Chapter 13 #2
Beautiful, yes. But a bit scary.
Her eyes met his, and he looked… Regretful. That was the only word she could use to describe him right now, and she really didn’t like that.
“Zane…?”
“I didn’t want… I didn’t want to do this to you.”
“What the hell?”
“I want you, don’t mistake me. But I was trying to protect you from me.”
“You were trying to protect me from what? Your amazing kissing technique and your perfect body?”
He growled, which seemed to be the most readily accessible noise available to him when he was hard. He moved quickly and lay her down on the bed, moving over the top of her, pinning her wrist up over her head.
“All of this,” he said. “Because I’m a mess.
Because I don’t know how to connect with anybody.
Because the only kind of relationships I’ve ever had have been one-night stands.
Do you understand that? You live here. I live here.
You… You’re practically family to Cody. And he…
Oh, he does not like us hanging around each other. ”
“I don’t care what Cody likes,” she said. “I mean that. I don’t need anybody to suddenly swoop in and be protective of me. I’ve been taking care of myself, my mother, for a long time. I know what I want. I don’t need anybody else weighing in or giving their opinion. Understand?”
He nodded once. “I do. But do you understand what I’m telling you about me?”
“I didn’t think that you were looking for a relationship. You’ve made it pretty clear that you’re happy being by yourself.”
Although the word happy felt like the wrong word.
He nodded slowly. “All right. As long as you understand that.”
He lifted her pinned wrist up from the bed, turned her hand over, and kissed her palm.
The movement was so tender, so shocking, that for a moment she could only lie there watching his movements.
Then he leaned in and kissed her again, and everything got lost. Her thoughts were swirled up in the slick glide of his tongue against hers, in the heat of his touch. His body over hers.
She was still wearing her jeans and her hiking boots. He was completely naked. She could feel the hard jut of his arousal pressing against her hip bone.
She wanted more. Wanted everything.
He obliged. He pushed his hands down beneath the waistband of her jeans, and she knew that he found her wet and slick for him.
His touch was like a match being struck, white heat streaking through her when his fingertips made contact with her clitoris.
She was pretty accomplished at self-pleasure.
A woman who made it to her age untouched by the hands of another human had to be.
But that was nothing like this.
She had no control over this. His hands were moving wherever they wanted to, claiming whatever they wanted to.
And it was Zane.
She looked up, her eyes clashing with his. His thumb moved over her clit again as he kept on looking deep into her soul, and she couldn’t tell which had her strung out more. His gaze or his touch. Maybe she needed both to feel like this.
She whimpered.
“Good?” He asked, his voice low.
“Yes,” she whispered.
The smile that spread over his face was unlike any of the smiles she’d seen. This one was wicked. Dirty. This one lit her on fire from the inside out.
He shifted his wrist, and then he pushed a finger inside of her. She gasped with the unfamiliar sensation, but then he pushed a second finger deep inside of her.
She gasped, grabbing his forearms. “Okay?” He asked.
“Yes,” she said. “Yes.”
It felt good. It just surprised her. Shocked her.
But it was so good.
He worked his fingers inside of her at the same time as he teased the most sensitive part of her. And when she quit trying to anticipate. Quit trying to control things. It just felt good. Great even.
She arched her hips up and met his fingers, and gave herself up to it. To him.
Her orgasm hit her like a wave. She flexed her feet, gripping the sheets as she whimpered out her climax, trying not to scream.
That same wicked smile was on his face when he undid the button on her jeans and pulled them down her hips. Then he found himself snagged on her boots, and paused to untie them and pulled them off, taking everything else off too.
Then she was naked in front of him.
He was down by her ankles, and he pushed his hands up to her knees, forcing her legs apart, and she ridiculously found herself trying to close them. Ridiculous because they were going to have sex, so why the sudden influx of maidenly modesty? It was a bit silly.
But she couldn’t help herself. No one had ever looked at her… like that. At least nobody without a medical degree.
He kissed her calf, the inside of her knee, and then moved right to where she was wet and needy for him.
His tongue was demanding, and he pushed his fingers back inside of her as he licked her mercilessly.
There was no introduction, no pausing, no question about if she was okay.
She was better than okay. She was flying. She was on another planet.
What he could do with his tongue, his lips, that was a true hidden talent. The man was so standoffish, so difficult to get close to, but who knew? All you had to do was get naked, and then it felt very easy to get intimate with him.
He would go right in. No hesitation.
She heard rumors that women were multi-orgasmic, but had never tested the theory herself. After all, self-pleasure wasn’t really an all-night affair. At least, not for her. Congratulations to the person who lit candles and really went for it like that. But it wasn’t her deal.
But Zane made the theoretical reality a reality, sucking her clit deep at the same time as he thrust his fingers inside her again, and she unraveled. Clutching his shoulders, digging her fingernails into his skin.
“I needed that,” he said, lifting his head and putting his hands over his face for a moment.
He needed that? He hadn’t even…
But before she could ask any questions, he went into the bathroom.
Before she could ask what he was doing, he had returned with a box of condoms.
It was interesting that he didn’t keep them close at hand.
The box also wasn’t open.
Later, maybe she would ask some questions about that, but then, as soon as she had that vague thought, she realized that if she started asking questions, he might ask questions.
When he took a condom packet out of the box and tore it open, rolled it onto his hard length, she realized that her resistance to him knowing about her lack of sexual history was as ridiculous as trying to close her legs to keep him from looking at her.
Because she knew about his past. Knew about his pain. Knew about the things that kept him awake at night. Now she had seen him naked, and he was going to be inside of her, so why was she embarrassed? About anything?
Then she really couldn’t think. Because he got back onto the bed, over her, his gaze intense.
He settled between her legs, and she knew that this was the moment, that she either asked for him to be gentle, or she just let it happen the way that it was going to happen.
She decided to go with the second option and hope for the best.
He kissed her at the same time as he thrust deep inside of her. And his fingers did not prepare her for this. Nothing prepared her for this. He was so big, and the sensation of being filled by him was so… So overwhelming.
It wasn’t incredibly painful, but it was…
She could feel tears pushing at the back of her eyes, and she closed them because she didn’t want him to see them.
Didn’t want him to second-guess anything. Because this was about her, about the enormity of it… about how she hadn’t expected having another person inside of her to be this…
She didn’t know what she’d been thinking.
She’d been thinking about sex the way everybody talked about sex.
Like it was an experience you have to have, like riding a really big rollercoaster or jumping off the tallest bridge in your town into the river.
Like it was a fun thing. Like it felt good.
Like it could be casual. Just a thing that you did.
She had been convinced it could be that way, even. Had even been toying with the idea of losing her virginity with Walker or Jackson because it would be easy.
She’d been foolish. Na?ve. It wasn’t jumping off a bridge. It wasn’t tearing off a Band-Aid or getting a handshake. It was having another person inside of you. Inside of you. And it was… It was just so much more, so much more profound than she had imagined it would be.
A wave of emotion washed over her body, and she did her best to let it pass. Did her best to focus on the physical sensations because they were good.
She took a deep breath, tried to find herself again. Tried to ground herself. Then he began to move.
And it was like nothing else mattered. Nothing mattered but the feeling of him inside of her. The feeling of them being together. Of him claiming her, over and over again.
She pushed her fingers through his hair, looked at the tension in his face, the tendon standing out in his neck. Cataloging all these little features of him, of his pleasure. Of what it was like to be this close to him. His pleasure began to build deeper pleasure in her.
Until she closed her eyes and let go. A free fall into the deepest, most intense orgasm she’d ever had. He pressed his forehead against hers, his movements becoming more erratic as he gave himself up to his own release.
Then, it was just the sound of their breathing. Her heart beating in her ears.
Her whole body buzzing.
She wasn’t a virgin anymore. So there was that. But that word didn’t even make sense to her anymore because this didn’t make sense.
It wasn’t just about sex. It was about Zane.
The way that he made her feel. The way that he made her want.
He moved away from her and rested his forearm over his eyes. He didn’t say anything. His chest was pitching up and down, rapidly, his breathing ragged. Maybe he couldn’t speak yet.
She was worried that he was angry.