Chapter 34
[Stone]
The next night, Taxi greets me in the driveway, rushing to kiss me. I don’t need to take, she gives.
“Fuck, I want to touch you,” I say, grinding up against her as I have her back pinned to the driver’s side door of my truck, which blocks us from view of the house.
Trudy lives outside of town, so her closest neighbor isn’t close enough to see what I want to do to this woman against the side of my vehicle.
“I need to taste you again,” I murmur against her mouth as I bend at the knees to line us up and thrust at her covered center.
“Same,” she whimpers against my mouth as we make out like randy teens, hiding from parents possibly spying through the front window.
The thought makes me chuckle.
“What?” she smiles, her lips swollen and wide as she pulls back. “What’s so funny?”
“I was just thinking how I feel like a teenager about to get caught making out with my girl. Any minute I expect a front porch light to flip on and off, like a warning for you to come inside before breaking curfew.”
“And you were thinking all that while kissing me?” she chides with giggles, especially when I angle for her neck and run my nose against her soft skin, the scent of citrus and honeysuckle invading my senses.
“I mean, besides the whole wanting to put my face between your thighs . . .”
Taxi hums with those three short mms and melts against me.
“How often did you do that?” she asks.
Abruptly, I pull back and focus on her eyes as best I can under the dark sky. “Put my face between thighs?”
She swats at my chest. “Kiss girls beside cars and watch for porch lights?”
“Oh.” I chuckle and swipe my hand through my hair. “Maybe only a handful of times. Small town, remember? There were only so many girls, and when half of them dated half of your friends, it wasn’t like I wanted to be second choice.”
“First pick,” she says, poking at my chest and tipping up on her toes, kissing me once again.
Eventually, I pull back. “We better get inside before I open this truck and lay us both down on the bench.”
Her eyes flare like she likes that idea. “Promises, promises,” she teases, before giving me one more quick kiss and then turning for the house.
“Wait.” I tug at the crisscross backing of her overalls. “Come to Sylver Sunday again this weekend.”
Taxi’s eyes widen.
“Bring Trudy. Bring Simon. Get out of the house for a bit.” All of them have been couped up since Trudy’s return and as much as she needs rest, she could also use a little time outside of the house.
Taxi’s brows pinch. “Let me see how she’s feeling, but I’d . . . I’d like that. I’d like that a lot.”
“Yeah?” I question for some reason.
“Yeah. I like your family.” She plucks at the placket of my shirt, where the buttons connect the two halves.
“You should go out with the girls some night.”
Taxi laughs. “You sound like Genie.”
“Well . . .” I arch a brow at her.
“I’ll think about that invitation, too.”
Thankfully, Taxi didn’t think too long about the Sylver Sunday invitation, and before I know it, we find ourselves in the upstairs bathroom. The same bathroom she cornered me in more than a year ago.
Taxi had excused herself for the bathroom, and within minutes of her disappearance from the backyard, I followed her.
I closed the door behind me, and at the same time she leapt for me, I stepped forward.
Our mouths crash together.
Her arms wrap around my neck and her legs around my waist, and I set her on the edge of the vanity. The kiss is hard, almost harsh, as we devour one another.
I didn’t see her last night. Another incident of loose sheep in Mabel Wilson’s yard that led to the discovery of a lost shoe, one believed to be linked to a child who disappeared three towns over.
The news was horrifying and had me hugging all my nieces and nephews extra hard today.
As for Taxi, the sense of anyone losing someone they love has me kissing her harder.
“I fucking missed you last night.” The admission might be more than she can handle, but I still want her to know I miss her when we aren’t together.
Sometimes, I try to convince myself we are a fleeting flirtation, a fling based on circumstance and proximity. Then I remember when we met. How instantly I’d felt a spark with her, and how the Universe, or something other keeps putting this woman in my path.
Our conversation the other night certainly sounded like she’s open to more.
I choose you.
Still, I’d never ask Taxi to make choices that go against who she is, what she wants. I only ask not to be shut out, like I said to her earlier this week.
As for right now, we’re almost as close as we can get.
With her legs spread and my hips cradled between her thighs, she grips my ass and yanks me closer, matching where I’m hard with where she’s soft.
“Superman,” she whimpers, throaty and deep, and I pull back to see her lips swollen from my kiss and her eyes dazed from kissing me.
“What do you need, baby?”
“You,” she whispers, her eyes meeting mine. Sharp and silver and seductive as hell.
I cup her throat and pull her back to me, crushing my mouth over hers. She makes my knees weak and my heart race. “Pure kryptonite,” I murmur against her lips.
She smiles against me.
“Let me touch you,” I quietly beg, wanting to feel her around my fingers, know that she’s wet for only me.
“Yes.” She tugs at the side of her skirt. The same one she was wearing the first night I met her. Layers of fabric in rich brown tones, each stripe a differing pattern. Her skirt is so symbolic of her. She’s multi-layered—textured and complex, but soft, pliant—especially in this moment.
While she lifts her skirt, I slip my hands beneath the material, coasting my palms over her thighs and meeting in her center, where she is warm and as wet as I expected. I hook my finger around the slim fabric covering her and run my knuckle against her seam.
She leans back, hands falling against the counter to brace her.
We both glance at where my hand is hidden beneath the pile of her skirt over her lap. There’s something extra about my hand covered, her thighs spread, the material hiding what I’m doing to her.
We can’t see it, we feel it.
Her ankle hooks around the back of my knee, and she pulls me forward. “Superman.”
“Been thinking about me?” Her body holds the answer. Her breath hitching as I easily slip a finger into her. Taking from her. Accepting the gifts she’s giving me. Her. Her body. Her time.
“Yes,” she whimpers, knees spread wide, ankle against my knee.
She rocks against my finger, and I add a second to the first, filling her as best I can.
Taxi cups my jaw and I meet her eyes. She sheepishly smiles and I match the curve of her lips as I work my fingers in and out of her.
She crooks her finger into the collar of my T-shirt and tugs me forward.
My lips meet hers, and my tongue seeks, mirroring my fingers in her channel with my tongue in her mouth.
I rock forward, mimicking the same motion with my hips. The desire to thrust into her. The need to fill her in other ways.
“Fuck, I want you,” I murmur against her mouth. It’s been a week since I’ve touched her like this. The intimacy. The rush. The need to be closer to her.
“Yes,” she says again, like it’s the only word she knows and she’s giving it to me.
“Let me see,” I say. “Let me see how I fill you up.”
She hikes up even more of her skirt, holding it higher, so I can see how my fingers fit her, what they do to her. She’s slick and hot.
“Please,” she whimpers.
“Not gonna stop, baby.” I almost want her to come undone more than I want it for myself. To know this strong yet vulnerable woman trusts me to touch her, to give her pleasure.
“No,” she whispers, and I stop. It’s the only word I need to hear.
She covers my wrist with her hand. “No. Us. Together.” She gently pulls my hand from her and presses at my shoulder with her other hand.
“Taxi,” I question.
She continues pushing me back until she can slide from the counter, and then she spins to face the mirror. I meet her eyes in it.
“Please,” she begs, those silver eyes working their magic on me. She pulls up her skirt while at the same time reaches for me, squeezing at the bulge in my jeans. The thickness straining against my zipper, begging for release.
“Like this?” I question.
She chews her lower lip. “I need you, Stone.”
Fuck!
The phone conversation and driveway make-out sessions, and all the little touches in between . . . I need her, too.
Hastily, I unbuckle my belt and unfasten my jeans.
“Next time, we go slow,” I warn her. Her eyes meet mine in the mirror again.
“Next time,” she slowly smiles, like the idea of doing this again makes her happy.
My chest expands. My heart hammers.
With my hand on her hip, I pull up more of her skirt, exposing her backside. She’s only wearing a slip of underwear compared to the boy-cut shorts I’ve previously seen. I wrap my finger around the string and run my knuckle against her crease.
She shivers.
When I’ve reached where she’s most sensitive, she arches back, forcing her backside toward me, willing my finger to brush where she’s needy.
With my jeans and underwear shoved below my hips, I fist myself, the head weeping to be closer to her.
“I don’t have anything in the bathroom,” I admit. I’ve got a new box of condoms in my room, unopened. I haven’t needed them in years, but I wanted to be prepared.
Still, every interaction with Taxi has been unexpected.
“I’m covered,” she says, surprising me again. “And we both know it’s been a long time for each of us.”
“Taxi,” I whisper, suddenly wanting to slow us down, despite my dick screaming in my hand and her center crying for my touch.
There might have been a time in my past when I wanted a child of my own, someone little who looked like me, and the memory tickles at my chest, but I’m well past raising more kids.
“Please. Don’t deny me, Stone.”
My head lifts, eyes connecting once more through the mirror. She looks vulnerable, aroused but still somehow scared . . . that I would reject her.
“Never,” I rush, then I’m at her entrance, and she leans forward. She’s warm and so wet, and I easily glide into her, both of us humming at the connection.
“Holy . . .” I cry out.
“Shhh,” she purrs, taking me into her body.
With her hands on the edge of the counter, she presses back, pulling me into her, filling herself with me.
“So deep,” I whisper as she drags me to the hilt, taking me completely inside her. “Fuck.”
I wrap my arms around her middle, leaning over her back and rock my hips forward, gliding back and forth through her slickness.
I shove her skirt out of my way to get my hand between her thighs, easily finding that sensitive nub.
The point on her that causes her to rock back, almost tugging me deeper, forcing me faster, bringing us together harder.
“Taxi,” I grunt, circling her clit and surging into her.
“Yes,” she smacks the counter, then reaches behind her, clutching my hip. Her fingernails dig into my flesh. The sting spurs me faster.
“We’re gonna make a mess,” I warn, feeling my lower back tighten and my knees weaken.
“Make a mess,” she hisses, pressing back harder.
“Fuck. Taxi,” I groan, feeling the build, the spiral in my gut, and the twist of something deeper.
“Yes,” she cries out, her voice echoing in the small space.
“Not without you.” I flatten my other hand low on her belly, as if I can feel myself moving inside her.
“Stone.” Her breath catches. Her hand covers mine, pressing harder. “Oh God. Oh God.”
The pressure works magic, and Taxi stills a second before shoving her ass toward me, causing me to surge into her. She clenches and clutches, squeezing at me in a way I haven’t ever felt. Like she wants to hold onto me, keep this connection as long as we can.
Everything inside me shatters and I let go, giving in to her warmth and her heart and the warm glow of this moment.
Me.
Her.
Us.
I can’t form a coherent thought. Nothing has ever been like this.
I slip my arms around her middle and lower my head to the back of hers, coiling around her while still buried inside her.
“Taxi.” I breathe out her name filled with a hundred questions and only one answer.
Stay.
Something I cannot ask.
Instead, I inhale the scent of citrus and honeysuckle and sex, and I squeeze her middle a little tighter, wishing I could keep us right here, locked in a bathroom.
A light rap comes to the door along with a throat clearing.
“Don’t mean to interrupt, but your meat might be burning.”
Both our heads lift and turn in the direction of the closure where Cortland speaks from the other side.
“Probably shouldn’t let Sebastian take over, like he wants to.”
I glance toward the mirror and catch on Taxi’s eyes, which are wide and gleaming back at me. She covers her mouth to hold in laughter, and I press a kiss to her shoulder to suppress my own.
Easing myself out of her, I reach for a hand towel, using it to catch any spill. Then I snap the towel gently against her left cheek.
“Ow,” she says, loudly, spinning to face me. Her skirt falls back into place. “What was that for?”
“So you remember me when you walk out that door.” I nod toward the bathroom door.
“I don’t think I could ever forget you. No matter where I go.” Her eyes dip sheepishly, and I pull her to me, placing a softer kiss on her, letting the touch linger, distracting myself from what’s been unsaid.
She’s still leaving.
Not today, but someday.