Chapter Six | FLINT #4
Sunny rose on her toes and kissed me back with both hands in my shirt, pulling me closer until I had one arm around her waist and the other against the wall behind her. Her mouth opened under mine, warm and hungry, and the kiss was mine because she chose it, not because I’d won anything.
I walked her back until her hips met the table.
She broke the kiss long enough to breathe. “Take me to the loft.”
“You’re sure?”
“I’m very sure. Take me to your bed, Flint, and keep me there without anyone yelling about focus.”
My hand tightened at her waist. “I can do that.”
“I had faith.”
We climbed to the loft slowly because I kept stopping to kiss her on every third rung. By the time we reached the bed under the sloped roof, Sunny’s scarf was gone, her curls falling loose around her face, and my control had worn thin enough to show.
She stood beside the bed in the last blue light from the small window while I pulled my henley over my head.
Her attention moved over my chest, my shoulders, the scar on my forearm. She touched the old mark with two fingers, then pressed her palm flat over my heartbeat.
I reached for the top button of her cream blouse. “Tell me if you want slower.”
Sunny put her hand over mine. “Take your time. Also get naked. Please balance those priorities.”
A laugh pushed out of me, rough and helpless. “I love you.”
“I love you too. Now prove you’re good at multitasking.”
I opened the first button, then the second, then the third.
With every inch of skin I uncovered, Sunny’s breathing changed.
Her freckles trailed over the tops of her breasts.
A dusting of flour clung near her collarbone.
Her skin held the day’s smoke and sugar, not enough to taste like a recipe, just enough to remind me she’d fought beside a fire and chosen me after it.
I kissed the hollow beneath her throat.
She trembled.
“Flint,” she whispered.
“I’m here.”
Her eyes met mine.
The heat in them deepened.
“Yes,” she said. “You’re here.”
I slid the blouse off her shoulders and dropped it over the chair near the bed. Her bra was pale cream, pretty and practical at once, with one strap twisted from the day. I fixed it with two fingers before unclasping it.
Sunny smiled faintly. “You would straighten a strap right now.”
“I like things where they belong.”
Her smile faded into heat. “Where do I belong?”
That question went through me clean.
I cupped her face. “With me. Only where you choose to be, but I hope it’s with me.”
Her eyes shone again.
“It is,” she said.
I kissed her before my chest could split open from the sound of it.
She pushed my hands to the button of her jeans, and I opened them. She stepped out of denim and underwear, then stood in front of me bare and flushed and watching my face like my reaction mattered.
It did.
I sat on the edge of the bed, pulled her between my knees, and set my hands at her hips.
“You’re beautiful,” I said.
Sunny’s lips parted.
I kissed the soft curve of her belly, then the inside of one hip. Her fingers slid into my hair.
“Flint.”
“I want to take my time with you.”
“I support that.” Her hands tightened. “I also support urgency.”
I drew her down onto the bed and followed, stretching out beside her. The sheets were warm from the cabin, rough cotton against my skin. Sunny rolled toward me and kissed my shoulder, my throat, the edge of my jaw. Her hands moved over me with confidence now, no hesitation left in them.
I kissed her breasts, took one nipple into my mouth, and felt her arch under me. Her thigh slid between mine. She was already wet when my hand moved lower, and the sound she made went straight through my blood.
“Look at me,” I said.
Sunny opened her eyes.
I slid my fingers through her pussy, slow enough to feel the way she tried to chase my hand. “I love how you ask for what you want.”
Her hips lifted. “Then you should reward good communication.”
I smiled against her breast. “You’re still bossy.”
“I’m still waiting.”
I gave her what she asked for.
My fingers moved over her clit in steady circles, then dipped lower, teasing her entrance before sliding inside.
Sunny’s hand clamped around my shoulder.
Her breath came faster, and she pressed into my hand with every stroke.
She didn’t go quiet. She never had. Every gasp and rough little sound made the cabin feel smaller and warmer around us.
“That’s it,” I said. “Let me feel you.”
Her eyes flashed. “You don’t get to say that like you’re winning.”
“I’m not winning. I’m taking care of what’s mine.”
She went still for half a breath.
Then she tightened around my fingers. “Flint,” she gasped. I held her through it, my thumb working her clit while she shook against me, thighs clamped around my hand and curls spread across my pillow.
When she came down, she blinked up at me, cheeks flushed, mouth soft.
“Yours?” she asked.
I kissed the corner of her mouth. “Only if I’m yours.”
“You’re mine.”
Then I moved down her body.
Sunny propped herself on her elbows. “Flint.”
I kissed the inside of her thigh. “I need to taste you.”
Her elbows gave out.
“Okay,” she said, breathless. “That was a complete sentence, and I support it.”
I laughed once, then put my mouth on her.
Her sweetness hit my tongue, and the rest of the day fell away.
I licked her slow at first, then firmer when her hands found my hair.
She opened for me, hips lifting, one knee sliding higher along my shoulder.
I used my hands to hold her close while I learned every sound she made when the teasing stopped and the pleasure took over.
“Flint, please.”
I lifted my head. “Tell me what you want.”
Her eyes were wild. “Please make me come again.”
I went harder.
She cried out, and I kept my mouth on her until her thighs shook around my head and her fingers pulled tight in my hair. The second orgasm hit her deeper. I felt it in the way her whole body curled toward me and the way her hips lifted toward my mouth.
I kissed my way back up her body while she was still shaking.
She caught my face between her hands and kissed me, tasting herself on my mouth with a soft sound that nearly snapped what was left of my control.
Then her hands went to my belt.
“It’s my turn,” she said.
“You don’t have to.”
“I know.” Her fingers opened the buckle. “Let me.”
I let her push me onto my back because I wanted her hands on me, and because Sunny choosing exactly what she wanted was the hottest thing I’d ever seen.
She stripped off my jeans and briefs, then wrapped her hand around my cock. My breath left me.
“Sunny.”
“I like when you say my name like that.”
“You’re going to kill me.”
“No, I’m going to make you feel good. There’s a difference.”
Then her mouth closed over me.
My hand gripped the sheet beside my hip.
Sunny was warm and wet and wickedly sure, taking me deeper, then pulling back to use her tongue in a way that made my vision blur.
I forced myself not to thrust. Forced myself to let her set the pace, to let her give because she wanted to, to let the woman I loved take pleasure in undoing me.
She looked up once, and the sight of her mouth around my cock almost finished me.
I cupped her cheek. “Come here.”
She lifted her head, lips swollen, eyes bright. “You want me to stop already?”
“If you keep going, this ends before I’m inside you.”
“That would be a tragedy.”
“It would be a short story.”
She laughed and climbed over me.
I caught her hips and rolled us until she was beneath me again. Her arms wrapped around my shoulders. My cock slid against her slick heat, and we both went still.
I looked down at her. “I love you.”
Sunny’s eyes softened. “I love you too.”
I pushed into her slowly.
Her mouth opened, and her nails dug into my back. I kept my forehead against hers as I filled her, inch by inch, until I was buried deep and shaking from the work of not moving too fast.
Sunny wrapped her legs around me. “You feel so good.”
I kissed her. “You’re the best thing on this ridge.”
Her breath hitched.
I moved slowly at first, deep enough to make both of us feel every inch. This wasn’t the creek bank, with cold water nearby and sparks in every dare. This was my bed, her hands on my back, my name in her mouth, and night settling around the cabin.
Sunny met every stroke. She touched my face, my shoulders, my scarred forearm when I braced beside her head. Her thumb moved once over the old mark, and something in me gave way.
I had built this place with one bed, one good pan, one life that didn’t ask anybody to stay.
Now Sunny was under me, around me, in every breath I took.
I buried my face against her neck. “Stay tonight.”
“I’ll stay.”
“Stay tomorrow morning.”
“I’ll stay.”
“Stay when you can.”
Her arms tightened. “Ask me for what you mean.”
I lifted my head.
Her eyes held mine, flushed and fierce and tender.
I drove into her once, slow and hard enough to make us both gasp. “I don’t mean one night, and I don’t mean one weekend. I mean my life, Sunny: calendars and pop-ups, your ridiculous aprons in my laundry, arguments about garnish, and mornings here because you choose them.”
A tear slipped into her hairline.
“I choose it,” she said. “I choose you.”
I kissed her and stopped holding back.
Sunny rose to meet me, her voice breaking, her heels pressing into my lower back. I slid one hand between us and found her clit. She gasped into my mouth.
“Come with me,” I said.
“I’m close.”
“I’ve got you.”
“You always say that like I believe you.”
“You believe me.”
Her eyes opened.
She smiled, breathless and wrecked. “Yes, I do.”
I stroked her clit and drove into her until she came around me, tight and hot and shaking, a cry breaking from her mouth. The feel of her took me over the edge. I thrust deep, held there, and came with her wrapped around me, her hands in my hair as she clenched through the last wave.
For a long time, neither of us moved.
The cabin settled around us in small sounds: wood cooling, sheets shifting, the faint call of night insects beyond the screen. Sunny’s heartbeat slowed under my palm. Her skin was warm and damp against mine. A loose curl stuck to her cheek, and I brushed it back.
She opened one eye. “Please tell me there are biscuits downstairs.”
I laughed into her hair. “That’s what you’re thinking about?”
“I’m in love. I’m not dead.”
“There are biscuits downstairs.”
She smiled with deep satisfaction. “I knew I picked the right man.”
I kissed her forehead. “You tied the right man.”
“I picked him and tied him.”
I rolled to my side and pulled her with me. She tucked herself against my chest, one leg over mine, her fingers tracing lazy shapes against my ribs.
“Flint?”
“What is it?”
“I’m proud of you for not throwing the competition.”
My throat tightened.
She kept her fingers moving over my skin. “I would’ve known.”
“I believe that.”
“And I’m proud of me for not needing you to.”
I held her closer. “I’m proud too.”
Her hand flattened over my heart. “We’re going to be impossible together.”
“Yes, we are.”
“Caprice is going to need a separate clipboard.”
“She’ll survive.”
“Ed might not.”
“He’ll complain his way through it.”
Sunny laughed softly, then went quiet. After a minute, her breathing evened out, warm against my chest.
I stayed awake.
Outside the loft window, Fire Mountain disappeared into the blue-black of night. Down in the meadow, the fire rings would be dark by now.
Sunny shifted in her sleep and tucked her face beneath my jaw.
I pulled the quilt over her shoulder, kissed the flour still dusting her hair, and decided my cabin had room for her to stay.