Chapter 14
Chapter Fourteen
AVERY
“ D inner first,” he said, his voice rough. “I don’t want to rush this.”
“Fine,” I agreed. “Dinner first.”
I finished slicing the bread, putting it on a plate to bring to the table, where he’d already set out softened butter. I turned to see West, a pasta dish in each hand, piled high, decorated with ribbons of basil, creamy lemon scents filling my nose.
“Oh, that looks good.”
“Yeah,” he agreed. “Smells amazing. Finn said the recipe wouldn’t be too hard, but I didn’t believe him.”
“But it’s not?” I asked. Finn had made it for me plenty of times, but I’d never done it myself. He didn’t like people in the kitchens at Heartstone. He got cranky if you touched his stuff. Considering Finn was a way better cook than I’d ever be, I didn’t argue that much.
“No, it really wasn’t. Want another beer?”
“Sure,” I agreed, realizing the one I’d been holding was empty .
We sat at the table and I dug in, twining pasta around my fork. It was perfect, the creamy lemon flavors exploding on my tongue. We didn’t talk much, too focused on filling our bellies.
“I missed lunch too,” West said in between bites. “I brought a sandwich, but somebody broke into the gear closet at the Inn, and I had to head over there.”
“Oh shit, really?” I asked after swallowing. “Are they still having trouble over there? Royal and Tenn haven’t said anything.” Not long after my father had died, Royal and Tenn had a problem with sabotage at the Inn, but I didn’t think they’d had any issues recently.
West shook his head. “Teenagers staying at the Inn with their parents. They wanted to go out on the river in the kayaks.”
“Do they not know how cold that water is?” I asked.
“Apparently not,” West said dryly.
I shook my head. “I’m always surprised by how many people forget we may be in the South, but we’re still in the mountains. It gets cold up here.”
“Exactly. Fortunately, we caught them before they got in the water. No life vests, no helmets.” He shook his head. “Dumbasses.”
“Well, that’s teenagers for you.”
“You weren’t a dumbass when you were a teenager,” West said. “I would have heard about it.”
“Nah, not me. It wasn’t worth getting on my father’s radar. Neither were you. Son of the mayor, future police chief. You stayed out of trouble.”
West smirked and shook his head. He swallowed a bite of pasta, took a sip of beer, before he said, “It’s not so much that I stayed out of trouble as I knew how to not get caught. Someday, maybe you can get your brother to tell you all the shit we got up to.”
“Why don’t you tell me, and then I can torture Griffen with it.”
He laughed. “Can’t do it. Best-friend code.”
“Huh. I’ll get it out of you. I have my ways,” I said, leaning forward and looking up at him through my eyelashes.
His eyes darkened. “I bet you do.”
Heat spiked through me. Dinner first , I reminded myself.
This pasta was too fucking good to leave behind.
I watched West’s fingers twirl his fork in the pasta, his hands strong and a little banged up from whatever he’d been doing all day.
He lifted the fork to his mouth, pasta neatly twirled around it, his jaw flexing as he chewed.
How was it that everything this man did was hot?
There were a lot of things I didn’t know.
If I could really run the brewery by myself.
If I were going to figure out the recipe I’d lost. If I were able to find out who killed my father.
But I knew one thing: I wanted to strip West Garfield naked and have my way with him.
And when I did, it was going to be amazing.
I looked down at my mostly empty plate, and shot a glance at his before taking another bite, and another, steadily finishing my dinner.
Finally, I dropped my fork back onto my plate with a clatter.
I took a long sip of beer, watching West wipe his mouth with his napkin and do the same.
I was already standing when he pushed his chair back.
He never made it to his feet. I stepped in front of him, my hands on his shoulders, and swung a leg to straddle his lap.
Leaning forward as I made myself comfortable on his lap, I cupped his bristly cheeks in my hands and pressed a kiss to his lips.
Before it could go anywhere, I leaned back, heat spiraling through me as his hands settled on my hips, his fingers curling in a tight grip.
“We’re going to do this, right?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Hell, yes,” he answered.
“Is it going to get weird?”
“Weird how? Like kinky-weird?” He raised an eyebrow, the side of his mouth curling up.
“Well,” I considered, “it could get kinky-weird, but that’s not what I meant. I mean like you and me and you’re Griffen’s best friend and, you know, that kind of weird.” I shifted on his lap, the heat of his body between my legs doing things to my head.
“No,” he said. “Not unless we make it weird. I talked to Griffen already.”
That was a bucket of ice water, though a small one. “What do you mean you talked to Griffen already? When? What did you say?”
“In the hospital. I told him I kissed you.”
“What did he say?” I asked, curious. “He didn’t punch you or anything, did he?” I studied West’s face, looking for signs of a black eye I’d missed.
“No.” West grinned.
“Did you think he was going to punch you?” I asked.
“A little bit, maybe,” West said. “He said you could do worse and told me to not be an asshole, which I try not to do anyway. ”
“And that was it?” I raised an eyebrow, not sure how I felt about this.
“That was it,” he said, running his hands up my back, sliding under my t-shirt, his callused fingertips delicious on my skin. I tried to focus on the conversation, just a little longer.
“No big brother posturing,” I pressed. “No ‘break her heart and I’ll break your face’?”
West shook his head, hands dropping to squeeze my hips. “I think that was all implied. I’m pretty sure if you told him I was being a jackass, he’d beat the shit out of me. Or he’d try. And if I really was being a jackass, I’d probably let him.”
“So... So we’re good to, you know, whatever?” I asked, butterflies taking off in my stomach.
“Assuming you’re up for—” he raised an eyebrow. “Whatever.”
“All these years,” I said, tracing a finger along the curve of his lower lip. “You were Griffen’s best friend. I always thought you were hot, but, you know, brother’s best friend, too old, too grown up, all that stuff.”
“I’m not that much older than you,” he said.
“Yeah, but when you’re fifteen...”
“You thought I was hot when you were fifteen?” His lips curled in a satisfied grin.
I rolled my eyes. “You knew you were hot when I was fifteen.”
“Yeah, but you were just a kid.”
“Not that much of a kid. Not at fifteen. Anyway. I always thought you were hot, but somehow I never thought we’d end up here.
” I squirmed on his lap, feeling the ridge of his growing erection exactly where I wanted it, minus the layers of clothes between us.
“But now that we’re here…” My hands dropped to the button at the top of his shirt.
“Now that we’re here,” he repeated.
“Now that we’re here, I can’t figure out why we didn’t do this sooner.
” I dove in, pressing my lips to his, done with talking.
I didn’t get very far with the buttons before West surged to his feet, his hands sliding down to cup my ass, tightening, lifting, and settling me against him.
He carried me down the hall, I was hoping towards his bedroom, but at this point, I’d take any flat surface if it meant West would be there with me, preferably naked.
I had a split-second view of his neatly made bed in muted greens before he set me on my feet, and I went after the rest of the buttons on his shirt. I hadn’t seen him without a shirt on in years, and I needed to, desperately. I needed to get my hands on his warm skin, needed to touch and taste.
I stripped the shirt over his shoulders, letting him handle getting it off his arms as I went for the hem of the white t-shirt beneath, yanking it up.
He pulled it over his head, dropping both to the floor, and my mouth went dry.
The sprinkle of dark hairs on his chest only highlighted the lean muscle, his broad shoulders.
He wasn’t weightlifter-built, but there was power there.
I ran my hands over his shoulders and down his arms, feeling the hard curves, the heat of his skin.
His fingers closed over the bottom of my sweater, pulling it over my head.
“Fuck, Avery,” he let out a breath. My bra wasn’t the sexiest in my collection, but that didn’t seem to matter.
He traced a fingertip over the curve of my breast before sliding the straps off my shoulders and unsnapping it in the back.
“Goddamn, you’re gorgeous,” he said, cupping my now bared breasts in his palms. “Fucking amazing.”
He slid his hands down my sides, closing them around my waist, turning me, easing me back onto the bed, the comforter cool under my bare back, his fingers working at my zipper, then sliding my jeans over my hips, taking my underwear with them.
I was spread out in front of him, naked, legs parted, looking up into West’s dark, hot eyes.
He moved forward, and I shook my head. “Don’t even think about getting in this bed until you lose the rest of your clothes.”
West’s eyes narrowed further, drinking in every inch of me, lingering on my breasts, my legs, the shadows between.
He flicked the button open on his jeans and shoved them down.
His cock sprang free, thick and hard. My fingers stretched, itching to touch.
I needed to know what he felt like in my hands, in my mouth, inside me.
He kicked off his jeans and socks and landed on the mattress beside me, pulling me further onto the bed, wrapping me in his arms, his legs twining with mine.
This kiss was so different from the one in the hospital.
That one had been tender, slow, and filled with promise.
This one was so much more—hot, wet, devouring.
I held on to his shoulders, kissing him back, my tongue brushing his, before I shifted to suck at his lower lip.
I wanted more. More of everything, more of West, and the feel of him against me .
He pulled back, his mouth grazing my neck, my collarbone.
His hand cupped my breast, lifting it to his mouth.
He nipped at the tip, shards of pleasure spiking through me and straight between my legs.
I moaned, arching up into his mouth. I twined my legs around him, my brain coming online just long enough to say, “Please tell me you have a condom.”
In answer, West shifted to the side, reaching for the bedside table.
I heard the crinkle of plastic, and he came back with a bright green square in his hands.
“Hang on to this for me,” he said, pressing it into one hand as he dipped lower, his mouth sliding between my breasts, tongue tasting my belly button.
I had a moment of panic, a flush of unexpected shyness.
I’d kissed him, had been eager, no, desperate to get naked with him.
But now, his face between my legs, my brain started to spin from desire to nerves, right up until his tongue flicked out, hot and wet on my clit.
My brain shut off abruptly. Anything that felt that perfect had to be a good idea.
“Oh God, West.” A finger slid inside me, then another, stretching me, getting me ready as he licked and sucked, every pull on my clit sending sharp waves of pleasure up my spine and into my brain.
It was too much. Too much and so good. The orgasm hit me out of nowhere.
I should have seen it coming, but the heat and weight of him, his mouth on me, it was too much.
And then it was everything. I screamed out his name, my fingers clawing at the bedsheets, hips rocking into the hot suck of his lips, his thrusting fingers, and then it was all gone, his fingers nipping the condom out of my hand, and he was moving, the hard nudge of him filling me all the way until I let out a low groan.
“Oh, fucking God, West, you feel so good.”
“Avery,” was all he said. My knees came up tight to his sides, my hips rocking up, taking him deeper.
“So good,” I murmured, my eyes shut tight. I wasn’t usually a multiple orgasm kind of woman, but this, this was like nothing else. He filled me right to the point of too much, the steady, hard thrusts hitting every nerve.
“Oh God.” In the end, all I could do was hold on, my fingers grasping his shoulders, my hips rocking up, my eyes opening to see his face so close, his dark eyes half-lidded, hot with pleasure.
“Avery,” he breathed. “Avery.” My body convulsed around him, pleasure spiking through me.
West followed, gasping my name over and over, rolling at the last second so I settled on top of him.
His mouth touched my neck in a soft kiss.
“Fucking amazing,” he breathed. “You’re fucking amazing.”
“Ditto,” I said, still trying to get my breath as he shifted me to the other side.
He disappeared across the room into what I guess was the bathroom.
A minute later, he was back, slid into the bed beside me, pulling up the covers, drawing me into his arms. I collapsed against him, his shoulder under my ear, his bristled cheeks so close.
I reached up to trace that full lower lip again.
“You’ve got a hell of a mouth there,” I said. Nudging his softening cock with my thigh, I added, “The rest of you isn’t bad either.”
“Right back at you,” he said, a laugh in his voice .
“Once is definitely not going to be enough,” I said, half to myself and half to West.
His chest rumbled with a laugh, sending a warm sensation spilling through me. “Once was never going to be enough, Avery. But now that I’ve had you, fuck no. Once is definitely not going to be enough.”
I was so warm, so comfortable. I snuggled in, stretching against him. “How much would be enough?” I mused aloud.
“I don’t know. We’ll just have to find out.”