5. Chapter 5
The slider opens and Sam steps back onto the balcony. Immediately, he pauses to study me lounging in the now single patio chair.
I shrug. “The wind again. It blew your chair all the way over there, and I didn’t want to get up to get it.” I point across the ten-foot space.
Sam laughs. “These gusts have been crazy, but where am I supposed to sit now?”
With a sheepish grin, I pat the seat of my chair. I watch Sam take a breath before he moves toward me. As he stares down, an intensity in his eyes, I stare back with a growing ache between my thighs.
“Can you get up?”
“What?” I ask, slightly offended that he doesn’t want me in the chair.
He extends his hand to me. “If you get up, it’ll be easier to situate ourselves. I’m too big, I’ll crush you.”
“Oh.” I take his hand, allowing him to help me up so he can get comfortable.
When he does, he holds his arms open to invite me into him. I gladly accept. As soon as I’m at his side, Sam cocoons me in his strong embrace, and I snuggle up. We fit so naturally, so perfectly. I rest my head on his chest and listen to his heart beating wildly behind his ribs. Almost as wildly as my own.
“This is perfect,” he whispers.
All I can do is nod. I’m so taken aback by how much I agree with him that I don’t even know what to think.
“Brynn?”
“Hm?”
Sam’s knuckle finds its way under my chin, and he tilts my head up. As he stares at me, I see so many things swirling in his irises, longing, desire, adoration, admiration. It’s the way I’ve always wanted to be looked at.
“I want to kiss you so badly.” Sam’s voice sounds strained, like he’s holding himself back. “May I?”
“Yes,” I breathe.
He presses his lips to mine in the gentlest of kisses. It’s soft, affectionate, not at all hungry like I expected. No, this is all tenderness and it’s everything I want it to be. Brushing together, our lips caress one another.
All too soon, Sam pulls away, taking the air from my lungs with him.
“That was…amazing,” he says as he presses his forehead to mine and closes his eyes.
“Sam?” I wait for his eyelids to open before I say, “Do it again.”
His mouth ticks up on one side as he leans in to put our lips together once more. This time, though, he cradles the back of my head, tilting it so he can deepen the kiss. I don’t mind. In fact, when his tongue slides along my mouth, I part my lips.
The longer we make out, the more I want. Not just in the kiss, but of him. I twist my fingers into his shirt and shift so our bodies make as much contact as possible. His free arm wraps around my waist, his fingers digging into me, and I moan. He devours the sound.
Our legs entwine, his thigh sliding between mine, and before I know it, I’m grinding against him like some horny teenager. The rational, overthinking part of my brain is mortified. I don’t do stuff like this.
But, boy does it feel good.
So good, I’m ignoring all the alarms going off in my head and replacing them with Sam’s grunts and groans. The more I move, the louder he gets, and it’s so damn hot. I never knew I could make a guy feel something without being naked. It’s empowering on a level I’ve never known. I like it.
I grind faster, harder. My hands are roaming, touching him every place they can reach. The best spots though, are where my fingertips brush his bare skin. Every single time I do, I’m set on fire. It only makes the space between my thighs wetter.
When he whispers my name against my mouth, I shatter. My body shudders as that delicious crest swallows me, but I don’t stop kissing him. He doesn’t seem to mind, either.
Once I’m finished, once my body has stopped convulsing, I let out a shaky breath and lock my eyes on his. The amusement dancing in his gaze immediately has my cheeks burning hot. I bury my face in my hand. “Oh my God, I’m so sorry.”
“What? No, don’t be sorry.” Sam gently wraps his fingers around my wrist and pulls my hand away from my face. “Brynn…will you look at me?”
With a grimace, I tilt my head up to find the most adoring smile on his face. Not an ounce of judgment. Just plain, simple acceptance, and it melts away my tension.
“That was…incredible.” He licks his lips, flicking his gaze to my mouth. “Do you maybe want to go inside?”
My eyebrows shoot to the sky in question.
“I’m not expecting anything, but I think we’d be better off indoors so we don’t keep giving the gas station a show.”
I let out a light chuckle and nod.
Sam holds on to me as he gets out of the chair, setting my shaky feet on the ground and taking my hand. He leads me through the slider and toward the bed. When he turns to sit, I don’t follow. Instead, I stand there, staring at the bed like it’s a ticking time-bomb.
He sighs. “Did you start thinking?”
“I told you, it’s what I do.” I shrug before I fold my arms across my middle in a self-hug.
“Can’t you, you know, not think?”
I bark out a laugh. “You don’t know me at all, Mudboy.”
“I’m serious. Why can’t you live in the moment?”
I lift my chin, looking to the ceiling. “Because I’m afraid of where the moment will lead me.” Dropping my gaze to the bed momentarily, I give him a knowing look.
Sam raises his hands as if surrendering. “Brynn, I’m not expecting anything from you.” He sighs, lowering his arms to his sides. “Do you want to hear a story?”
I nod. He pats the spot next to him, so I reluctantly sit down.
“Once upon a time, there was this guy named Samuel Eastman...”
I laugh, and he bumps me with his shoulder.
“Sam grew up in Wyoming, never really traveled much. So, when his long-term girlfriend had the chance to move to New York City, well, he was excited for her.”
A familiar pit forms in my gut. Even in Sam’s deliciously deep voice, that city still sounds like nails on a chalkboard. I’ve never visited, but Connor abandoning me to move there ruined it. I wonder if it’s ruined for Sam too? “You were excited? Not sad she was leaving?”
“I mean, sure I was sad. She and I had been together for a couple of years, but I couldn’t stop her from going.” He folds his hands between his knees. “Besides, we decided to try long-distance.”
I bristle. Connor wouldn’t even humor the idea of a long-distance relationship. He outright dismissed it and me.
Sam gives me a sideways glance, but continues his story. “It worked for a few months. We talked every night before bed, did video calls, and even made plans for me to come visit.”
“Did you ever make it out there?”
Sam hangs his head. “No.”
“So, what happened?”
With a deep breath, he raises to sit up straight. “Over time, our calls became less frequent. She wouldn’t text me back for a day or two. I honestly saw a breakup coming, but then she told me she was coming back to Wyoming for Christmas.” A sad smile tips his lips up. “She sounded really excited, and I thought everything was going to be okay.”
I grimace, but don’t say anything. I see where this is going; another person lost to New York City.
“When she came back, it was like nothing had changed. We fell into each other seamlessly. Spent the whole week of Christmas into New Year’s together. I convinced myself that we just went through a rough patch. Long-distance is hard, so I’d just have to try harder to make it work.” He sighs. “But she had other ideas.”
“Oh, no,” I whisper.
“Yeah.” He sucks in a breath, letting it out slowly. “Apparently, she had been planning to break up with me for a while, but didn’t want to do it over the phone. I appreciated that, but I didn’t appreciate her sleeping with another guy in the meantime.”
I feel like I just got punched in the stomach, and it’s not even my story. Poor Sam.
“Needless to say, she got what she wanted. Our relationship ended.”
“I’m so sorry, Sam. That’s awful.” I lay my hand on his, and he turns his head to face me.
“That was last January.”
“What?”
“We broke up in January. And I’m not telling you this for your sympathy. I’m telling you because what you said about your heart not being intact after your last relationship? Well, I know all about that.”
The sincerity in his tone grounds me. It ties me to him in a way I’ve not known with anyone else, not even Lisa. He knows the heartache of being betrayed by someone you love. The hurt that only your heart feels.