Chapter 45
FORTY-FIVE
DYLAN
LAST NIGHT FELT heavy and unbearable, but with Sierra there, it didn’t crush me. I never wanted her near any of that or to see that side of me. But she stood on my driveway, stubborn as fuck, refusing to leave. I know this girl inside out, yet she still has the power to break me open so easily.
Sierra wakes, and I’m met with my personal kryptonite.
It’s seconds before she’s pressed into the mattress and saying my name, just the way I like it.
She watches me as I kiss her stomach, and her scar.
An idea pops into my head—something I’d been hoping, fucking praying, to try with her if I had her under me again.
“I want you to say yes to me,” I say.
Sierra tilts her head. “For what?”
“I want you to try something. Do you trust me?” Suddenly, I’m desperate to hear the answer.
“Always,” she says easily. Then, as though she feels like I need it, her hand presses against my jaw. “My body doesn’t feel like it’s in pain when I’m with you. It’s almost as if your kisses make my scars fade.”
That’s when I think I could love this girl forever if she let me.
I move before I can second-guess myself, going to my far drawer, and before she even sees it, I slip a blindfold over her eyes. Her breath hitches, and I swear my heart skips a beat. “If it doesn’t feel right, tell me, and it’s gone. No questions.”
I wait for a beat, and I’m about to take it off, but then she smiles. “I like it.”
The words constrict my damn airway. I’ve done this before with established safe words, but with Sierra I wouldn’t take the chance of her not using it just to please me.
When I’m with her, all I want is to unravel her pleasure, to feel every moan and shiver beneath my touch.
That’s what gets me off. “If it’s too much, say Dale. ”
She chuckles. “I know I’m safe with you, Dylan.”
“But you’ll use it if you need to?”
“Yes. Now, will you please touch me?”
“Always so polite when you need me, huh?” I kiss her then and drop to my knees, caressing her strong legs along the way.
“W-what are you doing?” she asks, moving back on the mattress.
“I’ve been bad.” My voice rumbles against her soft skin. “And I want to prove to you that I can be good.”
“Dylan,” she practically moans, chest heaving, but I’m already lifting up her T-shirt. Her black panties are barely a scrap, and I have the urge to rip them with my teeth. But I’m being good right now.
“Will you let me be good for you, baby? Please?”
Sierra makes a breathy noise. “Yes.”
I pull down the wet scrap of underwear. “Tell me what to do.”
She only breathes at first, and when I tighten my grip on her legs, she gasps. “I want you to make me come.”
I kiss the inside of her thigh. “Anything else?”
“I—” She gasps when I press my lips over her clit.
“What was that?” I ask.
“Dylan, please.”
“I know, baby.” I put one of her legs on my shoulder. “But I want you to ask for it.” My breath leaves goose bumps her skin, and she shivers. I do it again.
“I want you to fuck me,” she says on a gasp, clearly aroused from the faintest sensation.
“Was that so hard?” I say, and even with a blindfold, I know she’s rolling her eyes.
Her tits are so close, I feel desperate to taste them. Probably fuck them too.
“Are you just gonna look, or are you going to do something?” She says it with all that fucking attitude.
I can’t wait to make her beg. But then she drags her fingers up her stomach to her tits, squeezing and moaning, and I think I go unconscious.
My touch is slow, deliberate, searching.
The warm center between her legs contracts when my fingers brush the wetness.
The small squeak of surprise that leaves her only sends a spark down my spine.
I lift her other leg over my shoulder, jerking her forward so she’s right where I need her.
I haven’t even started, and her legs are shaking.
“Relax, baby,” I whisper against her thigh, watching her shiver. Seeing her every reaction to me is my favorite thing. I don’t think I’ve loved anything more.
With both her legs on my shoulders, and my hands on her waist, I lift her up.
Sierra fists my hair so tight, it stings.
She’s been lifted by me so many times, but right now, she’s trembling.
When her back hits the wall, she gasps. I grip her thighs and taste her, right there against the wall.
She throws her head back and grinds her pussy against my face, riding it, chasing the high.
I’m in heaven, I’m pretty sure.
Her heel digs into my back, and when her legs start to quiver, I know she’s close. That’s when I push two fingers inside her and feel her orgasm in my mouth.
It’s sweet like cherries.
Back on the bed, I pull down my boxers. I tuck a pillow under her lower back and press a hand to her navel before I slide into her, slow and controlled. I watch myself fuck her, hearing her cries of pleasure and the way her hand wraps tight around my wrist.
“I need to see you,” she gasps.
I lean forward, pushing in hard, slipping off the blindfold to see her pupils dilated, almost entirely black.
She grabs my face before she’s even oriented and kisses me.
Sierra doesn’t hold back. The sounds that leave her are fucking pornographic, and I barely stop myself from coming right then.
I try my best to keep her moaning for me as long as possible, and by the end of it, when I come apart, I’m kissing I love yous into her skin.
“You still mean that?” she asks suddenly. “That you love me?”
“Always.”
“You’re sure?”
I almost laugh. “Let me help you understand, Sierra.” Her bottom lip quivers as if the way I’m looking at her is too much.
“The first time I really saw you, it was when you were doing something you love. Seeing you on that ice, like a wisp of smoke, so quick and confident, it was everything. When I look at you, that is what I see. The talented, determined girl who clawed her way back to where she belongs and made sure everyone knew it. You’re kind, and warm, and gentle even if you don’t think you are.
I love you for the way you guard your heart.
I love you for every time you’ve given me shit right back.
I love you for never backing down. I love you through all the times you can’t seem to catch your breath, and through every setback on the ice. ”
“And you want to skate with me?”
I smile. “I want to do a lot more than just skate with you, Sierra.”
“You’re serious? Because I’m not nice. I overthink a lot. Sometimes I can barely breathe on my own. And if I’m not skating, I spend a lot of time watching Dale Thunderman and knitting winter essentials.”
“Well, you’re skating with me. Let me think, so you can breathe. And I’ve become pretty fond of Dale and gloves. Is that all?”
“Probably not,” she mutters.
“Give me everything you got, Sierra, and I’ll show you how much I’d carry for you.”
This time when a tear falls onto Sierra’s cheek, she doesn’t brush it away.
“I know it may seem like I don’t care the same way you do,” she says in a soft voice.
One I barely ever hear her speak in. I prefer when Sierra is loud and unapologetic.
I like her exactly the way she is. No amendment.
“But I care if you’re hurt. I care if you feel like I’m pushing you away. I care a lot.”
“I know, baby.”
“Do you? Because I know you say you like that I can be kind of mean, but it won’t make me feel good if it hurts you.”
God, I love this girl. “Just you, Sierra. That’s all I want.”
“I know I haven’t said it back. Trust me, I know that makes me a shitty girlfriend, but I promise—”
“Don’t.” I cup her face between my hands. “I like you exactly as you are. Guarded heart and guarded words. There’s no time limit with us.”
“But I’d hate for you to think that I’m not in this as much as you. I am.”
“I know that. You never need to prove anything to me, Sierra. Let me be the one to take your guard down.” I take her hand and press it over my beating heart. The one that’s been going for her since the first moment I laid eyes on her.
To me, love isn’t something that fits into one neat box.
I don’t love her the same way I love my parents.
That love is complicated, broken, and tangled in old wounds, bound by unspoken conditions.
The love I share with my friends is easy, unconditional, and full of care.
But the love I feel for Sierra is different.
It’s the rhythm of my heart, the air I breathe—it’s the love I hold closest. It’s simple, never fragmented, and it comes with only one condition: I’ll love her as long as she lets me, and probably forever after that—even if she doesn’t feel the same.
This love isn’t about kisses or hand-holding or even sex.
It’s something deeper, something that lives in my bones, earned through what I do, not just what I say.
Sierra curls into me like I’m something safe. “I’m afraid that this is all a dream, that soon I’ll open my eyes and you won’t be here anymore.”
I brush a soft tendril from her cheek. “If you want me to stand here every single day and tell you over and over that I care, that I’m proud of you, that I could never see you hurt, and that your dreams have become my dreams because you feel them so purely, I will.
I’ll say it as loud or as gently as you want me to.
” My knuckles skim her jawline. “With as many kisses as you want.” I lean in to softly press my lips to hers.
“With as many hugs as you need.” I wrap her in my arms. “With every word I can think of. It’s all for you, Sierra. ”
BUNNY PATROL
Aiden Crawford: You all better be headed to Summer’s carnival.
Kian Ishida: That’s today?
Dylan Donovan: Ah shit, I’m tied up.
Cole Carter: When are you not tied up is the real question.
Sebastian Hayes: Now that we’re on the topic, I would like to take Eli’s old room.
Kian Ishida: We’re not on the topic.