Chapter 17 #2
Why was my mouth so dry all of a sudden?
It shouldn’t be that hard of a question to answer.
I had long ago told myself to stop being ridiculous about my partner and to stop thinking that way.
Yet that felt wrong to say. I hadn’t been thrilled when he had talked about his girlfriends over the years, but I told myself that was only because I didn’t want him getting distracted.
I’d repeated it so many times that I’d even started to believe it.
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “I couldn’t think that way, so I made myself stop.”
There was a loud slam as somebody closed the front door too hard, but it hardly registered. “I don’t think that’s how it works. You can’t just make yourself not think somebody is good-looking.”
“I had to try.” The words slipped out without my permission. I had never planned on having this conversation with him and didn’t know how to get out of it. “I was grateful just to be your skating partner, even if there was nothing else there.”
He pushed some stray strands of hair behind my ear. My breath caught in my throat as I waited for his hand to move away, but it stayed inches away from my cheek. “You assumed I would never be interested?”
“In the middle of my awkward phase? Of course I thought that!” God, why was it so hard to form coherent sentences right now? I hadn't drunk enough for my brain to have such a hard time focusing. “You were tall and handsome and always had a girlfriend, and I was definitely not in your league.”
“There have been a lot more years since then,” Dom said. “Years when you were definitely more… pulled together than when you were twelve. What about then?”
I chose my words carefully. “You sound like one of the interviewers we’ve laughed at over the years, asking that question.
Or worse, one of our exes who was weirded out by our partnership.
” Brandon was the most recent and the most volatile of them, but he was not alone in that category.
Dom had dated a couple of jealous girls over the years.
One of them had actually told me to keep my hands off her man.
I wasn’t sure if I’d handled the situation better or worse than Dom had, since my response had been to laugh and say that I had to keep my hands on him and she could just deal.
To be fair, we had been in high school at the time, so a little immaturity should be expected.
Not that I didn’t think it had been an appropriate reply. I might still give the response today.
“You avoiding answering makes me think it wasn’t just at the beginning,” Dom said, his voice low.
“You constantly asking makes me think maybe I wasn’t the only one who thought there might be something there,” I retorted.
I’d hardly let myself think that over the years, taking his comments to others that we were just friends to heart.
But with the way he was looking at me, transfixed, while pressing the issue made me think otherwise.
Dom slid over on the couch, closing the gap between us.
“And let’s say, hypothetically, that I had feelings of my own at some point,” he whispered.
He trailed his fingertips across my arm gently, making goosebumps form in his wake.
“If maybe I had thought about what it would be like to do all those things that I’d adamantly told Brandon we’d never done? Then what?”
I had been this close to him literally thousands of times before.
Even in the last few months, I’d spent so much time staring into his eyes.
How had I never noticed just how thick his eyelashes were before?
I thought I’d noticed every freckle over the years, but there was one near his lip I didn’t remember.
Was it always there? Had I just not noticed it because I tried to avoid staring at his lips to prevent this feeling that was forming in my chest?
“Hazel?” he asked, breaking the silence.
It was hard to get the words out. “Hypothetically, when would this have been?”
He moved his head ever so slightly closer to mine. “Years. Almost since the beginning.” After a beat, he said, “Tell me honestly. Did you ever wonder…”
He didn't even need to finish the question. “Of course,” I said without hesitation. “I just assumed I was the only one.”
Before I had time to react, his hand was against my head again. But this time, he was pulling me closer to him, with his fingers tangled in my hair. The next thing I knew, his lips were on mine, moving hungrily as he held me against him.
After a split second of shock, I leaned into him.
I thought he wouldn’t be able to surprise me after all these years, but he did.
I’d thought about kissing him so many times in my youth, but that didn’t prepare me for it actually happening.
There was no awkwardness or hesitation like I’d feared there might be.
Instead, there was the sense that we had been waiting for this to happen forever.
I wrapped my arms around his neck as I had done so many times before, but this time, the touch of his skin against mine gave me a rush.
When he pulled away, I tried to move with him, not ready for it to end.
I didn’t have to be sad for long, because as soon as he stood up, he reached out for my hand wordlessly.
As soon as I took it, he pulled me towards the stairs.
Not stopping to see if anyone was around, he dragged me across the basement to the door to his room.
He pushed open the door open with too much force, causing it to slam into the wall.
I worried for a second that somebody would come to see what the cause of the noise was, but that thought vanished as quickly as it had come as Dom locked the door behind us.
Then his lips were on mine again and I couldn't think at all.
His arms wrapped around me and pulled me up with ease, so we were the same height.
He pushed my back against the wall as I wrapped my legs around his waist for stability.
I entwined my fingers in his hair. I wasn’t going to let him pull away this time.
I couldn’t. Now that we had started, I needed it to continue.
How had I made it through so many years without kissing him?
One of his hands made its way under the hem of my shirt.
His fingers ran along the skin of my lower back, sending my heart into overdrive.
“Down,” was all I managed to say. Somehow, it was enough, and he slowly lowered me.
While the reasoning was different and I’d never had my legs around him in that particular way before, the motion was practiced.
The fact that I didn’t stumble meant that my feet were barely on the floor when I was able to pull my shirt over my head in one quick motion.
Dom’s dark eyes moved over my body for a moment before he pulled his own shirt off.
Bare chested, he closed the gap between us once more.
The touch of his skin against mine was almost too much to handle, even before his hands started roaming.
I breathed in sharply as one of his hands squeezed my breast. I could feel his lips smile against mine before he started slowly kissing his way down my neck.
When he reached my bra strap, he stood up again and kissed my lips. “I don’t want to do anything you’ll regret.”
“The only thing I regret is not doing this sooner,” I said.
It all felt so natural and so comfortable.
I knew his body so well and he knew mine, but seeing him in all of his shirtless glory was rare.
Every other time I'd seen him shirtless, it had been in the context of work.
Now, there was nothing stopping me from staring at his muscles.
The flat stomach, rippled only by abs and his pectoral muscles, was like something out of a magazine.
His arms and shoulders had held me before thousands of times, but I didn't get to see the muscles flexing then. Getting to take them in like this was new and incredible. I had been expecting this to feel weird just because it was so different. The fact that it wasn’t was a pleasant surprise.
He didn't need to be told twice. His arm snaked around my back and he unhooked my bra in one fluid motion.
He pulled the straps down my arms and let the bra drop to the floor.
I had no time to be self-conscious about my small breasts before he cupped one with his hand.
My nipple hardened under his touch, responding instantly.
Encouraged by my sharp inhale, he leaned down and took my other nipple in his mouth.
When he stood up again, he placed a trail of kisses from my collar bone, up my neck, to below my ear. "You are so gorgeous," he murmured before kissing me again.
As our tongues swirled around each other, I reached for the waistband of his jeans.
I slid my fingers over the top and undid the button.
"So are you," I said. Pressed against him, chest to chest, he felt like a wall of muscle.
His thick erection pressed against his boxer-briefs as I tried to shimmy his jeans down his legs.
I tried to be careful, but he had no patience for that.
Without separating our lips, he took a step back so he could tear off his jeans on his own.
Once he was free, he started working on my pants. "Let's get you out of these," he said.
I took a couple of steps back so I could look him over as I stepped out of my jeans.
His legs were just as strong as the rest of him.
I had always appreciated his body. But now, looking him over, I gained a new sense of appreciation for it.
He was unlike anyone else. And, judging from the way the black fabric of his underwear was struggling to contain him as his eyes roamed my body, he liked what he saw, too.