Chapter 15
Garrett
I’m stretching out on Rory’s bed, reading, when the girls get back from the market.
She comes barrelling in, then pulls up short when she sees me, and shoves her hands behind her back. “Oh! Hi. You’re here.”
I swing my legs off the bed. “I was taking a break.”
“Can you close your eyes?”
“Sure.” I blink my eyelids shut and listen to her rustle around. A drawer opens, then closes. “What are you doing?”
“Hiding something small I got you at the market.” She comes closer, until she’s standing right in front of me.
I keep my eyes shut.
She steps in between my legs, her knee brushing against the inside of mine. Nudging my thighs wider.
Reflexively, my hands come up to her hips.
“Is this okay?” My voice is low and rough. Can she hear the need there? Fuck. “Maybe blurs the lines of friendship. You said you didn’t want—”
“I know what I said. But this might be the last chance we get to be alone, so….” Her fingertips ghost over my lips.
Her hands push against my shoulders as she leans in, her soft sweater so close it’s tickling my jaw.
Her lips brush my ear. “If you keep your eyes shut, and just let me play with you, it’s sort of like it’s not really happening. ”
“I promise you that it feels very, very real.”
“Do you want me to stop?”
Fuck no. “I didn’t say that.”
She exhales, sweet apple cider and secret need swirling around me. “I don’t want you to think I only ask you to scratch an itch when it’s overwhelming.” Her hands trail down my chest. “I don’t want you to think I’m…selfish.”
With a gentle shove, she sends me tumbling back.
I blink my eyes open and stare up at the ceiling as she unbuckles my belt.
“Your family,” I manage to get out, rolling my head up to look at her.
She wraps her hand around my bare cock and shrugs.
Shrugs.
“I guess you’ll have to be quiet?”
I choke on a laugh as she licks around the straining crown, my surging erection. All for her. Only for her.
Her thumb rubs up and down over my piercings, and the pleased hum she makes as she chases that touch with her whole mouth is so damn good. She swallows me so those bars run right over her tongue, and fuck that feels good. Great. Incredible.
Mind-fucking-blowing.
She’s definitely not selfish. Rory Minelli is a very, very giving human being. “My God.”
“Goddess, if you please,” she says, her breath warm against the slick wetness coating my shaft. “Or Roar, if you want. I like hearing you moan my name.”
“I can’t moan your name. People will know what you’re doing.” My chest heaves as I shove my fingers into her hair and guide her back down my cock. “Don’t stop sucking, for the love of—”
She closes her lips around me and pulls. My eyes roll back in my head, and I have to bite my lip to keep the sounds I’m making inside my body.
“Your mouth is so perfect,” I manage to whisper.
There, that’s the right now. Low and private, just for her ears.
“You’re so good at that, Roar. You make me feel so fucking good.
Are you going to swallow my seed? Want me to spill like this?
Or do you want to stroke me and see me come all over your hand and my piercings? ”
She pops off, her eyes wild and bright. She holds my gaze as she pumps my cock. “Yeah, make a mess for me.”
Fuck fuck fuck.
Climb on top of me, I want to beg. Let me make a mess inside you.
Instead, I stare at her, transfixed, as she strokes her thumb up and down the underside of my shaft, my cock throbbing in her tight hold. I’m sure my eyes are just as hot and wild as hers, just as dangerously close to spilling secrets that would ruin this new peace we’ve navigated towards.
But I can’t look away.
My hips buck into her touch, my balls pulling tight. Churning with desire, with need, with something so profoundly right that I hate how much I fucked us up.
This could have been something so good, and I lost sight of that. I forgot how to be hers, and I wasted an entire year of our lives.
It’s really fucking something that I’m still fucking her hand while feeling that regret so intensely. As if sex is all that matters. It’s not even close, but I will take every second of intimacy I can get with her, on her terms, because it’s so much better than nothing.
And the sight of her mouth stretched wide around me, the feel of my barbells and her tongue, the quiet, urgent sucking sounds, the soft slide of her curls through my fingers as she bobs her head and holds her eyes on my face…it’s all perfect, actually.
“I’m not going to last.”
She smiles around my cock, as if to say good. As if that’s the point.
She wants to make me explode on her tongue.
So I give in and let her take me there. My balls draw tighter, tighter, then clench up, pulsing pure pleasure as she gulps down my release.
So. Fucking. Good.
“You’re incredible, just the best, holy shit,” I whisper.
She pulls off and grins. “Great job being quiet.”
I laugh and tug at her arm. “Get up here.”
“No, that was just for you.” She licks her lips, her eyes glowing. “Because I appreciate you.”
Ah, of course. She has a righteous sense of fairness, and she wouldn’t want to owe me too much for being kind over the holidays. But if we’re going to have transactional sex, it’s going to be fair in its own way.
“Returning the pleasure would also be for me,” I growl as I catch her by the arm, then find the strength to lever myself up and grab her hips so I can tumble her onto the bed. “Now it’s your turn to be quiet.”
“I need to change the sheets and get—”
“Shut up and let me lick your pussy, Roar.”
She shuts up.
I tug her waistband down, kissing the softness of her belly, nosing my way to the start of her pubic hair, those secret dark curls that are just for me.
She lifts her hips, because even though she thought she wanted to just be giving, she secretly craves this, too.
We both do.
I peel her leggings to her knees, then yank her panties down. My hunger mounts as I glimpse a betraying glisten along her slit.
“Did sucking my pierced cock get you wet, Roar?” I flip her over and pull her up onto her knees. “Why would you want to go downstairs with an aching little cunt when I could make you feel good?”
“I thought—”
“Stop thinking,” I demand. “Push your face into the sheets and just feel.”
She starts to protest, but as soon as I take her ass in my hands, tipping her hips up so I can get to her sweet little pussy, she gives in.
All the fight softens out of her and she whimpers into the sheets, the sweetest sound ever.
“That’s it,” I whisper. “You want my tongue, you feisty girl?”
“Mm-hmm.”
“Can you be quiet?”
“No.”
I laugh at the honesty, my breath brushing against her slick skin. “That’s your choice, then. I don’t care if they hear how good I make you feel.”
She squirms, her hips wriggling in my hands. I squeeze and lift her flesh, revealing more of her sweetness.
“Please, Garrett,” she pants.
“Love to hear you beg,” I rumble before finally giving her what she needs.
She’s sweet and tart on my tongue, and so fucking responsive. A day and a half of us not touching each other has primed her just as much as ovulating would. My needy, greedy, horny girl.
Her clit leaps to attention when I lick around it, throbbing as I latch on to suck.
Why the fuck haven’t we been doing this all the fucking time?
I growl and dive deeper, tonguing her entrance, her folds, and her clit again. I lap and lick and suck until she’s trembling, and then I latch my whole mouth onto her and consume her like she’s my last fucking meal.
“We need to strip the sheets.”
“What’s that, Miss Mumbles?”
Rory twists her head and looks at me where I’ve stretched out beside her. Her cheeks are so flushed—it’s fucking beautiful. “You heard me.”
“We will. But we can take a minute to enjoy the aftershocks.”
She takes a breath and holds it.
I shake my head. “Don’t say we shouldn’t have done that. We clearly both wanted it.”
“It’s just—”
“It’s Christmas Eve. Whatever that was, it was festive.” I’ll use her love of the holidays against her, I don’t care. “If you want to do it again tonight in front of the Christmas tree, I won’t mind.”
“You won’t mind?”
“I’m playing it cool. Wouldn’t want you to know how desperate I am do it again.”
She smiles despite herself.
“Yeah, you like that, don’t you?” I grin back.
She rolls onto her back and tugs her leggings up and over her hips again. “They’ll be here soon.”
The second attempt to redirect us back to the task of making sure the Minelli Family Christmas is perfect.
Note taken.
“All right.” I roll off the bed. “What do we need to do in here?”
“They’ll bring a playpen for the boys to sleep in, so we just need to get our bags out of here.” Her eyes soften. “I, um, bought you a present I need to wrap, too.”
I clutch at my chest. “A present and you came on my face? I am not worthy.”
“Shut up.” But she’s giggling. “Can you go grab a set of sheets from the hallway closet? And knock when you come back but I’ll wrap it quickly.”
I take a detour through the bathroom to wash my face and hands. I’d keep Rory imprinted on my skin all afternoon if we weren’t going to be hugging family members any minute.
Then I find fresh linens.
When I return, she’s added a newly wrapped present to the top of the bag of gifts.
She tracks my gaze. “It’s just something small. It’s okay if you didn’t—”
“I got you something, too.”
“Oh.” She jerks her eyes to the sheets in my hand. “Let’s make the bed.”
“I got it. Why don’t you pack up your clothes for our move downstairs? Everything of mine is still in my bag.”
She turns to the dresser, but as soon as I pull the blanket and the sheets off the bed, she’s back, trying to insert herself into the task.
Irritation flares. “I’m perfectly capable of making a bed, Rory.”
She doesn’t even look at me. “I know you are.”
“Do you?” I mutter under my breath.
“What does that mean?”
“Nothing.”
She snatches a pillow and yanks off the pillowcase. “Didn’t sound like nothing.”
I know that Rory knows I can make a bed. “I don’t know where that came from.”
“It’s just what we do. We made it a lot longer than ninety minutes, though, so…” She closes her eyes and takes a long, deep breath. “It’s okay.”
“Yeah. We’re both probably on edge.” Except I thought the orgasms would help with that. But on the other side of them there’s just more tension.
“And I just want it to be—” She stops and presses her lips together.
“What? Perfect?”
“Good.” But she glances away.
I cross my arms over my chest, trying to ignore the tension coiling in my shoulders. “It’s not your job to make Christmas perfect for your family.”
Her cheeks heat up, annoyed. “It’s not not my job. I mean, ideally it’s everyone’s job. I know you don’t care—”
“You don’t think I care about making sure you have a good Christmas? And your family by extension?”
“No, I mean—”
“Because I’m here.”
“I know that. I see that! I’m saying, it’s not something you care about. The holidays. I know you’re doing it for me. But that makes it all the more stressful in a way, which is why I want to even the balance out!”
We glare at each other. Her eyes are locked on mine, and I can see the struggle in them—the push and pull between what she really wants and what she thinks she should want. Or maybe what she thinks she needs.
God knows, I have no clue what she needs. Not really. Not anymore. And I know she doesn’t want to be mine, but I still don’t know why.
“Garrett,” she says, her voice barely above a whisper.
I shift closer. Too close, my body humming with the need to touch her again. “I don’t want to stress you out, Roar. I always want to ease your burdens, because you’re precious to me, and if this isn’t the way—”
A door slams on the first level, and the unmistakable high-pitched laughter of small children drifts up the stairs.
She pushes me away. “They’re here.”
“Hang on a second,” I say, heart pounding.
But she’s gone, slipping past me the way she always slides out of my grasp. The way she slid out of my life when I told her I wasn’t happy anymore.
Rory Minelli has an intense self-preservation instinct.
And deep down, I scare her.