Chapter 12 #3
I felt Simon’s heat behind me before I realized he was moving, crowding me against the door. I wasn’t trapped, but I could pretend to be with him this close.
The thought made a shiver run down my spine. I let it build up, let myself enjoy the solid presence of him, the scent, the way my body recognized his, and channeled it into a moan I might’ve been embarrassed to make if I’d actually been having sex with someone.
I didn’t mind making a sound like that in front of Simon. Even if, when I turned to look at him, he had a brow raised.
“You’re making me sound very good at this,” he said, soft enough that it wouldn’t carry.
“You are good at it,” I said. Nothing would convince me he wasn’t. Nothing would convince me that sex with Simon would be anything short of life-changing. That it wouldn’t ruin me for all other partners.
“I am?” he asked, brow arching a notch higher.
A grin spread over my face. “You are,” I said, laying my hand in the center of his chest and giving him a firm shove toward the bed.
He backed up obediently, the mattress springs creaking when his knees hit the edge and he had no choice but to sit.
“Climb on,” I murmured, already kicking my shoes off.
I could get into this. I could give everyone in this house a performance worth listening into, proof that Simon wanted me, even after we’d fought.
That he hadn’t given up on me, and that, on top of being the sweetest man in the world, he was also unbelievably good in bed.
Simon kicked his shoes off as well, shuffling back on the bed, watching me with something between curiosity and alarm. I crawled after him, making heavy, clumsy movements so the bed would creak and groan.
I’d gotten caught once as a teenager making out with Jeremy Collins in this bed. I knew it was loud enough to hear as far away as the kitchen, which was in the middle of the house, and I was willing to bet Mom was hovering there. Listening in to everything going on.
Might as well give her something to listen to.
“God, Simon,” I stage whispered, sitting back on my heels to bounce on the mattress. “Want you.”
“Want you, too,” Simon replied.
It was a whisper, not really loud enough to be overheard, but it was more than enough to short circuit my brain. How long had I wanted to hear that from him?
I braced my hands on the mattress, screwing my eyes shut to ride out the hot wave of arousal rolling through me.
This was probably a mistake, but we’d started now. If we stopped, everyone would know we’d been faking it.
The only way out was through. I’d already made dozens of mistakes this weekend when it came to almost having what I wanted from Simon, dozens of little moments I’d remember forever. All of them would hurt every time the memory surfaced. What was one more?
“Need you,” I said, louder, letting my voice break. “You’re so, you’re so…”
“Yeah,” Simon responded—still breathless, but a little louder this time. Probably not enough to make out the words, but the sound would carry. “You, too.”
I pushed against the bed again, pumping my arm rhythmically. “Oh,” I cried out. “Ah. Top drawer, top drawer.”
Simon took the hint, tugging the top drawer of the night stand open hard enough that the runners squealed. There was, as it happened, a tube of lubricant in there. It’d been there… four or five years, since the last time I’d been summoned here for a family get-together.
“C’mon, Sy,” I said, letting my voice take on a whine. “Don’t make me wait.”
“Anything you want,” he agreed, fumbling in the drawer then slamming it shut again.
I crawled over to him, moving heavily to be sure the mattress would creak. Simon smiled as I approached, a conspiratorial look that made me grin back at him.
“Wow,” I said, looking him directly in the eyes. “I keep forgetting how big you are.”
Simon’s eyes widened, and he covered his mouth to muffle laughter.
I wanted people to hear him laugh. To think he was having the time of his life, that we had the kind of warm, easy relationship where we laughed in bed as well as out of it.
I’d always wanted that.
“Let me see you, baby,” I wheedled, louder than I might have otherwise.
“Baby?” Simon mouthed, brows raised.
“Not baby?” I whispered.
Simon giggled. I’d heard the sound a thousand times—more, probably—but I wasn’t sure I’d ever loved it as much as I did now.
“Pookie?” I tried, giving him my most innocent look.
He covered his mouth again, but this time, I reached out and took his hand away. “Big boy?”
Simon bit down on his lower lip, laughter glittering in his eyes.
“Pumpkin?” I said, inching closer. “Honey bunch? Cupcake?”
Another giggle escaped. I’d forgotten all about putting on a show for the moment, too caught up in trying to make Simon laugh.
“Now you’re just naming foods,” he hissed, still trying not to laugh.
I crawled another inch or two up the bed, holding his gaze. “Sugar lump?”
“No,” Simon hissed again, laughing louder this time.
“But you’re so sweet,” I said, grinning even wider at him. “My unbroken stallion? I don’t think you qualify as a bear. Maybe a little one. What are those—oh, my moon bear?”
“Theo,” Simon said. He was trying to do his stern voice, which wasn’t all that stern to begin with, but the fact that he was barely stopping himself from dissolving into giggles again didn’t help at all.
“Tiger,” I said. “Stag?”
“I’m not an animal.”
“No, that’s true,” I conceded, tilting my head as I considered my next option.
Once I had it, I leaned in to whisper in his ear.
“Daddy.”
Simon burst into laughter, and the next thing I knew I was being flipped back onto the mattress, Simon looming over me.
A jolt of arousal made me panic. The rush of blood flowing south would be difficult to hide at the best of times, and especially while he was so close. I needed to put some distance between us.
Normally, I would have hesitated to use the ultimate weapon at my disposal, but desperate times called for desperate measures.
Simon hissed as my fingers found his sides, howling with laughter as I tickled him through his shirt. He was ridiculously susceptible to tickling. Like all of his weaknesses, I tried not to use it against him.
“No, no, no,” he objected, squirming away from me. “Oh my God, that’s cheating.”
His breath was already coming in harsh pants, face flushing as I mercilessly dug my fingers in under his ribs.
“Theo, Theo,” he cried out, curling in on himself before rolling off me and flopping on the mattress beside me, still laughing.
I didn’t realize I was laughing until I sat up on the bed again, turning to look down at him. I wasn’t just laughing, I was cackling, and I couldn’t stop.
Which meant I missed the glint in Simon’s eyes for just a split second too long. When he surged up again, he caught me by surprise.
I yelped as I overbalanced, rolled onto my back, then kept rolling with the momentum until we ran out of bed, both of us tipping over the edge.
Simon landed under me with a thud and a winded oof, and I landed on top of him with a squeak.
We were both still laughing.
“Fuck,” he said between giggles, both hands thumping on the floor beside him in defeat.
I sat up on top of him, my stomach starting to hurt from how hard I was still laughing. This was possibly not the world’s most convincing fake sex, although the thud we’d made would probably explain why we’d stopped to anyone listening in.
“You okay?” Simon asked. He was out of breath, but his voice was low and gentle.
I took a breath to say something, but when I met his eyes—still behind his glasses—it caught in my chest.
He was gorgeous like this.
I stared at him, lips parted, panting for breath, trying to figure out what I could possibly say that wasn’t I love you.
It was the only thought in my head when I looked at him, still chuckling intermittently, hair disheveled and face flushed, lying under me without complaint like he didn’t mind me being on top of him at all.
I shifted my weight so my hips weren’t directly on top of him and hoped he’d assume he felt my phone in my pocket.
“Fine,” I said after much too long a pause. “I’m fine. You okay?”
Simon nodded, still out of breath, and started laughing again.
“Never thought you’d like it this rough,” he said, voice wrecked, low enough that no one but me would hear.
I don’t, but I could if you do.
You’ve thought about how rough I like it?
Get back on the bed and find out.
Instead of saying any of that, I climbed off him as carefully as I could and extended my hand. He took it, and even that skin contact—we must have touched like this before, I must have known Simon’s hand was warm and dry and had a callus under the two middle fingers—was too much for me.
“Do we keep going?” Simon leaned in and whispered in my ear, so close the brush of his breath made the hairs at the back of my neck stand on end.
I swallowed hard once, then again. I couldn’t do this. I could not do this, I shouldn’t have agreed in the first place. No matter how badly I wanted Mom and Corey and Delilah and anyone else who still believed the lie to think Simon still wanted me, even though I’d screwed up.
“Let’s…” I paused to think. “Make sure the mattress creaks while we get ready for bed. And not turn the shower off between us, so it sounds like we’re showering together. You go first.”
There. That would work.
“You’re good at this,” Simon murmured, still unbearably close. My skin prickled all over, and the urge to shove him back onto the bed, kiss him like I meant it, tear his clothes off and demand his dick for real this time almost got the better of me.
“… to bang the wall a few times while I’m in there?” I heard past the rush of blood in my ears.
“Uh,” I said, scrambling to catch up with the question. “Yeah. Okay.”
Simon pulled back, grinning at me.
“Jump on the bed while I get undressed,” he murmured. “Let them think we’re finishing up anyway.”
I nodded, crawling onto the bed again once Simon had brushed past me into the en suite.
At least I had cover to jerk off in the shower this time.