21. Dove #2
“Someone reminded me it was still here,” he said, glancing over his shoulder at me, his voice heavy with suggestion.
My face flamed as I realized that when he’d pried Torrence off me last night he would have seen what we were doing up against his truck, the one now parked right behind him.
I decided to ignore that fact altogether.
“I honestly didn’t expect it to be,” Josh continued, tentatively. “Not after…”
After you used it to get as far away from here as you could, then left poor Eddie with the job of dropping it back off—like you couldn’t stomach to have it with you, reminding you of home.
“I didn’t think it would run.” I took a few steps closer to peer at the engine, making sure to keep at least a foot of distance between us.
“Just barely.” He blew out frustrated sigh, turning back to it. “I had to push it the last of the way. Sitting around hasn’t done it any favors. Honestly, I’m surprised I got it running at all.”
I imagined Josh straining and grunting, his muscles bulging as he pushed the aging truck into the garage.
A part of me was annoyed he hadn’t asked for my help, but a bigger part was relieved.
I wouldn’t have been able to deal with the image of him red faced and sweaty, confronted with just how strong he’d become.
I walked over to the work desk along the wall and picked up a random tool to fiddle with, not meeting his eyes as I forced the titillating image out of my mind. “It wouldn’t have sat if you hadn’t left.” I aimed for casual, but it came out sounding more bitter than intended.
“Dove…” Josh sighed again, scrubbing at his face. His voice turned serious. “I think we need to talk.”
Reminded of why I’d come to find him in the first place, I forced myself to push the words whirling around in my head out of my mouth. “Last night was a mistake.”
Silence grew so heavy between us I could have heard a pin drop. When I risked a glance over to him, his face was blank, and for the first time in a long time I couldn’t read it.
That look combined with his silence unnerved me. While Josh was often stoic and quiet, it wasn’t like him to be guarded. Not with me. I was always able to read him, even in his silence. Something about him right now was different…
It was like he was someone else entirely.
The bang of the hood slamming down abruptly had me jumping. Startled, the tool in my hand dropped with a clang to the floor as he stalked toward me like a predator, a wild glint in his eye I’d never seen before.
I stepped back as he drew closer until the press of the work bench dug into the small of my back.
Frozen in place as he advanced, I missed the opportunity to escape, to slid out of his reach, before he took one final step and boxed me in.
Bracketed in his arms, his hands curled against the work bench, and just like that I was trapped.
It was easy to feel dwarfed by him, especially this close. My neck strained as I titled my head back to meet his eyes, still darkened by something I couldn’t quite put my finger on. It wasn’t just lust. It was deeper than that—sharper, almost primal.
He leaned in so close, our chests would have touched if I’d taken a deep enough breath, but I found I couldn’t. My breathing had grown labored with his proximity. Josh had a way of doing that to me, stealing the air from my lungs.
I had no idea I held the ability to do it to him.
It was… powerful, knowing my mere presence caused a reaction so intense in Josh that I could see it happening.
His breath ghosted over my ear. “If it was a mistake,” his voice came out hoarse and husky, “I won’t find you wet for me right now, will I?”
Fuck .
Last night flooded back to me at the same time his words hit me like a zap of electricity, heading straight to my clit.
I never would have guessed my stepbrother had such a dirty mouth.
I never would have guessed I liked it.
Words lost to me, I shook my head to deny it, even though I could feel myself growing slicker by the second.
I nearly gasped as he lowered himself down to one knee slowly, putting him at the perfect height for?—
No, I couldn’t think it. I was trying to end this. Whatever this was. Whatever we had unlocked from Pandora’s box last night. Something I wanted for so long it tasted like the sweetest temptation. Something I knew we couldn’t —shouldn’t —have.
Something we needed to shove back into that box, close the lid on and keep locked up tight.
As I opened my mouth to protest, his hand grasped the tool I dropped, his knuckles brushing my thigh as he slowly brought it back up. They caught on my shirt, exposing a sliver of skin as he reached up to place the tool back where it belonged on the desk.
“Can’t leave this laying around.” His smirk was debauched, his eyes wicked.
The path his hand had took burned like I’d been licked by flames, and when he leaned in to nuzzle against the exposed skin of my lower stomach, fire ignited inside me like I’d swallowed gasoline.
I gasped as his stubble scraped against my oversensitive skin. Head thrown back, I choked on a moan as my hands slid into his hair of their own volition as his teeth nipped under my belly button, teasing just above my waistband.
My mind turned into a wanton void. Whatever I’d come in here to talk about vanished, replaced by Josh and where he was touching me. When his teeth retreated and I could breathe again, my half-lidded eyes flickered down to his.
His wild, darkened gaze met mine and suddenly the mysterious look in them was easy to read.
Possessiveness.
His hands bracketed my hips, pinning me to the desk as he hunched further to nuzzle lower this time, right on the seam of my shorts. The heat in my stomach spread like the wildest of fires, the kind no amount of fight could contain. When he breathed in and groaned, I was consumed by it.
He backed up just far enough to ask, “Have you ever had a fantasy?” as nonchalant as if he were asking about the weather.
It took me a second to process the question through the lusty fog in my brain. I had plenty of fantasies. Every single one of them starred the man kneeling at my feet, but I wasn’t going to tell him that.
I forgot Josh knew me better than anyone else in the world—he read my hesitation easily.
His smile curved upward devilishly, pleased, as his fingers slid under my shirt to grasp the bare skin of my waist. I nearly groaned at the contact, at how perfect it felt to have his hands on me—like it was more right than wrong.
“I have,” he admitted. My eyes met his in surprise. They sparkled back at me mischievously. I knew that look. He was up to something, and I was both intrigued and scared at just what it could be.
It also reminded me that this wasn’t supposed to be happening, lifting me from the spell his touch had put me under just enough to object, “Josh, we can’t?—”
He shushed me, placing a biting kiss to my navel. I gasped.
“I’ve fantasized about eating you out on the hood of my truck.”
Whatever words of protest were lingering in the back of my throat, I swallowed them. His dirty words had me squirming, clit throbbing.
I couldn’t believe he’d imagined… that. With me.
“You have?” I asked breathlessly.
His lips skimming the soft skin of my stomach as he nodded. “Every time I look at the damn thing I wonder what you’d look like spread out on top of it.”
This time his name escaped me in a moan.
“Fuck,” he whispered huskily, leaning his forehead against my hip. His hands gripped my sides harder, and I whimpered as they bit into my skin.
“Let me, Dove,” he pleaded, on his knees before me, face pressed into my stomach. “We have to talk about this, I know , but right now all I want to do is unbutton these damn shorts, part your pretty thighs, and make you scream my name.”
He kissed my navel gently, sweetly. “I’ll make you feel so good, baby.” My stomach somersaulted at the promise behind those words, his breath ghosting over my skin.
Hearing him call me baby had me trembling, resolve crumbling, and I wanted to tell him he already had made me feel good.
Last night… I never felt anything like that before.
Not from myself and certainly not with any of the guys I’d fumbled and stumbled around with.
The orgasm he’d given me had been damn near transcendent .
I wasn’t sure I could survive another one.
I wanted to find out anyway.
All I could do was nod, but that was all it took. One small nod of consent.
A breathy gasp was ripped from my chest as Josh gathered me in my arms, lifting me so I had no choice but to wrap my arms and legs around him. He was huge and sturdy under me, and for once I didn’t worry about my weight or how undainty I was.
Josh had me.
He strode over to his truck as I clung to him, tucking my face into his neck. The smell of him was muskier here, that decadent smell of his more concentrated. It made me want to stick my tongue out and lick .
And I was allowed. At least right now, in this moment, I was.
So, I did.
Josh stumbled, cursing. I hid my smirk in his neck.
My back hit something hard as warm breath rasped against my ear. “You’re going to look so hot spread out across my truck.”
His hips pinned mine to the grill as he gave a shallow thrust forward. I couldn’t help the moan that escaped, the zing of his touch trailing up, up, up, until I could feel my nipples tighten inside my bra.
With each sucking kiss he planted up my throat, I bit my lip harder to contain the eager, pleading sounds that wanted to fall out. “I want to see what you’d look like sprawled out along the seat, too.”
God, what was he doing to me? I’d never felt like this before—like my skin was stretched too tight, and his touch was too much yet not enough.
The throb in my clit was becoming damn near painful each time he ground himself against the zipper of my shorts, and if he didn’t touch me in the next few seconds, I swear I was going to combust.