I score my nails lightly across his hard pecs, around the sides of his hips, and to where the scars mar his otherwise flawless skin. “I wouldn’t want your back to hurt.”
He chuckles low.
The vibration from his chest rolls through me, and his cock gets even harder inside me. I groan at the sensation, my body tingling with the memory of the first release, and clench around him.
He makes that deep rumbling sound again and crushes his lips to mine. “I told you before, and I’ll tell you again, Camille, whatever you need, anytime, anywhere, always, I’ll give it to you.”