by Kennedy Ryan
We share a smile, and I go back to that first night we met in the bar.
“Well they have to share me with the Waves now.” I sober. “I am sorry, though. I know you hate losing.”
“Fuck.” The hard line of his jaw sharpens. “And of course, everyone’s saying it’s my fault.”
“Which is ridiculous! It’s a team sport.”
“Yeah, but I’m the franchise player. When a team is paying as much as the Waves pay me, when they build their team around you, the expectations are higher.” He shrugs and grimaces. “This kind of scrutiny comes with the territory,” he says. “Thank God for Kenan. He’s so much more mature than the rest of us. He’s been doing this a long time and knows what it takes to win. He’s the real leader in our locker room.”
“I’m sorry about the losing streak.” I sift my fingers through the silky curls at my knee while he sits on the floor. He leans his head back into my touch, a deep breath lifting his shoulders and swelling his broad chest.
“That feels great,” he says huskily. “Don’t stop.”
It feels great to me, too—touching him, breathing in the scent unique to his hair and skin and whatever molecules combine to make August. I want all of them wrapped around me. I shift on the couch, feeling myself growing wet at the juncture of my thighs the longer I touch him.
I clear my throat hoping to say something that will make my horniness feel less awkward. “Your hair is getting so long.”
What am I even talking about right now? Should we discuss the weather, too?
He turns his head to peer up at me. “You said you like it longer, right?” he asks, almost uncertain, which August rarely is.
Now I really don’t know what we’re talking about.
“I said that?” My fingers tunnel through his thick hair, from his neck where it’s shorter and straight to the crown of his head where it lengthens into amber-streaked sable curls.
“Yeah. That week in Baltimore,” he reminds me, his voice soft.
My hands go still in his hair as his meaning sinks in.
“Are you saying . . .” I swallow and try again, unfolding my legs from under me and setting my feet on the floor. “You’re growing your hair out because I said I liked it longer? For me?”
He flips his body so that he’s facing the couch, still sitting on the floor, angling a grin up at me.
“Let me get this straight,” he says. “You were completely unimpressed when I turned down forty-five million dollars to live in the same city as you, but you’re kinda blown away that I’m growing my hair out?”
When he puts it like that, I feel like an idiot. We both laugh, our eyes tangled in affection and something more—something that neither of us acknowledges, but it fills the air around us.
“I wasn’t unimpressed,” I say, teasing him with a look. “But you do kinda blow me away.”
He watches me, taking in all my details, starting at the hair casually knotted on my head and the silky robe, then my bare feet. He grabs one foot and kisses the arch.
“August!” I snatch my foot back, laughing and trying to ignore the feeling simmering low in my belly. “Don’t kiss my foot.”
“I’ll kiss your foot if I want to.” He grabs my other foot and kisses the arch, this time lingering, then running his nose up my leg. It’s hard to swallow, and I’m struggling to breathe. With his eyes closed, he feathers kisses up my bare thigh. He lifts my leg just enough to gently suck at the flesh behind my knee.
“Ah, August.” Pleasure arrows through me, and I press my back into the sofa.
“You’re sensitive there,” he says, his voice husky. “What about here?”
Open-mouthed kisses climb the inside of one thigh while his hands minister to my other leg, stroking, kneading my calf. I stare at his mouth drawing on a muscle in my thigh, an erotic suction that ripples shockwaves to my core. The sound of it, his lips and teeth and tongue working in tandem to mark me, leaves me a trembling mess.
August lifts his head, catching my dazed eyes with his. “Are you naked under this robe, Iris?” His voice is a hope and a prayer, and he makes me feel divine. Worshipped.
I nod, gulping down my anticipation, the nerves over what happens next.
August groans and drops his forehead to my thigh, still stinging and wet from his mouth. “You’re killing me, babe.”
“I was asleep when you texted, and—”
“You sleep naked?” His palms skid along the outside of my thighs through the silk, heating me up even more. “Shit, Iris.”
He draws the panels of the robe together over my legs, concealing me from view, and drops a chaste kiss on my thigh before standing up. “I should go.” He looks around. “What’d I do with my keys?”
“Why are you . . .?” I stand, too. Barefoot, I rise no higher than the middle of his chest. “You’re leaving?”
He studies me and squeezes the back of his neck. “Keeping it one hundred here, Iris. You said you needed to take this slow, and I don’t want to make you feel . . . I don’t know. Pressured.” His broad palm cups my chin, and he caresses my lips with his fingers. “I want this so badly.” He shakes his head. “But I’ve waited a really long time for you, and my out-of-control libido isn’t fucking that up.”
He starts to pull away, but I place my hand over his on my face.
“What if I like your out-of-control libido?” One step forward narrows the space between us.
“Iris, don’t . . .” He bites his bottom lip and knuckles my cheekbone. “I’m gonna go.”
When I thought of this moment, the moment when I’d have sex again, I thought there would be trepidation. Terror. That the memory of what Caleb did to me that last night, and all the nights before, would shadow my intimacy with someone else.
But it’s not the pain of that night on my mind. I’m not remembering his hostile takeover of my body at all. I’m navigating these seas for the first time—waves of want I’ve never ridden. My body is a stranger to me, an imposter wearing my skin, but disguised in new urges.
“Would you like to see me, August?” I rub the silk ties of the belt between my fingers.
“What?” Shock and hunger vie on his face. “What do you mean?”
Instead of talking, since that seems to be getting me nowhere, I slowly untie the belt and let the silk glide over my shoulders and puddle at my feet.
His sharply indrawn breath and the ravenous way his eyes eat at me lick fire under my skin. I reach up to the hair knotted on my head, releasing it so it cascades in heavy coils around my shoulders and down my back.
Power surges through me. The power to render such a huge, beautiful man speechless with the gravity of my robe falling to the ground. With his first sight of me, naked and ready and strong. I have the power to determine when I share myself and when I will withhold.
Your body is yours. Yours to keep and yours to share.
“I want to be with you, August.” I step so close my nipples brush against his T-shirt. He hasn’t moved—hasn’t touched me or said a word. His Adam’s apple bobs in his throat with a deep swallow. “I choose you.”
“Are you sure?” His voice scrapes, scratchy and barely audible. “Because once we start . . .”
“I don’t want to stop.” I walk past him, my body buzzing from the heat of his eyes on my back, my legs, and my ass. I head toward the bedroom, turning to see if he’ll follow. “I’m sure.”
I expected some other response. I didn’t think I’d have to persuade him. Maybe I miscalculated. I’m considering running back, grabbing my robe and yelling April Fool’s in October—anything to retract my offer. But then large, warm hands span my waist from behind, and the cotton of his sweatpants brushes my legs as he matches my steps. In my bedroom, I turn to face him, reaching around to lock my door. It brings my naked body into contact with his fully clothed one.
“Sarai stumbles into my bedroom sometimes,” I whisper, gulping at the sudden nerves assailing me.
Only minutes ago, I felt like
a sensual, adventurous creature. Now, I’m starting to just feel exposed and relatively inexperienced compared to all the women he’s been with.
He doesn’t respond to my statement but leans down to capture my lips, swirling his tongue inside my mouth. Driving one hand into my hair, he sends his other hand to my waist and down to cup the globe of my ass.
“I’m struggling here, Iris,” he says against my lips, his breath picking up. “I want to give you time to change your mind, but with you like this . . .” He catalogues every nuance of my body, starting at my toes and working his way up until he meets my eyes.
“You’re the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.” There’s passion, desire in his eyes, but also rampant emotion. And I realize I’m not just sharing myself with him. He wants to share himself with me, too, and my mind eases. Any leftover doubts and residual fears fade.
I go down on my knees in front of him, slipping my hands into his sweatpants and working them down narrow hips and over powerful thighs. I lick my lips at the sight of his erection tenting his briefs.
“Babe, you don’t have to . . .” He draws his brows together. “What are you doing?”
I know he doesn’t mean that literally. He’s probably lost count of how many blow jobs he’s gotten over the course of his life. Hell, even just over the course of his career.
He won’t lose count of this one. This one, he’ll never forget. Not because I’m better than those other women, but because I want him more. There’s no way they had this with him, what started between us that night and has only grown since.
“What am I doing? Making you feel like a winner,” I say, trapping his eyes with mine and taking the tip into my mouth.
“Holy . . .” His breath stutters, and he slumps against my bedroom door. “Babe.”
I lick the rigid length of him, my tongue wrapping around warm steel. He plunges his hand into my hair, commanding my mouth to take him deeper. For a second, I freeze, thinking of all the times Caleb forced me to do this at gunpoint. How he liked to make me choke and drool—how he invented ways to debase me. Before fear can take root, I look up, and it’s still August. The look on his face is not sick pleasure, but awe.
“You make me feel so good,” he says huskily. “There’s never been anyone like you, Iris. There never will be.”
With every encouraging word, I take another inch. I roll his balls in my hands, emboldened by the sounds of his pleasure. Even when he becomes the aggressor, holding my head still, pumping between my lips, growling and tugging my head back, I don’t forget who’s fucking my mouth. I don’t lose track of this moment—of its scope. Its breadth. It’s one of the biggest moments of my life, and there’s only room for the two of us. There’s no room for anyone else. Not Caleb. Not even the naysayers who’ll accuse me of being a gold-digger who hops from player to player. No one else intrudes.
It’s just me and the man I love.
43
August
I come in spectacular fashion. Iris sucks it all down, flattening her small hand around my ass, clutching me as close as she can get me. Her eyes are molten, the pupils golden and nebulous. I’ve seen her eyes change colors, oscillating through every shade of brown and green, but right now they’re almost gold. She glows with the satisfaction of pleasing me, licking her swollen lips, rubbing them back and forth over my still-wet tip.
Desire resurges, overtaking me like a hurricane. I pull her to her feet and lift her. She wraps her legs around my waist, and her forehead drops to rest against mine as I walk us to the bed. Our breaths meet, a sultry congress between our mouths. I lay her down like she might break, but I already know I’m gonna fuck her like she’s indestructible.
How can I not?
Dark hair streams behind her, and I study her for long minutes, determined not to rush this. She’s small. Her shoulders are slim, her breasts full, her waist narrow, and her hips flared. A master craftsman took his time with the dips and lines of her body, ensuring symmetry. He exaggerated her curves, balancing them to perfection.
With one knee, I nudge her leg to the side. Taking my cue, she silently opens both wide.
“I want to look at you.” I glance between her legs, waiting for her subtle nod. I push her legs up until her knees are bent and she’s completely exposed to me. A self-conscious laugh slips past her lips.
“August.” She covers her face, hiding her eyes. “Are you just gonna stare at it all night?”
“Definitely not.” With my hand under her ass, I guide her up to me and swipe my tongue through her wet folds. Her taste, her smell, the silky heat of her saturates my senses. I press my palms inside her thighs, widening her even more until that bud buried between her lips plumps and rises, begging to be sucked, bitten, consumed. I comply, giving her clit the complete and undivided attention it deserves, while one hand slides up her torso to twist and pluck her nipple.
“Oh my God.” Her hips buck into my face. Her back arches. Inch by inch, her body loses control, loses inhibition. When I probe her entrance, rolling my tongue tight enough to slip into the small opening, her hands claw into my hair and rake over my shoulders. God, she’s wild. She presses the arch of her foot on my shoulder, urging my face deeper between her legs. She grinds against my lips, and I love every hot, juicy second of it.
Her orgasm is an infinite refrain of whimpers and moans, a keening sound set loose in her throat. She unravels before my eyes, liquefying right into my hands, her lips moving in a soundless, sensual prayer.
She’s limp and sated. She got hers. She took it, and I love that. I shower her shoulders and breasts with kisses like she’s the only girl in the world, because for me she is. I glide my fingers over her clit, inserting one, two, three fingers until she’s fucking my hand so hard, the headboard knocks the wall. She wrestles with her passion, pinning it down and then bucking wildly when it flips her and regains control. I love her wanton and disorderly.
I suckle at one breast and continue working between her thighs. Her eyes glaze over. Her mouth slackens with unrelenting pleasure. I lick the underside of her breast, my open mouth kissing the curve.
“Oh, God, August,” she says hoarsely. “Now. Please now.”
I get up to grab my sweatpants and pull a condom from my wallet. It’s on before I even make it to the bed. Her eyes fix hungrily on my cock. I pump it lightly, as much for me as for her.
“It’s all yours, Iris.” I settle between her hips and thighs, relishing this last moment of mystery when I haven’t known this part of her. The moment before a miracle of intimacy, when we merge and for those moments, become one.
I plan to ease in, take my time, but as soon as my cock gets that first taste, I surrender to a force that is almost centripetal, drawing me in deeper. I plunge into the tight clutch of her body. She folds around me as I enter. When I withdraw, there’s a reluctant letting go. With every thrust, she takes more of me. Her body is the call, and mine is the response.
“Holy shit, Iris,” I groan into her neck.
I’ve never had anything like this. Not just her pussy, though the tight, wet grip of her is the best I’ve ever had. No, I’ve never felt anything like this. Like my soul is being turned inside out. Does she feel this, too? I rear up on my elbows to watch the answering passion play across her face. I dip to kiss her, and the contact ignites a scorching intercourse of lips and teeth. We’re mouths clashing, hips colliding, and hearts pounding in tandem, in sync. This feeling is sorcery. Her touch is a spell, and Iris? She’s my witch.
She goes first, her hands shaking as she cups my face, her head tipping back into the pillow, the elegant line of her neck straining and exposed. I rut unrelentingly, pounding between her legs, gripping her thigh tightly, holding onto her for dear life because I’m coming apart. Splintering. Parts of me peel away, falling at her feet.
“Don’t stop,” she whispers. “More, August. I didn’t know it could be . . . I had no idea. Oh, God, I had no idea.”
The awe in her words and in her e
yes undoes me. I grip her neck, nipping at her lips and muttering words of worship into the untamed spill of her hair.
I empty myself of all I was before and take whatever she has to give. There’s a newness when our eyes meet—wonder in the laughter we share while I hold her. We don’t speak, but there’s eloquence in our fingertips, in our hands as we touch and explore. Our bodies commune, confess.
I don’t have to say the words.
She knows I’m hers.
44
Iris
“Okay if I move that one here,” I say, shifting a number on my spreadsheet, “then I could put that over here.”
I move fifty dollars from the column marked electric bill and squint at the bottom line like it might have grown bigger when I look back.
Nope. Still a tiny amount of money to live on after the bills are all paid.
Paid-ish.
I’ll call on the water bill to see if I can get an extension.
I’m still doing the dollar shuffle at my makeshift desk, also known as the dining room table, when a pair of huge hands slides under my arms to cup my breasts through my T-shirt. My nipples instantly pebble beneath the cotton, and my breath constricts. August’s thumbs tease the tips of my breasts, and he sucks at the curve of my neck.
“Come back to bed, Iris,” he says huskily. “You know I have to leave soon and I reeeeeeeally need to fuck you again.”
The words stroke a finger along my clit.
This man.
I had no idea—no earthly idea sex could be so addictive and satisfying and transformational. Every time August is inside me, I feel different afterwards. Like we’re swapping atoms—I’m taking some of him and giving so much of me.
I used to think Lo was being silly when she said I settled for sex with Caleb because I had nothing to compare it to. Boy, was I wrong. I want to write letters to Cosmo about my experience. Diary of the Previously Underwhelmed.
Maybe that could make me a little change on the side . . .
