Chapter 44
forty-four
. . .
CONNOR
I wake up to her hand on my chest.
At first, I think I’m still dreaming. The room is dark, the sheets are warm, and Whitney is pressed into my side. She’s been there all night, but my body still hasn’t figured out how to act normal about it.
Then her fingers flex.
“Connor,” she whispers.
My eyes open. “Hey, you okay?”
Her face is half-hidden by the dark, but I can feel her looking at me.
“I need you.”
Her body curls against me, and I know exactly what she means. Exactly what she needs.
But hearing her say it out loud does something to me, because now I know I’m not the only one lying here half out of my mind with want. I’m not the only one this gone.
My hand finds her waist on instinct, and I roll toward her, dragging her closer until there’s no space left between us. She comes easily, warm and soft and still sleepy, one leg sliding over mine like it already knows where it belongs.
That nearly finishes me right there.
“Jesus, Whitney,” I mutter.
She makes a quiet sound and buries closer, her mouth brushing my shoulder.
No teasing. No armor. Just her, half asleep and asking for me like it’s the most natural thing in the world.
It does dangerous things to my head.
My hand moves over her slowly, deliberately, mapping heat and softness, every pass pulling another quiet reaction out of her.
She’s warm everywhere. Sensitive everywhere.
Still carrying the evidence of earlier in the way she shivers when I touch her, in the way her breath catches before I’ve even done much of anything.
That realization nearly ruins me.
“Still this worked up for me?” I ask, mouth brushing the corner of hers.
She turns her face into my neck like that’s somehow an answer.
I laugh softly, dark and satisfied. “Thought so.”
Her nails drag lightly down my back.
I lift my head and look down at her, at the shine of her eyes in the dark, the mouth already swollen from kissing, the way she’s breathing like she’s trying not to make a sound and failing.
I swear there is nothing sexier on earth than Whitney trying to stay composed when she’s this close to losing it.
“You gonna make me do all the work?” I murmur.
Her lashes flutter. “Probably.”
I kiss her once, quick and hard. “Brat.”
I ease her onto her back and follow her down, catching myself on one elbow, my other hand sliding slowly up her inner thigh. She opens for me before I’m even fully there, all instinct and trust and sleepy need.
I tease two fingers through her slit and the slickness I find there has me stifling a groan.
Her breath catches, and that sound goes straight to my cock.
Fuck.
“You’re drenched, baby.”
I kiss her before she can respond, and she opens for me immediately, warm and soft and still drowsy enough that every little reaction feels unguarded.
My mouth moves slow at first, tasting sleep and heat and the last few hours still clinging to her, and when she sighs into me, something low in my chest tightens.
She gives as good as she gets, even half asleep, warm hands moving over my shoulders and back like she can’t stop touching me either. That might be the filthiest part of all of this—the way she reaches for me with no self-consciousness, no hesitation, like wanting me is just a fact now.
She rocks against my hand, chasing friction, so I fill her up with my fingers, and tease her clit with my thumb.
“Connor, please. More.”
I know what she means, so I reach for a condom, tear it open and roll it over my hard cock.
“You needed me?” I murmur, voice rough. I settle between her legs, then line myself up. “Then take me.”
She’s so wet—from earlier and now waking up so damn needy—that one thrust is all it takes until I’m deep inside her.
“There you are,” I murmur against her mouth.
Her fingers slide into my hair, tugging just enough to make all the nerve endings light up.
“Connor,” she sighs.
“Yeah,” I say, brushing my mouth over her jaw, then lower. “I’m here.”
I mean it to soothe her, but it comes out a little rough anyway.
Like the way I’m fucking her, rough and messy and a little obsessed.
“You wanna know what’s really fucking me up?” I ask.
She nods.
“That I’m not the only one gone.”
Her expression shifts.
Softens.
That should calm me down, but it doesn’t. If anything, it makes this hotter. Makes it mean more. Makes the whole room feel tighter, the air heavier, my body more aware of every inch of hers under me. Every slick slide of my cock deep inside her.
I kiss her once, then drag my mouth to her ear.
“I’m not the only desperate one here anymore,” I murmur. “That’s what’s got me fucked.”
The sound she makes at that is small and helpless and absolutely perfect.
I move against her with more purpose and she breaks on a breath.
There it is.
My forehead drops to hers.
“Yeah,” I say, voice shredded now. “That’s it.”
My hand slides up to her breast, then back down her side, taking what I can, touching everywhere I can reach because for some reason that feels as urgent as anything else. She arches into it, into me, and I swear I could come apart just from that alone.
“You’re so fucking beautiful like this,” I say before I can stop myself.
The words hang there.
Raw. Honest. Too true.
Whitney goes still for one tiny second, and I think maybe I’ve said too much.
Then her hand comes up to my face.
Her palm settles against my jaw, quiet and deliberate, her thumb brushing my cheek like she needs to touch me back.
That nearly wrecks me harder than anything else tonight.
I kiss her hard enough to make up for it.
The pace turns rougher after that—not careless, never that, but needier. Less thought. Less restraint. Her breath breaks around my name. My hand tightens on her waist. Her body goes taut under mine in waves, each one dragging me closer to the edge with her.
“Connor,” she whispers.
“Yeah.”
“Please.”
That’s it. That’s the one.
I catch her mouth with mine and let the rest of it burn through me. Her whole body tightens, shudders, then melts, and feeling that happen under my hands, against my chest, wrapped around my cock in the dark is enough to wipe every thought out of my head except one.
Mine.
The word doesn’t feel like possession. It feels like awe. Like reverence. Like the way a man looks at something he can’t believe he gets to touch.
“Fuck, Whitney,” I breathe into her mouth.
I’m finished a second later.
Absolutely destroyed.
Afterward, she goes soft against me, all loose limbs and warm skin, and I pull her into my chest before my breathing has even settled. My hand keeps moving over her back because I can’t stop now—not when she’s warm and spent and mine to take care of.
Eventually she presses a sleepy kiss to my chest.
I brush my mouth over her hair. “You’re dangerous in the middle of the night.”
“Only in the middle of the night?”
I laugh, low and tired and still not remotely recovered.
My hand slides into her hair, smoothing it back from her face when she tips her head up to look at me.
Even now. Even wrecked and sleepy and half buried in my chest, she’s beautiful.
She settles back against me a second later, one arm across my stomach, one leg tangled with mine, and I hold her there in the dark while her breathing starts to even out again.
And because apparently I haven’t suffered enough tonight, the worst thought I’ve had yet slides into place just as I’m staring at the ceiling, wide awake.
I could get used to this. That’s the dangerous part.
It’s not wanting her, but wanting this.
And I need to figure out a way to not fuck it up.