Chapter 37
choosing the fall
Rowan
I could live this life and the next getting lost in those eyes. But right now I want her lost in mine. That beautiful mind of hers will be consumed by me and only me. My lips. My hands. Nobody else’s. I won’t let her head convince her otherwise.
My knuckles run up her center over her damp panties, her legs already trembling at my sides. I strain so hard against my zipper I have to shift myself back on the saddle before I accidentally rub against her and this is over before it starts.
“This what you want, baby?” I make another pass over the wet cotton. Her hips jerk to meet me.
“Yes.”
“Mmm. Inside or outside?”
I slide over her again and she whimpers. “Both—everywhere,” she sputters. “I don’t care, just touch me please.”
My gaze dips to the space between her legs.
I hitch an arm under her knee to hold her steady as I push her panties aside and glide my thumb through her arousal, ending at the bundle of nerves at the top, circling there.
Her moan slices the air against the low roar of the engine.
Another finger follows, up and down the slick skin, spreading the wetness around until I’m coated in her.
Her back arches off the bike, and she brings a hand up to squeeze her breast over her dress.
“Yeah, that’s it. Give yourself what you need.”
I imagine pulling her neckline down, tugging whatever lacy cup covers her nipples below the swell to take her in my mouth.
But this is about her, what she wants.
I push her knee wider, bend low to kiss her. She hums into my mouth as I keep up the work of my fingers below. One digit slides in, and her mouth falls open on a staccato breath. Her hand falls back to grip the handlebar, the other clutching my shirt.
“Mmm, atta girl,” I breathe, smirking against her lips. “Hold on tight.”
I add a second finger, holding there for her body to acclimate. She clenches around me, tight and warm, and I have to kiss her again I’m so high on the feeling.
One small thrust and she tears her lips away. “Rowan!”
“God, baby, you’re doing so good.” I pull out and push in again. Her hips rotate, writhing toward my touch. “Need more?” I punctuate the question with a firm thrust, though I already know the answer.
My fingers curl inside to give her the more she needs. Her head tips back, eyes fluttering shut as she lets out a needy groan.
“Look at me, Hannah.” She lolls her wanton gaze back to mine. “Whose fingers are buried inside you right now?” Another rough, claiming thrust.
“Y-yours,” she stammers, panting.
In, out, again, and again. “That’s right, sunshine. Nobody touches you except me, yeah?”
She nods jerkily. “Only you.” Her orgasm closes in as her wild eyes fight to stay with me.
Possessiveness sparks through me like a live-wire. My thumb circles, fingers pumping a steady rhythm that makes my own head spin. Slick and filthy and perfect.
My voice is a rumble in my chest when I say, “Show me how pretty you are when you come.”
Her fist white-knuckles the handlebar and she grinds into my hand, voice pitching on every sharp exhale as she chases her release.
The image of Hannah unraveling beneath me will forever be branded into my memory. Cheeks flushed, mouth open, dress bunched over her stomach. Her body surrendered to my touch in the most soul-wrecking display of trust I have to clench my teeth against the blissful torture of it all.
I thrust again, then once more and she careens over the edge. Her orgasm crashes into her with such intensity, her voice bottoms out on a silent cry. Her chest stills, face burning crimson.
“Breathe, Hannah!” I command.
She exhales on a loud moan so all-consuming my vision blurs. It boomerangs off the walls, echoes over the bike’s exhaust. The tension in her limbs cracks like a whip and she’s lost to a thousand sensations, every one of them pure ecstasy.
“So goddamn beautiful. Ride it out, don’t stop.”
Her body rocks as my fingers plunge and retreat rapidly to stretch out the tidal wave of pleasure coursing through her. The bike jolts beneath us, her knee pushed to the side quivering in my grasp.
Long seconds of aftershocks chase the final moments of her climax before she goes limp against the bike.
I drop my forehead to hers, our lungs swelling in tandem. Slowly, I lower her leg to the ground, flip the kill switch on the handlebar. Silence cleaves the air as I whisper the words again. “So beautiful.”
Our lips find each other in a soft kiss. I right her panties and sit up to look at her, the mess she’s made on the leather saddle. Her lids are heavy, but they flare on a tiny gasp when I lick my fingers clean, humming over the taste.
Her eyes drop and she swallows hard. What she says next sounds meek around the edges. Vulnerable. “You look like you need to…um…”
Tugging her dress back over her thighs, I ignore where I’m hard behind my jeans. Painfully hard.
“No, baby. I’m fine.” I pull her to a seated position.
“You’re not though.” The words are hollow. Detached. Her throat bobs again. “I can…if you want me t—”
“Stop.” I take her face in my hands, gaze fiercely locked on hers. “You don’t owe me anything.”
After days of uncertainty and hesitation, she asked for my touch, trusted me with her body. Hannah bared herself for me. She’s so much stronger than she realizes.
Her shoulders sink, relief and guilt coalescing in one expression. “I’m sor—”
“Don’t.” I kiss her once, firmly. “There’s nothing to be sorry about. I’m so proud of you. This was perfect—you are perfect, and I’ll touch you as many times as you want. Whenever, however, wherever you want, and you’ll never owe me a thing in return.”
A shy grin pops one cheek. “That’s really noble of you, soldier, but what are you gonna do about that?” she asks, eyes dipping to my jeans again.
I chuckle and swing off the bike. “You are gonna pretend not to know what I’m doing in the shower while you start dinner.”
She giggles, and the sound softens the heaviness in my chest like a balm.
Twenty minutes later, I step out of the bathroom to find Hannah chopping cucumbers at the kitchen table. She pauses her knife on the cutting board and meets me dead in the eye. That smug little face doesn’t pretend at all.
I cast her a warning glare. “Don’t say it.”
“Hey”—she points her knife at me—“I’m just a woman.
You know, a normal person”—she resumes her slicing efforts, eyes on the task—“in a normal kitchen, chopping a phallic-shaped piece of produce for your dinner.” My shoulders bounce in stifled laughter and I round the table.
“And as the elite conversationalist that I am, Rowan.” She pauses, looks at me, then the board.
“It’s only natural for me to ask the person who just finished a nice, long, hot shower how they feel after said shower. ”
My arm wraps around her collarbone from behind.
She pops a slice of cucumber in my mouth. “So…feel better?”
“Like I’m the king of the world. Top of my game. Unstoppable,” I muse.
A soft laugh. She’s amused, but every word I said was true. I just got off to the image of the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen laid out on my motorcycle, coming on my fingers, and it was paradise. No made up fantasies, only the real-life thing standing right here in my own kitchen.
I pinch her hip bone. “I tell no lies, sunshine.”
Cheeks flushed, she scampers to the bedroom to change out of her work clothes while I finish dinner and dream about the next time I get to touch her.
“Tell me about this one?” Hannah’s eyes find me in the light of the bedside lamp. Her finger traces the words inked over my heart:
P.S. Come home safe
“Mom’s handwriting. It’s how she ended every letter to my dad while he was deployed. She signed her letters to me the same way.”
She clicks her tongue. “Such a little momma’s boy.”
I smile, not the least bit embarrassed. “And?”
“And nothing. I think it’s sweet.”
Her hand drifts to my shoulder then, fingers floating along the edges of the anchor wrapped in a string of pearls inked there. The significance isn’t lost on her. For a moment, she just stares at it—the memory a living thing, dwelling in the silence.
Two soft taps against the tattoo and her gaze flits up. “Hope?” I nod softly. “And the pearls?”
“Pearl is Margaret in Greek. Pops used to call her that sometimes.”
Her lips curve in a sad line, palm flattening over the anchor like it might hold her there. “He never told me that. I wish he would have talked about her more with me.”
I wrap my hand around hers, kiss the back of her knuckles.
“Why do you think that is?” she asks.
“My guess is probably for the same reason he never told me about you.” I dip my chin, deadpan gaze fixed.
She pulls in a heavy breath, eyes pinging between mine. “Yeah, no, that was on me.” My brows knit together. “I asked him not to tell you.” A pause. “I’m sorry.”
I shake my head. “You don’t have to apologize, but I’m curious why you didn’t want me to know.”
A soft breath rushes out of her nose, mouth opening and closing once before she speaks.
“We barely knew each other, my life was a mess, and you’d already done so much for me.
I didn’t wanna give you the impression that I needed or expected more from you.
And I definitely didn’t want you to think I was trying to weasel my way into your life because I was like, obsessed with you or something.
It’s also why I didn’t wake you when I left or leave my phone number. ”
There’s a laugh deep in my gut, but I hold it in. I lean in close, stopping before our lips connect. “Hannah”—kiss—“that is”—kiss—“the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.”
She slaps a hand over her face and breaks into a fit of laughter.
“I was the one obsessed with you.”
“Stop it,” she chuckles, the sound fading on a sigh. “You were not.”
Oh, she’s playing coy now. “Literally, I would have had sex with you in that matchbox on faulty axles if you’d said you wanted to, wildlife be damned.”
Hannah loses it, rolling onto her back, laugh bouncing off the ceiling. “But what about the bear cubs, Rowan? You said you cared about them.”
“I lied.”
Her brows lift to the heavens, feigning shock. “How am I supposed to believe anything you say now when this was all founded on lies? Lies, Rowan!”
I stretch my arm over her pillow and tap my shoulder. She comes immediately, head in the crook of my neck, leg hiked over my hip. “You know what to do, runaway.”
A satisfied hum coasts over my bare collarbone. “Tell me something real, soldier.”
“I’m glad we didn’t back then.”
She slides her fingers through my beard. “Why?”
I crane my neck to look at her. Warm eyes peer up at me, and I scan her face, cataloging every detail. The crease on her upper lip, the way her irises appear a little greener in the evening light.
Flashbacks of our night in the camper scroll through my mind—the effortless conversation, the sound of her laugh, the way my pinky fit around hers.
The moment I realized I’d fallen. For her humor.
Her heart. Her mind. I assumed then we would only have that one night together, but even if someone had told me for certain I’d never see her again, I’d still choose falling for Hannah James over a one-night stand with the runaway bride every time.
My lips trace her brow. “Because this is better.”