Chapter 22 #2
“Such a pretty little thing, rubbing your pussy against me. Taking what you want,” he murmurs.
He presses his lips against my neck, just below my ear.
Then he pulls back, eyes blazing as his gaze rakes over the piercing he put in my ear just a handful of days ago.
“It’s hotter than it should be, seeing you with a piece of jewelry that I put on your body. ”
Heat licks up my spine and I toss my head back, stifling a moan. “Keep talking,” I urge him. “Please.”
Declan’s mouth is on again me a moment later, taking advantage of the exposed skin of my throat. He sucks at the spot just above where my neck meets my shoulder, and I shiver.
“I’ve been thinking about this since the day we met,” he breathes against my skin.
“Been dreaming of getting my hands on your body. Wondering what you taste like. Thinking about what that sassy mouth of yours would feel like wrapped around my cock. Fuck, I can’t wait to be inside you.
” Declan nips at my collarbone while he continues expertly strumming my clit, and I arch against him again.
“I need you to come for me first. Can you do that?”
“Yes,” I whimper. “Please.” I don’t even know what I’m begging for, but Declan does. He sinks a finger inside me and I groan at the stretch, a need I didn’t even realize that I had being met. Because of course Declan knows exactly what my body craves, even when I don’t.
He slides his finger back out and rubs my clit, spreading my slickness around and using it as a lubrication.
When he sinks two fingers back inside me, his thumb moves quicker against that aching bundle of nerves, helping me chase the orgasm that’s still just slightly out of reach.
Declan pumps his fingers out and back in, agonizingly slow, until he curls his fingers and hits something inside me that has pleasure zapping up my spine.
I cry out and Declan’s mouth crashes down onto mine, swallowing the sound. His tongue strokes against mine at the same tempo as his fingers, and I melt against him.
Declan surprises me by grabbing my braid with his other hand and wrapping it around his fist. When he gives it a gentle tug I gasp, the bite against my scalp a surprising but welcome sensation.
He pulls back and grins at me, a feral, wolfish gleam that reminds me of a predator ready to finally capture its prey.
“Let go,” Declan commands. His thumb presses against my clit at the same time he tugs on my hair, and my orgasm crashes over me like a tidal wave.
He fucks me with his fingers while I come, and that delicious, tingling heat spreads from the base of my spine all the way up to my scalp.
As I ride out wave after wave, Declan’s eyes never leave mine, watching me unravel at his touch while he murmurs things like, “That’s it, baby,” and, “So pretty when you come for me.”
When my orgasm finally subsides, instead of feeling sleepy and sated, the way I normally do, I’m surprised to realize that the hunger is still there. I want more – more of Declan, more of his hands on my body, more filthy words whispered in my ear.
I want him to stretch me, to fill me up and make me come again.
I’m debating how best to tell him that when he slides his fingers out of me.
I watch, shocked, as he slips them between his lips, tasting me on his skin.
If I hadn’t already been geared up and ready for more, the sight of his fingers, slick with my release and sliding into his mouth all the way up to his inked knuckles, would be enough to get me there.
Goddamn, he’s so hot.
“Declan?”
The unexpected voice outside the greenhouse snaps me out of my post-orgasm haze.
My eyes dart up to meet Declan’s, panic washing over me, but he just grins down at me, unbothered.
He reaches down and grabs one of my hands, twining our fingers together.
Somehow, even after everything we just did, the sweetness of the gesture makes butterflies take flight in my belly.
“Deck?” the voice, which I now recognize as Sean’s, calls out again.
“Be right there,” Declan yells back. His eyes are still locked on mine as he brushes a stray piece of hair off my cheek and tucks it behind my ear.
There’s a small, gentle smile on his face, but his eyes – I’ve never seen his dark irises so bright.
The way he’s looking at me… it’s pure wonder. Absolute reverence.
This sweet, soft version of Declan is so at odds with the version of him that just touched me until I came on his fingers. The one whose hunger and need was felt in every glance, every caress. Who whispered filthy things in my ear while I came apart under his touch.
At every turn, Declan manages to toss the preconceived notions I had about him right out the window.
Yes, he’s the same guy who pissed me off on the sidewalk at our first meeting – the big, tattooed, motorcycle-riding man who wears a lot of black, tattoos people for a living and likes to drive me crazy as his primary hobby.
But he’s also the guy who told me he just wants to know me.
The guy who’s been burrowing his way under my skin since day one, and not letting my prickliness scare him off.
The same Declan I find watching me in his spare moments, always with a curious look on his face, like he’s cataloging bits and pieces of me and tucking them away for reference later.
The very same guy who spent a full ten minutes on the floor with Lucy yesterday, petting her and telling her what a good girl she is, while I busied myself with customers and avoided his eye, letting Noah play interference for me.
When he left to get back to work, he didn’t even seem bothered by the golden fur covering nearly every square inch of his clothing.
The more of himself that Declan shows me, the more this small, tucked away part of me screams mine! every time he’s near. I’ve tried like hell to ignore it, but it’s growing bigger and noisier by the day.
“Guess I’d better get back in there,” Declan says, though I note he doesn’t sound happy about it.
When he reaches down to adjust himself, I can’t help the way my eyes zero in on the bulge in his jeans.
I’d been so close to finally extinguishing some of this heat that’s been burning between us since the moment we met.
So close to finding out if what’s behind that zipper is as big and imposing as the rest of him.
“Elsie?” Declan says, snapping me out of my reverie. His voice is laced with amusement, and I try not to feel embarrassed about the way I was just eyeing his bulge like the horny freak he’s apparently turned me into.
“Right. I’d better get going, too.” I’m suddenly painfully aware that I’m sitting on a shelf in my greenhouse, with my panties askew and my release still slick between my thighs.
Before I can put myself back to rights, Declan does it for me, reaching between my legs to grab the edge of my underwear and tug it back where it should be.
His barely-there touch is a tease, a reminder of what just happened, and what I’d been hoping was still to come.
Declan grabs the hem of my dress that sits bunched around my hips and lets it fall back into place, before grabbing my hips and lifting me off the shelf. When he sets me down in the grass, he doesn’t let go of me right away.
“Don’t go hiding on me again, okay?”
I’m distracted by the tattoos that I’m now eye-level with.
The skull with snakes coming out of its eyes on his right pec.
The rose dripping black ink – meant to be blood?
– right below his breast bone. A small star near his right collarbone.
There are at least a dozen inked designs on the front of his torso alone, and I wish I could spend all day tracing them with my fingers and asking what each of them mean.
I jump slightly when Declan touches his thumb to my chin and tips it up so I’m forced to meet his gaze. “Elsie,” he scolds teasingly. “I know I’m distracting, but focus, please.”
I can feel the blush spreading across my cheeks. “Sorry, what did you say?”
“Don’t hide from me again,” he repeats. “Don’t be nervous, or embarrassed, or whatever it was that made you stay away for two days. I didn’t like it.” He smooths the hair off my forehead with his free hand and I lean into his touch.
“I won’t hide,” I promise him. After what just happened, I don’t think I could. I want more. More of him. More of his hands on my body. His words in my ear. His gaze locked on mine while I fall apart for him.
“Good.” He leans in and brushes a quick, gentle kiss across my forehead, and suddenly my heart is a snow cone on a hot July afternoon, melting all the way down to my toes. “Catch you later,” he says before grabbing his shirt off the grass and heading back toward the shop.
I watch as he disappears out the door of the greenhouse, tugging his T-shirt over his head as he goes. The second he’s out of sight I drop to the grass and bury my head in my hands.
I still have no idea what the hell is going on between us, but for the first time, I think I’m equal parts terrified and excited to find out.
Especially if it includes more orgasms.