35. Down, Boy
DOWN, BOY
Miles
My brain short-circuits. A hum vibrates through my body as we kiss, hot and deep.
Our lips seal together. The taste of her sweet mouth is almost too much.
Her vanilla and brown sugar scent drives me wild.
And soon my thoughts disintegrate as my right hand slides into her hair, careful to avoid her ear.
My fingers tangle in those strands I’ve missed, tugging gently at the ends.
She moans into my mouth—a frantic sound that obliterates the last shreds of my control. Not that I had much to begin with.
I kiss her even harder, the way I know she likes it.
The way I know she wants. She moves with me, her tongue seeking, her lips just as hungry and greedy as mine.
It’s a kiss that’s wild, reckless, and so much more than the sum of its parts because we’re in perfect sync.
We want the same things—in bed and, I’m starting to think, out of it too.
I break the kiss to trail my mouth along her jawline. I should take my glasses off, but I can’t be bothered to stop right now. My pulse hammers mercilessly as I find the hollow at the base of her throat and press my lips there. That spot reminds me of the locket we found the day we spent together.
“That locket looked so good on you,” I murmur against her skin, remembering it, wishing I could see it on her again.
“You’d look good in me,” she replies, her voice a blend of tease and heat.
A laugh bursts out of me, and I pull back just enough to look at her.
She’s so fucking perfect for me. She keeps me on my toes—snarky, smart, kind, brave, passionate—and it feels like ages since I kissed her, even though it’s only been…
“How the hell did I last a year without kissing you when it already feels like forever since I kissed you nine long days ago?”
Her hand slides against my chest, right over my heart. I don’t know if it’s intentional—where she lays her palm—but it doesn’t matter. It makes that organ in my chest slam hard just the same, especially when she says, “Time doesn’t work the same way when you can’t stop thinking about someone.”
And now my heart is beating outside my chest. It’s beating so damn loud she’s got to be able to hear it.
I want her so much. I need her so completely it’s terrifying and wonderful at the same time.
A part of me wants to tell her, to blurt out you’re the one, but no way am I scaring her off before we figure out what this is.
Before I know if we’re both this caught up in each other.
I force myself to focus on the physical, and that’s not hard at all.
I glance down at her shirt, my restraint hanging by a thread.
I want her stripped bare. I want to take her apart, fuck her, make love to her, have her in every way.
But I need to know—even in spite of her you’d look good in me remark—that we’re on the same page.
“Tell me I can take all your clothes off,” I say, my voice rough, my hands playing with the button on her jeans. “Tell me I can eat you. Tell me I can fuck you till you’re begging for more orgasms.”
She blinks, then shudders. “I would think you already know my opinion on that.”
“Tell me this one. Tell me now.”
My hand is restless at her waist, barely holding back.
She slides her fingers into my hair, her touch grounding and electrifying all at once. “I want all of you. I can’t keep fighting this, Miles,” she says.
And dear god, those are the greatest words any woman has ever said to any man. “Don’t fight it. Let’s fuck instead.”
She ropes her arms around my neck, and I scoop her up and carry her up the stairs to my bedroom.
But it smells like her, and it somehow, incomprehensibly, already feels like ours.
What a heady thought.
What a fantastic thought.
I set her down on the bed. Every instinct in me screams to tug off her black shirt, to peel away those jeans, but I force myself to slow down. I run the backs of my knuckles down her cheek. “Tell me what you need and don’t need from me,” I say.
But she’s already lifting a hand toward her right ear. “I’m taking them out,” she says wryly. “I don’t want to lose one—or both—when you fuck me into next year.”
My heart hammers so hard it hurts. I’m falling deep for her. The fact that she can make that joke right now—that she can let me see this unguarded side of her and still laugh—does it for me.
She rises from the bed, moving toward the bathroom with that confident sway I can’t look away from. At the doorway, she pauses, glancing back over her shoulder. “Maybe I was presumptuous,” she says, holding up a small case. “I packed my bag, but I left this behind.”
“You should be presumptuous with me,” I reply.
Her lips curve into a small smile before she steps into the bathroom and clicks open the case.
When she returns, her hearing aids tucked safely into their charger, she places a hand over my chest. “I can hear you,” she says, looking up at me, her gaze clear and steady. “You don’t have to yell or over-enunciate. But just know, if you murmur, I’m probably not going to catch it.”
I laugh softly, the sound catching in my throat as my laugh burns off, replaced by something raw, tinged with need. “I don’t think I could be quiet with you even if I tried.”
“Don’t be then,” she says.
“I won’t,” I say, as my fingers find the loose strands of hair curled behind her ear. I tuck it back gently, my fingertips grazing the shell of her ear for the first time.
It’s such a privilege to touch her like this.
Her breath halts and when she looks up at me, the softness in her eyes steals the air from my lungs. This moment isn’t lost on me. She’s letting me in. She’s trusting me when she’s at her most vulnerable. I swear to myself I won’t let her regret it.
First, though, I let go of her, take off my glasses, and set them on the nightstand. Then I grab her and haul her close, running my hands through her hair at last. “Fuck, this feels so good,” I rasp out, grateful to have free rein in these gorgeous locks.
She leans her head back, savoring my touch. “It does.”
I kiss her throat again then up her neck, then I nip her earlobe.
She gasps, melting into me. I kiss along her ear, flicking my tongue across the flower studs she wears every day. Every damn day. I’ve known this, but I haven’t entirely felt the magnitude of it till now. “I fucking love that you wear these all the time,” I say, then pull back to look at her.
“You have good taste in jewelry,” she says, teasing, a little dry. Like she knows how to wind me up.
“I think it’s more than good taste,” I say, my fingers teasing at the hem of her shirt. “You like wearing something I gave you.”
She rolls her eyes playfully. “If you want to see it that way.”
“I know it’s that way,” I say.
She laughs, shaking her head, but then gravitas sets over her eyes. “I don’t like taking them off.”
“Don’t. Don’t ever take them off,” I say before I can think twice about the ever.
But I don’t linger on it. I move on as I tug off her shirt, growling at the sight of her in lingerie again.
“Fucking missed this,” I say as my gaze travels over her chest, the swell of her breasts, the white lace snug against her skin.
I’m used to seeing her in black lace—well, the three times I’ve gotten her clothes off or halfway off. But white fries my brain too.
Her nimble fingers make quick work of the buttons on my dress shirt, but by the time she’s halfway down it, I have no more patience.
I jerk it over my head, then peel off her jeans as fast as I can. “Can’t wait,” I say, as I help her step out of them.
When they’re on the floor next to the bed, I rise up…and swallow roughly as I stare at the gorgeous sight.
She’s wearing matching white lacy panties, and that’s it. She’s here. With me. Wanting me. Ready to say fuck it to all the complications.
The ones involving her, me, and everyone else. The weight of this hits me all at once, but it doesn’t scare me. It makes me want to do right by her however I can, whenever I can.
My brave, bold, beautiful woman. “You’re stunning,” I tell her, my eyes locked with hers, but those two words hardly capture the depth of what I’m feeling.
Everything.
“So are you…” she says, but the words trail off as I cup a hand on the damp panel of her panties, her wetness soaking through them.
She shudders.
“You finally gonna let me taste you properly?”
Her lips part. “Have I been holding out on you?”
“Yes,” I say, half joking, but also feeling like the world has been holding out on this blazing lust. “And I can’t wait.”
In no time, I slide her panties off, then before I can even be bothered with spreading her out on the bed, I get down on my knees in my dress pants and press a hungry kiss to her greedy clit.
“Oh god,” she murmurs as her hands clamp around my head. I fucking love the feel of her grip, nice and tight, like she needs to hold on to me.
I groan as I taste her sweetness. She’s slick and hot and delicious. I flick my tongue around her clit, then suck on her.
Another needy moan falls on my ears and drives me on. I kiss her pussy more deeply. As I lap up all her arousal, she pants and moans, her fingers curling tighter around my skull.
I want her to be rough with me. I want her to use me for her pleasure. I wrench away, run a hand up her stomach, and meet her gaze for a hot, heady beat. “Pull on my hair, fuck my face, do whatever you want.”
She nibbles on the corner of her lips briefly, then turns her gaze longingly to the bed. Specifically, the pillows piled by the cushioned headboard.
I pop up in no time. “Let me revise that, sweetheart. Sit on my face right now and ride me.”
Her smile is wicked and wanton.
Soon, I’m stretched out on the covers and she’s straddling me, looking down right as I curl my hands around her hips.
“Use me like you did that toy on the video. Fuck my face even harder than the toy,” I tell her, then I jerk her pussy right to my mouth and groan.
“Miles,” she murmurs, half surprised, half protesting, but all blissed out.