Chapter 28 Aspen
ASPEN
Roan was everywhere—his hands tangled in my hair, his heat surrounding me. His taste took me under.
He pulled back, eyes wild. “Aspen,” he croaked.
“Don’t,” I whispered. “Please, don’t take it back.” I didn’t think I could handle it if he stole this kiss from me.
“Never.” The single word was a guttural oath. His hands framed my face. “I’m not any good at this kind of thing. People. Emotions.”
I looked up into those blue depths. “Seems like you’re doing a pretty good job to me.”
I wanted him to laugh, forget he’d pulled away, and lose himself in me again. Instead, he searched. Those eyes of his probed and tested. “I don’t want to hurt you. I wouldn’t mean to, but I could.”
My hands fisted in his shirt. “Yes, you’ll hurt me. Just like I’ll hurt you. But if we care about each other, we’ll mend it. We’ll learn to do better the next time.”
A muscle in his cheek fluttered like crazy. As if a silent war raged within him that I would never get to see.
I pressed a hand against his chest, over his heart. “No one has ever made me feel as safe as you.”
Roan’s Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed. His hand trailed down, his thumb tracing the column of my neck. “Sometimes, I think you hypnotized me. Can’t stop thinking about you. Even when I should be thinking about anything else.”
Heat flared, hope rising along with it.
“I used to watch you.”
My brows pulled together at that.
Roan flicked his chin toward the mountainside covered in trees. “My cabin’s up that way. Looks out over this farm. Even before I met you, I’d sit on my balcony and watch the red-haired woman with her daughter. Always so happy. So patient. So full of life. I thought you couldn’t be real.”
His thumb trailed lower, then he pressed a hand over my heart. “But here you are, this living, breathing thing. A walking temptation.”
“Give in,” I whispered.
Roan’s eyes sparked. “You don’t know what you’re asking.”
“Then show me.”
He moved so fast I didn’t see it coming. One second, I was on the porch swing. The next, I was in Roan’s arms. My legs went around his waist on instinct as he strode into the house.
The door slammed behind us, and Chauncey lifted his head from his dog bed in question.
“Lock,” I breathed.
Roan took one step backward, flipping the top deadbolt, and then he was moving again. His long strides ate up the space. He didn’t kiss me as he moved, but his gaze was like a physical caress, stroking and teasing.
He made it to my bedroom in a matter of seconds, shutting the door behind us. He lowered me to the floor so slowly it was almost painful. My core pressed against the long, thick ridge in his pants, and I almost whimpered.
“Need you to be sure.”
I looked up into his face, infusing every bit of certainty I could into my voice. “I’m sure.”
Roan stroked his thumb across my pulse point. “Need control.”
I swallowed against the dryness in my throat. “Okay.”
That thumb trailed over my chest and down my sternum. His fingers twisted in the hem of my sweatshirt. “Arms up.”
There was a grit to his voice, a need, and it had heat pooling between my thighs. I obeyed.
Roan slowly peeled my sweatshirt off and tossed it to the floor, leaving me in my sleep camisole. His eyes flared as he drank me in. “So pretty.”
I let my arms slowly fall, soaking in Roan’s stare.
His finger traced my nipple through the delicate fabric. It peaked and tightened. “Fuck. Look at that response. So beautiful. So perfect.”
My heart sped up as need pulsed low.
“Can I have this?” Roan asked, his fingers toying with the strap of the tank top.
I nodded.
“Words, Tender Heart. I need the words.”
“Yes,” I breathed.
The camisole was gone in a flash, joining my discarded sweatshirt on the floor.
Roan stepped back, towering over me and taking in every inch of my bare skin. He stilled in front of me, looking at the scar that ran along my collarbone and down my side. I fought the urge to turn and cover myself, but before I could, Roan bent.
His lips trailed across the raised flesh. “I’d do anything to take away this pain.”
“Roan.” His name was a hoarse whisper.
“Anything,” he echoed.
Tears stung my eyes as Roan’s fingers followed his lips. He wasn’t scared of my damage. It didn’t make him flinch. He took me exactly as I was.
He kept moving, circling me, stopping behind me, and tracing a finger down my spine. “Smoother than I ever could’ve dreamed.”
“Roan…”
He pulled me flush against him, my back to his front. I could feel the need pulsing between us, his hardness nestled against my ass.
Roan slid a hand beneath the waistband of my sweatpants and under my panties. I let my head fall back against his shoulder, breathing hard.
His fingers slid down, exploring. Wetness gathered between my thighs. He cupped me. “This heat. Could burn a man alive.”
My core clenched at his words. “Roan…”
“Patience.”
I pressed my thighs together, tightening around his hand, trying to give myself more pressure, more friction. Just…more.
Roan pinched my thigh, making a tsking noise. “Behave.”
I twisted my head and bit his neck.
He chuckled, the sound only driving me higher.
“You’re mean,” I chastised.
Roan’s fingers were back, teasing and toying. “I warned you. But you said you were sure. Changing your mind?”
“Never.”
“That’s my girl,” he whispered in my ear, his teeth nipping the lobe as two fingers drove inside me.
I did whimper then. There was nothing I could do to stop it. Those long digits stroked and twisted, bringing me higher and then backing off. It was a glorious torture, and I only wanted more.
“Please,” I begged.
“Tell me what you need.”
“More,” I breathed.
“Be. Specific.” Roan’s fingers curled.
My mouth fell open on a soft mewl. “That. You. Inside me.”
Roan’s hand was gone in a flash. Then he sank to his knees, taking my sweatpants and panties with him. He tapped my left leg. “Lift.” Then my right. “Lift.”
Then, my slippers and every last stitch of clothing were gone. I lowered my hands, feeling the need to cover myself somehow.
“Don’t,” Roan clipped.
I stilled.
“You’re the most breathtaking thing I’ve ever seen. Don’t hide an inch of that beauty from me.”
My hands fell to my sides, and I breathed deeply.
Roan’s hand traced up my leg to my ass. He gripped it hard. “Perfect.” He nipped the globe. “So damn bitable.”
A shiver coursed through me, one of heat and need.
He shifted, coming around in front of me but still on his knees, his gaze locked on the apex of my thighs. “Knew you’d be beautiful.”
Roan’s thumb parted me, and he leaned forward. His tongue flicked across my clit, and I nearly lost my balance. Roan’s arm came around my legs, holding me steady. “Still.”
I couldn’t get a single word out, but I nodded. Roan grinned against my core. His tongue circled that bundle of nerves as his fingers drove inside me. Each swipe of his tongue nearly sent me over the edge. But it was as if he knew what would take me there and wasn’t ready for that quite yet.
“Please,” I whimpered.
“Need to come?”
“Yes.” I was past shame in begging. I just needed release, escape from the pressure building inside me.
Roan added a third finger, pressing on that spot inside as his lips closed around my clit. He sucked deeply, and pinpricks of light danced across my vision. My thighs shook violently as my walls clamped around him. Nonsensical sounds slipped from my lips.
Roan teased out each wave of pleasure. Just when I thought it was over, another surged until my legs finally gave out.
He scooped me up, depositing me on the bed and grinning down at me. “Like that afterglow on you.”
My entire body tingled, but it was the mischievous smile on Roan’s face that nearly did me in. “Need you.”
Roan stepped back, his fingers going to the buttons on his shirt. “You’ve got me.”
I gulped as he tugged his undershirt free. I knew Roan was a large man but seeing all that muscle in the flesh nearly had me swallowing my tongue.
“Like the view?”
My eyes met his. “Could look at you forever.”
His expression softened as he kicked off his boots, and his fingers went to the button on his pants. “Seems like a waste of time to me.” He stilled for a moment. “I don’t have a condom.”
My mouth went dry. “I’m on the pill to regulate my periods. And I’ve had a checkup.”
“I have, too. And it’s been a long time for me.”
There was something about that. The trust he gave me, the way he let me in. This was more than sex.
“It’s been a long time for me, too,” I whispered.
Roan moved in a flash, jerking free the rest of his clothes and then striding toward me. My breath hitched as his big body covered mine. My legs encircled his waist, his tip bumping against my entrance.
Those endless blue eyes sought mine. “You still sure?”
My hand lifted to his stubbled cheek. “Always.”
It was all Roan needed.
He slid inside on a long glide. My eyes fluttered closed at the stretch—so much delicious pressure.
“Need those eyes,” Roan growled.
My lids flew open.
His expression was almost pained. “There she is.”
With that, he began moving. My fingers dug into his shoulders as he thrust deeper, picking up speed. Everything built all over again, quicker this time.
“Torturous heaven,” he gritted out.
My back arched, bringing Roan deeper, and he cursed. It set something free in him—that wildness in Roan finally loose.
He took me.
Each thrust was deeper than the one before. Wave after wave of sensation crashed into me, tears gathering in my eyes. It was almost more than I could take.
“One more, Tender Heart. Come with me.” Roan’s thumb found my clit, circling and then pressing.
I clamped down around him on a cry, the vise grip taking him with me. Roan drove into me again and again. We spiraled together in frenzied need.
Roan collapsed, rolling to his back and taking me with him as he still pulsed inside me.
I struggled to catch my breath. “That was…”
“Fucking awesome?”
That startled a laugh out of me.
“Please don’t,” he groaned. “You’re going to kill me.”
I tried to stop but still grinned against his neck. “For as quiet as you are most of the time, you’re surprisingly verbose during sex.”
He grunted.
“Back to your talkative self, I see,” I groused.
Roan flipped us again, sliding out of me, his hand lifting to my face. “Never felt anything like that, what we just had.”
My heart stutter-stepped, and I struggled to breathe. “Me either.”
I opened my mouth to say something else, but a car door slammed outside. My gaze flew to the clock, and my eyes widened in panic. “Cady.”