35. Absolutely Everything
35
ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING
Nick
Twenty minutes later, the car drops me at The Wave, the nearest dance club to the inn, according to Google. It’s on the beach with indoor/outdoor dancing.
I pay the entry fee, and go inside the dark club, with purple smoky lights sweeping across the dance floor and bass thumping in my bones. I scan the packed house for the woman.
She’s not by the bar.
She’s not on the dance floor.
She’s not by the stage.
With nerves strung tight and unraveling, I march to the door leading outside to the beach. The late summer night air warms my face. Music blasts and bodies grind, and tequila flows. Ignoring the scene, I hunt for Layla, but I don’t see the beautiful blonde who owns my heart.
I spot Harlow in the middle of the dance floor, bumping hips with Ethan. I weave through bodies, stalking over to her right as the music downshifts at the end of the tune.
“Where’s Layla? Is she here? I have to see her.”
Fuck tomorrow.
I need tonight.
Harlow must sense I’m not in the mood for games. She rises on tiptoes and shouts in my ear. “She went home. She wasn’t up for dancing. We offered to go with her, but she insisted we stay. But I should warn you, if you’re going to break her heart, you need to tell me so I can be there for her.”
Damn. She does have amazing friends.
“I don’t ever want to break Layla’s heart. I’ll protect her. I promise,” I say, then with an honest smile, I make the request of my heart. “Can I have the address, please?”
I could get it from Layla, but I have a different plan.
Harlow tells me, then I thank her and leave, and once I snag another ride, I have the driver take me to Layla’s home. When I’m a mile away, I call her. I can’t bang on the door at night uninvited.
She answers with a tentative, “Hi.”
She sounds sad, and I’m sure it’s my fault.
“You left something at the hotel,” I say.
“I did?”
“I have it. I’ll be there in three minutes,” I say. It pains me to fib, but I also won’t tell her the truth on the phone.
This is not a phone call conversation. This is a face-to-face conversation.
When the car arrives, I thank the driver, then race up the steps two at a time. I rap on the door, and in seconds, I hear movement. She’s probably turning off the alarm, unbolting the lock.
She opens it, and I waste no time. “I was wrong. I was the one who left something at the hotel.”
I’ve confused her even more. “What did you leave there?” she asks.
“ You ,” I say emphatically, standing in the doorway. Then, because I have to earn her, because you should always earn all the good things in life, I stop saying things like we can’t do this again , and I start saying let’s give this a chance . “I want to be with you for real,” I say without any finesse, just speaking the truth of my heart. “I don’t want to stop. And I don’t want to sneak around anymore. I don’t want to slip out of your home before the sun rises. I don’t want to walk around an event pretending I feel nothing for you, when I feel… everything .”
Her smile can’t seem to contain itself. It’s instant, a star lighting up the whole night sky. “Everything? That’s a lot, Nick.”
There she goes. Teasing me, like she did the day I met her. It feels so right.
“I feel absolutely everything for you, Layla Mayweather and Lola Jones,” I say, still completely serious. I have to be. I’m the one who has to make this choice and hope she’ll go along with me.
“I need to tell David about us,” I say. “I was going to ask your permission to tell him as soon as I could do it in person. I was going to say all this to you tomorrow, but I can’t wait any longer. My heart hurts when I’m with you but not with you.”
Some of the tension leaves me—the stress of holding the door closed on my emotions. In its place comes a new, hopeful tension as I pray she’s willing to take the risk with me.
Layla doesn’t make me wait. She reaches for my tie—the ruby red one I wore tonight—and tugs hard on it. “Get inside.”
Leaving all the tension behind, I kick the door shut behind me. “I won’t say a word unless it’s okay with you. But I couldn’t wait any longer to tell you. I would have told you this morning, but then?—”
“Oh, shut up. You found what you left behind.”
She kisses me, and it feels, at last, like the start of something.
It feels like the start of everything.
I’m in her bedroom, lying down on the king-size bed, my hands parked behind my head, desire filling every cell in my body. “Undress for me, beautiful,” I tell her.
After a good long stretch of dizzying kisses, we finally made it to the bedroom, where she pushed me down on the mattress and stripped me. Fair’s fair. Now I want to enjoy the show.
“If you insist.” Layla nibbles on the corner of her lips, then lifts her hands behind her neck, untying the pink strap of her dress.
When it falls, freeing her beautiful tits, I growl.
I’m up and out of bed in a heartbeat. “I’ll finish the job,” I command, and I slide the dress off her lush body, kissing her as I go. Her neck, her throat, her nipples. Then I’m down on my knees, kissing her soft belly.
I savor the jasmine scent of her skin. The feel of her soft flesh. The way she shudders under my hands. I press a kiss to the top of her panties and then whisk those off her too.
She steps out of them, roaming her hands through my hair, gazing down at me as I look up at her. “Are we really doing this?” she asks with wonder.
I kiss her stomach reverently. “We are, sweetheart. You’re mine. I need you,” I tell her, desperate for her once again.
Her soft fingers tighten in my hair, and she forces me to look up at her. “I need you too. But you have to be here for me.”
My brow knits, and I rise, sweep her hair from her face. We’re both naked, and it’s an odd moment. Standing in our birthday suits, pressing pause on the fucking. But her concerns are too important to ignore. “I will be,” I tell her, meaning it completely.
“I want you all the way. I want you in my life,” she adds, emphatic.
“That’s what I want too,” I say, then I lift a brow. “I thought that was clear?”
She swallows, maybe a little uncomfortably. “It is. But I just want to make sure. I’ve never felt this way. I don’t want to feel like this and then have you walk away. If… ”
I get her meaning. I haven’t done the hard thing yet. I haven’t declared us. But she deserves this promise. She’s giving me not just her body, but her big, beautiful heart. “I promise, Layla,” I tell her, with all the conviction I feel. “I’m not backing down. You can trust me.”
She cups my cheek, then runs her thumb along my jaw. “I do trust you. I always have.”
“Good.” I kiss her tenderly. When I break the kiss, I say, “We can wait. We can stop. We can see each other in New York after?—”
She laughs then rolls her eyes, pushing me back to the bed again. “I believe you’ve been wanting something in particular for some time.”
A rumble works its way up my chest as I settle onto a pillow, then pat my shoulders. “Fuck my face. And don’t hold back.”
In seconds, she’s climbing over me, her knees on the pillow, her hands on the headboard, and her hot, sweet pussy on my mouth.
Grasping her hips, I pull her close then moan salaciously as I taste her. “It’s only been a day or two, but it’s been too long,” I murmur against her.
“I think you’re insatiable,” she says.
“Ya think?”
“And I like it.”
With a pointed flick of my tongue, I mutter, “Good.”
But then I’m done talking. My lips and tongue are busy pleasing her.
Devouring her.
Savoring her moans, her cries, her oh gods .
She tastes so good and sounds so sexy that my dick is thumping, begging for attention. I don’t deny myself either. My Layla likes it when I’m horny for her. I let go of one hip, grab my cock, and stroke.
“Nick, that’s so hot,” she says on a breathless pant.
She’s craning her neck, watching me jerk, all while she rocks faster, more urgently against my mouth.
I’m on fire.
My cock throbs and I give another tug while I flick my tongue faster over the hard nub of her clit.
“Yes, do that again,” she urges.
I’m not sure if she means my tongue or my hand. But I’m sure both would do the trick for her. Good thing I can multitask. I lick and I jerk, giving her a show while I consume her pussy.
Until she’s smothering me and losing her mind. I couldn’t be happier, but I do need to focus on finishing her.
I let go of my dick and don’t stop a goddamn thing till she’s screaming in bliss. Then quaking above me.
When she comes down eventually, I lift her off, wipe a hand across my lips, and give her an order. “Get on your hands and knees. Need to fuck you hard.” Then I add, “For the first time.”
“You do,” she says as she smiles, woozy and sex drunk. But then she complies, offering me her body as I grab the condom that I left on the nightstand and put it on.
I move behind her, but I don’t sink into her right away. I slide my hands over her ass, up her back to her soft hair. I bend lower, kiss her earlobe. “There are so many ways I can fuck you, beautiful,” I say, hearkening back to a fantasy promise I made in Miami. But this is a real promise, sealed with emotions. “And I’m going to start right now.”
She trembles and meets my gaze. “Do it. Because I want to come again.”
Well, a gentleman should give a lady what she wants.
But I’m not gentlemanly at all as I kneel, then sink into my woman.
A scorching zing of desire shoots down my body from the feel of her. She’s hot and welcoming and mine.
I grab her hips, pulling her tighter on my dick, letting the insane pleasure ratchet through me. “Mmm. You feel so fucking good,” I tell her.
She wiggles against me. “Everything does, Nick.”
She’s right. Everything is good tonight, now that we’ve decided. There is no more living in the in-between. There is only being together.
That’s how I fuck her—like we belong to each other. I thrust deep inside her, savoring each sound she makes, each sway of her hips, each breath carrying the scent of our intimacy.
She rocks back, asking for more, asking for me, only me, to please her, to have her, to be hers.
I listen to her cues, picking up the speed, then I roam my hand down her back. She bends with me, dropping down to her elbows with a long, seductive moan.
When she’s grabbing at the sheets, her fists curling tighter, I rope a hand around her, find her clit, and stroke her while I take her to the limits of pleasure.
Like that, she gasps, then moans before crying out as another orgasm wracks her body. It ignites one in me too. I shout a filthy yes, fucking yes , as my climax obliterates me with a soul-deep passion I don’t want to lose.
And I don’t intend to.
I will fight for her. Even if it hurts.