Chapter 28
“Colter.”
The way she breathily whispers my name nearly makes me come undone. Her skin is soft beneath my touch, velvet under calloused fingers that don’t deserve her. I trace the line of her jaw, down the curve of her throat, memorizing every tremor, every hitch of her breath.
Her eyes flutter closed, lips parted, and I swear I’d kill for the right to see her like this. Unguarded, waiting, trusting me with a kind of innocence I’ve long since burned out of myself.
I lean in, brushing my mouth over her teasingly. Punishing myself as much as her. She tilts forward, chasing me, but I pull back enough to keep her wanting. The small sound she makes lodges in my chest, and I feel it ripple through me like fire catching dry grass.
My hand skims lower, over her shoulder, down her arm, slow enough she can stop me if she wants. But she doesn’t. She arches into instead, bare thighs pressing against my hips where I stand between them, a silent plea that unravels the last thread of restraint I’ve been clinging to.
“You don’t even know,” I rasp, my forehead resting against hers, “what you’re doing to me.”
Her eyes open, hazy and luminous. “Then show me.”
Those three words break me.
I slide my hands to her waist, gripping tight, and tug her closer until the cool granite of the island is the only thing keeping her steady. Her breath hitches again when I press against her, every inch of me thrumming with the need to claim her, to prove she’s mine and no one else’s.
“Careful,” I murmur against her lips, my voice low, warning and promise all at once. “Once I start, I don’t stop.”
She smiles. Soft, defiant, intoxicating. “Good.”
“Lift your hips up, good girl.” As she obeys, my hand drifts to cup her slick cunt. I can feel the heat of her through the thin lace thong she is wearing. “So wet for me.” Pushing the material aside, I insert two fingers inside her, feeling her tighten around me. “Are you always this wet?”
“Just for you,” she moans, writhing against my touch, trying to take my fingers deeper. “Please. I want your fingers…”
“Prove it,” I smirk, removing my fingers from her delicious cunt.
“On your knees on the counter.” Her eyebrows dip in confusion for a moment before she shimmies her ass back on the island before sliding her dress up and off, shucking it behind her.
Slowly, she rearranges herself on her knees before me in nothing but her panties and heels.
“Such a good girl,” I praise her, loving the way she subtly preens at my affection. “Open your legs,” I tell her. She does as I ask but it isn’t far enough my liking. “More.” She spreads her thighs further until her sopping pussy nearly touches the countertop.
Placing my palm up on the granite beneath her, I nod at my fingers. “Go one now,” I instruct. “Straddle my fingers, baby.”
She hesitates for half a second, a flicker of uncertainty crossing her face, but then she bites her lip and lowers herself slowly, dragging that soaked lace over my fingers until the wet heat of her is pressed against me.
“Fuck,” I groan, the sound ripping out of me before I can stop it. Watching her like this, kneeling on my counter, straddling my hand, her breath shaky and uneven, it’s too much and not nearly enough.
Her lashes flutter as she moves, rocking forward, back, the slick slide of her arousal coating my skin. She braces a hand on the countertop, the other one on my shoulder, like she needs me to anchor her through the storm she’s about to drown in.
“Look at you,” I rasp, curling my fingers slightly so she drags herself over the ridges of my knuckles. “So desperate. So perfect. You’d do anything I asked right now, wouldn’t you?”
Her whimper is answer enough. She nods, hair falling into her face as she rides my hand, a mix of innocence and sin that makes my chest ache.
I grab a fistful of her hair and tug her head back so I can see her eyes. They’re dark, glazed with lust, but there’s fire there too. Always fire with her.
“Yes,” she whispers, broken and beautiful. “Anything.”
My cock throbs painfully against the front of my suit pants, every muscle in my body screaming to rip her panties off and bury myself inside her until she can’t scream anyone’s name but mine. But I don’t. Not yet.
Instead, I curl two fingers into her, slow and deep, until she gasps. My thumb finds her clit, circling, coaxing, pushing her closer to the edge with every slick stroke.
“That’s it, Peyton. Take it. Take what I give you.”
She’s trembling, thighs quaking as she fights to keep her balance on the counter. I know she’s close, the heat of her pulsing around my fingers, the desperate grind of her hips begging for more, harder, faster.
And when she’s right there, about to break, I stop.
Her cry is sharp, furious, needy. “Colter!”
I pull my fingers free, dripping with her arousal, and bring them to my mouth. My tongue slides over them, savoring the taste of her, letting her watch.
“Mine,” I growl, and then I crash my mouth to hers, devouring her with a hunger that’s been festering since the moment she walked into my life.
Her taste lingers on my tongue when I finally break the kiss, breathing hard against her mouth. I drag her forward until she is sitting on the edge of the island again. My hands grip her thighs, spreading them wide on the cold granite until her slick heat is open and waiting for me.
“You’re dripping for me,” I murmur, dragging my thumb through her wetness, smearing it over her swollen clit. “And you’re going to take every inch of me right here.”
“Colter—” her voice cracks on my name, torn between need and disbelief, but I don’t give her room to argue.
With practiced ease, I pop the button on my slacks and slide the zipper down before hooking my fingers into the thin strip of lace and rip her thong down the middle, the sound sharp in the stillness.
I don’t even bother peeling it off her fully, just push it aside to bare her glistening pussy.
“Goddamn,” I hiss, stroking my cock once, twice, before lining up at her entrance. The head pushes against her, and the way she gasps—eyes wide, lips trembling—burns straight through me.
“You ready, baby?” I ask, though my voice is low, dangerous, more command than question.
She nods quickly, desperate, nails digging into my shoulders. “Yes. Please.”
That’s all I need.
I slam into her, hard enough the counter shakes under us. She cries out, her body clenching around me like a vice, pulling me deeper until I’m buried to the hilt. My forehead drops to hers, sweat mixing with the heat pouring off her.
“Fuck, little star,” I growl, holding still for half a beat, savoring the way she feels, the way she owns me without even realizing it. Then I pull back and drive into her again, harder, rougher, setting a brutal pace that has her clawing at me, moaning against my neck.
Her ass bounces against the granite with every thrust, the obscene sound of our bodies colliding filling the kitchen. I grab her wrists, pinning them above her head with one hand while the other squeezes her throat, not cutting off her air but making sure she knows she’s mine.
“Say it,” I snarl against her lips, pounding into her so hard her heels scrape against the counter. “Say you’re mine.”
Her voice breaks on a moan, raw and pleading. “I’m yours, Colter. Yours.”
That admission nearly undoes me. I thrust harder, faster, until she’s writhing, until her back arches and she shatters around me, her pussy spasming in tight, wet pulses that drag me right to the edge.
I can’t hold it back and I don’t want to. With a guttural curse, I spill into her, grinding deep, marking her, owning her the only way I know how.
For a long moment, the only sound is our ragged breathing, the faint creak of the counter beneath us. I loosen my grip on her wrists, my hand smoothing down her arm before cupping her jaw again, softer this time.
She blinks up at me, flushed and trembling, lips swollen from my kiss. And fuck if I don’t feel it in my chest—this sharp, aching need to keep her like this, keep her mine.
“You’ll never doubt me again,” I rasp, brushing my mouth over hers. “Not about Melanie. Not about anyone. There’s only you, Peyton.”
Her chest heaves against mine, skin damp, trembling from the aftershocks still rolling through her. My cock twitches inside her, buried deep, refusing to let her go. I don’t pull out. I don’t move. I hold her there, stretched around me, filled with me, every inch of her claimed.
Her lips part like she wants to speak, but I silence it with another thrust—slow, deliberate, enough to make her whimper. My teeth scrape her jaw as I growl low in her ear, “Don’t ever question who you belong to again.”
The counter beneath her is a mess, her thighs slick, her dress somewhere on the floor. I don’t give a fuck. Let the whole world see her wrecked like this if it meant they knew the truth. She’s mine, ruined for anyone else.
I stay inside her, locked there, my hand still tight around her throat, thumb pressed under her jaw so she can’t look anywhere but at me. Her eyes, glazed and hazy, meet mine.
And I smirk, dark and satisfied, because I know she feels the raw, dangerous finality of this moment.
There’s no going back.