29. Ivy
IVY
E verything Cam does is with fervent intent and unbridled determination.
Every brush of his hand across my skin. Each kiss perfectly placed to elicit those little shivers through my body and mewls that fall from my lips whenever he touches me just right.
The man knows what he’s doing, and good God , when all his passion and attention focuses on me, it would be impossible not to be entrapped in his snare.
His fingers brush along the waistband of my leggings as he kisses me, urging me to lift my hips so he can peel them down and toss them behind him.
I clutch at his jacket, not wanting him to pull away, not wanting to end the kiss, but he chuckles against my lips, low and dark, the sound making my clit throb where it’s currently pinned to his hard cock.
“I’m more than willing to fuck you like this, Ivy, but I will say, I enjoy it far more when I get to see all of you.”
The lust thickening his words ushers a little thrill through me, and I know he isn’t just saying them to stroke my ego.
He wants to see me.
All of me.
The good.
The bad.
The ugly.
The things I want to keep hidden.
I watched the man paint me last night, spend hours on my form, highlighting every curve, every dimple, every scar, every line of my body so perfectly it almost looked like a photograph by the time it was completed.
Seeing the final result this morning made me believe those people who say God speaks through the hands of artists—because Cam made me see God and captured the aftermath with such utter precision and clarity it could only come from a divine hand.
He brushes his thumb across my trembling bottom lip. “What are you thinking about?”
I shake my head, trying to clear the haze of my desire surging through me. “What?”
“Your cheeks just got very pink, and your thighs tightened around me.”
Shit.
It wasn’t soley my mind wandering to those carnal memories. My body remembers it all with vivid clarity and wants more.
So much more.
“I was thinking about you painting me last night…”
His eyes flare wide, the heat in them blazing even hotter.
“Did you like that?” He slips his thumb into my mouth, and there’s something so erotic about tasting his skin this way that I moan around it.
“Lying there naked with my cum dripping out of you while I painted every inch of your beautiful body?”
He cups me between my legs possessively, a low growl rumbling in his chest against mine as a moan slips from my lips around his thumb.
There’s no way he can’t feel how soaked I am already, how slick and ready my cunt is for him.
And I can’t deny it.
Something about watching him paint me, completely nude, so intensely focused on the canvas and my body…
A slow grin pulls at his lips, making him even more handsome, even more feral looking. Like some sort of animal was just unleashed when he realized what watching him paint me does to my body, even now. “You did like it, didn’t you, Ivy?”
I nod, a breathy, “Yes,” slipping from my parted lips.
He grinds the meaty part of his palm against my clit, ghosting his lips across mine, teasing me in both places. “I loved it. Seeing you in my bed, knowing I was just inside you, how fucking beautiful and pink you were after I made you come.”
I tremble again, unable to stop myself from rolling my hips along his length and hand, so desperate for the friction now that it’s embarrassing.
“Would you like me to do that again, Ivy?” Another brush of his lips and a crush of his hand. “Twist you up into different positions and paint you so you can see how fucking stunning you are?”
“Oh, God.”
I drop my forehead against his shoulder, and he grins into my neck, his tongue snaking over my thrumming pulse.
“That can be arranged, Ivy. All you had to do was ask.”
Fuck.
I thought losing Drew was going to kill me, too, but Cam has become my sweetest agony.
This man…he will be what truly destroys me.
His fingers delve through my slick core, easily drenching my clit in my arousal, and my hips twist at the contact, jerking in his hold.
He groans as he devours me, his tongue lashing against mine, his hips grinding forward, his body seeking the same thing mine is—that connection we found last night.
The utter desperation and need that completely wash away everything else—all our reservations, all our worries, all our sins .
The longer we kiss, the harder he grinds his hand and cock against me, the more delerious I become, scoring my nails over his skin, clinging to him with a kind of frenzied, burning, soul-deep desire that feels like it might consume me in its flames.
When Cam tears his head back and steps away, both of us panting, struggling to find our breath, I brace my hands on the counter and watch him shuck off his jacket and let it fall to the floor.
Then he reaches between his shoulders and pulls off his shirt in one smooth motion that leaves his upper body exposed in the kitchen light.
Every deep groove and valley of hard-earned muscle, his tattoos practically alive as they dance across the sun-kissed skin. The snakes coil and writhe over thickly corded forearms as he reaches for his waistband.
“I wish I could paint you.”
He freezes, his head cocking to the side. “Why can’t you?”
I bark out a laugh that has him grinning. “Because I don’t have an artistic bone in my body.”
His fingers pop the button and gradually drag down the zipper, releasing his hard cock before he shoves his jeans the rest of the way down, tugs them off, and tosses them haphazardly behind him.
My mouth goes dry as he takes himself in one hand and strokes it, then steps forward, sliding his free one along the hem of my shirt, dragging his fingers back and forth gently, teasing my sensitive skin and leaving goosebumps across it.
He dips his head to mine, fluttering a kiss across my lips. “I beg to differ.”
The head of his cock glides through my wetness, and I grin at him as he slowly pushes inside me.
My eyes roll back, my head dropping as he fills me—inch by glorious inch.
“Fuck…”
The word tumbles from my lips on a sob he catches in his mouth, and he uses his hands to push my shirt up and over my breasts, then tears away long enough to get me fully naked.
When his lips find mine again, it isn’t the needy, desperate, frantic kisses he’s given me before.
It’s torturously slow, as is the way he draws back his hips and sinks into me again, grinding against my clit when he reaches the hilt.
His tongue drags along mine at the same tempo as his languid hips.
In.
Out.
Advance.
Retreat.
Over and over.
The head of his cock stroking that wonderful spot deep inside me that draws out a whimper and sends heat spiraling through me.
I shift to wrap my arms around his neck, clinging to him, and his hand comes to rest at my shoulders to hold me steady as he thrusts into me with such slow, determined strokes.
Feeling him like this, every glorious fucking inch, so unhurried yet decadent in a way that steals my breath with each thrust, overwhelms my senses to the point of tears.
One slips down my cheek, and he catches it with his tongue, dragging it across the damp skin. “I don’t like to see you cry, Ivy.” He stills his hips, and I whimper. “Tell me what’s wrong.”
Nothing and everything at the same time.
Shaking my head, I squeeze my eyes closed, willing the tears away because God , I don’t want him to stop. I might die if he does. I need this, him, so badly. He’s a beautiful distraction from everything else that’s so wrong.
“Look at me, Ivy.”
I force my eyes open to meet his. The blue shimmers tonight with so many emotions that it’s impossible to separate them, and he captures my cheek in his palm, brushing his thumb across my lips.
“Tell me.”
“N-nothing is wrong, I just…” I shudder under him, my pussy clamping down on his cock. “You feel so good. This. Being with you does…”
His gaze softens, and he dips his head to kiss away another tear before moving to my mouth again so I can taste the salty drop on his tongue.
He resumes his languid, leisurely pace, building me up so fucking slowly that my entire body trembles violently, my hips bowing to meet his as he pumps into me.
Just a bit more.
Just a little more.
So fucking close.
The simmering heat wants to spark. It wants to combust. That explosion of pleasure is right there, barely out of reach.
Then he draws back, slipping from inside me, and I gasp, reaching for him, but he drops to his knees, dragging me to the edge of the counter, and buries his face between my legs before I can object further.
His tongue replaces his cock.
Probing into me.
Dragging over my clit.
Gliding through the wetness seeping from my cunt for him.
His low growl of satisfaction vibrates against my skin. “Fucking hell. I could stay with my face between your thighs for eternity, Ivy.”
In this moment, that sounds really fucking good, like a magical plan I can completely get behind one hundred percent.
I brace myself on one hand so I can watch him as I bury the other in his hair, holding him in place, directing him where I want him. But this man doesn’t need any direction, doesn’t want any. He reaches up and grabs my wrist, pinning it onto the counter as he drags his head back.
His lips glisten, and he very deliberately flicks his tongue across my clit as he holds my gaze, making me twitch. “Trust me to give you what you need, Ivy.”
Bloody hell…
I groan, so desperate for it now that the tears start to leak out again. But I do trust him. With this. With my life. Even with what’s left of my heart. Even if I shouldn’t.
He slips a finger inside me, curling it up and dragging it along the walls of my pussy. Then another, pumping into me in that glorious spot that makes me see stars. I whimper as my body trembles, starving for release, and he watches with hooded, hungry eyes, eating at me like a starved man.
Heat blooms from my core as his tongue rapidly laps at my clit, but just as I’m about to come, he pulls away, stands, and slams his cock into me, driving me backward on the counter.
His arm comes up behind me to catch me before I fall completely, his mouth ravaging mine as he drives into me ruthlessly.
My head starts to spin, that slow smolder igniting into a raging inferno where we’re connected that spreads out through every limb and fiber of my being until I finally burst.
Tears stream down my face as the orgasm rips through me.
My body convulses against his as he holds me tightly and pumps into me harshly, driving me through the orgasm and keeping it going.
Only just as it starts to ebb, his hand slips between us and finds my clit. I gasp at the contact on my overly sensitive spot, but he rolls his thumb across it rapidly, keeping the orgasm going impossibly long until he finally stills deep inside me and releases on a strangled groan.
“Fucking hell, Ivy…”
He buries his face in my neck, both of us panting, our sweat-slick bodies pressed to each other as we labor to calm our racing hearts and find our normal breaths.
Each minute that passes, I fall further into him, allowing him to hold me even closer, absorbing all his strength and passion and anything else he’s willing to give me, because without it, I’d be lost again.
And I’m terrified this was a goodbye as much as I thought that kiss outside might have been.
My skin starts to cool and pebble with goosebumps in the chilly air, and he finally lifts his head and meets my gaze again, emotions wrestling with each other to take control.
He didn’t want to come in here, didn’t want to be in this house with me like this, but this is my home, where I belong, where I’m going to stay, and I need to have this man in it.
So much so that it terrifies me.
“Please don’t leave.” My impassioned plea makes his brow furrow, and he squeezes his eyes closed, dropping his forehead to mine as he takes a long, deep breath.
“I can’t…” He shakes his head, still keeping it pressed to mine. “I can’t stay, Ivy. Not here. I’m sorry.”
The plea in his voice for me to drop it, for me to let him go, makes my eyes burn with a different type of tears than before, and I bite my lip to try to hide how badly it trembles right now, to bite back the words I want to say.
That this is my house, and though I may have shared it with Drew and made memories and plans with him here, he’s gone.
Something the man still buried inside me forced me to admit to myself, forced me to see.
He’s the one who made me let go of the unhealthy death grip I had on Drew’s memory, and yet he can’t.
And I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to make him.