by A. K. Evans
When I tossed it aside and looked down at Mack, he was staring at me with an intensity so strong I could see it even in the dimly lit room. Something about the look told me there was something profound happening. It was enough to make me pause and wait.
I never could have prepared myself for the words that came out of his mouth next.
“Do you know how much I love you?” he asked.
My lips parted. My heart pounded in my chest. My fingernails dug into the skin at his shoulders.
I had no verbal response to his question.
Mack loved me.
He loved me.
Maybe it shouldn’t have come as a surprise, but it did. After all these years, after the way I pushed him out of my life, I thought I should have had to work harder to be deserving of his love.
But I was lucky, and he was a dream come true.
I took so long allowing his words and the feeling they gave me to sink in that I didn’t get a chance to respond before I felt Mack press a kiss to the center of my chest. One of my hands flew to the back of his head as his mouth drifted to the side and he began to flick his tongue over my nipple.
“Mack,” I rasped.
He sucked my nipple into his mouth. I arched my back, sending it deeper.
One of Mack’s hands drifted down over my ass. He squeezed me there. Then he dragged his mouth and tongue across my chest to the other breast. After giving that side the same attention he gave the first, Mack effortlessly picked me up and flipped me onto my back. He captured my mouth with his, his tongue plunging inside, as he began to grind his erection against me.
I was already so turned on, and he wasn’t even inside me. How could he manage to build me up like this when we both still had our bottoms on?
At the very moment I had that thought, Mack lifted his body up, brought his hands to my hips, and yanked my sweats and underwear down my legs. The next several seconds passed with him simply allowing his gaze to roam over my naked body.
“You’re so beautiful, Marley,” he declared with a bit of disbelief in his tone.
I reached out and started to tug down on his sweats when he touched his fingertips to my inner thigh. He used his other hand to help me with his bottoms, and a moment later, his cock sprang free.
Just as I wrapped my fingers around his impressive length, his fingers on my thigh drifted up and touched me right between my legs.
Throughout it all, we never once lost eye contact. The spark between us was undeniable, and that spark quickly burst into flames as neither of us could hold back our moans.
I stroked his cock while he drove one finger into my vagina. He wasted no time pressing his thumb to my clit and circling, quickly building me up.
It felt so good, and I was certain I wasn’t going to last.
“Mack,” I called out a warning.
“Are you going to come for me?” he asked, the unmistakable sound of pride in his voice.
My grip on him tightened, but my strokes slowed until they ultimately stopped when I closed my eyes and pressed my head back deeper into the pillow as my orgasm tore through me.
Mack began to slow the pace of his fingers when I started to come down, until he eventually stopped. Then his eyes roamed over my body before settling on my face. “I feel like I’ve waited a lifetime for that.”
“You and me both,” I murmured.
Mack smiled, leaned down, and touched his mouth to mine. After he kissed me, he said, “I love having your hand on me right now, but I want to be inside you, baby. Can you let me go so I can grab a condom?”
As much as I didn’t want to let him go, I knew it was the only way he’d be able to get a condom and I could finally feel him inside me, giving us both the opportunity to experience something it seemed we’d wanted for a long time.
So, I let go of him.
Mack moved out of the bed, grabbed a condom, and stood there as he rolled it on. I didn’t take my eyes off of him for one single second.
The next thing I knew, he was back in bed with me, and his hips were settled between my parted thighs. I could feel the tip of his erection pressed against me. He brought his face to within inches of mine and said, “I love you, Marley.”
This time, I didn’t hesitate. “I love you, too, Mack.”
That was all we said before Mack pushed forward and was inside. He buried himself to the root and held himself there for a few moments. “I would have waited another lifetime for this, baby.”
Baby.
I loved that.
“It’s always been you, Mack. Always.”
At that, Mack groaned and began to move. There were no longer any words between us. It was all about connecting with each other in a physical way. It was about naked bodies, soft caresses, gentle kisses, and seductive sounds.
My hands roamed over his shoulders, down his back, and to his ass. The strength of his body was mind-blowing, and the stamina was on another level. Mack didn’t rush things between us. I would have thought we’d have been frantically clawing at one another, but it wasn’t like that.
Of course, I didn’t think that meant we wouldn’t have that someday. This was perfect now. I loved that our first time together wasn’t frenzied and hurried. It was soft, slow, and sweet. It was about us, two people who had loved each other for a lifetime, finally coming together and getting what we both deserved.
I couldn’t kiss him enough. He couldn’t touch me enough. We rolled several times—me on my back, him on his back, me on my back again. We ended up on our sides somewhere in the middle of it.
It was everything I could have wanted and more.
And eventually, the physical reaction to all that was happening between us could no longer be held back. We were both panting, our bodies had a sheen of sweat on them, and there was a sudden sense of urgency.
“Mack,” I breathed.
“Marley,” he rasped.
That’s when it happened. Mack and I came apart around one another at the same time. It was the most beautiful experience of my entire life.
It meant so much to me that when we both came down and were on the other side of our orgasms, tears leaked from my eyes.
Mack immediately noticed and grew concerned. “Are you okay? Did I hurt you?” he asked, his body rigid.
I shook my head. “No, I’m just… that was beyond what I could have ever imagined. It just felt…” I trailed off, trying to figure out the right word to describe it.
“Perfect?” Mack asked.
I nodded. “Yeah. It was perfect.”
He smiled and pressed his lips against mine. After he kissed me, he pulled back slightly and said, “I agree.”
Loving that he felt the same, I lifted my head from the pillow and kissed him again. I did that for a while before he tore his mouth from mine and explained, “I need to get this condom off, Marley. Let me do that before you get me all worked up again.”
I bit my lip.
Mack chuckled.
He kissed my cheek, pulled out, and made his way to the bathroom.
I closed my eyes and sighed with relief. Coming to his room tonight was definitely not a mistake.
Fifteen
Marley
I didn’t think it could get any better.
Not after what we just had.
Yet, where I was right now was all the proof I needed that things could get even better.
Because now I was in bed with Mack after we’d both gotten ourselves cleaned up. He was on his back, and my body was curled into his. My cheek was pressed against his chest, and we were both completely naked.
“This is nice,” I said as my fingertips traced delicately over his pec.
The man’s body was unbelievable. And it was all mine now. Mine. Mine. Mine. I just needed to make sure I didn’t start drooling on him. Seeing him naked, it made sense why so many people trusted him to teach them how to keep themselves in shape. Mack’s body was utter perfection.
“Yeah,” he agreed. “Everything that happened b
efore this was nice, too.”
I smiled. Of course, he thought that.
“I’m so glad you’re back in my life, Mack,” I shared. “This, what we have right now, is better than I thought it would be.”
“I feel the same, Marley,” he assured me.
The silence stretched between us again, and it was nice to just be like that with one another. I especially liked the way his fingertips were tracing absentmindedly over the skin at my hip.
Something so simple had taken me back. I could very vividly recall the ease with which Mack and I used to be around one another. It wasn’t simply just two friends hanging out with one another the same way I did with Ben, Easton, or Ryder. Mack was different. He’d always been different. We used to sit side by side on the couch and we never hesitated to touch one another. It hadn’t ever been in a sexual way, but it was always comfortable.
Right now, the way my fingers were tracing over his pec and the way his fingers were tracing over my hip indicated that same level of ease between us that had always been there was still there. But it also suggested something else now. That little extra something that had been missing years ago.
The intimacy.
Yep. Things had definitely gotten better, and I totally believed I was one lucky woman.
Eventually, Mack broke the silence and asked, “Can I ask you a question?”
“Sure,” I answered.
He hesitated briefly before he questioned me, “Did you really fall in love with me back in high school?”
Did he think I would make that up?
“Yes,” I confirmed.
“Fuck,” he hissed.
My body tensed, and I lifted my cheek from his chest so I could look at his face. “What’s wrong?” I wondered.
“I just… I never should have held myself back,” he began. “I should have pursued you.”
This declaration came as a surprise to me.
“You felt the same?” I countered.
Maybe it was strange to ask that. I didn’t know. Mack had said that I meant the world to him, but he never actually said that he was in love with me. And considering my track record, I didn’t think it was wise to be presumptuous.
“Absolutely.”
Suddenly, I was confused. This didn’t make any sense.
“So, if you felt so strongly about me, why didn’t you pursue me?” I asked.
Mack didn’t respond, and I started to wonder if he thought that I was angry about it. Just as I was about to let him know that wasn’t the case, he shared, “I never thought you wouldn’t be there.”
Now I was even more confused than I had been a few seconds ago. “What?”
His fingers pressed in a little deeper at my side. “I guess I didn’t anticipate things falling apart between us the way they did,” he started. “I thought I had time to let things settle down before I took that step with you. I can’t really remember a time when I didn’t like you, but it was right after that ski club trip when we kissed on the bus that I knew I needed to do something about what I felt for you.”
My brows pulled together. “But you didn’t,” I noted. And hearing him admit now that he had wanted to stung, because even though he never allowed things to get awkward between us after that, he never indicated he liked it enough to want to do it again. I had tried not to think too much about it at the time, but it was hard considering I’d liked him so much.
“No. Because things went south with the rumors about us almost immediately afterward,” he explained. “I didn’t want you to get the wrong impression and think that I was trying to take advantage of that situation.”
“I don’t think I would have ever thought you were trying to do that,” I told him.
“Please don’t say that,” he begged. “I already feel enough regret.”
“I’m sorry,” I apologized. “It doesn’t all fall on you. I felt the way I did about you. I could have made that more clear.”
Mack’s hand had drifted from my hip to my ass. He gave me a gentle squeeze there before he said, “Well, you certainly did that tonight.”
I smiled and dropped my cheek back to his chest.
I had done that tonight. And despite all the nerves I had about it, it turned out to be the best decision of my life.
“Yeah,” I replied softly.
“Why?”
“Why what?” I asked.
“Why did you do it? What made you get out of bed and walk down the hall to me tonight?” Mack questioned me.
I licked my lips and admitted, “I kept hearing the words you said to me earlier ringing over and over in my head.”
“What words? What did I say?” he pressed.
Lifting my cheek from his chest again, I looked at him and repeated his words. “You meant the world to me.”
There was a lengthy pause before he replied, “That’s all you needed to hear?”
“No. Yes. I don’t know,” I vacillated. “I guess it was that combined with everything else. I kept thinking about how it seemed that we both had wanted each other for such a long time, but neither of us took the steps to do anything about it. I honestly didn’t know that things would lead to where they did tonight. I didn’t even have that expectation.”
I paused a moment to gather my thoughts before I continued, “We lost so much time, Mack. I feel wholly responsible for it, and I guess I was hoping that you still felt strongly about me like you did back then. I wanted to mean the world to you again.”
“Baby,” he whispered, his arms tightening around me. “I’m so glad you decided to come to me.”
“I was nervous, but I didn’t want to waste any more time,” I shared. “Plus, over the time that things were going well before we talked about what happened in high school, I found myself feeling a lot of the same feelings I experienced before things went south. In fact, I found myself feeling a lot of new feelings, too.”
Mack completely surprised me when he returned, “It feels good to know I wasn’t alone.”
I tipped my chin up and out to the side. “What does that mean?”
Mack lifted one hand to the side of my head and drove his fingers into my hair. He allowed his fingers to run through my strands before he offered, “I didn’t think you felt the same about me. And after what you told me out on the balcony the other night about you telling Dakota there wasn’t an us in the way she and Beth and probably Faye were thinking, I started to think that there was no hope for that. I honestly believed you didn’t want anything beyond the possibility of repairing our friendship.”
At the time I said it, I hadn’t considered how that would come across to him. Then again, I hadn’t really contemplated the possibility of there ever being anything between Mack and me. There had been so much hurt and time and history between us. I didn’t think we’d ever be able to overcome it. Truthfully, I didn’t think I would have been able to get over it, even if it seemed on the surface that I had and even if, deep down, I really wanted to.
When I took too long considering all this without a response to Mack, he went on and informed me, “I was struggling.”
My body tensed. “Struggling?” I repeated.
“We had been on speaking terms for less than twenty-four hours, and despite me not knowing what had taken us down that horrible path, I was already entirely caught up in my feelings for you,” he clarified. “But I didn’t want to do anything about it and act on those feelings without knowing what pulled us apart to begin with.”
It was crazy.
All of it was crazy to me.
Mack and I had such strong feelings for one another back in high school, and despite the horrible time and distance between us for the last fifteen years, we both ended up right back where we started in a matter of a day. Maybe we were a little older and wiser now, but the bottom line was that the love we felt for one another never went away. I might have tucked it somewhere in the corner of my mind and tried to convince myself it didn’t exist for fifteen years, but if that had been the case, I
wouldn’t have felt this strongly about him this quickly.
“Do you think we would have made it if we’d gotten together when we were younger?” I asked him.
“Yes.”
“Really?” I returned, completely surprised by his response, which was not only immediate but also contained not a shred of doubt.
“Absolutely. It’s become very clear to me that we were always meant to be, Marley. I’d like to think that if I had acted on my feelings for you back when I first recognized them for what they were, you and I would have never ended up going through all we did without one another.”
The moment he got those words out, I dropped my forehead to his chest.
Had I ruined years of our lives?
The tip of my nose began to sting as my throat got painfully tight. Years. Gone. All because I had made a stupid assumption. Not only that, but I also chose not to share the reason with Mack, who could have cleared everything up with a simple conversation.
“Baby, what’s going through your mind right now?” Mack asked. His voice was so sweet and tender. And his fingers were gently caressing my skin. It only made me want to cry that much more.
“We’ve lost so much time for the worst reason,” I rasped.
I barely got the words out when my body was moving. Mack had rolled us, flipping me to my back. Half of his body was covering mine.
“Please don’t do this to yourself,” he pleaded with me. “It has always killed me to see you in any kind of pain. We’re here now, and we’re together. Focus on that.”
“But it’s been years, Mack,” I argued. “Doesn’t that upset you? I feel so much regret.”
And I did.
The moment I learned the truth and knew that he hadn’t spread all those rumors about me, I wanted to start kicking myself.
“I’m not going to lie and say that I don’t wish it hadn’t ever happened,” he began. “But I’m also not going to sit here and dwell on it either. We can’t punish ourselves. We were kids. Kids do stupid things. We can learn from it, though. Everything from this point forward can be so good.”
“You should be so angry with me,” I murmured.
