Chapter Seventeen
Seventeen
Abby
I’m nervous, which is unlike me.
Jack and I were pretty quiet on the ride home, although his hand did sneakily slide into mine at some point along the drive. And what’s even more surprising is I allowed it to happen. Again. I even liked it.
With the rest of the evening ahead of us—where I have no class, and he doesn’t have a game until tomorrow—my mind is racing with possibilities about what might happen when we get home.
I can still feel his soft kiss from back there at the little playground, and every so often, I catch myself touching my lips, hoping he doesn’t see when I yank my fingers away after realizing what I’m doing.
I follow after him as we make our way up to the apartment, my body thrumming with anticipation and simultaneously racked with nerves.
It’s just been so long since I’ve done anything like this—part of me wonders if I even remember how to.
My last boyfriend—if you can even call him that, since he was more of a twice-a-week hookup situation—went into the “relationship” knowing we had to be discreet, even if the reasons I gave him were different from the actual truth.
Hiding who you are because of your dad’s past mistakes makes for a very difficult dating life, that’s for sure.
But I don’t have to hide now.
I can go inside that apartment and do whatever I like with Jack, and save for the stipulation we both made about keeping things quiet from our siblings, I don’t have to worry about what anyone might say, what they might do. I can just be me.
The only problem is…I may have forgotten how to do that.
I still don’t know if I’m ready to take things all the way—if only for the fact that the idea of being so close to someone still kind of scares the hell out of me—but more of what we’ve already done?
More touching, more kissing…it seems my body is more than down for more of those things, at the very least.
“Is it weird that I’m nervous?”
I startle a little, roused from my thoughts as I take in Jack with his hands on the keys that are pressed into the lock at the door.
“What?”
He chuckles under his breath, but it sounds strained. “I’m terrified I’m going to screw things up somehow.”
“With me?”
“No, with Ms. Sanderson down the hall,” he huffs. “Yes. With you.”
I can’t help it; a laugh burbles out of me. I hadn’t thought in all my inner musings that Jack might be feeling the same way.
“Glad you think it’s funny,” he mutters.
“No, I don’t,” I assure him. “It’s just that I was pretty much thinking the same thing just now.”
“You were thinking I’d screw things up with you?”
“More the other way around, actually.”
His brow furrows. “How in the hell could you screw things up with me?”
“I’m not exactly the picture of fun,” I tell him. “And I’m not…good at this.”
“Good at what?”
“This.” I gesture between us. “I’ve never messed around with someone I’m friends with.”
His lips twitch. “So you admit we’re friends.”
“We’re something,” I concede.
“It was the nachos, wasn’t it.”
“Yes, Jack,” I say flatly. “It was the nachos.”
He turns then, wrapping an arm around my waist. “I knew it.”
“We’re in the hallway,” I remind him.
“I just need a minute,” he tells me. “Because there are about a hundred and one things I want to do to you, and I need to know which ones you’re ready for.”
I feel my heart rate skyrocket, my neck flushing. “Straight to the point, huh?”
“I don’t want to do anything you aren’t ready for,” he stresses. “But I do want to touch you again.”
I let my fingers press against his sternum, sliding my palm over his chest. “What if I wanted to touch you this time?”
“Abby,” he groans. “Do you want me to come in the hallway? Keep talking like that and see what happens.”
“Open the door,” I tell him. “Let’s go inside.”
He turns the handle to let us inside, and then both of us are spilling into the entryway in a rush as I fall into his chest, his arms at my shoulders to steady me.
His eyes find mine and hold them, looking a little hazier than they did a moment ago.
I feel his thumbs brushing back and forth against my shoulders, his tongue darting out to wet his lower lip.
“Abby,” he practically whispers, almost like he’s shy. “Can I kiss you?”
I press up on my toes in lieu of answering, sliding my arms around his neck to pull him down to me as I touch my lips to his.
He makes a soft sound in the back of his throat, one that I feel all the way down to my toes.
His tongue slips past my lips to touch mine, and then it’s me making the sounds, whimpering a little when his hands find my ass to hoist me up like I weigh nothing.
“Bedroom?” he asks against my mouth.
I nod, seemingly unable to stop kissing him. “Go.”
He never stops kissing me as he carries me to his bedroom, a situation not unlike the one that led us here last night. I’m more sure this time, less afraid of what it might mean for tomorrow—content to just live in the moment as Jack deposits me on his bed.
“I want to see all of you this time,” he says huskily. “Can I?”
I bite at my lower lip, feeling a flutter of nerves at the idea of being naked with him, mainly just because it’s been so long since I’ve been so with another person.
“You first,” I say.
Jack grins as he reaches for the hem of his T-shirt, lifting it off in one smooth motion and tossing it aside. I feel as dry mouthed now looking at him as I did when I caught him coming out of the shower; he’s just so fucking perfect, it’s enough to make anyone nervous to follow that.
He’s reaching for the button of his jeans as I squirm on the bed, snapping them open and shoving them down his thick thighs, which flex and strain with the effort to kick them off.
Then it’s just him in his dark gray boxer briefs—the outline of his already-hard cock straining against them in a way that makes my mouth suddenly not so dry.
He called me gorgeous last night—it’s something I committed to memory immediately—but looking at him now…I’d argue he’s the gorgeous one.
I scrabble up from the bed to my knees before crawling to the edge, running my hands up his thighs and feeling the corded muscle bunch under my palms. He shivers at my touch, and it makes me feel almost powerful that I could be the one to make him this way.
“S-seems a little one-sided here, Abby,” he points out.
He even sounds wrecked.
It goes straight to my head.
“You want to see?” I ask sweetly.
He nods, his eyes hooded. “Please.”
I bring my fingers to the hem of my tee, making a show of teasing it upward slowly, so slowly that Jack fidgets, his fists clenching like he’s holding back the urge to take over and do it himself.
His breath catches when I pull it over my head, dropping it to the floor.
I’m grateful that I chose a cute bra today, because the way he’s eyeing the pink lace hungrily is doing wonders for my confidence.
“The underwear matches,” I tell him, feeling a little wicked.
He groans. “Let me see.”
I’m a lot slower at removing my pants than he was, drawing it out, torturing him a little.
He just looks so damned eager that it’s hard not to.
When I’m left in nothing but pink lace, Jack hisses through his teeth, finally giving in to his urges to touch.
His hands slide over my shoulders and down to my elbows, drawing my arms up around his neck as he leans in to kiss me once more.
My breasts press against his hard chest as he pulls me in close, his hands starting to wander.
I feel them smooth down my sides, lingering at my hips, his fingertips tucking under the elastic of my underwear to palm at my ass as a needy sound escapes me that he catches with his tongue.
“I said I wanted to touch you this time,” I remind him. “Get down here.”
I feel his lips curl against mine. “Yes, ma’am.”
He rolls as he brings us both down to the bed, landing on his back with my body plastered to his front as his mouth continues to plunder mine.
The hard lines of his body feel good against me, and I let my hands do a little wandering of their own as I palm down his hard chest, his chiseled stomach.
All the way down to the iron bar between his legs that jerks under my touch.
His head falls back as a stuttered breath releases from him, his lashes fluttering shut as I squeeze his cock through the fabric of his underwear. I like the way my touch seems to make him lose control, and it has me wanting more of it, wanting to make him come just a little more undone.
I press kisses to his jaw, his throat, letting my tongue tease at his collarbone as I start making my way down his body.
“Abby,” he breathes.
I reach behind me to unsnap my bra, working it off me and tossing it away as my bare breasts tease his abdomen.
“Christ, Abby,” he rasps. “Let me touch you. Let me taste you. Come up here.”
“I told you”—I dip my head so I can tease at his navel with my tongue—“it’s my turn to touch you.”
I curl my fingers into the elastic of his briefs so I can tug them down, and then his heavy cock is bouncing free, slapping against his stomach.
He’s swollen and red and already wet at the tip, and I can feel my mouth water in a way it never has before.
I want him in my mouth. More than anything.
I want to feel him come apart because of me.
I catch his gaze when I let my tongue loose to tease at the base, licking a heavy stripe all the way to the tip as he makes a pained sound before kicking his underwear off and away.
“Fuck, Abby, I—I won’t last—Let me—”
His words turn into a garbled moan when I take the head between my lips, sucking softly there as a burst of his flavor spreads along my tongue.
I press my lips tight as I slowly slide down to take more of him, enjoying the broken sounds he lets out, like he’s losing his mind just a little bit.
I gag a little when I near the base, the action resulting in a forceful swallow that has me pulling off him, gasping for air.