Chapter 28 #2
The bell over the diner door jingles as we step inside, warmth and the smell of sugar hitting us both. For a few minutes, we’re just two people ordering donuts at the counter, arguing about whether maple bacon is an abomination or a gift from above.
(It’s a gift, obviously.)
She picks out a dozen like it’s a serious strategic operation, and I let her, because watching her light up over sprinkles is the most peace I’ve felt in days.
We take the box to go. I balance it on one arm while I unlock her apartment door with the other, the Christmas tree leaning against the railing outside like it’s standing guard.
Inside, the space feels even smaller than usual, but warmer somehow. Lived in. Hers.
I set the box on the counter and the keys in the dish by her door, muscle memory already forming where she’s concerned.
“We can decorate tomorrow,” I tell her, jerking my chin toward where the tree waits outside. “Right now…”
I push the door closed and turn the deadbolt, that solid click sinking through my bones.
“I need to make love to you, Tallulah.”
The words surprise me. No less than they surprise her.
But they’re true. Not I need to fuck you. I’ve done that. Plenty of times in my life, with women whose names blurred together after a while.
This is something else.
Her breath catches.
I don’t give either of us a chance to overthink it. Sliding my fingers into the silk of her hair at the base of her skull, I tip her face up and crush my mouth to hers.
She comes up on her toes, hands fisting in my shirt, kissing me back like she’s been doing it her entire life. I walk her backward through the narrow living room, around the coffee table, past her sad little twig tree in the corner, until the back of her knees hit the side of her bed.
We break apart long enough for me to drag my shirt over my head and let it fall wherever.
Then I bend and make quick work of getting Tally beautifully, gloriously naked for me.
She helps, shoving leggings and underwear down, wiggling out of them, tossing her shirt toward the hamper and missing by a mile.
She starts to scoot farther back on the bed, instinctively trying to create space. I’m not having that.
I grip her hips and haul her down to the edge, then drop to my knees in front of her.
“Wh…what are you…oh my sweet baby jeezus—”
Her question dissolves into a broken moan the second I fasten my lips around her clit and suck.
Tally is my new favorite meal. My new religion. I intend to worship daily.
She tastes like heat and sugar and something uniquely hers. I lick and lap at her with slow, deliberate strokes, flattening my tongue, then circling, learning what makes her gasp, what makes her hips jerk.
It doesn’t take long. She’s wound tight from the drive, from the risk, from the day. From me.
Her fingers tangle in my hair, holding on, not guiding—trusting.
I slide one finger into her, groaning into her when her walls clamp down. I curl it up, searching until I find that rough little spot inside that makes her entire body jolt.
“There you are,” I murmur against her.
Her thighs tremble against my shoulders.
“Bran, please,” she whines, hips rocking, chasing the friction.
“Good girl,” I tell her, adding a second finger, stretching her, careful and reverent even as my cock throbs at the memory of how tight she was around me the first time. “Come on my tongue.”
She does. Hard.
I hold her through it, tongue and fingers working her until she’s shaking, little cries spilling out of her with each pulse of her orgasm. Only when she slumps back on her elbows, boneless, do I ease off.
When I stand, she’s staring up at me, cheeks flushed, lips swollen, hair a wreck, and somehow still manages to make a face at me.
“Not half bad,” she mutters.
“Yeah, whatever,” I say, even as smug satisfaction curls through me.
Without answering properly, I grab hold of her and haul her up into a seated position on the edge of the mattress. A second later, I pull her into my arms.
Her legs come around my waist like they belong there. I kiss her, deep and open-mouthed, wanting her to taste herself on my lips, to know exactly what she does to me.
She moans into my mouth, tongue tangling with mine, and my brain blanks.
The only word that forms is mine.
Tallulah Gentry is mine.
It’s a disconcerting, novel idea. I’ve never had such an immediate, visceral reaction before, never had the bone-deep certainty that I was meant to be with any specific person.
I test the thought from a few angles, the way I would a new gun: checking weight, balance, feel.
Yeah. It fits.
The first step in that direction is sinking my cock deep inside her until the only thing she knows is where she ends and I begin.
I carry her the rest of the way up onto the bed and lay her down, then step back long enough to strip. Button, zipper, shove jeans and boxers down, kick them aside.
Her eyes track the movement, dark and focused and full of heat. She props herself on her elbows, shameless about looking.
“You really don’t do anything halfway, do you?” she mutters, lips quirking. “You’re a public safety hazard.”
“You didn’t seem to mind last night,” I say, stroking once, slow, just to watch her pupils blow. “Or the one before…”
A flush crawls up her throat, but her gaze doesn’t flinch. “Yeah, well. I’m getting used to the risk.”
I step in closer, letting the head of my cock nudge against the slick heat of her, my hand smoothing over the curve of her ass.
She softens under my touch like she always does, body already recognizing mine.
The trust there—earned in sweat and bruised lips and the way she fell apart for me—is a punch straight to the chest.
I lift her hips, angle her, slide two fingers through the slick heat between her legs, groaning low. “Jaysus, but you’re soaked for me—”
It’s almost my undoing.
I press the blunt head of my cock to her entrance and force myself to go slow, inch by inch, stretching her, letting her adjust. We’ve already crossed the virgin line back at the cabin; the sharp, guilty shock of that first thrust lives in my muscles now, a warning.
“I’ve got you,” I murmur, one hand at her hip, the other braced on the mattress near her ribs.
She pushes back on me, greedy, making a choked sound when I finally bottom out.
We stay like that for a moment, breathing.
Then I move.
Long, steady strokes at first, until her little gasps turn into open-mouthed moans, her body meeting mine, taking me deeper, harder.
“Bran,” she pants.
“Yeah, baby.” I reach around and find her clit with my thumb, circling in time with my thrusts. “You feel that? That’s me. All the way inside you. No space left for anything else.”
Her hand slaps against the headboard for leverage. Her legs tremble where they’re hooked around my hips.
“Come on my cock, Tallulah,” I rasp, holding the edge of my own orgasm back by sheer will. “I want to feel you.”
Her whole body locks up, then shatters, those tight inner muscles milking me, dragging me over with her.
I empty myself into her with a hoarse shout that probably has the neighbors wondering if someone’s dying.
If Kael kills me for this, I think distantly, at least I’ll go out satisfied.
I manage to roll us so I don’t crush her, ending up on my back with her sprawled across my chest. I drape an arm over her, palm covering most of her back when I spread my fingers.
She’s quiet, fingers tracing restless little patterns over my ribs. I can feel her heart racing almost as fast as mine.
“You’re quiet,” I say finally.
She shifts, chin tipping up so she can look at me. “What you said…did you mean that? Or was that just good sex talking?”
“When I said you were mine?” She nods, teeth worrying at her bottom lip.
I hold her gaze. I could lie. Make this lighter. Safer.
“I meant it,” I say instead.
She drops her head back to my chest. “What if I don’t…what if… It’s only been a few days, Bran. You can’t say shit like that.” She pushes against me like she might get up, but I tighten my arm around her.
“When you know, you know,” I say simply.
She makes a small, distressed sound, and I pat her ass, gentling my tone. “It’s okay if you don’t feel the same way yet, Tally. Take your time.”
She huffs out a shaky breath, but the fight drains out of her. Inch by inch, her body relaxes, muscles unwinding over mine until her breathing evens out.
Within minutes, she’s out cold, soft weight heavy and trusting on my chest.
I stare at the ceiling, one hand splayed across her back, feeling every rise and fall.
“I’m not going anywhere,” I murmur to the quiet room.
To her. To myself.
To whatever monsters are listening.