Chapter 26 #2
I find the first snap on the shirt and pop it open. Then the next. Then the next, all the way down, taking my time, while she watches my face with those amber-flecked eyes and her breathing goes shallow. When the last one gives, the flannel falls open and I stop.
I just stop dead in my tracks.
Because I’ve imagined this. Right here in this room, when I knew I could never have her, I imagined what she’d look like, and, fuck, I wasn’t even close.
She’s golden in the lamplight, all soft curves and warm skin with a scatter of freckles on her collarbone that have mesmerized me more times than they should have.
“You’re staring.”
“I’m allowed.” I slide the shirt off her shoulders and watch it pool behind her. My eyes follow the line of her waist, the curve of her breasts, the flare of her hips, the soft skin of her stomach. All of her. Every inch I’ve spent six years dreaming about. “Give me a sec.”
“Take your time.” The corner of her mouth lifts, throwing my own words back at me, and that’s all the restraint I’ve got left.
I lean down to press my mouth to her collarbone, right where the freckles start, and her fingers dig into my hair, her nails raking across my scalp.
I move to the curve of her breast, and she arches into me with a sound that short-circuits every nerve I own.
My hands tighten on her hips and I pull her closer, needing her closer.
Because now I know I need her so deep inside my life that nobody can pull her back out.
“Wyatt.” My name comes out breathless and needy, and I decide right there that I will spend the rest of my life trying to make her say it exactly that way.
I flip us. She lands on her back against the pillows and I settle over her, one forearm braced beside her head, and the height difference between us has never been more obvious.
She’s all delicate bones and fierce brown eyes beneath me, and I have never in my entire life been more careful with anything.
“Tell me what you want.” My voice doesn’t sound like mine as my eyes flick between hers.
“You.” She runs her fingers down the center of my chest to my belt. “Just you. All of you.”
I drop my forehead against hers. “You already have me, Daisy-girl. There hasn’t been a version of me that wasn’t yours in a very long time.”
Her breathing hitches on an exhale before she traces my bottom lip with her thumb. Then her lips lift in a daring smile as she murmurs, “Prove it.”
She undoes my belt and I deal with the rest, ignoring the tremble in my hands.
Thirty-five years old, and this woman has reduced me to a nervous teen, but I don’t care because she’s looking up at me with a longing that matches my own, and I have never deserved anything less and wanted anything more.
When there’s nothing left between us, I pause, looking down at her laid out beneath me, and every thought I’ve ever had exits my head.
Those brown eyes are watching me like I’m the only thing in the world, and I have to hold myself in check with what’s left of my self-control, which is approximately nothing.
“You’re sure.” Not a question, not really, but I need to hear the words.
“Wyatt Hartley.” She takes my face in both hands and pulls me down to her. “I’ve been sure since I was old enough to know what sure meant. Now stop making me wait.”
I don’t rush. Couldn’t if I tried. I trail my mouth down her jaw onto her throat, lingering where her pulse throbs under my lips.
She tastes like salt and warmth and I breathe her in, letting the scent of her fill my lungs until there’s no room for anything else.
Her pulse is racing under my tongue, and mine’s matching it beat for beat.
My hands slide over her sides, thumbs brushing the undersides of her breasts, feeling the weight of them shift under my touch.
Her ribs expand with each shaky inhale, and when I cup one breast fully and drag my thumb across her nipple, her back lifts off the mattress.
Her legs part as I settle between them, and the sight of her beneath me, open and trusting, hits me so hard I have to stop and press my forehead against her sternum just to draw a breath.
“You’re so goddamn beautiful.” My back is bowed over her, my shoulders more than a little unsteady as I murmur against her skin. “You have no idea.”
I kiss across her collarbone, then down the center of her chest. Her nipples are already tight before I even touch them, flushed dark and straining, and when I close my mouth over one and suck, the sound she makes goes straight to my cock.
Her fingers thread into my hair and pull, and the tug sends a jolt down my spine that makes me groan against her skin.
“Harder,” she whispers, and I obey because right now I couldn’t even think to say no. I suck harder, graze my teeth across the peak, and her hips buck up against me. I can feel her wetness smearing against my stomach and it takes everything I have not to grind down into the mattress for relief.
I move further down, pressing open-mouthed kisses along her stomach, feeling the muscles twitch under my lips. Her thighs tense as I nudge them wider with my shoulders, and I look up at her from between her legs because I need her to see my face when I do this.
I need her to know this isn’t something I’m rushing through to get to the rest.
This is the rest.
“Eyes on me, Daisy.”
She looks down, and I hold that gaze while I lower my mouth to her. The first slow stroke of my tongue rips a sound out of her that makes my cock leak onto the bedsheets. She’s hot and slick and swollen against my mouth, and the taste of her—fuck.
My fingers dig into her thighs hard enough to leave marks I’ll feel guilty about later.
“Jesus.” I pull back just enough to speak against her, my lips brushing over her clit with each word. “You taste like you were made for me.”
Her hips roll up and I press a hand flat on her belly to hold her steady, because I need to take my damn time here.
I circle her clit with the tip of my tongue, slow, teasing, learning what pressure makes her thighs shake and what rhythm makes her fingers twist in the sheets.
Then I close my lips around her clit and suck, light at first, then firmer, and her whole body jerks so hard she nearly comes off the bed.
“Wyatt, oh God—”
I slide two fingers inside her and she clenches around them immediately, tight and wet and pulsing. I curl them forward, searching, pressing, and when I find the spot that makes her cry out, I lock onto it. “I’ve got you. Let me hear you, baby.”
I build a rhythm with my fingers curling deep inside her while my tongue works her clit in steady, relentless strokes, and her thighs start to shake around my head.
Her breathing turns ragged as her stomach trembles under my hand, and the sounds coming out of her mouth are going to finish me before I even get inside her.
“Don’t stop, don’t stop, don’t—”
“Not a damn chance.” I growl it against her, the vibration making her sob, and then I seal my mouth over her clit and suck hard while my fingers drive into her, curling on every stroke.
She comes apart against my mouth, her back arching clean off the mattress, and I feel it everywhere as her thighs tighten against my face. She clenches around my fingers as she gasps my name, and I stay with her through every tremor, easing her down slowly, until she’s boneless and panting.
Once she eases her grip on my hair, I kiss my way back up her body, lingering on the dip of her navel, the curve of her ribs, and the valley between her breasts as I taste her skin the whole way.
When I reach her face, she pulls me in and wraps her legs around my waist, and the wet heat of her pressing against my cock nearly stops my heart.
Then I kiss her slow and deep, taking my time with it, one hand cradling the back of her head while the other traces down her side.
She melts into me, her hips rolling up against me, sliding herself along the length of me, and the slick friction drags a groan out of my chest. Soft sounds build in her throat until she’s whimpering beneath me and pulling me closer.
I break the kiss and reach for the nightstand drawer, but stop halfway because there’s nothing in there. Hasn’t been in a long time. I drop my forehead to her shoulder as I huff lowly, “Shit.”
“What?” She tips my chin up and searches my face.
“I don’t have any condoms.” I hold her questioning gaze. “Haven’t had reason to.”
She searches my face as she furrows her brow. “What do you mean?”
I don’t break eye contact, just let the answer sit between us.
Her lips part as realization dawns. “How long, Wyatt?”
“Six years.”
She stares at me for a beat. Then I see it land. Her face does the math before her mouth catches up.
“Six years,” she repeats quietly. “There’s been no one in six years.”
“Couldn’t make myself want anyone else.”
Her eyes glisten when she takes my face in both hands and kisses me with a tenderness that almost breaks me open.
“I’m on birth control,” she whispers against my mouth. “And I’m clean.”
“Yeah.” My voice is hoarse. “Me too.”
She almost smiles before whispering, “Then stop talking.”
I raise myself above her and look down along her body.
She’s flushed from her chest to her cheeks, her lips swollen from my mouth, her thighs glistening where my tongue has been.
When I notch my cock at her entrance, she’s swollen and ready for me.
I drag the head through her folds, once, slow, coating myself in her.
Her breath catches. And mine simply stops.
I press inside, slowly, inch by inch, our gazes never once slipping. She stretches around me, tight and hot and so fucking wet, and when I bottom out, we both go still. Her lips part and her eyes widen, and her nails dig into my arms, and for a second neither of us breathes.
She’s so tight around me as she clenches in little pulses like her body is still coming down from her orgasm, and I’m so deep inside her I can feel her heartbeat on my cock. There’s nothing between us now. No barrier. No pretense. No distance.