Chapter 25 Bash
Chapter twenty-five
Bash
Charlie’s muffled cry floats through the dimly lit bedroom, strained and breathless. I lift my head just enough to see her. Cheeks flushed, lips parted, I feel her pulling on the sheets as her fingers twist into them, clinging for dear life.
God, she sounds so fucking good.
But, we made a deal.
I press a slow kiss to the inside of her thigh and lick, teasing the already marked skin. “Quiet, Shortcake,” I remind her, voice rough. “Everyone's back now and you promised.”
Her chest rises and falls rapidly, eyes squeezed shut like she’s concentrating on not shattering. “I’m sorry,” she whispers as she shoves her pillow into her mouth.
Hell, if that doesn’t just make me want to ruin her more.
I smirk against her. “Now… can I finish my dessert please?”
She nods desperately, and because I’m not a fucking saint, I drag my tongue through her just to hear that muffled whimper again.
She tastes incredible. Slick against my tongue and so tight against my fingers as she clenches around them.
The first filthy glide of my fingers inside her earns me a choked-off groan, muffled tight into the pillow she's still mashing against her mouth. Christ, every hitch in her breathing goes straight to my cock, already aching where it’s trapped against the mattress.
My free hand grips the soft flesh of her thigh hard enough that I know I’ll leave bruises, but she just bucks against me, her hips jerking in sharp little rolls like she can’t decide whether to chase my fingers or my mouth.
As if I’d let her choose.
I press deeper, fingers crooked just right, and she gasps, her back bowing off the bed like I’ve shocked her.
Her heel digs into my shoulder, nails dragging through my hair, messy and desperate.
I don’t let up, licking a broad stripe over her clit before sucking lightly, my fingers curling up inside her the way I know she—
There.
Her entire body seizes, muscles going rigid as the first wave crashes through her.
For one suspended moment, she's perfectly still, quivering like a plucked string.
Then it hits. Her whispered moan fills the room, back arched impossibly high as her heels slip from my shoulders.
Her thighs clamp against my ears, muffling everything except the rhythmic pulse I feel around my fingers.
I don't stop, just soften my approach. Languid, lazy strokes of my tongue between each deliberate curl of my fingers, drawing out every tremor.
I work her through it all, slowing only when the trembling turns to twitching, her breath hitching with each too-sensitive touch.
By the time I drag myself up her body, leaving kisses along her hip, her navel, the flutter of her ribs, she’s a wreck.
Lids heavy, her chest rising and falling too fast, bottom lip bitten red.
Still, even half-gone, she reaches for me the second I hover over her, her fingertips skating up my arms like she needs to confirm I’m real.
Then her nails dig in, unforgiving, and she yanks me down into a heady kiss, all tongue and teeth and smug, satisfied noise when I groan into her mouth.
Like she’s marking me right back.
"Your turn," she murmurs against my lips, the words warm and honeyed with satisfaction, and before I can even process the sudden shift in power dynamics, not that I'm resisting, but she's already moving, palm pressing firmly against my shoulder.
I let her push me over with a breathless laugh, surrendering control willingly as my back hits the mattress with a muffled thump.
The impact barely registers, all my focus narrowed down to the weight of her settling over me, knees sinking into the sheets on either side of my hips.
Fuck me sideways, the sight of her. Wanting and triumphant, with her messy auburn waves tumbling around her shoulders like a goddamn Renaissance painting come to life.
I catch that infuriatingly clever glint in her hazel eyes as they flick over my face like she's already pieced together how easily she can unravel me.
And she's touching me like she owns every inch of skin beneath her fingers, skimming her palms over my bare chest with this slow, proprietary drag that makes my breath catch.
And that little smirk curving her mouth as she licks her bottom lip?
Yeah, that's the one that makes my pulse hammer like I'm back on the slopes, mid-drop, no safety net in sight.
Mine.
The thought barrels into me like an avalanche.
Raw, stupidly sentimental, dangerously close to something I shouldn’t be thinking right now.
Especially not with our arrangement in place.
Not even as she leans over me with that feline grace, fingertips curling just below my ribs in a way that sends a full-body shiver racing down my spine.
She reaches for the condom from the nightstand while still staring straight through me, utterly unhurried, the foil catching the faint glow of the bedside lamp.
Her other hand stays planted on my sternum, a heat-searing brand I feel everywhere, even as she tears the packet open with her teeth.
Christ, she's lethal like this.
She’s the hunter and I’m her prey.
I'm embarrassingly hard, straining against the warm press of her thigh where it brushes against me.
And the way she's watching me, her gaze hooded and flickering between amusement and absolute hunger, doesn't help.
Neither does the torturously slow slide of her fingers as she rolls the condom down my length, taking her sweet goddamn time like she's savoring every choked noise I'm failing to suppress.
The little minx knows exactly what she's doing.
I catch her focusing on the way my stomach tightens under her touch, the way my fingers fist in the sheets just to keep from yanking her down and losing my goddamn mind inside of her.
Then, with zero warning she rises up and sinks onto me in one excruciatingly perfect slide.
Inch by torturous inch, taking me deep until I’m buried to the hilt.
Her breath escapes in a shuddering, uneven exhale, her chest rising and falling with each ragged inhale as her head tips back.
The elegant line of her throat is perfectly exposed, the flutter of her pulse beneath her skin downright mesmerizing.
Her perfect tits pushed toward me when she arches slightly, and this sight alone nearly undoes me right there.
But it's the way she clenches around me as she adjusts her hips. Tight and slow, then releasing with a deliberate roll that steals my goddamn breath. Her body’s memorizing every ridge, every inch of me, and the sensation makes my vision grey out at the edges, my grip on her waist instinctively tightening.
The sheer heat of her drags a rough noise from my throat before I can stop it.
"Fuck, Charlie—"
Her eyes snap to mine, wicked amusement dancing in them.
"Shh," she murmurs, pressing a finger to her own lips in mock reproach before rolling her hips again, that teasing bite sinking into her lower lip. The deliberate shift as she finally takes me all the way—holy shit. It’s agonizing and perfect, tight and slick and all-consuming.
Fuck.
The word reverberates through my skull, half prayer, half curse, because how the hell is she real.
I swear my vision whites out for a second.
My hands fly to her hips, and she starts to really move. Rolling her body in a slow, maddening rhythm that has my grip tightening. “Charlie—”
She leans forward, palms flat on my chest now, and does something with her hips that makes me see stars. “I said quiet,” she teases, dragging a finger over my mouth.
I don’t fucking listen.
Instead, my thumbs brush the underside of her breasts, then higher, twisting her nipples between my fingers just to hear her breath catch.
There it is. Another broken moan.
I grin, victorious, and take one into my mouth, sucking hard.
She curses under her breath, bracing one hand on the headboard, the other fisting in my hair as she rides me harder—faster—until all I can do is hold on, my fingers digging into her hips as she takes exactly what she needs.
I release her nipple with a wet ‘pop’ as she continues to ride me.
She’s close. I can feel it in the way her muscles are tightening, in the way her rhythm falters.
I want to flip her under me, take control, make her come so hard she forgets the whole be quiet rule, but then she grinds down and I can’t fucking think.
The pleasure coils tight, sharp, too much. I still her hips with a shuddering breath. “Charlie—I can’t—”
She whines, but I don’t let go. Not until the first wave passes and I can drag air into my lungs again.
Then I give in.
Fuck practicality. Fuck the full house.
I lift my hips and drive up into her once, twice.
She falls apart on my third thrust, clenching around me with a gasp that I swallow with a kiss. I follow her over the edge, groaning into her mouth as I spill into the condom, fingers digging into the nape of her neck, pulling her closer to me as if I can fuse us together.
For a long moment, neither of us moves.
Then she collapses fully on top of me, chest heaving, heartbeat thundering against mine. Her forehead drops to my shoulder, and she exhales a slow, satisfied laugh.
I stroke her back, pressing a kiss to her shoulder.
Mine.
The thought is startling in its possessiveness, its certainty.
But I don’t have time to dwell on it.
Because the moment we both catch our breath, the bedroom door softly rattles—
A knock.
Her body stiffens on top of me.
“Charlie?” Emily’s voice, smug and far too amused, carries through the wood. “Just a heads-up. Y’all weren't quiet.”
She buries her face in my neck with a groan.
I can’t help it. I laugh.