Chapter 8 - Griffin #2
I angle my head, taking more, and she matches me.
Her nails scrape against my skin through my wet thermal shirt, and I can feel her breasts pressed against my chest, perfectly soft and full.
The cold is forgotten. The wet clothes are forgotten.
Everything is forgotten except the way she feels against me, the way she tastes, the small sounds she's making in the back of her throat.
My hand slides from her hair down her back, feeling the curve of her spine, the dip of her waist. I want to see all of her, touch all of her, taste every inch.
But I don't. Not yet. Because this is already more than I planned, more than I should be doing, and I need to make sure she actually wants this and isn't just caught up in the moment.
I pull back, just enough to look at her. Her eyes are dark and wide, her lips slightly swollen from the kiss, her breathing as uneven as mine.
"Tell me to stop," I say, my voice rough.
She stares at me. "What?"
"Tell me to stop, Hannah. Tell me this is a bad idea and I'll leave right now."
"I—" She blinks, processing. "You want me to tell you to stop?"
"I want you to tell me what you want. Because what I want right now is to keep kissing you. And if you don't want that, you need to say so."
Her hands are still on my shoulders, fingers curled into the wet fabric of my shirt. She doesn't let go. Doesn't pull away.
"I don't want you to stop," she says.
"You sure?"
"Griffin." She leans in, her nose almost touching mine. "I'm soaking wet, freezing cold, sitting on a lumpy bed in a cabin with no power, and you just made me jump into a freezing waterfall. If I didn't want this, I would have pushed you away already."
"Just checking."
"Stop checking and kiss me again."
I don't need to be told twice.
This time when I kiss her, I don't hold back. My hand slides up under her wet thermal shirt, finding bare skin that's cold to the touch but warming under my palm.
Her hands move from my shoulders to my hair, fingers tangling in the wet strands, pulling slightly, and fuck, that feels good. I groan against her mouth, and she makes that sound again, that little whimper that goes straight to my cock.
I'm hard again, and there's no hiding it now. Not with the way we're pressed together, not with the way she's practically in my lap. She can definitely feel it, the rigid length of my cock pressed against her hip through our wet jeans.
She doesn't pull away. If anything, she presses closer.
My hand slides higher under her shirt, fingers skimming the underside of her breast. No bra. I already knew that from the waterfall but feeling it is different. Feeling her soft weight, the way she shivers under my touch even though we're both warming up now.
I cup her breast fully, my thumb finding her nipple, and she breaks the kiss with a gasp.
"Griffin!"
"Too much?" I'm already starting to pull my hand back, but she stops me, her hand covering mine through the fabric of her shirt.
"No. Not too much. Just…" She looks at me, and there's something vulnerable in her expression. Something nervous. "I need to tell you something."
I go still, reading the tension in her body. "Okay."
"I haven't—" She takes a breath, and I can see her gathering courage. "I've never done this before."
It takes me a second to understand what she's saying. "You're a virgin?"
She nods, not quite meeting my eyes. "I told you I’ve never dated, and I know that's probably weird at twenty-eight, but I just never… There was never anyone I trusted enough, and then after a while it became this thing I'd built up in my head, and—"
I kiss her again, cutting off the rambling explanation. When I pull back, I make sure she's looking at me.
"It's not weird," I say firmly. "And I'm glad you're telling me."
"You are?"
"Yeah. Because it means we're definitely going slow, and you're definitely going to tell me if anything doesn't feel right."
"You're not... disappointed?"
"Disappointed?" I almost laugh. "Hannah, I'm trying very hard not to think about the fact that if we do this, I'll be your first. Because that thought is doing things to my head that probably aren't healthy."
She blinks. "What kind of things?"
"Possessive things. Caveman things. Things that involve making absolutely sure that if we do this, it's nothing like 'not great.' It's fucking perfect."
A small smile curves her lips. "You said perfect again."
"Because I mean it." I brush a strand of wet hair away from her face. "But we don't have to do anything. We can stop right here. We can just sit by the fire, dry off and pretend this didn't happen."
"I don't want to pretend it didn't happen."
"Then what do you want?"
She's quiet for a moment, and I can see her thinking, processing. Then she says, "I want you to keep touching me. I want to see where this goes. I just... I might be nervous. And I might not know what I'm doing."
"That's okay. I know what I'm doing." I kiss her jaw, then her neck, feeling her pulse jump under my lips. "And we'll go as slow as you need. If you want to stop at any point, you tell me. Understood?"
"Understood."
"Good." I kiss her neck again, then the hollow of her throat, and she tilts her head back to give me better access. My hand is still on her breast, thumb circling her nipple, and she's making these small moans that are driving me insane.
"Your shirt is wet," I murmur against her skin.
"So is yours."
"We should probably take them off. For warmth."
She laughs breathlessly. "Is that your excuse?"
"It's a good excuse."
"It's a terrible excuse."
"But you're not saying no."
She pulls back just enough to look at me, and there's a challenge in her eyes despite the nerves I can still see there. "Take yours off first."