Chapter 34 Hope
Hope
Even though I’m sleeping in Zane’s arms every night, we haven’t been intimate again since everything happened.
And the more days roll by, the more nervous I get, even though I miss him like that.
I’m starting to show now. Just a little. A tiny bump that’s only visible if I’m naked, but if we’re intimate, I’m going to be naked.
With Zane.
This is shock, I tell myself.
I need to get over it, but it feels stupidly hard. Like it’s growing into a mountain of a problem, when it doesn’t need to be.
Then one night, I happen to wear a sundress from the pile of thrifted clothes Mercy gave me, that makes me feel pretty as it skims my thighs.
And sometimes it’s just that simple.
Zane watches me all evening, and it’s heady. I’m thinking about how to suggest we sneak off somewhere when he shows he’s way ahead of me in the planning department.
“After you tuck Bellamy in, bring the baby monitor outside and find me,” Zane whispers against the back of my neck as I’m tidying up in the kitchen. “I want to show your sundress the respect it deserves in the moonlight.”
He slips out the side door, leaving me staring at his retreating back. My pulse picks up, and I smile.
It doesn’t take me any time at all to find him. He’s down the hill from the house, on the slope running down to one of the ponds lining the long driveway.
There are frogs and crickets singing songs in the near distance, but otherwise we have the summer night to ourselves.
He’s laid out a blanket on the grass just out of sight of the house. I set the monitor down on the corner of the blanket, then sprawl out, my skirt riding up on my thighs as I lean back on my elbows.
“This is a nice bit of privacy.”
He slides right up against me, one arm behind me.
The other ghosts over my belly, making me quiver inside, then between my breasts, his knuckles grazing my collarbone and the side of my throat before he unfurls his hand and cups the back of my neck.
With a low groan, he traces the edge of my jaw with his thumb as he tilts my face up.
In the shadows between us, it’s hard to read his expression, but it’s easy to feel his need and that pulsing desire floods me with anticipation.
His muscles are taut, too, like he’s holding himself back.
I don’t want him to be restrained tonight.
“I wore this so you’d have easy access,” I whisper. “You don’t need to—”
“I’m taking my time. Savouring you. This isn’t a problem,” he rumbles.
“Maybe it’s a problem for me, Cowboy.”
“You want me to do more than just look at you?” He smiles, slow and broad, his teeth flashing white in the dark. “Just say the word, mama, and I’ll make you feel so good.”
“Is the word please? Because yes—”
“I just wanted to make sure you were sure. You’ve been through a lot.”
I cup his face. “Please.”
He kisses my mouth, soft and giving, then trails his mouth down my neck, grazing my skin with his teeth before he settles in at the fluttering pulse at my clavicle. “You smell like heaven, you know that? I want to bury my face in your skin forever.”
I know the feeling. I seek his scent out, too, every chance I get. I’m eager, hungry. Desperate, even.
He drags in a big inhale, then kisses onto my chest, his lips teasing at the neckline of my dress, making my breasts surge toward him, suddenly aching and heavy.
Flushed with awareness, and the arousal that follows.
His hand cups my flesh, his thumb teasing a tender nipple. “How are you feeling here? Sensitive?”
“Y-yes.” My head falls back and I stare up at the sky as he ever so carefully circles my nipple, first on top of my dress, then after he tugs the neckline down, around the bare skin.
Around and around his thumb goes, until heat is racing through my entire body and my breast is pulled taut, the nipple hard and extended.
He ducks his head and covers the taut peak with his mouth, his tongue as soft as his touch. Suckling, and it makes my knees buckle.
My legs fall open, and my skirt hitches up to my hips.
With an exhale, warm against my wet tit, he glances down. “That’s a mighty nice invitation, seeing your panties flash me in the moonlight like that.”
I whimper and he returns to my breasts, giving my other nipple the same loving attention. Pulling it to a tight point and then sucking on it like he wants to taste the milk I’ll make our babies.
A wave of desperate yearning threatens to break into this precious, perfect moment, and I shove it away.
Nothing will ruin tonight. Not for me, and not for Zane. I want to give him all of myself, or at least, all of the good parts. All of the willing and eager parts. My breasts and my thighs and everything in between, including my heart.
Because I know Zane only wants this if it’s real.
And it is.
As scary as that is to admit, this connection between us is the deepest and strongest I’ve ever experienced. More real than anything else I’ll ever hold in my life, and I treasure it.
So I will protect it from my dark fears and ugliest regrets.
“I want to see you in the moonlight, too,” I whisper. “Take your shirt off, please.”
“Love the way you ask so sweet. Makes me wonder what else you might ask for if I kiss you long enough.” He brushes his lips against my nipple again, his breath almost as hot as the hungry gaze he shoots up to my face. “You have any other requests?”
I lick my lips as he lifts up just enough to strip his shirt off, then I reach for his bare chest, to the light dusting of hair there, and I trace it down, down, down, to where it narrows and thickens below his belly button. “I want to make you feel good.”
“I feel pretty fucking fantastic right now.” He covers my hand and pulls it lower, so we’re both cupping his erection, my hand in his. He groans under his breath when I squeeze, and his voice goes ragged when I drag my fingers down to his balls. “You want to make me come in my jeans again?”
I laugh, a little breathless. “I want to see it this time. Or feel it.”
“Fuck.” He bucks his hips, pressing into my touch. “Yeah, okay. Whatever you want. However you want it. But I have some requests, too.”
“What do you want?” I find his gaze, but when our eyes connect, it’s him who holds the connection.
Everything, his expression makes clear.
“Tonight, and tomorrow…” he murmurs, shifting so his body covers mine, so my bare tits are pressed against his warm chest, and I’m wrapped in his safe embrace. “And the days after that, if you can share them.”
“They’re yours.”
“I’m going to be greedy and ask for weeks next, then months…” The way he trails off, leading me, waiting for me to catch up, tells me where he’s going, and it’s so much, it’s almost too much, but I nod and kiss him back.
He wants years after that, too.
“Years,” he repeats, as if he can hear my soul. “Forever, if you’ll let me…”
And then he kisses me, as if he doesn’t want to give me space to say no, to correct him. As he kisses me, his hands returning over and over again to my breasts, and then lower, drifting up and down, up and down, until I panting and writhing for him.
When he gets my skirt up high enough to play at the top of my panties, his fingers teasing the elastic there, it feels like electric sparks on my belly.
He eases his head back enough to hold my gaze as he touches me there for the first time. At first I think he’s going to slip his fingers into my panties, but instead he flattens his hand over my middle. “Is this okay?”
I nod carefully.
“You’re so gorgeous.” He swallows hard, and that little reveal means the world to me. He’s nervous about this, too.
But that doesn’t stop him from taking charge again.
Kissing me again.
Touching me, up and down, up and down, under my dress this time.
And when he returns to my panties, this time he does slide his fingers into the damp cotton, and it’s everything.
“Jesus, Hope, you’re so slick. Did you make all this for me?” He crushes his mouth against mine, a kiss that says thank you and you’re sexy and God damn all at the same time.
His chest heaves as he rolls me onto my back and shoulders his way between my thighs. When he pulls my panties aside, he whispers another wish against my bare, pulsing flesh. “I want everything you can give me. But I’ll start with this, if you’ll let me taste you.”
I can’t say no to him. My hips lift, surging against his mouth and my pussy connects with his tongue for the very first time.
I’ve never been licked before, and it’s shocking. Soft but firm, wet and constantly moving. Exactly like kissing, of course it is, but on the most sensitive part of my body. The most intimate and private, too, and Zane is devouring me like he owns this part of me.
He’s being cautious about our sounds not carrying too far, but he’s not that quiet. I can feel that tension as he keeps his growly, horny noises low. Just for me, encouraging reactions to my body throbbing and growing swollen, slick.
“That’s it, that’s the way.” He pulls up and licks his lips, his gaze hooded but piercing. “You taste incredible.”
I squirm at the compliment.
He grins. “Gonna want to do this every day for sure.”
And then his smile slowly softens, fading into a look of serious intent as he ducks his head again.
My clit jumps to meet his mouth again.
Every day?
What would that be like…
Incredible. Ab—so—lutely inc—
“Zane!” I shove my hands in his hair as he latches on to my clit and pulls it into his mouth, sending my body into a new level of aching arousal.
He mumbles something that I can’t make out properly because I’m smothering him between my legs, but he wraps his hands around my thighs and squeezes reassuringly, keeping them tight around his head as he pulls again, doing that same thing and getting the same result.
Holy. Crap.
I moan into the night air, and unlike him, I’m not good about keeping quiet. I slap my hand over my mouth and close my eyes, rolling my hips and chasing more of that feeling as he pulls and pulls and licks and pulls and—