Chapter 41
Eliza
Having Mac in my family home is weird enough, but to feel relaxed while he shows me affection in front of my parents is beyond what words can describe. It has me simultaneously going what the fuck and why does this feel so right?
My parents showed each other affection growing up, so it’s not like I never saw it, but they preached about waiting until marriage and finding the one.
Who knows, maybe if Mac and I didn’t start the way we did, maybe he’d be the one.
I know my dad is watching Mac like a hawk, wanting to make sure he’s a good man, and I love my dad for it, but I also fear his disapproval of Mac.
There’s something about the way Mac casually rubs his thumb over the back of my hand that has all the anxiety I’ve had today float away.
I feel safe right now. A simple hand hold shouldn’t be so monumental, but for some reason it is.
It’s like he’s anchoring me and all my messy thoughts and I can just be.
The ability to just be in the moment without letting outside thoughts and worries weigh me down is like the final puzzle piece clicking into place and giving me the complete picture.
That picture is a look into my future, a future I want with Mac by my side, building a life together.
It’s the realization that I was stupid and let myself fall in love with him.
I feel like I should be pulling my hand away, trying to fight this, but there’s no point.
I can’t change something that’s already happened.
I manage to make it through the rest of dinner keeping conversation relatively light, and thankfully no questions of Where do you see this going?
or Is it serious? get asked and we manage to leave relatively unscathed.
At the car, Mac opens my door for me, but once I’ve climbed in he doesn’t close it, rather he steps closer and waits for me to look at him. When our eyes meet, he asks, “Can I stay at your place tonight, or will you come to mine?”
My heart starts racing. My brain is saying no, hell no, but my heart and...other parts of me are saying what the hell is taking you so long to say yes? His eyes are soft and pleading, and my heart wins out as I whisper, “Yes.”
He grins at me like a freaking puppy, and I know I’m digging my heart's grave deeper. He closes my door, rounds the car, and we’re on our way.
“Your place or mine?” he asks.
“Yours. Can I just grab some stuff from mine first?” I need to keep him as far from my place as possible right now. I have a serious feeling that if we start spending time there, each room will remind me of him when we inevitably part ways.
He nods, and his right hand finds the top of my thigh, gently resting there. I stare out the window, listening to the music playing from the radio and spacing out.
Mac comes upstairs with me as I throw some things in a bag. I’ve left a few things at his place, but there are a few more things I need. I’m putting the last items in my bag when Mac wraps his arms around me and kisses the top of my head.
“I missed you,” he whispers.
I smile, leaning into him and closing my eyes. “It’s only been a week.”
“Longest week of my life.”
I hold my breath. This is all too perfect, he’s too perfect. I almost wish he was a complete asshole so I could stop having feelings for him, but it’s almost impossible. I haven’t found a single thing about him that would send me running for the hills.
He kisses the top of my head again, and I force myself to finish packing. He grabs my bag for me and interlaces our fingers as we head back down to his car. When he puts my bag in the trunk, I notice a packed bag and look at him.
He shrugs and smirks. “I was hoping you’d say yes to one of them, and I wanted to be prepared.”
I have damn butterflies in my stomach, and I hate it.
Mac makes me feel so wanted, and I’m not sure any other man will make me feel the same way.
I study him on the short drive to his place.
His hand is once again resting on my thigh as his other grips the steering wheel.
He looks strong and in control like this, but yet his grip on me is soft and comforting.
It’s a dichotomy that has me practically melting.
When we get to his place, he keeps the lights low, offers me a blanket, and pulls up a movie, and I realize that without even having to say anything this man knows I need to decompress.
I settle on the couch, and he pulls me into his side, wrapping his arm around me.
Usually I can only fully relax by myself.
I need a blanket and a show or movie I’ve seen a hundred times or a book.
Something where I can completely shut myself off from the outside world.
I find myself relaxing with Mac, though.
I don’t feel like I’m still putting up a facade, but rather that I’m boneless and content.
I love that Mac doesn’t push to do something else, but rather joins me in this form of relaxation. We’re in the moment together.
When the movie finishes, we head to bed. The second I’m under the covers with him, he’s tracing his lips over my shoulder, up my neck, and I find myself immediately tilting my head to give him better access.
Mac keeps his touches soft, waiting for more direction from me before he does anything more.
When he stops the trail his lips were making, I face him and crash my lips to his.
I kiss him in a desperate way as though willing him to understand how things have changed.
Trying to get an answer to if maybe he feels the same way.
His hands slowly make their way across my body, and I’m pushing at his pyjamas, needing to feel his skin on mine. I need to be closer to him. He lets me remove his shirt and then his lips find my shoulder again, his fingers delicately pushing at the strap of my tank top.
“Mac,” I whine.
He doesn’t say anything, just smiles against my skin. He pulls the strap and the top of my shirt down just enough that my breast is free from the fabric. His lips wrap around my nipple, and the most needy sound leaves me. I should be embarrassed, but I can’t find it in me to be.
He does the same with the other side of my top, leaving it sitting around my waist as his lips move to find my other breast, his hand replacing his mouth as he moves. He takes his time showing each breast attention, and I’m soaked, almost on the verge of begging him to touch me somewhere else.
“You’re fucking perfect,” Mac whispers, and my heart flutters.
These little praises he gives me are almost too much, feeding into my hope.
He adjusts himself so he’s on his knees and looking down at me as he pulls my sleep shorts off slowly.
His gaze is hot as he follows the trail of my shorts.
When he tosses them to the side, my legs fall open, providing him the perfect view to see just how wet I am for him.
“Bloody hell,” he says, his hands sliding from my knees, up my thighs until they’re on either side of my hips. “You are sin wrapped in a beautiful package.”
His finger traces from hip to hip, and I squirm, wanting more contact.
“I love how needy you get.” His voice is barely above a whisper, and I have to strain my ears to hear each word.
As though programmed to respond to his every touch, I moan, and he watches my face as his fingers move from my lower belly to the tops of the thighs and delicately drag down a few inches as he traces floral like patterns over my skin.
I’m damn near hyperventilating when his fingers finally brush the outside of my pussy.
He chuckles when I startle at the contact.
He drags them through my wetness, circling my clit, sending my back off the bed at the contact.
I bite my hand as the loudest moans try to leave me.
Mac has learned to play my body like a fucking fiddle, and I don’t know if I should be elated or scared.
Part of my mind wonders about all the other women he’s been with to make him so experienced, knowing that I could never live up to any of them.
It took some serious sit-down sessions with myself to accept that I’m enough no matter what, and if he doesn’t see that, then that’s his own damn bad.
Mac doesn’t let me sit in my mind for long, his fingers finding my clit and gently circling it as he watches my face.
I don’t feel close enough to him right now, so I find his hair and pull his head to mine, claiming his lips in a kiss.
When my tongue slips between his lips, it seems to be his undoing.
He’s pushing his own shorts down in frantic movements as he continues to kiss me.
He has to break our connection when he reaches into the night stand and grabs a condom, ripping it open between his teeth before rolling it down his erection.
I’m panting from our kiss alone and my pure need for Mac right now.
With the condom on, Mac finds my knee with his left hand, slowly dragging it up my leg until he grips the top of my thigh and lifts it so I wrap it around his waist. He drags his cock through my wetness and notches it at my entrance.
Without thought, my leg around his waist pulls him in, and he doesn’t fight it.
We both inhale as he stretches me open, and I realize how long it’s been since we were last together like this.
It feels new and familiar all at the same time.
When our hips meet, he kisses me in a soft intimate way that has my heart leaping out of my chest.
He slowly pulls out before pushing back into me, and I find his eyes, deciding to tie myself to him even more like an idiot.
I shouldn’t have looked in his eyes, because now I feel tears burning behind mine, this connection feeling so strong.
Mac doesn’t fuck me like we did back in London.
Instead he takes his time, both of our orgasms slowly building until we both tumble over the cliff together, and if that isn’t an apt metaphor for what my heart is currently feeling, I don’t know what is.
I manage to hold back my tears, not ready to show him just how much my heart is invested in this. He helps me clean up before we climb back into bed together, and for the first time all week, I get a proper nights rest.