Chapter Seventeen
Hazel
The look he gave me in response was priceless. A heavy dose of confusion mixed with curiosity flittered across his features, and then he pinned me down with the one he settled on.
Determination.
“Explain. Because I think I would remember if somehow over the last few weeks I showed you my dick.”
“It wasn’t recently.”
“Wha… oh shit .”
Pressing my lips together, I gave him a jerky nod, confirming the conclusion he’d come to a lot quicker than I’d expected.
“That night.”
Nodding, I tried to look away, but he shifted, holding my gaze. I flinched as he raised his hand, gently grazing my jaw with his fingertips until I relaxed. His warm palm cradled the side of my face, and I tried to remain calm, waiting for him to process this new kernel of information.
“I guess I’m not exactly sure how that’s true. You’ve had boyfriends before, Haz. I’ve met a few of them. They didn’t deserve you, but it’s just not computing in my head that none of them wanted to…”
“It was me. I didn’t want to.” And until recently, I was happy with my decision not to jump into bed with the men I’d dated just because it was expected. I’d wanted it to mean something. And I knew Reid hadn’t shared the same sentiments about intimacy, but this was about me, not him. His past was just that. In the past .
And he’d never once pushed me during the last week to do or take part in anything I wasn’t one hundred percent a willing participant in.
“You could’ve told me. I would have toned it down. If I made you uncomfortable, you should have sai—”
“Nothing that has happened in the last week has made me uncomfortable. At least the bad kind of uncomfortable. I feel safe with you, Reid. Scared shitless half the time, but safe. That’s part of why I agreed to let you help me with this. I knew you would respect my boundaries.”
He closed his eyes, shaking his head momentarily, but the pad of his thumb tenderly stroked my cheekbone.
“Please don’t start treating me differently.”
“Haz, I…”
“Please. This can’t make things weird between us. Because I don’t know what I would do without you. I spent so long running from the things you made me feel, and I decided after Halloween that I wasn’t doing that anymore. I missed our friendship more than I was embarrassed, and after you helped defend me, I…”
“That was all you, kitten. I wasn’t the one with the pink bat in my hands. My job was solely as moral support while you put Viv in her place.”
My brother’s ex had come after me at the bar’s Halloween party shortly after he’d accidentally fake kidnapped my best friend. Things with Viv had gotten nasty quickly, with her accusing me of trying to bad mouth her to ruin her relationship with my brother. But she didn’t need my help. She did that all on her own, I was just tired of taking her shit. When she’d tried to physically assault me during the party while she threatened me, I’d grabbed the closest thing I could reach and rammed it into her stomach.
Only I missed and she got the blunt end of a bright pink bat shoved straight into her crotch. Once she started howling and carrying on about assault, Reid had dragged her out with Mikey, the guy who worked the door at the bar .
“So maybe I should thank her for you finally talking to me again?” It felt good to hear him laugh, but the way he was tenderly stroking my cheek had my brain going fuzzy and warm.
“I don’t think we should go crazy, but I’m not sad you’re back in my life. Even if you push me way out of my comfort zone.”
“If I’m coming on too strong, or…”
“You’re perfect, Reid. Seriously. You haven’t crossed any lines I wasn’t inviting you to cross. But I’ll understand if this changes things for you. Because—”
His fingers plunged into my hair; his face suddenly much closer than I was expecting. “Fuck that, Haz. You’re the one who is perfect, and your experience or lack thereof doesn’t bother me.”
“Yeah, cause I’m such a fucking catch. Flighty, sarcastic, built like an adolescent, has two public personas… complete silence or never shuts up and has no social awareness. But, yeah, I’m great.”
“Well, you were right about one thing…” he whispered, leaning in close to my ear. “You are pretty great.”
“You have to say that,” I mumbled into his cheek, wishing I saw myself the same way he saw me.
He pulled back, releasing my face, but he scooted in close, his arm draped across the back of the couch again. “And why is that?”
“Because you’re Hudson’s best friend. You’re supposed to be protective.”
He nodded, pursing his lips, but I could tell he wasn’t buying into that reasoning. “You’re right, I do feel protective of you. But it’s not because you’re Hud’s little sister.”
“It’s not?” I asked, and he chuckled, looking amused at my reaction.
“No. It’s not. It’s because this is pretty much all I can focus on lately.”
“I’m sorry. This project is taking up too much of your time, I…” My voice trailed off as he started shaking his head again, but it was hard to keep myself from babbling more apologies as my anxiety spiked .
“Don’t even say it. You’re not getting rid of me that easily,” he warned, placing his hand on my thigh. He wasn’t even touching my bare skin, but my pulse hammered as I tried to keep focusing on what he was saying without spacing out. “Nor do I want you to let me off the hook. In fact, I want you to sink all your hooks into me.”
“Even if I have no idea what I’m doing half the time we’re setting up these photoshoots?”
“Especially when you don’t know what you’re doing. You could have told me earlier, and I would have approached things with a little more finesse. No wonder you were so jittery the first time. You’ve never done that either, right?”
His smile widened, and I was glad that laid back Reid had returned. I was worried telling him all this would change how he acted around me. It had whenever I’d confessed my inexperience to past boyfriends. Most of them had run in the opposite direction and promptly lost my phone number.
“You couldn’t tell?”
“Well, there was the whole attempting to suffocate me and the bruise that’s just now fading, but I was chalking those up to nerves and you being a klutz, not inexperience.”
“I’m not that much of a klutz.”
He cocked a brow and nodded at my leg, his drawing mostly covered by my leggings, but the tip of the vine peeking out was easily visible, trailing toward my ankle.
“What was I supposed to do? You told me you were the one who left the crate there in the middle of the floor. It’s not like I tripped on purpose. It wasn’t supposed to be there.”
My previous friendship with Reid had become strained and almost nonexistent after I’d walked in on him having sex against the storeroom wall at the bar with some random hookup a few years ago.
At first, I hadn’t realized what was going on, but when she started moaning and I noticed his pants around his ankles, I’d caught on pretty quickly .
Only I’d tripped over a case of whiskey bottles while trying to get out without being noticed and ended up with a piece of glass bottle sticking out of my leg.
“I was just trying to escape before you realized I was there!” I exclaimed, narrowing my eyes at him when he started to laugh at me.
“Yeah, and apparently you got an eyeful instead.”
“Well, I don’t know about that. Maybe just a smidge of an eyeful. Not a full one. It was dark, and you’d already finished, so I’m sure that affects the size. Then there was the condom, so I really didn’t see much…”
“Not much, huh? Is that what you think I’m packing? No wonder you haven’t fallen for my charms. Maybe I shouldn’t have hidden it underneath that sheet in the last photos so you could at least have an accurate depiction. I thought about asking you to video chat while we took the pictures, but someone never called me last night.”
My eyes widened at the blatant flirting he’d been holding in coming back in full force. “What happened to you not wanting to make me uncomfortable?”
“Does the thought of me showing you my dick make you uncomfortable, kitten?” he asked, leaning in to whisper in my ear. “Because it makes things uncomfortable for me too, but only because thinking about your reaction is getting me hard.”
“Right now?” I squeaked, looking down at his shorts.
“Does that bother you?” His voice was quiet, but I heard him despite the pounding in my ears from my racing pulse. “Because if it does, I’ll stop. Do you want me to stop, Haz?”
“No,” I breathed, my movements shaky as I shook my head.
“Do you like the idea of me getting hard because of you?”
A jerky nod was my only response, but Reid somehow knew I was giving him the go ahead to lead as he continued talking to me.
“Because every time I’ve been near you this week, this is how hard I’ve been.” He picked up my hand, softly stroking my fingers before he placed it on the part of his anatomy we’d been talking about. My fingers twitched, and he groaned softly, leaning close to whisper in my ear. “Why don’t we get the camera set up before I get too carried away?”
“This isn’t getting carried away?” I asked, wrapping my hand around him. He hissed and my adrenaline soared at the thought of how much I’d affected him.
“Not yet.” Gently pulling my hand free, he placed it in my lap, standing up from the couch like he hadn’t just put my hand on his dick and let me feel how hard he was.
Reid tidied up the pizza, throwing away our trash before he calmly walked to where he’d dropped his camera bag. I watched as he set it up, carefully lining up the shot before he came back over to the couch and grabbed a pillow, holding out his other hand to me. “You ready?”
“No. Not really,” I laughed nervously, but I took his hand and followed him to the wall in the small hallway leading to my bedroom, where he’d set everything up.
He tossed the pillow to the floor before he turned me to face him, bending his knees so he could look me in the eyes. “I’m not expecting anything from you, but I’m also not going to stop it if you decide you want to touch me. What happens next is entirely up to you. We can take the pictures, and I’ll pack up and go home, but—”
“And if I want to do more?”
“Then you can see exactly how much you affect me every time we’re together while I tell you how I like to be touched. But guys are easy, Haz. It doesn’t take much to turn us on, and we’re very visual. Any guy who is lucky enough to have your hands or lips on him won’t stand a chance.”
My eyes were laser focused on the pillow he’d thrown on the floor, touched he was worried about my comfort, but also wildly turned on at the thought of getting to touch him. To feel the evidence of how much he wanted me. Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine he’d return my attraction, but my fingers itched with the memory of how warm and hard he’d been beneath the soft material of his shorts.
“And you’re okay if I tell you to keep your pants on the whole time? Like you won’t think I’m a tease and get mad later if I…”
It’d been years, but my boyfriend in high school had broken up with me when I wouldn’t do anything other than teenage over the clothes fumbling. I hadn’t been ready back then, and when I’d told him, he’d bailed instead of waiting for me to be comfortable touching him.
Reid’s fingers tilted my chin up, forcing me to hold his gaze as he stood to his full height, looming over me. “I will never get mad at you for taking things at your own pace, sweet girl. And I wasn’t just saying it when I told you that you’re in control here. You have my consent to explore however you want to, and I’ll follow your lead. Just do whatever feels natural to you. I promise it’ll all feel good for me.”
Laughing humorlessly, I shook my head. “You’re not what I expected, Mister Harding.”
He grinned, leaning down to coast his lips against my cheek, his warm breath fanning across my ear. “You’re not what I expected, Miss Rivera, but I have to admit I really like you showing me this side of yourself.”
“The side that is an even bigger hot mess than you expected?” I laughed, the sound morphing into a gasp when his lips pressed against the skin beneath my ear, ghosting a barely there kiss and making my pulse soar.
“The side of you that is honest and feisty. I love that you’re not afraid to be authentically yourself. It’s sexy as fuck.”
“We’ll see if you’re still saying that a few moments from now,” I whispered, pushing against his chest and closing my eyes briefly, trying to muster the courage to kneel on the pillow at his feet. "Because I am authentically a disaster."
Reid’s intimidating gaze was focused on me as I settled into place and then looked up toward him. My heart skipped as he took a few steps forward, bracing his palms on the wall far above my head, essentially trapping me there with his hips directly in front of my face.
I should have been terrified, feeling completely out of my element and self-conscious, but I wasn’t.
The look in his eyes made me feel empowered and sexy. With this man looming over me completely at my mercy despite our positions. He’d turned over the control to me, and that was what had me pulling him closer, my fingers skating along the hem of his shirt and lifting it, a clear demand to remove it.
As his toned chest was revealed inch by tantalizing inch, I tried to focus and zeroed in on the waistband of his shorts, playfully slipping a finger underneath the elastic and tugging on it.
“If you want them off, take them off,” Reid whispered. I gulped, slipping my thumbs beneath the material, his warm skin sending a rush through me as I started shifting his waistband lower. Looking up at him, I tried to figure out what to do next.
Absently, I could hear the click of the camera a few feet away every so often, Reid doing a much better job of documenting this scene than I’d done with the others, but I wasn’t in position to capture what I needed for my reference photos just yet, and he knew it.
Reid was capturing these pictures so he could look at them later. And the thought of him stroking himself to the memory of me on my knees for him had me leaning in, grasping the back of his knees and ghosting my face along the outline of what he’d put my hand on earlier.
“Did you just nuzzle my dick?” Reid chuckled, his body vibrating as I watched his cock flex beneath the material of his briefs.
But he’d told me I was in charge, and that he’d let me lead. It wasn’t time for him to distract me. Looking up, I pinned him down with an unimpressed look. “What happened to me being in charge here? If you don’t like what I do, then I’ll stop right now.”
His mouth dropped open, but he didn’t laugh again before he spoke. “I’m not sure how to deal with this mouthy version of you. ”
“Well, then I guess it’s a good thing you’re keeping all your clothes on tonight. Then you won’t have to live through the torture of my mouth on you.”
His earlier shock turned into a naughty grin, his eyes flashing dangerously as he leaned forward, bracing his forearms against the wall and growling while he looked down at me. “Fuck, feisty Hazel is a little bossy, and I’m here for it.”
“Are you going to keep talking or are we going to take a picture of me fake blowing you?”
He couldn’t hold in the laughter, his body shaking inches from my face. “Sorry, kitten. Shutting up. Do your worst.”
“We both know I don’t settle for mediocrity,” I teased, holding his gaze as I tipped my head back.
“What has gotten into you? Maybe I should feed you sausage more often.”
“Do you not like it?” Suddenly I was afraid that I was ruining the moment by not taking this more seriously. Bantering with Reid was instinct for me, but if it was killing the vibe, I could try to keep my mouth shut.
He shook his head slowly, a mischievous grin drawing across his lips. “No, I fucking love it.”
Nodding, I took a deep breath and mustered my earlier courage. “Good. Then keep your mouth shut. I need you to behave like the good boy I know you're not and quit distracting me from pulling off your shorts.”
Reid just watched as I tugged the material lower, leaving it pooled at his ankles while I appraised the package in front of me. There was something familiar about the waistband of the boxer briefs suddenly inches from my face. But when I grazed my fingertip down the hard ridge inside them, Reid’s answering groan was enough to distract me from any thoughts about his underwear purchasing habits.