by Angel Lawson
Really works.
We stare at each other for a long moment, and I’m not sure what my face is saying, but she’s got this wicked little smile that’s making me think I need to lock my door.
I do that.
“I needed some air,” she finally speaks, standing. “Dinner with my mom was kind of…”
I turn to her, rubbing the towel over my face. “Kind of what?”
“Like, an interrogation? A wellness check?” She shrugs, shoulders falling low. “Whatever it was, I didn’t want to be there anymore.”
“So you came here.” Fuck, I like that. I like the fact she relied on me. That she feels comfortable enough to just come over. “Did my dad or… whoever he’s with, let you in?”
“Nah,” she grins, stepping toward me, “those B&E skills came in handy.”
I raise an eyebrow, gaze dropping to her mouth. “I didn’t mean for you to use them against me.”
Her eyes track where the towel in my hand falls on the floor. “So, you want me to leave?”
“Not a chance.” I wrap my arms around her waist and pull her close, trailing my nose over the shell of her ear. “You’ve been teasing me all day, in that shirt. Those jeans. Wearing my jacket.” I bend and lick that little patch of skin beneath her ear, where the mark has faded, feeling her squirm against me. “I’ve been fucking dying to get you alone.”
Her hands splay across my chest, and I slide a hand behind her neck, intent on kissing her long and slow. Deep and unrelenting. There’s not enough time for us to be alone—not with our schedules, her brother, the Devils. She meets my kiss with a vigor that’s causing a situation my towel can’t hide. Her tongue is hot and persistent against mine, and when I lick into her mouth, she surges into me. The movement brushes across the towel and I choke on a groan at the feel of it. Her breath is hot and quick and I push the jacket off her shoulders, dropping it carelessly to the floor.
My fingers tug clumsily at the knot in her shirt, pushing beneath the fabric as we kiss, wet and loud in the stillness of the room. I know it was brave of her to wear this—to show her scars. I never needed Sydney fucking Prescott to tell me about those insecurities. This is something only Vandy and I can really know, having the proof of that night branded into us forever.
She sways towards me when I bend, planting a slow, sweet kiss on the pale flesh.
“Reyn.” Her breath catches, hands grabbing at my sides.
I catch the towel before it falls completely and say, “You keep messing with me, I’m going to lose the towel.”
“Then lose it.” Her tone is daring, eyes lit by a brilliant spark.
I let out this embarrassing half-laugh, half-groan. “Trust me, I am losing it.”
She reaches for her shirt and yanks it over her head. It’s a move so sudden that I have to blink a few times to really process all the skin standing before me. She’s not wearing a bra, and her tits are perfection, soft and round. She watches me back, wetting her lips. “Let’s just… get lost.”
This isn’t a fingerbang in the front seat of my Jeep. It isn’t head in the Alumni house. It isn’t eating her out, quick and dirty in the Stairway. It isn’t even that night in her room, when I went up her skirt.
This is both of us, here, alone, practically naked.
Absolutely nothing is stopping us.
I exhale slowly, lifting a hand to gently graze the side of her breast. It’s warm and just as soft as it looks, and I instantly just… know.
I know I can take it.
“We don’t have to—I mean, we can wait,” I say, thumb brushing across her nipple. “There’s nothing wrong with taking things slow.”
She shudders in a breath, blinking slowly. “We did take it slow,” she whispers, catching my wrist before I can pull it away. Her blue eyes bore into mine. “I did wait.”
My body says to go for it, and despite having just jerked off, my cock’s already hard again, ready, two seconds from exploding. My brain is a jumbled mush. My eyes won’t stop staring at her tits. At her flat stomach. Then down at the scar.
Guilt.
It washes over me. Always. I can’t shake it. I can’t get away from it.
I take a step back, but she moves with me, eyes imploring. “Hey, I want this. I want you.”
God, I want her too.
“Then take me.”
Did I say that out loud? Fuck. “I just need to—” I need to think. I need to make sure I’m doing this right. I need to consult the risk management plan.
Some of that spark in her eyes dims. “Unless you don’t want to?”
“No, I do,” I burst, taking her face in my hands. I can feel the heat of her cheeks beneath the pads of my thumbs. “So badly, you have no idea. I just thought I’d have more time to plan.”
Her eyebrows knit together. “Plan what?”
“How to do this without hurting you.”
“Reyn,” she says, mouth quirking into a grin. “It’s totally fine. I talked to Afton, Elana, and Georgia about it. They all say it hurts, but only a little and not for long. Come on, you know I’m not scared of a little pain.”
“No, I don’t mean that.” I shake my head. “Obviously that’ll hurt, and that… that sucks.” I get lost in this little brain-loop of awareness that, yes. I’m going to hurt her. With my dick. It’s not a good feeling to have. “But mostly, I meant…” My eyes drop to her leg. “Sex is physical, and I wasn’t sure if—”
“Oh,” she cuts me off, blue eyes full of realization.
I rush to assure her, “Not that I think you can’t do it or handle it. But if there’s a way I can make it easier or better, then I wanted to know. Before.”
There’s a moment of pensive silence, and I worry that I’ve pissed her off. There are few things Vandy hates more than being babied. Luckily, she just looks at me and says, “It’s not like I have any experience, but I don’t think that’s going to be a problem. We can just work it out, right? Together.”
This is the scariest thing about it. The trust. She has this faith in me to make it good—to make it worth it. This girl—the girl I love and want and obsess over constantly—is offering to do the one thing I think about three times a second, and here I am, scared shitless. Eventually, she’s going to realize that I’m not good enough.
I really don’t want that moment to be now.
“Yeah,” I say, mustering a confidence I don’t feel. “We’ll work it out.”
The skin over her ribs is warm and smooth when my fingertips drag over it, mouth taking hers in a slow, long kiss. She winds her arms around my neck and her tits press into my chest. It takes my breath away, this heavy feeling swelling in my throat. It’s full of things I already know I won’t say. That I love her. That I’d die for her. That being with her like this is better than stealing. It’s better than drugs. It’s better than anything.
I try to tell her with my kiss, with the way my hand cups her tit in my palm, gentle and testing. I swallow the sound she makes and wrap an arm around her waist, steadying her as I move us toward the bed.
I glide my hands down her back, over the curve of her ass, and lift her, placing her on the bed. She sits before me, eyes staring into mine, and softly drags her nails down my chest, traveling below my belly. They hook into the towel that’s honestly barely hanging on at this point. I just watch her back as she tugs it away, letting it fall around my feet.
Her eyes dip down, taking me in slowly, reverently. Her hands touch me like she’s not even nervous about it. Like she knows this is hers. Like she owns it. Her palms drag down my hips, eyes fixed to where I’m hard and eager, cock flushed and ready.
I suck in a deep breath when she wraps a hand around me, giving my cock a soft stroke. A tremor shudders through my body. She’s watching her hand on me, interested, inquisitive, and I let her play with it for a few moments before capturing her wrist.
“Keep doing that and this’ll be over before it begins.”
Her eyes jump up to mine, flashing in grati
fication. I slide my forearm under her lower back and gently ease her up the bed before dipping back in to capture her lips. Vandy kisses like it’s still something new. She takes her time, patient and curious, and gives me that same frission I feel when I’m breaking into something. No one else has this. Kissing me like this is all she knows. I’m all she knows. Beyond the layers of crushing anxiety I feel about it all, there’s definitely something satisfied and possessive lurking beneath.
Her mouth chases mine when I pull away, but I sit back on my heels, fingers tugging at the button on her jeans. She’s flushed all the way down her chest, hips lifting as I tug them down her thighs. When I don’t pull her panties down with her jeans, she reaches down to do it for me, sliding them down her hips.
“Fuck, V.” I look at her spread before me, and it’s almost surreal. Her hair’s fanned out on my pillow, mouth parted as she watches me in return. There’s something nervous and soft in her eyes, and her knees graze against my bare hips when she tries to close them. I soothe my hands over her thighs, running them up to her hips. “You’re so fucking gorgeous, you know that?”
She sinks her teeth into her lip when I bend down to press an open-mouthed kiss to the tattoo on her thigh. I linger there for far too long, lathing it with my tongue, licking up one thigh, and then the other. I suck and nip, embarrassingly self-indulgent about it, before I crawl on top of her, kissing her hips, her scars. Her hair fans behind her like a golden halo, and it only slams it home that I’m defiling her, claiming her, taking something that can never be given back. She must sense my hesitation because she pushes up and captures my lips, coaxing me into a searing kiss. A kiss so good, combined with her roaming, curious hands, that makes the doubts vanish and my lust rush forward.
She makes a sharp sound when I take her peaked nipple into my mouth. “Reyn…”
I hum as I palm the other one, spine going liquid at the feel of her squirming beneath me. Her hips cant upward and the soft skin of her thigh brushes the tip of my cock. I unthinkingly chase it, ultimately grinding down into her center, thrusting mindlessly against all of her warmth.
“Shit,” I rasp, pulling away. We’re getting ahead of ourselves.
“Sorry,” she says, but she doesn’t look it. “You’re just really good with your hands. Catching footballs, swiping keys…” I dip my fingers between her legs, and she shivers. “And that. You’re good at that.”
She’s already wet for me, mouth falling open as I sink a finger inside. I take some time opening her up, swallowing the little sounds she makes with aborted, distracted kisses. At some point, her leg hitches over my hip and I have to clench my teeth against the wave of frantic want that explodes in me. I want to feel every inch of her skin pressed against mine.
Quietly, she asks, “Do you have a condom?” and I pull away.
It already feels like I just ran suicides. “What kind of Devil would I be if I wasn’t prepared?” I fumble for the drawer by my bed and shake a condom out of the box. I’m impulsive, but not stupid. I didn’t need my dad to give me his gross horny teenager talk to know better than that. I tear the package with my teeth, intensely aware of her leaning back on her elbows, staring.
I pause, dick in hand, rubber at the tip. “What?”
Her eyes jerk up to mine, heavy-lidded and inquisitive. “I want to watch.”
I laugh. “You like to see the monster that’s coming?”
She lifts an eyebrow. “It’s big and all, but it’s not a monster, Reyn.”
I’m not talking about my dick. I’m talking about myself. It’s hard to see myself as anything else. But the girl below me, the one watching my every move, doesn’t look at me like a monster. She looks at me like—fuck—like I’m the moon and the stars, the sun that rises. Or maybe I’m projecting, because that has to be how I’m looking at her. Like she’s the shiniest damn thing I’ve ever seen and god, I want her.
Mine now.
The words are on the tip of my tongue. I’ve known them forever—felt them my whole life—but I don’t want to be that guy. My girl deserves better than to just belong to someone. She deserves to get what she wants. Vandy doesn’t want to be coddled, and the very least I can give her is that, which is why I look past the way she tenses her belly, the rigidity in her thighs, and I take control. Not that I have much of it at this point. My balls ache and I’m probably at risk of being a two-pump chump, but I kiss her lips, steady her hips, and press the tip into her warm, wet pussy.
I freeze there, wide eyes seeking hers, terrified that she’ll hate me forever if this hurts too much.
But she just exhales against my lips. “I’m fine, Reyn. I’m fine. Please…”
I push, rocking inside past the resistance. That’s the thing about stealing, about taking, you can’t hesitate. There’s no time for it. So I take her, caving to the urge to invade and have.
She’s so warm, so tight, so soft underneath me. I have to take a second, pressed deep inside her, to pull myself back from the edge. Not fucking brainlessly into her wet heat is harder than running an entire afternoon of suicides. Harder than ruck marches. Harder than just about anything.
Soft exhalation blows across my face, and I feel the tension in her stomach easing, her thighs releasing their tight clutch around my hips. When I open my eyes, I see the curve of her parted lips, the soft fluttering of her lashes.
I cradle her cheek. “Are you—” My words choke off into a rough noise when she rocks up against me, spurring me on.
“Yes,” she breathes, fingers pressing divots in my shoulders.
She’s okay. We’re okay.
And fucking hell, I’m going to take this girl and really make her mine.
31
Vandy
I’ve felt a lot of pain in my life and I’ve numbed the hell out of myself to keep it at bay, but having Reyn inside of me, stretching me, pushing my body past the point of pain toward the rush of pleasure, is something I didn’t anticipate.
At first, I thought there was no way he’d fit inside of me. No way his cock, with the length or girth, would be able to get past my entrance. But it was the noises he made that broke down my defenses. The little grunts, the hum of pleasure, the set of his jaw as he tried to control himself. It was the look in his clear green eyes, the tightening of his stomach and god, how safe I felt in his arms, even as he pressed into me.
“Breathe,” he whispers, mouth hot near my ear.
I do it, sucking in air and with it, the clean, masculine scent of him. Slowly that fear, that insecurity, all melts away. I want him more than I fear what comes next and when he sinks into me, rocking his powerful hips, all I want is more.
It’s not just my body, it’s my heart, my mind, my skin, my core. That feeling that was almost bursting out of me before finally spills over, and I can’t do anything but pant against the wave of it. My nails drag down his back, wanting him closer.
“More,” I whisper, because what Reyn doesn’t understand is that I’m not afraid of pain. I’ve lived with it for so long that this other side of it is deliriously intoxicating.
My demand breaks the tight concentration of his façade. He laughs.
“What?” I ask, panicked that I’m doing it wrong.
“You.” He grins down at me. “I need to stop underestimating you.”
Our eyes meet and hold for a long, precarious beat. I run a hand down the curve of his bicep and shift my hips, planting my feet on the bed. He sinks in deeper, a teeth-clenched grunt wiping away the smirk.
I’ve been afraid of feeling for so long, but now I can’t get enough of the tug in my chest. I can’t get enough of him. The long cords of muscle down his back, the pebbled scars that unite us, the curve of his ass, his breath, the sweep of his tongue. Sweat builds between us, and it’s sticky, messy, noisy, and god, so very real.
That’s what I’ve been scared of: real.
The way Reyn McAllister's hips drive into my body is achingly real. The way he sets my nerves on fire, the way he tastes, th
e way he touches me—god, the way he looks at me, so soft and intense, like I’m the only thing that exists here and he’s so grateful for it. His thumbs hold me down, anchoring my body so that my desire can build.
The sounds coming from me are unexpected; grunts and moans, words I can’t place, sharp fricatives. Slowly, we fall into a rhythm—our rhythm—one that’s coursed between us from the beginning. It all led to this. To this pounding. This pain. This pleasure.
His hips buck harder, frantic, and I know he’s close. I can see it in the pucker of his brow, the tremor in the arm that’s holding him up. “Baby,” he groans through gritted teeth. His sweaty forehead lands on my neck, mouth hot on the skin of my collarbone. He pushes out a long, raggedly whispered, “Fuuuuck,” before coming, back ramrod straight.
He collapses on me with heaving breaths, and I swear I can feel his thudding heartbeat against my chest. Before I have a chance to process the weight of him, solid and sure, his hand dips between my legs, circling my wet, aching clit. My body shudders from the sensitivity. It’s overwhelming. Too much.
“It’s—” I start, wanting to beg him to stop, to say that it’s enough for one day, but he leans over me and swallows my breath with a kiss. I sink and just when I think I’m going to drown, he pulls away and travels down my body, ultimately replacing his hand with his mouth. My hips buck, and his hands slide under my ass, tilting me upward. This, god this, is nothing like I’ve ever felt before. My orgasm, coiled tight, releasing like a pounding heartbeat, is so close, so near, that when it finally happens it’s like a breaking wave, crashing hard. My head presses into the pillow, heels digging into the mattress. My nails sink into his skin, needing something to hold onto so I don’t get washed away.
When I open my eyes, he’s looking down at me, lips shiny, curved into a smirk.
The feeling in my chest, in the pit of my stomach, I recognize it. It’s fear.
Not of pain. Of how much I love Reyn McAllister. I’d always thought we were connected, linked. But now? Now there’s no going back.
