Chapter 36
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
Around five in the afternoon, my stomach grumbles loud enough for Adam to hear it over Friends . When I found out he’d never watched it, I hit play first and gawked second. “Watch the show, Elle,” he said, but he was grinning. That crooked thing stayed on his face for episodes . I could see it in the corner of my vision.
I grimace as I head to the kitchen. “The time has come where you see how I truly live.”
“And how is that?” He tails behind me, socked feet quiet on the tiled floors.
“Like a college freshman of the male variety.” I throw open the cabinets and fridge for him to see. “I have three different kinds of Pop-Tarts, frozen chicken, bacon bits, and Velveeta. The end.”
“And here I thought you just drank green smoothies and ate candy. Is this the part where you say It’s all about balance , or does that come later?” Suddenly, Adam’s breath is against my throat, sending a hot flush rippling out as his hands find my hips.
Come later. Seriously, he gives a girl one tiny orgasm and my mind permanently relocates to the gutter. I’ll send out a change of address with my Christmas card, two birds and one stone and all that. It’ll save on postage.
But yeah, I sure hope something is coming later. Someone. We’ll need to cuddle to keep warm. Survival 101.
“I’m sure we can find something here to make.” Adam’s head disappears into my fridge, so purposeful, so on a mission , that I take a step back and let him have at it.
He pulls out a can of biscuit dough, shredded cheese, and the bacon bits. From the pantry, a jar of marinara I forgot I had—it’s a little dusty. He stands, but when my stomach growls, he reaches back into the pantry and produces a silver foil package. “We can make pizza.”
“With Pop-Tart crumble topping? I like the way you think.”
Adam lays the ingredients down on the counter and turns on the oven to preheat. “The Pop-Tarts are an appetizer.” He grabs my hips and lifts me onto the countertop. He presents the package to me, and I take it. And then I take a kiss.
He doesn’t fight me on it, but when his stomach is the one to grumble this time, he pulls back with a parting peck. “As much as I’d love to stand here and kiss you all day, we need to get our strength up for later.” His eyes flick down the length of me, lingering on the neckline of my shirt, the dip of my waist, where my thighs press together. Maybe I’m not the only one with a dirty mind. He looks back at the TV pointedly. “We’re making it to season two tonight.”
I nibble on my snack as Adam kneads the biscuit dough across a cookie sheet. It’s not perfectly circular, but it will get the job done. I wonder if he came up with this on the spot or if this is something he’s done with his nieces before.
I want to meet them, not only because they’re important to him but because they know him. He’s still somewhat of a puzzle, and they’re holding pieces I need.
Once the dough is in the oven to prebake (“Otherwise it gets soggy”), Adam turns to me, stealing a bite of Pop-Tart that was on its way to my mouth. Karma is loyal as always, because half of it crumbles onto his chin and down his shirt. I help him brush it away, but my fingers snag on his collar, twisting in the fabric.
I see his intentions from a mile away when he glances at my mouth, a question in his eyes. But I want whatever he’s planning, so I give him a tug.
This kiss from Adam is my favorite so far: melting, needy, with just a sprinkle of the desperation rising in my own body.
“You taste like cherries,” he says, coming back for another sampling. His tongue is soft, hot, talented . How is it in a hundred different places at once?
My blood turns to champagne, and Adam makes my head spin like I drank a bottle of it too fast. Everything moves in flashes around us. I can’t tell whether we’re in slow motion or fast-forward. His hands sliding up my waist, around my back, down my legs, are slow like honey. But his kisses are gaining speed and severity, and my heart beats up-tempo in my ears.
Adam’s shirt is on the floor before either of us realizes the pulsing in the air is the beeping of the timer. With a throaty groan, he pulls away, stepping out from the cradle of my legs to pull the baking sheet from the oven.
“That almost looks like pizza dough,” I rasp. Have I always sounded like a phone sex operator?
He gives me a mollifying laugh, which is also crisp and jagged. When he shifts, reaches for the front of his pants, I see he’s got a little problem on his hands. Maybe a big problem. His face stretches tight as he clamps his jaw shut. The strain in his jeans grows tighter the longer he stares at me.
We’re alone. Actually, honest to goodness alone . We checked our obligations at the door, and we don’t have anywhere to be, anyone to fix or take care of but ourselves.
Every word and phrase I’ve ever learned for moments like these escapes me, until all that’s left is, “Oh.”
His throat bobs with a swallow. It sounds physically painful. He winces as he turns back to the counter covered in makeshift pizza ingredients.
We don’t talk and we don’t touch. Not as he covers the dough in sauce and cheese and bacon crumbles. Not after he returns the tray to the oven. Eight minutes later, when he slides it onto the counter, I stay silent as I point to the drawer that houses the pizza cutter. And he watches with quiet contemplation as I pull plates from the cabinet over my shoulder. I eat sitting on my counter, him leaning beside me. Even our chewing is quieter than usual. No one chews quietly except when they’re trying not to break a moment with unnecessary noise.
Our eyes stay locked the entire time.
The only problem is, his eye contact does me in worse than his mouth. I can’t think of a single reason we shouldn’t be horizontal right now. This moment is fragile enough that, if the wind were to rattle the windowpanes, it might shatter completely. I think of five different cheeky things to say but talk myself out of them before my mouth ever opens. We’re terrified to misread each other, but it’s about to come at the expense of missing the moment altogether.
He reaches for my plate, runs it under water. I slip off the counter and reach for a dish towel, the way we have countless times at Lovie’s. Things are natural with Adam in a way they never were with Grady. Laughs come easier; smiles get brighter.
Adam’s hand catches my wrist, thumb grazing my pulse point. His eyes are dark with want, and I know the time has come.
I lead him to my bedroom.
Maybe later Adam will take in these pieces of me laid bare before him. Mismatched artwork that just barely goes with my bedding. The cat tapestry Liss gave me for a housewarming gift hanging as a curtain, which is atrocious but reminds me of the months I spent living with my best friend. A shaggy Moroccan rug. A blue neon sign, which I flick on now, that reads Good vibes only . I’ve had it for a while, but Grady thought it was tacky to hang in the bedroom, since it matches my vibrator.
Adam smiles when he sees it.
And that’s the last time I compare Adam Wheeler to Grady James.
We reach for each other in tandem. Our bodies are going fuzzy around the edges, begging to blur together. We fall to the bed, and it doesn’t matter anymore that it’s unmade. Adam kisses me soundly as I settle my weight over him, his hands tangling in my hair like he never wants his fingers to unknot. His tongue strokes mine in gentle—but commanding—waves.
My legs come to either side of his hips. His shirt is still on the kitchen floor, and I take this opportunity to learn his tattoo with my mouth. The hair on his chest is just soft enough to tickle. The noise that floats from him is half surprise, half content, and it hovers between the two as I trail my lips down Adam’s chest, torso, and unbutton and pull down his jeans to reveal dark-gray boxer briefs. As I reach for their waistband, he flips me fast, my vision going hazy. But his hand cradles my head, lays it tenderly on the pillow, and I am once again shocked by the dichotomy of him. Hard and soft. Fast and slow. Naughty and nice.
His hand grips my ass, and—I whimper.
He pulls back.
“I fell earlier,” I remind him. “It’s still tender.”
His gaze darkens. “Don’t worry,” he murmurs. “I’ll kiss it better.”
There’s no awkward fumbling, no waiting so long for the other person to take your clothes off that you get frustrated enough to just do it yourself. I’m not questioning where I should put my hands or trying to remember the last time I put on deodorant. We move like we’ve done this before—practiced and sure. And let me say, Adam has practiced a lot, because I’m sure I’ve never been stripped so gracefully.
“Can I feel you?” He hooks a finger in the waistband of my underwear, lets it snap against my skin.
A whimper of “Please” later, his fingers dig beneath the fabric. We groan together at the contact, and it’s just abrasive enough to pop our bubble of silence.
“Is this how you touch yourself?” His body is all hard lines, flush with mine.
I want to say something equally flirty, but the point of flirting is sex, and we’re basically having it already. So I go for honesty instead. “You’re better. Take them off.”
His smile goes dark and splits his face in half as he tugs my underwear down.
“That first night,” he says. His tone is casual though his words are not. “When you fell on top of me in bed. Do you remember what I said?”
I’ve only dreamt about it twenty times. “You told me to stop screaming.”
“Yeah,” he murmurs, running his fingers down the seam of me. “Forget I ever”—my loud gasp cuts him off momentarily as he slips in—“said that. Damn, that’s so good.”
I know I’ve used obscene to describe Adam a few times now, but it’s the word that keeps coming back to me. I have this man—this incredibly rugged, dark, funny, considerate, gentleman-in-the-streets-freak-in-the-sheets man—in my bed, his lips on my breasts, his fingers exploring me, and it’s all just too good to be true. He’s my walking fantasy. If I wake up to find this was all a figment of my overactive and underlaid imagination, I’ll be devastated.
“Condomsinthedrawer,” I breathe, shoving at his briefs. When he’s free from them, my mouth falls open. “Never mind. Get on your back. Or come up here. I don’t care, just—let me—”
He grins, sliding off the bed to step out of them completely. “Cat got your tongue?” He hooks his hands under my arms and drags me to the edge of the mattress, right in line with him.
I’m staring at him upside down, and from this angle, his jawline is even more chiseled. “No,” I say. “But it is busy.”
And then I put my money where my mouth is—with my tongue, on him. He’s warm, hard, and I’m eager, which only drives him further. This could be overwhelming, in this position, but he doesn’t lose control.
“Elle,” he groans, urgent, fingers tightening in my hair. His other hand rests on my throat. “ Please . You’re going to kill me.”
I pull away, reaching for the nightstand as he climbs onto the bed. “Funny. That first night, I thought the same thing about you.”
“Did you think we’d be here?” He grasps my waist, pulling me to straddle him. His grin turns wicked as he runs his hands up my chest, squeezing, pinching my nipples. “Here again .”
I take a second as he rolls on the condom to consider his question. The hard angles of his face, which soften around me. The hands he runs across my skin. The dark shadows backlighting his face, which I now know come from hard work and obligation and empathy, so much empathy.
I was kidding myself earlier, about falling in love. It wasn’t just a few stairs I missed. It was the whole damn staircase. I am falling, hopelessly falling. Have fallen, past, and am falling, present, and will keep falling, future.
All the pieces of me love him.
“I hoped,” I say. As I reach between us, he cups my cheek.
Despite the enormity of this situation, the flood of sensations and hormones ravaging my body, my eyes stay locked with Adam’s as I take him in fully, slowly. His one hand doesn’t stray from my face, his thumb brushing my cheekbone as his fingers caress the shell of my ear. When I brace against his chest, weeding my fingers through the dusting of hair, he holds my waist, my hip, my thigh, like he can’t decide where to touch me first.
Like maybe he hoped for this too.
It’s a slow, torturous rhythm I set, one that takes in every moan, brush of fingers or lips, and adds to it. Of all his expressions, this may be my favorite. Color striping his jaw, eyes half lidded, pupils fully blown. Hair mussed from my fingers. His lips strain to kiss my chest, and I lower, giving him easier access.
Without warning, he plants his feet, driving up, and it knocks me off-balance. My chest presses to his face.
Adam groans, deep in his throat, and captures my nipple in his mouth.
“Enough slow shit,” he rasps, wrapping his arms around my back and flipping us. “I’ve wanted you too long.”
He braces on the pillow under my head, hitching my leg over his hip, and begins to move.
Soft is good, but hard is good too, and I start to wonder if everything is good with Adam, just because it’s him. I move my hand between us, because I’m growing more desperate with each drive, and Adam’s moving faster, breathing harsher. My limbs are deliciously heavy, all the pleasure centers of my body screaming at me for release, for something more, more more more please more. I say these same words, tears in the corners of my eyes.
Adam’s teeth close on my shoulder as his hand joins my own between my legs, and here it is , the beginning of my end.
I’m not sure who, technically, goes first. If it’s his choked noises and hard pulses that pull me along, or if the feel of me, so gone for him, is what does him in. But we break, and it’s together, and we’re together.
And after, as we try to calm our racing hearts, as Adam’s grip goes from possessive to gentling, fingers along my spine, I wonder how many stairs are in this staircase, if I will be falling forever.