Chapter 13
JONAH
“Has your ceiling always been this color?” Ellie asks an hour later. We’re laying in my bed, her head against my chest. She feels so fucking good like this, dressed only in one of my t-shirts, her long smooth legs tangled up with mine.
“It definitely has.”
“Hmm. Has it always been so…fuzzy?”
I chuckle. “I think that’s the alcohol talking.”
She sighs. “Tomorrow is going to suck, isn’t it?”
“It might not be so bad. We got plenty of water and some Advil in you, which helps. I’ll make you a bacon sandwich in the morning—perfect hangover cure.”
“I’ll have to get up early with Lucas. I swear that kid has a sixth-sense for the nights I stay up too late.”
“I’ve got Lucas in the morning,” I tell her. “You sleep as long as you can.”
She’s still for a long moment. “Why?” she finally whispers.
“Why what? Why sleep in? It will help with the—”
“No. Why take care of Lucas? Why take care of me?” Her voice is soft and a little rough, maybe from the alcohol or singing at the club.
Or maybe just from emotion. “You’ve flipped your whole life upside down for us and I don’t really understand why.
I’m sure there are women in this town who are far less complicated. ”
“None of this feels all that complicated to me, Ellie.” I smooth her hair back, breathing in her lemony smell. “I want to be with you. I want to be with Lucas. It’s pretty simple.”
“But—”
“No, baby. I mean it. This, with the two of you, it feels like the most natural thing in the world. Like I’m supposed to take care of you. And that’s just what I’m going to do.”
She sounds much more sober when she says, “I don’t want you to think of us as an obligation.”
I consider that. “It is an obligation, sweetheart, but that’s not a bad thing. It’s like the bar—I love the hell out of that place. You know why? Because my brothers and I worked for it. That building is our own blood and sweat. Making it a success feels amazing. Because it matters to us.”
“Are you comparing me to a bar?”
I chuckle, rearranging her a little so more of her body rests against my chest. “I’m saying, the important things in life take some work.
And when we love those important things?
Well that kind of work is called having a purpose, darlin’.
And I’m starting to realize I’m the kind of man who needs a purpose. ”
She’s quiet for so long I assume she must have fallen asleep. But then I hear her whisper in the darkness. “I think I might love you, Jonah Barlowe.”
Something thick and gentle spreads through me, hot like whiskey and sweet like honey. That’s Ellie, I think, Taking up root in my chest, right on down to my very bones. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.
“I know that I love you, Ellie.”
It’s still dark when I wake up. I lie there for a moment, trying to get my bearings.
There’s no noise coming from the hall, no Lucas coming in to say he had a bad dream.
But the space in the bed next to me is empty.
Still warm, though, so she couldn’t have gone far.
A moment later, my door eases open, a small, dark figure creeping in.
“You don’t have to tiptoe,” I tell her. “I’m awake.”
“Why are you awake?” she whispers. “You’re not the one with a bladder filled with long island iced tea.”
I chuckle, pulling the blanket down for her to climb in next to me. “You feeling okay?”
“I drank more water and I had a granola bar. I don’t feel nauseous, but my head hurts.”
“You should have woken me up,” I murmur. “I would have gone down to get you a snack.”
She wraps an arm around my middle. “You did more than enough for me tonight.”
I scoff. “Bullshit.”
She’s quiet for a moment, her breathing even but not deep enough to be asleep. “Jonah?” she asks after a minute. “I’m not drunk anymore.”
“That’s good. Though you were pretty damn cute like that.”
She slides her leg between mine, running her thigh up over my knee. The contact has my belly tightening. She feels so fucking good. “I’m telling you I’m not drunk anymore. Completely cold stone sober.”
“Okay?” She’s clearly trying to insinuate something but I’m still half-asleep and I’m not getting it.
“At the bar you told me I could get laid when I was sober.”
I choke on a laugh. “I did say that, didn’t I?” I wonder what else she remembers from the bar—or from those moments in the dark when we both used the word love.
A stab of fear goes through me—I think I might die if she says she didn’t mean it, that it was just the alcohol talking. It’s such an intense fear that I can’t even bring myself to mention it. Instead I roll us both over so I’m on top of her. “You want to get laid?”
“I want you.”
That little bit of fear still hums at the back of my mind, making my movements more desperate than usual. I yank the t-shirt up to her armpits, displaying her perfect pale tits for me. “Put your hands over your head,” I demand, voice like pure gravel. “Hold onto the headboard.”
I watch her face while she complies, making sure she doesn’t look scared or unsure by the command in my voice.
All I see reflected back at me is desire, dark and needy, just the way I feel.
I’m learning that Ellie likes this kind of thing—me in charge.
I might have worried that she would need more gentleness after the shit she went through with her ex, but every time we’re together like this, she seems more than eager to hand over control.
And I am happy to take it.
“Don’t let go,” I demand, rising up to my knees. I pull my boxers off and toss them to the floor, then straddle her chest. Her eyes widen a little, a tiny flicker of nerves flashing in her gaze. But it’s overwhelmed by pure excitement as I grip my rock-hard dick and bring it to her lips.
“I want your lips wrapped around my cock,” I tell her. “You think you can do that for me, darlin’?”
She nods so eagerly that I have to chuckle. “Good girl. Show me.”
She opens her mouth and I could come just from the sight of her pretty pink little tongue sticking out.
“I’ve wanted this all night,” I groan, looking down at her. Her blond hair is messy on my pillow, her hands gripping the slats of my headboard. She looks like a sweet little sacrifice waiting to be devoured by me. My cock twitches and her open lips tilt up into a smirk when she notices.
I know just the thing to wipe that smirk off her face.
I press myself forward into her open mouth, relishing the way her lips have to stretch around me.
She looks so small, so delicate, under me like this, struggling to take my dick in her mouth, my body big as I hover over her.
That image turns my blood to fire and I have to fight not to bury myself deep in her throat.
That will come later.
“I want you to relax,” I tell her, cradling her face in my hands.
God, this is the hottest thing I’ve ever seen, this gorgeous girl’s sweet pink lips stretched around me.
I run my thumbs over her cheeks, groaning at the feel of them suctioning around my flesh.
“I’m going to take just what I want from you, pretty girl, okay? You just have to relax and let me.”
She nods eagerly and that’s all the permission I need. Shifting my hands from her cheeks to the back of her scalp, I lift her head gently, getting the angle just right, before I thrust all the way to the back of her mouth.
Her slight gag awakens a dark desire in my gut, making me want more, but I force myself to wait, to watch her face, to make sure she’s okay with this.
She meets my eyes and nods. Emotion floods my chest even as lust forces my hips forward again.
She’s fucking perfect for me, in ways I didn’t even know I needed.
I’ve always liked the rougher edges of sex, preferred to take charge in bed, but I never needed it like this.
Never realized how fucking amazing it would feel to watch someone I loved give herself over to me so completely.
I tilt her head a little more and thrust harder, deeper. “Fuck.”
I don’t speak much after that, the only noises in the room the wet sound of her mouth around me, the little gags when I hit it deep, and the grunts and groans spilling from my lips that I couldn’t contain with a gun to my head.
She feels so fucking amazing and I’m ready to come in an embarrassingly short amount of time.
But how I can hold out with this gorgeous girl so perfectly submissive beneath me? So desperate to please me, to take everything I have to give her.
“I’m going to come,” I gasp. “Can you take it for me? Can you swallow it all?”
I pull back just long enough to hear her answer, and God, the mindless need in her voice has my balls tightening. “I want everything you have to give me.”
I push back into the wet suctioning heat of her mouth and start to pound.
She manages to relax her throat, allowing me to go deeper, her eyes watering as my hands tighten in her hair.
It only takes a few rough, deep strokes for me to explode, technicolor flashes filling my vision as I grunt out my release into the dark room.
A moment later I find myself slumped over my girl, arms wrapped around her, face buried in her shoulder. She’s rubbing my back and murmuring gentle words in my ear, like I’m the one who needs comfort after that.
“That wasn’t too much?” I gasp against her neck when I finally have the brain power to form words.
“No.” Her voice is fiercer than I would expect, though a touch of rasp reminds me that I was awfully rough on her throat just now. The thought both shames me and makes my cock twitch.
Ellie doesn’t seem interested in letting me feel that shame, though.
“It wasn’t too much at all,” she continues. “It was just what I needed.”
I pull my head from her neck so I can see her face. She’s staring at me with a determined, fiery expression. “I love the way you are with me,” she says. “I love that you don’t treat me like I’m broken.”
“You’re the farthest fucking thing from broken I’ve ever seen in my life.”