Like Lovers Do

by Tracey Livesay

  “I understand your friends’ concerns,” she said. “And they’ve been wonderful. As for your ex, I can handle her. That’s my job while I’m here, right?”

  Right. As far as Nic was concerned, it was the main reason she was here.

  So get your lust in check, Van Mont, and enjoy this time with your friends.

  They ended up at a casual Italian restaurant in town. Tinsley hadn’t joined them, telling Bronwen she’d made other plans. She hadn’t been missed. They’d eaten, laughed, and shared a lot of memories. Recalling what Nic had mentioned about the extra guest on her vacay, he made sure to check in with her often. But she appeared to be enjoying herself, talking to Bronwen, occasionally joining in on their ribbing, but mostly, watching them—him—with an indulgent smile curving her lips. At one point during dinner, he’d reached for her hand. With their fingers entwined together, it had felt natural to raise them and kiss her knuckles.

  Tinsley wasn’t present. There had been no need to pretend. But he’d done it for no other reason than he’d wanted to.

  Nic had turned her bright vivid gaze on him and in that moment, everyone else faded away, leaving just the two of them.

  You know my nipples are supersensitive. I can come just from you pulling & sucking on them.

  Then that’s what I’ll do . . .

  “Do you need us to leave?” Davis had asked, a smirk on his face.

  Ben blinked as reality came crashing back.

  “Don’t offer if you don’t mean it,” Nic said.

  Everyone laughed, sweeping away that moment of tension. But when he’d shot a quick glance at Nic, it was to find her heated gaze on him. He waited for her to look away.

  She didn’t. She’d held his gaze, then tilted her head to the side, as if issuing him a challenge.

  What was going on here?

  “This has been fun,” Palmer now said. “The place hasn’t changed one bit. I think that’s the same jukebox we used to play in high school.”

  “Is it? I don’t think I noticed it when we came the last time,” Bronwen said, accepting a glass of wine from the server with a smile. “It may look like the same facade, but jukeboxes are digital now. And there are newer songs.”

  An idea occurred to Ben and he stood. “Will you excuse me for a second?”

  “Dude, see if they have Green Day,” Davis called out.

  Ben waved him off and walked over to the machine. Bronwen was right. The outside was the same: rounded top, rectangular bottom, with plastic tubes that lit up in a rainbow of different colors. However, instead of the usual letter-number button combo, there was a large touch screen. He scrolled through the selections, stopping when a particular song caught his eye. Checking the queue, he saw his choice would come after the song currently playing.

  “What’s coming?” Davis asked when he returned to the table. “Did they have ‘Holiday’? Or are you yearning for the nostalgia of the aughts? Some Evanescence, perhaps?”

  “I wouldn’t do that,” Ben said. “We barely made it through Palmer’s Amy Lee fascination the first time around.”

  “Can you blame me?” Palmer asked. “She was the perfect combination of beauty and toughness.”

  “It’s clear you have a type,” Nic said.

  They all looked at Bronwen before bursting out laughing. As their merriment died down, the familiar strains of the song he’d chosen filled the area.

  “Wise men say, only fools rush in . . .”

  He watched Nic, waiting for her to—

  She gasped and glanced at him. “No fair, Van Mont!”

  He stood and held his hand out. “Dance with me?”

  She glanced around. “No one else is dancing.”

  He didn’t care. He wanted to hold her, to be close to her. To confirm the signals she was tossing in his direction.

  His skin burned to touch hers.

  “Then we’ll be the first.”

  Nic stared up at Ben, warmed by the heated longing radiating from his beautiful eyes. As Bronwen had predicted, he and his friends had transformed from sandy beach bums with little effort. More than one appreciative eye had followed them as they’d walked from their parked cars to the restaurant. Ben’s dark hair gleamed and he looked casually chic in a pair of army green chinos and a blue-and-white-striped collarless shirt. She’d never gotten off on the Ivy League, New England prep style before, but damn if Ben didn’t make it look good.

  Placing her hand in his, she was no longer surprised at the tingle jolting up her arm with the skin-on-skin contact. She allowed him to pull her to her feet and lead her closer to the jukebox where there was a small space next to a darkened hallway that led to the bathrooms. When he stopped, she went into his arms and, with his hands clasped at her lower back, began swaying to the music.

  They’d hugged before but, with the song playing in the background, everything felt a bit more intimate than in the past. The notes flowed over her and her body relaxed into his. She laid her head against his chest and heard the deep, steady thrum of his heart. So solid. So strong. Just like Ben.

  “But I can’t help, falling in love with you . . .”

  “I’m glad you’re here with me,” he said, his fingers massaging her hips. “Thank you for coming.”

  Sensation arrowed through her and she swallowed. “You’re welcome. It’s the least I can do, considering.”

  “One isn’t conditioned on the other,” he said softly, their conversation for their ears only. “No matter how this turns out, I’m going to make sure no one interferes with your fellowship.”

  She knew that. It was another weight tipping the scale in favor of opening up and giving them a chance.

  Because that’s what she’d decided to do.

  “I love Haley’s version of this song,” she said instead, drawing a pattern on his bicep.

  “I know.” His breath tickled the curls at her temple.

  “Just like I know you prefer the original Elvis version.”

  “I do.”

  “I can’t believe I’d never heard it before it was used in a gum commercial. Now it’s in heavy rotation on my favorite playlist.”

  “And since you’re not shy about sharing your music . . .”

  She laughed. “Sharing” was a nice way to put it. She had a tendency to play her music loudly when in certain moods.

  “Oh, like a river flows, surely to the sea, darlin’ so it goes, some things are meant to be . . .”

  He squeezed her close as they continued swaying to the haunting, romantic melody. His thighs were strong as they brushed against hers and the muscles in his back flexed against her palms. Her fingers roamed over the square footage, with a latitude and abandon she’d never before felt free to indulge.

  She took a deep breath and admitted, “And that’s what scares me.”

  He stiffened. “You’ve lost me.”

  “The song. Us. Other than my mom and my girlfriends, you’re the person closest to me. I don’t even know how that happened.”

  “I said something similar to Davis and Palmer.”

  She looked up at him then. It was time to be honest. To put it all out in the open. No more flirty signals. “We haven’t done anything irrevocable yet. We can go back.”

  His eyes glittered down at her. “Can we?”

  “If we pursue this . . . attraction, we could risk our friendship. I don’t want to lose that.”

  But the compulsion to be with him was getting harder and harder to resist.

  “I don’t, either. I haven’t.”

  She frowned. “What does that mean?”

  “Do you think this is the first time I’ve thought about you in that way?”

  Wait, what? “It wasn’t?”

  “No. But I can’t ignore it anymore. I don’t want to lose you but I can’t get those texts or the picture you sent out of my mind. Can you?”

  “Oh, for I, I can’t help, falling in love with you.”

  She shook her head and a curl flew into her face. He s
moothed it back, his fingers lingering on her cheek.

  “Hey guys,” Davis called out. “The song is ove— Hey! Where are you going?”

  “Davis, be quiet,” she heard Bronwen say as Ben led her down the darkened hallway and past the restrooms to another door she hadn’t noticed.

  “I want to finish our conversation,” he said, pushing open the door and leading her out to a small balcony that overlooked the restaurant’s parking lot and the harbor beyond.

  She braced her hands against the railing and watched the setting sun turn the sky a gorgeous pinkish purple.

  He came up behind her, trapping her body between his and the post. “When we were in high school, the patrons would come out here to smoke. I took a chance this was still here, although the restaurants and bars on the island are now smoke-free.”

  And speaking of smoke . . .

  Just like this morning, the heat from his body burned through the thin fabric of her clothes. She leaned back and let her head fall onto his chest. “What do we do?”

  He gripped her hips. “About what?”

  “Making the transition. From friends to lovers.”

  “Why does it have to be one or the other? Why can’t it be both?”

  It could be. It just hadn’t been her experience before.

  “I like the sound of that.”

  “Good. Because there’s something I want to talk to you about.”

  More talking? Nic rolled her eyes. She’d had enough of talking.

  Before she could respond, Ben continued, “I was very interested to learn that your nipples were so sensitive. Would you only come from me sucking them or does touching them work, too?”

  Nic gasped and the subjects in question tightened.

  Holy shit! Ben didn’t just sext, he liked to talk dirty, too.

  She had the sudden, clear realization that equating easygoing with safe might’ve been one of the biggest mistakes she’d made in her life.

  She glanced around to see if anyone could hear them.

  “There’s no one out here. We’re alone. Tell me,” he said, his voice husky and urgent in her ear.

  Heat pooled between her thighs and she licked her lips. “Playing with my nipples feels good but having your mouth on them would seal the deal.”

  “I can do that.”

  Hmmm, she bet he could. “It might take a while.”

  He nipped the tip of her ear, then dipped his tongue along the outer ridge. “I’d be willing to keep at it, for as long as you’d need.”

  She moaned and rolled her head to the side. “Would you mind if I touched myself while you did it?”

  “Of course not.”

  Talking to him this way, not able to see one another in the ever-darkening night, was turning her on almost as much as his words.

  “You wouldn’t think I was being selfish?”

  He brushed his lips down the side of her neck. “You know what you want and you go after it.”

  She shivered and gripped the railing so hard she thought the metal would crush between her fingers.

  At the appropriate age, her mother had given her a frank talk about sex. She’d also explained about masturbation and the importance of a girl knowing her own body, so the first time she had an orgasm, it wasn’t tied to the person who gave it to her. Dee hadn’t wanted her daughter thinking she needed a man or to engage in risky behaviors to feel that way again.

  “I love that,” he said against her skin. “In fact, the thought of you rubbing your clit for your pleasure makes me hard as fuck.”

  Her knees actually went weak.

  “Oh really?” Turning to face him, she reached down and cupped him through his pants, swallowing as she felt his rigid length.

  He was right.

  He grabbed the railing on either side of her. “You know where else I want to put my mouth?”

  It took Nic a moment to shake off the lethargic spell his words and body were casting over her. “Where?”

  “On your pussy. I’ve dreamed of spreading your thighs and tasting your sweetness on my tongue.”

  Breath evacuated her body, leaving her light-headed. Good God, the man had a way with words.

  “And thanks to your skillful fingers—”

  “How do you know they’re skillful?” she asked, inhaling deeply, needing as much air as possible.

  He kissed her forehead, the tip of her nose, and her lips. “Because you’re the chief orthopedic surgical resident at one of the top programs in the country. Because you demand excellence of yourself in everything you do. Because you’re you.”

  For one brief, dizzying moment, her heart stopped in her chest. And then it began a frenzied beat that should’ve sent her into cardiac arrest.

  Ben continued. “As I was saying, by this time you’re probably so wet—”

  “I am.” Both in his fantasy and in real life. “My fingers would slip through my folds and I’d want something to slide into me.”

  “I’d have just the thing for you,” he said, with a smile that tilted one corner of his mouth and sent sensation arrowing in her belly.

  She squeezed his cock again. “I know.”

  He leaned his body away from her, allowing the momentum to bring him back until the evidence of his arousal was imprinted on her belly. “I want to fuck you so badly I can barely see straight.”

  She stared up into his deep brown eyes and tumbled headlong into them.

  “Then what are you waiting for?”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Ben opened her door and helped her out of the car, but made no move to enter the house. After dinner, Davis had lobbied to hit a nightclub one town over in Oak Bluffs, but Nic had been so worked up from their foreplay that she was practically vibrating.

  They’d declined the invitation.

  Standing in the driveway, the moonlight casting shadows over his features, he asked, “Are you sure you still want to do this?”

  Disappointment tightened her chest. Had he changed his mind? “Yes. Don’t you?”

  “Oh yeah.” He pushed her back against the vehicle and captured her lips in a hot openmouthed kiss.

  There was no tentativeness, no testing of the waters with sweet, soft pecks that gradually heated into something more. Ben took her mouth like a person claiming what was rightfully theirs. She shivered in delight at the confident display and allowed the possession.

  His tongue swept into her mouth and rasped exquisitely against hers. Butterflies performed aerobatics in her belly like they were auditioning for the Blue Angels. Wanting to be closer to him, Nic clutched his shirt in her fingers and stood on her toes to deepen the kiss. He grabbed her ass and lifted her against the solid ridge in his pants. The bulge that’d had her mouth watering since she’d felt it half an hour before.

  She’d kissed a fair number of men and there had been some skillful kissers in that group. Sometimes the kisses led to more, sometimes they didn’t. While technique was everything in an operating room, when it came to fucking, passion was paramount. Ben didn’t have perfect technique, but he made up for it with an intensity she’d take over precision any day. Ben was overflowing with passion, making him far and away the best kisser she’d ever had. He kissed her with an erotic longing and desperation that sent moisture to her pussy, drenching her panties.

  I want you, his kisses seemed to say. Don’t hold back. Give me everything.

  And she did.

  As his mouth devoured hers, she ravaged his, letting her hands sift through the soft strands at the nape of his neck, flitter across his broad shoulders, and clutch his wide, muscled back. She couldn’t get enough of him, his taste, his smell, his touch. Their loud, ragged breaths acted as an audible aphrodisiac, turning her on even more. Only when the warning signs of lack of oxygen began blaring, did she pull away from him and drag in deep mouthfuls of air.

  Eyes wide, she stared at him. Holy fuck. Their first real kiss and it had been . . . extraordinary.

  Is this what she’d been missing? />
  He watched her, his eyes glittering, his chest rising and falling swiftly. “You’re so beautiful.”

  Her heart leaped in her chest at his quiet, reverent words.

  She’d always wanted to be judged for her intellect, not her aesthetic. But Ben was her friend. He knew her strengths and her weaknesses. Knew her capabilities and her deficiencies. She didn’t have to prove herself to him and that made her want to be attractive for him.

  Lifting her in his arms, he placed a brief kiss on her neck, turned, and headed inside.

  So strong. She wrapped her legs around his waist and held on. “Where are you going?”

  “To our room.”

  “No.” She squeezed his hips with her thighs to get his attention. “Let’s go over there.”

  He turned his head to see where she’d pointed. “To the hammock?”

  “Uh-huh.” She laved his earlobe with her tongue before taking the fleshy part between her teeth.

  He moaned and dipped his head toward her. “You’re not worried about people seeing us?”

  What people?

  “No one’s here. But even if they were, it’d just add a little excitement.”

  He growled. “Damn, you’re perfect.”

  He crossed the expanse of the manicured lawn, alert and careful. She used the short trip to kiss every part of him she could. His cheeks, his neck, his jaw, his mouth. And still it wasn’t enough. She wanted to consume him and the intensity of her desire almost frightened her.

  Almost.

  When they reached the hammock, he released her and her body slid down his, every part of her sparking with pleasure at the contact, until her feet touched the soft grass.

  He cupped her cheeks. “Do you know how long I’ve wanted to do this?”

  His voice was a verbal abrasion against all of her sensitive parts.

  She shook her head, unable to speak, mesmerized by the inferno blazing in his eyes.

  “From the first moment I saw you.”

  He’d wanted her back then? She didn’t have time to process his words or what they meant before he was lowering his head. This time when they kissed, it was slow and languid and carnal and she’d been oh so wrong about his technique. Or lack thereof. He knew how to work his tongue, so that it sensually explored her mouth. Long, bold strokes that stole her breath and her soul and made her a part of his. He cradled her face and nibbled along her lower lip, feasting upon her until her bones were molten and all she could do was grip his hips and hold on for the ride.