Chapter 23 #2
It baffles me that anyone could resist her, could deny her. But then I remember where we are. What her life is like. And I wonder if it all comes down to circumstance.
Because it absolutely cannot be her.
I lower my mouth to her ear. “When’s the last time you were tasted?”
She bites her lip, drawing it between her teeth in a way that makes my control snap like a rubber band stretched too thin. I pull my hand from her, and she winces—barely a twitch in the mirror, but I feel it too.
“Tell me I can taste you, Maggie.”
“Yes, Holden, please. I want your mouth on me.”
I drop to my knees, ready. Aching. But I don’t want to rush it.
Because if this is my only taste, I want every second burned into memory.
So I take my sweet-ass time undressing her, easing off her underwear, working them over her hips, down her body, before tossing them aside.
Then I turn her to face me, my eyes locked on hers as I hook a long, lithe leg over my shoulder.
She’s fucking beautiful. Perfect. Glistening. Her scent, heady and intoxicating, goes straight to my head.
“Goddamn, Maggie.”
I lean in, my lips grazing her bare skin. I don’t just want to taste her. I want to devour her.
“Holden, please,” she whispers, fingers diving into my hair, winding tight, unknowingly guiding me. Putting me where she wants me. Where she needs me.
I spread her open, exposing her to my mouth, and drag my tongue through her, slow and deep. Another moan escapes her—louder this time, guttural—shooting straight to my cock. She arches back, her golden hair falling around her shoulders as her robe slides down her arms and pools on the dresser.
And like a man starved, I dive in, devouring her, mouth and fingers working in tandem. Worshiping her body until she tightens, trembles, and shatters on my tongue.
Everything stops, then starts again: Maggie’s shallow breaths. Brandi’s low crooning. The warm glimmer of candlelight. Vanilla. Magnolias. Her.
“Holden?” Maggie says, her leg slipping from my shoulder, her hands sliding from my hair to circle my neck.
“Yeah?”
“I think you may have broken me.”
A laugh tears from my chest. My dick feels like it’s about to explode. I may have broken us both.
“That was…um…yeah,” she says.
My lips twitch against her stomach. “It…yeah.”
“Can you stand?”
“Debatable,” I say, but somehow I manage.
My breath catches at the sight of her, sated and slightly undone.
Her robe is back in place, but the tie hangs loose, baring her body to me.
Her cheeks are flushed, glowing. Her hair’s tousled, a few strands clinging to her skin.
I brush them back, and my hands linger to hold her face—her sparsely freckled, God-given, unaltered face. Undoubtedly my favorite feature.
Second only to her eyes. The bluest eyes in Texas, I think, with a kind of reverence.
And when they drop to my mouth, it’s all the invitation I need.
My fingers splay against her jaw, my thumb dragging over her bottom lip. She lets out the tiniest sigh, and just like that, it’s quiet on the set. We’re rolling.
I pull her to me, fusing our bodies together, and finally give her the kiss that’s undeniably hers. The one I gave her at Blue Hole. The one I imagined giving her this morning.
I drink in her breath, swallow her soft, needy sounds, taste the ache on her lips.
She clings to me like she never wants this to end, and if it were up to me, it wouldn’t.
“Tell me if you want me to stop,” I whisper, angling her neck to my mouth, pressing my lips to her delicate throat.
She shudders, her pulse pounding wildly under my touch. I go slow, savoring the way she responds to me before slipping my hand between our bodies, finding her once more.
Her head falls back, and she writhes against my fingers.
“Jesus, Maggie,” I say, my breath hitching because she’s still so goddamn wet for me. “When’s the last time you were fuc—”
She stills, completely stops moving, and I know I’ve taken my little game of questions too far.
I pull my hand away, put some distance between us, and brace myself for…I don’t know what. Irritation? Disappointment at my crass mouth?
But when her head lifts and she blinks up at me, what I get is so much worse. Uncertainty, maybe even apprehension. Is she…afraid?
“Maggie, shit. I’m sorry. I never should have…”
Been so careless with a girl like you.
She quickly shakes her head. “No, Holden. It’s not you. I-I haven’t… I’ve never…” Her voice trembles, and I close my eyes.
I don’t need to ask because I already know. “You’re a virgin.”
It’s not a question but a realization, one that my brain is desperately trying to process. This breathtaking, brilliant, stubborn-as-hell woman—this woman who completely undoes me—has never had a man inside her.
I take a step back, and regret slams into me at the hurt flashing across her face.
She closes her robe, her arms crossing tight, and looks away.
“Maggie…”
“It’s fine. I get it.”
I’m at a loss here. I want her. Fucking hell, I want her. But I don’t know if she wants me.
“No, Maggie, you don’t.”
Her gaze cuts to mine. “Explain it to me then. Five seconds ago you were all over me. Now you’re acting like I have a disease.” She sags against the dresser like I’ve knocked the air out of her. “It’s not a big deal, Holden. Just because I’m a virgin doesn’t mean I don’t want this.”
This. Not me.
I scrub a hand over my mouth.
“Is it too much responsibility for you? Am I too innocent? Too naive?” She lets out a humorless laugh. “Or do you think I’ll fall in love with you and want to follow you back to LA? That’s it, isn’t it?”
“No, Maggie.”
You couldn’t be more wrong.
The truth barrels into me. Undeniable. Unshakable.
It is a big deal.
I want her to fall in love with me.
And I want her to follow me back to LA, because goddammit, I’m in love with her.
I am in love with her.
Apart from the raspy vocals still streaming through Maggie’s Echo, the room goes deadly quiet. I pace to her desk, grip the back of her chair like I need it to hold me up. “Why me?”
“Why—what? Why you?” Her tone is brisk, and I can tell that was absolutely the wrong thing to ask.
I turn back to her, stuffing my hands in my pockets. “I just—I need to know what this is. Do you want me, Magnolia, or am I just…convenient?” The word lands wrong the second it leaves my mouth.
“You really just asked me that.”
“We don’t have to do this,” I say, pleading. “I’ll take you to bed and pleasure every single inch of you until call time if that’s what you want.”
If that’s what you want? What even the fuck?
“But you won’t sleep with me.”
I’m slow to respond, and something in her face shutters.
“I don’t want you to regret me,” I finally say.
The music kicks up, the tempo shifting. Someone new.
I go to where Maggie’s standing at the dresser, her arms still tightly crossed.
“I thought you cared about me,” she says. “I thought maybe…I meant something to you.”
“God, Maggie, you do mean something to me,” I say, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear. “I have feelings for you—strong feelings—that I’m not convinced you share.” I cup her jaw, my thumb softly stroking her cheek. “I don’t want you to look back on this one day and think you made a mistake.”
Think I was a mistake.
My heart thunders at my admission. Did I say too much? Her lips part, but she doesn’t say anything at all.
I lower my arm. “I crossed a line. I’m sorry.”
She pulls in a long breath, like she’s steadying herself, then picks up my hand and holds it against her chest. “You really don’t think I have feelings for you?
I lost my ever-loving mind over a song. I completely freaked out seeing you kiss another woman.
For a movie.” The smallest hint of a smile touches her lips.
“And convenient? Are you kidding me with that? Toothless Wally down at the filling station is convenient. You are not.”
I huff out a laugh. Roger that.
“I want this, Holden. With you,” she says, each word short and sharp. “And I know we have an expiration date, but I need you to quit looking at this like it’s some kind of souvenir or parting gift. It’s just sex. Between two people with feelings.”
Strong feelings.
She pushes up on her toes, and I think she’s going to kiss me, but it’s a hug I get instead, one I didn’t realize just how much I needed.
I hold her every day when we dance, but this is different.
It’s personal, intimate in a way that quiets everything else.
The noise in my head shuts off, and it’s just her: steady, solid, real.
Her cheek rests against the curve of my shoulder.
My arms tighten around her waist, and even with her height, I lift her off the ground.
This may be all we have, but God, I fucking hope not.