Chapter 23
Chapter Twenty-Three
Jason
The Taste-First, Ask-Questions-Later Maneuver
That’s the moment.
The precise instant she tilts her chin, not in defiance or invitation—no, it’s something worse. She trusts me. Trusts that I’ll behave. That I’ll deliver exactly what she wants, how she wants it, and I won’t hold back.
I won’t. I fucking can’t.
I’m totally done. I have to give it all. Her lips part like she’s about to whisper my name. Her eyes glint like she knows what I’m about to do and is already cataloging all the ways she’s going to pretend to be surprised about it later.
My restraint? Picture a Post-it note clinging to the fridge door during a tornado. That’s where we’re at.
I lunge.
No finesse, no slow burn tease—just years of pent-up need crashing into her like I’ve lost the ability to think.
My hands find her face, jaw cradled between my palms like she’s precious.
Breakable. I know she’s not, but it feels right—holding her like I’ve been dreaming of this exact grip for way too long.
Like, I’m afraid she’ll leave because I know she can just walk away right now. But she doesn’t.
Her gasp is soft, involuntary, and, fuck, that sound.
My lips brush hers like an apology I don’t mean, a warning I have no intention of following. Her breath catches—right before I take her mouth for real.
This isn’t some polite first-date peck.
This is lips crashing, tongues tangling, my body pressed flush to hers as if we’ve got to make up for every damn second we didn’t do this before. My thumbs sweep along her jaw. Her fingers fist in my shirt, dragging me closer like I wasn’t already trying to crawl inside her skin.
She tastes like tangy sauce and recklessness—like poor decisions I want to make over and over again.
I kiss her like I’m starving, and she’s the last damn bite.
Her back hits the wall with a soft thud—because, yeah, apparently, I’m a caveman now. I brace one arm next to her head, the other sliding down to grip her hip, anchoring her to me as our mouths move together like we’ve done this a hundred times in dreams we were too afraid to talk about.
She moans. Low. Deep.
It punches through my gut like a low blow in the best way.
Her legs brush mine, and suddenly, I’m acutely aware of every inch of her—every soft curve and sharp inhale. And when her teeth catch my bottom lip, playful and daring?
I growl.
Actually growl.
Fuck.
I stop. Just for a breath. Just long enough to debate if I should throw her over my shoulder and carry her to my bed like a man with no self-control and zero shame.
Instead, I lift her—hands gripping her thighs as I hoist her up and set her on the counter.
She gasps, her back arching instinctively, legs parting as I step closer.
Then she opens her eyes—wide, dazed, pupils blown. Her lips are kiss-swollen, her cheeks flushed. I don’t want to move. Not when she looks like that.
I want her right here.
Backlit by the glow of the stove, legs trembling, hair tousled.
We stare at each other like we just finished a race, even though we’ve barely started.
I press a hand to her chest, right over her heart. It’s pounding beneath my palm. Rapid and uneven. Matching mine.
“Don’t move,” I rasp, voice low, ragged from want. “Not yet.”
She blinks once, breath shuddering as I step between her legs and palm her thighs, still bare from earlier. Her skin is warm, damp from arousal and the heat of my mouth. I slide my hands upward slowly, from knee to mid-thigh, my thumbs tracing the crease where her leg meets her hip.
That’s when I see them.
Silky black panties.
Barely there. Just a whisper of fabric stretched over her, soft and clinging, like they were designed to frustrate me.
“Fuck, Scottie.” My voice cracks over her name.
Her lashes flutter, lips parting. “What?”
“These.” I run my knuckles up the inside of her thigh, brushing the edge of the lace. “You wore these knowing I’d be the one to take them off.”
She doesn’t answer.
She doesn’t need to.
But I do. I need every sound, every sigh, every breathy curse she’s ever saved just for me. I need to prove to her this isn’t just about sex—even if I have to fuck her senseless to say it.
Her hips shift, needy and unconscious, like her body’s already chasing the high she hasn’t had yet.
I grip the sides of her panties, my fingers hooking under the thin waistband, and slowly drag them down.
Not rushed. Not frantic. Just pure, deliberate torture.
I keep eye contact as I kneel in front of her again, watching the fabric slide over her thighs, past her knees, catching slightly at her calves before I ease them off her ankles.
I don’t drop them.
I bunch the silk in one fist, lift it to my nose, and inhale.
She gasps.
I grin.
Then I kiss her ankle.
Not her thigh. Not the center of her heat.
Her ankle.
One soft, reverent press of my lips there, then the other, and her entire body tightens like she doesn’t know what to do with gentleness from a man who just promised to wreck her.
“Your legs,” I murmur, tracing her shin with my fingertips. “Fuck, these legs. They’ve been wrapped around my head in my dreams for days.”
She bites her lip.
I don’t stop.
I drag my hands up slowly, worshiping every inch like she’s a map I intend to memorize. When I reach her knees, I spread them wider, eyes locked on the slick, glistening pink of her pussy—but I don’t touch it. Not yet.
Instead, I press kisses up her thighs. Left, then right. Just the edges. Just enough to make her squirm.
Then I lick.
One teasing swipe over her inner thigh. Not where she needs me. Just enough to make her cry out.
Her hands grip the counter—her back arches.
“Jason,” she breathes. “Fuck me.”
I smile against her skin. “Not yet.”
I glance up, chin resting just above her pelvis like I’ve got all fucking day.
Because I do. Because this—this right here? This is a religious experience, and I’m the most devout sinner she’ll ever know.
She’s trembling. Eyes glassy, thighs twitching, hips tilting like she’s trying to nudge me where she needs me most.
I don’t budge.
Instead, I blow.
Just the faintest breath—nothing more than a ghost of heat across slick, swollen skin. Her body jolts like I’ve zapped her. Her fists tighten against the counter’s edge, and a curse slips past her lips.
“Oh, fuck, Tate.”
I grin, slow and cocky. “You rang?”
She groans. Full-body, head-thrown-back groan, the kind that makes a guy want to drop a ring on her finger just to hear that sound on the regular. Her legs try to close, but I hook my arms beneath her knees and anchor her wide.
“Where do you think you’re going, baby?”
A second breath. Longer this time. Her core pulses beneath the heat of it, and, fuck. I’m hard as granite, just watching her squirm.
“You’re evil,” she hisses, but her voice cracks halfway through, breathless and broken in the most beautiful way.
“And you’re soaking my countertop,” I mutter, like a prayer, dragging one finger up her folds—light, teasing, like the idea of contact rather than the real thing. She chokes on a sound, all hips and hunger. My finger circles her clit, barely grazing.
“Don’t be a tease.”
“I am a tease,” I say and press the tip of one finger right against her entrance. “But I’m also very, very good at making you come hard—if you don’t move.”
Then I push in.
Slow.
All the way.
Her gasp rips through the room. Her spine arches, heels digging into my back like I just lit her up from the inside. And then—oh, fuck me—she clenches around my finger like she’s trying to pull me deeper with sheer will.
“Jason, you’re—” she pants, voice cracking as her nails scrape down the edge of the counter. “You can’t just?—”
I curl my finger just right.
She shatters.
Not all the way. Not yet. But her body’s trembling like she’s about to fall apart from the promise of it.
“Still want me to go slow?” I ask, voice rough with need. I kiss her inner thigh—just a graze of lips against skin. “Or do you want the Tate Special extra filthy?”
She glares down at me like she might strangle me or sit on my face. Either option works.
“Both,” she grits out. “You smug bastard.”
I chuckle. “Smart girl.”
Then I devour her.
Tongue flat. Deep, greedy strokes like I’m starving. Because I am. Because she tastes like honey and sin and everything I’ve ever wanted. My finger pumps slowly, deliberately, dragging along every nerve inside her as I suck her clit into my mouth and hum.
Her entire body jerks. A strangled cry bursts from her lips.
“Fuck—Jason—fuck, don’t stop, don’t you fucking dare?—”
I don’t. I couldn’t if I tried.
I lap her up like she’s the only thing that’s ever mattered. I fuck her with my finger, slow and filthy, lips teasing her swollen clit, tongue flicking and dragging until she’s a trembling, gasping mess against my face.
Another finger joins the first.
Her thighs shake. Her moans become guttural. She fists my hair as if she’s both praying and dying at the same time, and holy shit, I want to tattoo this moment on my fucking soul.
She’s close. So, fucking close.
“C’mon, Scottie,” I murmur against her, tongue still working her clit as my fingers thrust harder, deeper. “Fall apart for me. Let me wreck you.”
And when she does—when her body bows, her cry breaks free, and she comes all over my mouth and hand?
It’s fucking everything.