39. LANE
LANE
Sitting this close to Cora is a distraction most of the time. The fact that she gets so engrossed in the task makes it easier. But I’ve been interrupted more than once as I steal looks at her.
Once she’s wrapped into something, she mashes her lips together, back and forth. It’s not the first time I’ve noticed. She does the same thing when she’s calculating stats or when we work together.
It might also explain her lip balm habit. I swear, she’s always putting it on. But, to be fair, she’s always engrossed in something.
When she told me she currently has a 4.0, it was surprising for about a second—until I realized Coralee Banks is nothing like anyone I’ve met. Not even thinking about other girls, just other people. Everything she does, in my experience, she’s executing at the highest level.
It makes me want to do better.
Not that there’s any way I could ever get a 4.0. I’ve never been one to get the grades. Before I started staying with the Knights, most of my brain power went to trying to survive. Finding my next meal. Doing enough at school to fly under the radar. Get what I needed for hockey.
Cora smiles as she types something, like she’s finally figured it out. It’s alarming to think about the contrast between the two of us. Now. Before. I’m sure Cora grew up in a house where parents put food in the cupboards, celebrated birthdays, maybe even had dinner together every night.
A wave of… something washes over my skin. It’s almost like relief. It comes and goes, still, when I think back on the memories I’ve done my best to run from—tried to lock in a vault and throw away the key.
I’m out of it. It’s in the past. They can’t hurt me anymore.
Cora closes her laptop and announces, “Done.” She sighs out a low breath, leaning back into the couch cushions and closing her eyes.
Again, I don’t know how she does it all—the vision of the planner with all the checkboxes and things pops up in my brain. It’s like superhuman shit.
“You and me. What’s the plan?”
The question she asks catches me off guard. I knew we’d have to talk about it eventually. Sooner is probably better.
“I plan to see you as much as possible. Between hockey and that color-coded planner of yours,” I reply with a joke.
She laughs and says, “I think you know what I mean.”
“Has to be a secret. Being with you would get me in deep shit with the team. With Coach.” I rub my forehead with my fingers.
I’ve had time to think about the pros and cons of this. What it means to give in. It’s not lost on me that I’ve got everything to lose. But the idea of not being with her? Of someone else having her? Not an option.
“Yeah. My dad would lose it. He’s always had this thing about me dating hockey players.”
“That doesn’t surprise me.” I think about Coach being younger, in the locker room.
Cora shrugs. “Even though he met my mom his first year in the NHL. So, she dated a hockey player and obviously they’re not all bad.”
“Your dad. He’s a good guy.” I rub my hands together as I lean forward, resting my forearms on my knees.
Her shoulders bump with mine. “And you’re not?”
I give her the honest answer. “I want to be.”
The response is unfinished, but now doesn’t feel like the time.
To come in with the story of my depressing fucking childhood full of neglect and trying to figure it out.
I’m not afraid to tell her, I don’t think she’s the kind of person who would ever judge for something like that.
I just don’t want to put myself through it tonight.
Her hand reaches over, lightly grazing my cheek, and she turns me to face her. She kisses me and some of the weight drifts away.
“So, we keep it a secret. I can do that,” she reassures me.
I nod, then ask, “Is Freddy completely out of the picture?”
Cora rolls her eyes at the mention of his name and I immediately wish he was standing here for the sake of my kicking him square in the dick.
“Freddy’s annoying and thinks we can still be friends, but I’m over it. Promise.” We both nod, coming to an understanding. “He made it clear that he was bored of me. Even if he was talking about future plans a few weeks before.” Her voice fades. “I’ll never beg anyone to stay.”
Fucker.
“Plus, you saw my planner. You think I have time for more than one of you?” She laughs and I follow suit.
“I love when you smile. It’s like… hard not to smile back,” she whispers, her hand pushing through my hair, my bangs falling to my forehead.
The way she beams at me gives me a reason to smile. There’s one thing that keeps running through my mind: you can’t fuck this up.
“Okay, that’s enough talking for now.” I step in, reach for her and haul her up, tossing her over my shoulder. She giggles and I can feel her abs flex against me.
“What are you doing?” Cora asks between laughs.
I march us straight into my bedroom and toss her on the bed. Her black hair is splayed around her and she uses her hands to get it out of her face.
“I would’ve walked in here, you know?”
“And what’s the fun in that?” I tease her. I hover my body over hers, my legs straddling her now. A sliver of her stomach shows beneath her lifted shirt, her muscles flexing when she laughs. I love that she’s strong.
I kiss her lips but have other plans. Quickly, my lips move down her body. Nipping at her neck, kissing her collar bone—that sliver of skin that’s teasing me.
“Where’d you go?” She’s breathy as she asks the question.
I settle in right at her waist, looking up at her. “Right where I want to be. Been thinking of this ever since the other night when you soaked my fingers.”
I wait for Cora to tell me to stop. To blush. Maybe cover her face. But she does none of these things.
Instead, her blue eyes lock on me and she whines, “Better put yourself out of your misery, then.”
My smart mouth girl. Fuck.
She’s biting her lip as she lays on the bed. I make quick work of the leggings and then it’s just her and a pair of light pink panties.
I place a kiss to her center, the fabric still between us. Cora lifts her hips when I pull away. My lips move to the inside of her thigh and I kiss, slowly, to the apex—where fabric meets skin. Lightly, I lick along this skin. She lets out a tiny moan.
Fuck, I want to taste her. Right now. Send this to overdrive.
Instead, I pull at all my self-control and switch sides, lightly blowing on her as I cross to the other thigh. I start at the fabric this time, stroking the sensitive skin with my tongue, back and forth before my lips move to her inner thigh.
This time when I pull away, she whines, “Laaannneee.” I could listen to her say my name like that forever and die a happy man. I’d have accomplished nothing, but fuck, I think it’d be worth it.
Giving her what she wants, my fingers slide inside her panties, the fabric soft to the touch, and I pull them down and off.
Tossing them to the side, I come back and find her legs are pressed together—she could be damn near crossing her ankles.
My hands start at her shins and push up, my thumbs on the inside of her legs, her skin smooth beneath my fingers.
When I reach her knees, I glance up and see she’s mashing her lips together. It makes her seem needy and desperate under my hands, and it makes my dick twitch.
“Cora,” Her name is soft on my lips. “Open up for me,” I coax, and see a faint tug at the corner of her lip when she splits them an inch.
Teasing me. Pushing my buttons, even now. And you know what? I’m fucking loving it.
“More.” The command comes from my chest and is rough around the edges.
She listens and spreads her legs wide—perfectly on display.
Now, I know she expects me to keep teasing her. But the push and pull has me wanting to be selfish. Take what I want.
Hovering over her, I lick a slow stroke from her entrance up to her clit. She shudders beneath me with the first press of my tongue and moans. I go back to her entrance, lapping at her wetness, and her hands find my hair, locks twisting around her fingers.
“Fuck. I’ve been dreaming of this. Tasting you again,” I moan as her hands pull at my hair.
Cora’s hips shift and tilt—she wants me to keep going.
I take a finger, replacing my tongue, and push in slowly.
In. Out. I add another finger and feel her stretching around me.
The whine that comes from her has my lips on her clit.
I lightly kiss, giving her a tiny bit of pressure.
And her hips push into my lips, like she’s trying to fuck my face.
A fucking dream.
I keep stretching her with my fingers and use my tongue to circle around her sensitive spot. Her abs start to flex and I know she’s close. Cora’s hips keep moving, searching for the right angle as my tongue keeps working her.
Pulling away and looking down to my fingers, she asks for me. “Lane.”
“What do you want, baby?” I know what it is but it’s much better when she says it.
She pants, “What you were doing. Before.”
“Say it.”
“Use your tongue. On my clit.” Her voice is quiet, like she’s unsure of claiming those words as her own, and a mental to-do list starts to form of all the things I want her to say.
I give her exactly what she wants. I speed up the pace of my fingers and my mouth and let her move with me. It’s only a few moments later when her hands are holding my head, my mouth exactly where she wants it.
“Right. There,” she demands.
I do exactly what I was doing and it’s only a few seconds before her shoulders are lifting from the bed.
“Just like that, Peaches. Come on these fingers,” I practically beg her.
The sound that breaks from Cora’s chest is like a yell that she muffles by keeping her lips shut—her hands busy pulling at my hair. She coats my fingers and the blood rushes to my cock.
My fingers and mouth keep moving until she releases my head and rolls away from me. Her chest quickly rises and falls as I move up the bed and kiss her. She moans into it before pulling away.
“My turn.”