CHAPTER SIX
Tucker
The bedroom was dark except for the faint glow from the living room fireplace filtering through the doorway. Rain hammered the roof, wind batted against the windows, but all I could hear was Emily’s breathing—fast and shallow against my neck.
She was warm against me, her pussy pressed against the hard ridge of my cock with every step I took.
Our bodies separated only by denim and cotton.
Her hands tangled in my hair, tugging just hard enough to make me groan, her breath trembling as she leaned into every kiss as if she needed them as much as I did.
In my bedroom, I set her down slowly, letting her slide against me until her feet touched the floor. I felt every curve, every soft line of her. My hands stayed on her hips, holding her close, and I had to fight the urge to strip her bare right then.
Slow down. Don’t screw this up.
But she was looking up at me with those big eyes, lips parted, hair falling loose from her braid, and slow was the last thing my body wanted. I wasn’t supposed to need this. I wasn’t supposed to want someone who could see past the scars.
“If you tell me no, I’ll hear it,” I said. It was the only thing I had left to say that made any sense at all.
“Tucker.” The way she said my name—breathy and wanting tore something inside me. I felt it in every place I’d thought scar tissue had made me numb. “Kiss me.”
And I did. I kissed her hard, desperately.
She gave herself to me, opening her lips, sliding her tongue against mine.
I thrust my leg between hers, pulling her to me.
When that wasn’t enough, I walked her backward until her legs hit the bed.
She fell back with a soft sound, and I followed her down, covering her body with mine.
The feel of her underneath me—soft and warm and willing—made my head spin.
Her hands were everywhere. In my hair, on my shoulders, sliding under my shirt to touch bare skin. When her nails dragged across my back, I groaned against her mouth.
“Off,” she murmured, tugging at my shirt.
I knelt beside her and reached back and grabbed my shirt behind the neck, pulling it over my head. She’d seen the scars before—on the porch that first day, at the clinic—but this was different. This was permission to look. To touch.
I waited for the flinch. The pity. The careful way people looked at damage they didn’t know how to process.
It never came.
Instead, Emily sat up, her hands sliding over my chest, tracing the lines of scar tissue with her fingertips. When she pressed her lips to the worst one—the jagged line that ran from collarbone to ribs—I stopped breathing.
“These don’t scare me,” she said quietly against my skin. “They’re part of you. And I want all of you.”
Something in me shifted, started breathing again.
Something I’d thought was dead. I’d lived with the scars so long I’d stopped feeling them.
But under her touch, they burned back to life.
Just like I was doing. Every inch of her was warmth and smooth against my cold edges.
Now, every breath I took was a reminder that I wasn’t dead inside after all.
I framed her face with both hands, kissing her with everything I couldn’t say. Thank you. I want you. You’re more than I deserve.
Her sweater came off next, and I was looking at pale skin and white lace and curves that made my mouth water. I traced the line of her collarbone, down between her breasts, feeling her shiver under my touch.
“You’re beautiful.”
She laughed, but it sounded a little sad. “You don’t have to—”
“I don’t say things I don’t mean.” I caught her chin, making her look at me. “Every fucking inch of you is beautiful.”
Her eyes went bright, like she might cry, and I kissed her before she could—or argue. When I reached around to unclasp her bra, my fingers fumbled slightly—I was shaking, undone by the simple act of touching her, of being allowed this intimacy, this privilege.
The fabric fell away and I groaned, low and involuntary, the sound torn from deep in my chest.
“Fuck.”
She was exquisite—perfect under my hands.
Creamy skin, breasts fuller than my palms could contain, with delicate blue veins visible beneath the surface.
When I cupped her breast, testing the weight of it, her head fell back, exposing the long line of her throat, and the sound she made—breathy and desperate—went straight through me, tightening the coil of need until it was almost painful.
I pushed her back onto her back and covered her body once again.
I lowered my mouth to her skin, kissing the swell of her breast, tracing my tongue along the underside where she was softest, most sensitive, before taking her nipple between my lips.
She gasped, her fingers tightening in my hair, holding me there as I lavished attention on her—sucking, licking, using the edge of my teeth just enough to make her arch and cry out.
“God, Tucker,” she whimpered, rolling her hips. I fought the urge to strip us of the rest of our clothes and simply sink inside her. My cock was hard and ready.
But I wanted more. Needed more.
My hands found the button of her jeans and she lifted her hips, helping me slide them down her legs.
White satin covered her pussy just like it has her breasts.
I could see the nest of dark curls through it and the stain of her arousal darkening the fabric, proof of how much she wanted this—wanted me.
Unable to resist, I cupped her mound, my fingers splaying over her. The heat of her burned through the thin satin. “This is mine, Emily. Do you fucking understand?” I growled the words, unable to stop the primitive words of possession.
Her eyes widened, but she nodded her head.
“Good girl,” I murmured. “Now let me get a taste what’s mine.”
I pulled her panties off with one long jerk.
The fabric tore and she gasped but didn’t try to stop me.
I lay beside her, tracing a line from her throat to her stomach.
She grasped my hand, stopping me. I knew what was going through her mind.
She thought she was too soft there. Too much.
Just as I had with her mound, spreading my hand over her soft flesh.
“I love your curves, baby. Every one of them.”
Then I was moving my hand down, my finger sliding along her wet slit. “So fucking wet. You want this, don’t you? You want me touching you? Fucking you?”
I pressed my finger inside her. Her body jerked at the touch and the sound she made had my cock leaking pre-cum from its swollen tip. I was so hard I hurt, by body screaming at me to just take her, to bury myself inside and lose control.
I plucked at her bud, squeezing it between finger and thumb as I continued to thrust my finger in and out. I bent down and kissed her, using the same motion with my tongue. In and out. Hard and deep.
I swallowed her moan and kept touching her. I added a second finger, stretching her, feeling her body adjust and accept the intrusion. She was tight—so damn tight—and all I could think about was how she’d feel wrapped around me.
I moved, kissing my way down her body. I sucked her nipples for a moment, grazing them with my teeth again until she whimpered, then soothing the sting with my tongue. This time when I placed soft kissed on her stomach, she didn’t protest. Then, I was spreading her thighs, opening her for me.
Her pussy was pink and swollen, glistened from her juices. So delicious looking. Beautiful. Mine.
I bent down, swiping my tongue up her center without warning.
The taste of her exploded on my tongue—sweet and musky and addictive.
She bucked at my touch, but I held her still for it.
I did it again and again, eating her up.
I pushed her legs back and up, spreading her open even more, one leg over my shoulder.
I parted her lips with my fingers, drilling my tongue inside her.
She tasted so fucking sweet, I almost came.
I had to press my cock against the covers to stop myself.
As I licked and sucked, I knew I couldn’t last long. I thrust two fingers inside her, scissoring them back and forth, stretching her. She was so damn tight and I was a big man. When I added a third finger, she gasped, but I didn’t stop. “Easy, baby. I gotta do this. I need to get you ready for me.”
She relaxed into my touch. Her body opened for me, accepting, trusting. I sucked her clit into my mouth, flicking the little bud with my tongue. Circling it, applying pressure, then backing off just to hear her whimper. I wanted her to come. Needed her to come so I could be inside her.
Between my mouth and fingers, it didn’t take long. She made a sound between a moan and a scream as she came. I licked up her juices then crawled over top of her.
When I finally settled between her thighs, skin to skin, I had to stop and just look at her.
Emily underneath me, hair spread across my pillow, eyes dark with want, lips swollen from my kisses. Real and warm and here.
In my bed.
Choosing me.
“You’re staring,” she whispered.
“I can’t help it.”
“Tucker.” She reached up, pulling me down to her. “I need you.”
“Me too, baby. Me too.” I shifted her hips, positioning myself, and when I guided the head of my cock to her entrance and felt her body yield, stretching to accommodate me, the world fell away completely.
Everything from my past. Everything except what was happening right now.
She was tight and hot and perfect, surrounding me, enveloping me in wet heat as I pushed inside slowly, inch by inch, giving her time to adjust.
“Fuck,” I breathed out, every muscle in my body straining with the effort to go slow, to not just thrust deep and lose myself. “You feel incredible.”
Finally, I was seated fully inside her. I pushed back the hair from her so I could see her expression. Her eyes were closed. “Look at me,” I ordered. I wanted to see what she was feeling. Because to me it felt like we were meant for this. Meant for each other.
When she did, I started moving, savoring every sensation—the drag and pull, the way her body gripped me, the heat and wetness. “That’s it, baby. Let me have you.”
Her hands were on my chest, pushing slightly. I knew the sensations she was feeling were intense. If let them too, but I didn’t stop. I didn’t think I even could at this point in time. I lifted her leg, changing the angle of penetration and we both gasped.
“Oh—” she cried out. “That’s—so deep—”
I thrust a little harder. “Take all of me. Every inch.” My fingers dug into her hips, hard enough to leave bruises that would remind her of this moment. Of me.
I buried my face in her neck, breathing her in, tasting her skin, feeling her pulse race against my lips. Her nails dug into my back, scoring lines that would mark me tomorrow, and I loved it—loved that she was claiming me the way I was claiming her.
“Harder,” she gasped, and something surged through me.
I drove into her with more force, more purpose. She cried out, her back arching. Her breasts rocking with the force of my movements.
“Right there,” she panted. “God, right there, don’t stop.”
“Say my name,” I demanded, my voice rough. “Tell me who’s inside you. Who’s making you feel this good.”
“Tucker,” she gasped. And then she shattered, her body arching and tightening around me, pulsing in waves that threatened to pull me under, her pussy clenching and fluttering around my cock.
The sight of her—head thrown back, lips parted, face flushed with pleasure, completely undone—was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.
“Fuck, yes,” I groaned, feeling her orgasm milk me, feeling my own release building at the base of my spine, inevitable and overwhelming. “That’s it, baby. So fucking beautiful when you come.”
I followed her over the edge moments later, my release crashing through me with an intensity that left me gasping. I buried myself as deep as I could, pumping my hips, once, twice, and then I was emptying my body inside hers.
For a long moment, we stayed like that—joined, trembling, holding each other like letting go meant drowning.
I’d been with women before. But never like this. Never where it felt more than just physical. Never where it felt like I was giving her pieces of myself I didn’t know I still had.
Neither of us spoke. We just lay there, listening to the rain, feeling the warmth of skin on skin.
Her fingers traced lazy patterns on my chest, following the lines of old damage. Not exploring. Just... being. Like she was memorizing me.
I was thinking I didn’t deserve this. Didn’t deserve her warmth, her softness, her willingness to see past all my broken parts. I was thinking I’d spent years convincing myself I was better off alone, and then she’d walked into my life and proved me wrong in a matter of days.
I was thinking I wanted to keep her.
But I couldn’t say any of that. Not yet. Maybe not ever.
I’d convinced myself I was better off alone. That isolation was safety. That the mountain was enough.
But lying here with Emily in my arms, I realized I’d been lying to myself.
The mountain wasn’t enough.
The silence wasn’t peace.
And being alone wasn’t the same as being safe.
It was just... alone.
Emily burrowing closer, seeking my warmth, and I tightened my arms around her.
Whatever happened next—whatever complications came from this, whatever challenges we’d face—I knew one thing for certain.
I wasn’t letting her go.