Hold Me Today

by Maria Luis

  Nick needs no more encouragement than that.

  He steps into the V of my legs, his mouth still molded to mine, our tongues dueling. “On the counter,” he growls when he breaks away. “Now.”

  I like bossy Nick. A lot.

  With a hand to his chest, I push him back with a flirty grin. His face is all rigid lines but his eyes . . . God, they set me on fire. More black than gray, they watch me steadily, never veering away. Wanting to provoke him—to see that tightly leashed veneer of his crack—I twist around, planting my hands on the wooden stool. I arch my back, sticking my butt out, rubbing up against the hard-on not even his jeans can hide.

  He cuts loose a guttural groan, and I soak up the sound.

  Step One to making Nick Stamos lose his ever-loving mind? Complete.

  I pop the button of my jeans. Squeeze my eyes shut tightly. Here goes nothing. The only sound that echoes in the kitchen is the tab of my zipper inching down over each metal tooth. My fingers hook over the waistband, and I almost laugh at the way they tremble. Like this is my first time having sex—six years after everyone thought I ruined good, ol’ Nick during his wedding night.

  Broad fingers fold over mine. “Let me,” comes Nick’s rough timbre.

  So, I do.

  I hear his knees hit marble behind me. I feel the heat of his hands graze my skin as he slowly, so slowly, inches the denim down over my hips. My sight is replaced by the sensation of touch, the way he kisses my exposed flesh like a man kneeling before an altar. It rocks me to my core, and I feel myself grow wet, there between my legs.

  My jeans and underwear are tugged down to my knees—right before Nick’s palm cups my butt cheek, right over my tattoo.

  “You never fail to surprise me,” he murmurs, brushing his thumb over the ink there: a wreath, the same one marked on Greece’s Coat of Arms, encircling a phoenix, the national bird, rising from the ashes. It’s no bigger than the palm of my hand, invisible to the eye when I wear underwear or bikini bottoms. It’s for me . . . and now for Nick too. “Why this?” he asks, voice low.

  Lids fluttering shut, I ball my hands into fists on the kitchen island. I don’t want to lie to him, not about this, so I don’t. Facing away from him, the admission slips out easily. “For all the times I’ve never felt Greek enough. Not speaking the language doesn’t make me any less Greek—an Ellenitha. Not being able to read the words doesn’t mean I’m not somehow connected to my heritage.” I pause to beat back the tears that threaten to spill. “I am Greek.”

  He must hear the turmoil in my tone because he strips off my jeans completely, taking off my snow boots, too, and then rises to his full height. He towers over me, and I can feel his heat against my back when he brushes my hair over one shoulder and leans in. “One day,” he says, “you’ll trust me enough to tell me why this, of all things, turns your voice to fire.”

  A gasp rips from my soul as I feel his fingers delve between my legs. Oh, God. “Nick—”

  His mouth rasps over my neck, and a shiver rakes down my spine. “One day,” he goes on, just as reverently, “but not today.” He turns his hand sideways, wordlessly ordering me to spread my legs. His free hand grips the lip of the granite island, his knuckles white with restraint. My mouth goes dry. “But I’m gonna tell you this once, Ermione. You are Greek. Your soul, your blood, your name that makes people stop in their tracks and ask for it again. You’re an Ellenitha, koukla, and even if you weren’t, I wouldn’t give a damn.”

  And then, as if to prove a point, his finger collides with my clit and I quiver.

  “Oh, my God.”

  My vision goes blurry around the edges as he rubs in small, little circles. My balled fists on the island go flat, as though I can ground my very being through my fingertips. Nick doesn’t hasten the tempo of those circles. Like his kiss earlier in the car, he goes slow, every move measured and drawn out to make me beg for more.

  And I beg, shamelessly.

  In the way that I grind my hips down over those magic fingers, seeking more, seeking anything he can give me. He increases the pressure just enough for me to rise up on my toes. Electric. That’s how his touch feels, like I’ve jabbed my finger into an outlet just for shits and giggles.

  It twines through my limbs, and I’m keenly aware of my knees trembling.

  I dart out one hand, clasping his that’s still gripping the island, and I squeeze. A silent plea.

  “Say it.” His stubble scratches my throat as he drops his mouth to the place where my pulse pounds madly. “Tell me what you want, Ermione.”

  I’ve never been shy.

  Insecure, yes.

  But never shy.

  Until now. Until a Greek Adonis finally looked my way and hurled my carefully planned out life straight into the flickering flames of want, need, lust.

  My lips part. “You.” I swallow, thickly, then glance down. At the way he’s anchored my ass to his groin with an arm wrapped around my hips. Those fingers play me like a finely tuned instrument . . . or a piece of wood he’s molded and created into something beautiful. His fingers glisten with my wetness, and it’s both the most obscene and sexiest thing I’ve ever seen. “Any way I can have you.”

  I cry out as he plunges that one finger deep inside me.

  “You’re gonna have me, koukla.” Another finger enters me on the second thrust, and I’m so tight—it’s been so damn long that I’ve thought about anything but Agape—that my head falls forward as I suck in a heavy breath. “My tongue on your clit,” he edges out, his fingers curling to hit me just right, “my cock in your pussy.” I feel myself tighten around his fingers, and a rough laugh rumbles deep in his chest. “You like that, huh? The visual or the way I’m fucking you with my fingers?”

  “I’m not the only one around here with a smart mouth.”

  He curls his fingers again.

  “Both,” I whimper, giving him his answer. “Do it again. Please.”

  His fingers leave my sex, and I nearly whimper again at the loss. Except that he doesn’t leave me hanging. He grabs the hem of my sweater and gently pulls it up and over my head, then does the same with his T-shirt. Immediately my eyes dart to the white bandage covering his new tattoo. His skin is still pink from the abrasion of the needle, and I’m sure the same can be said for mine.

  Pink or not, though, there’s no stopping me from looking at his gorgeous torso. Greek words are etched into skin—the quote I noticed earlier—and then I’m seeing nothing but hard pecs and even harder, finely ridged abdominal muscles.

  A whole whopping eight because a man like Nick would never be satisfied with a measly six.

  “I was right,” I breathe out.

  Big hands go to my ass, where he boosts me up onto the kitchen island. “About?”

  “You look like a statue. One of those finely chiseled ones that stand sentry at every museum known to man.” I’m naked, save for my pretty-much-useless bra, but not even that can keep me from running my gaze over his body and that drool-worthy V leading down into his jeans. God bless construction jobs.

  He pops the brass button. “You talking about the ones with the appropriately placed leaves?”

  I make a noise of agreement in the back of my throat. “The very ones.”

  Nick shucks his jeans, and his cock proudly bobs free. “I’m gonna need a big leaf.”

  Talk about the understatement of the year. I can’t tear my gaze away. “Raphia regalis,” I hear myself mutter.

  “The what?”

  I flick my attention up to his gorgeous face and all that messy, dark hair. “It’s a species of palm tree. Biggest leaf in the world. I saw it on Jeopardy.”

  His pewter eyes flicker with mirth. “Pick a category.”

  “What?”

  “Humor me.” He reaches around me to unclasp my bra. By my ear, he drops his voice to a low rumble. “Pick a category. I promise you’ll enjoy every one.”

  Has he gone off his rocker? Given his firm constitution, probably not. Going along with his
game, I say, “I don’t know the categories.”

  “Animals. Westerns.” He pauses, drawing his tongue along the front of teeth. “Planets.”

  I raise a brow. “Those are some interesting categories.”

  “Got a preference?”

  “I’ll take Animals for one-hundred, please.”

  His grin is positively blinding. “A woman after my own heart.”

  Before I can even decipher that particular statement, he’s hauling me up into his arms. I bounce against his chest, careful not to disturb his bandage, as he cuts through the kitchen to a less formal room. A TV is strung up on one wall, and a sectional sofa takes up most of the space. But it’s the wall-to-wall window that steals my breath. Lights flicker outside, and Nick, seeing my awe, murmurs, “Outdoor solar lights. It’s cold out but there’s still enough sunlight for them to do their job.”

  And do their job they do, twinkling like fairy lights leading into an enchanted forest.

  Nick puts me down in front of the window. He grasps my hands and presses them flat against the cold glass. “I’ve thought about this,” he tells me, reverent hands skimming my curves, “me fucking you from behind. You seeing our reflection and the outdoors all at once.”

  I feel the heat of his cock like a brand against my butt. It hits me, then, that this is actually going to happen. Me, Nick, sex. Sex with Nick Stamos. Pinch me, please, or at least don’t make me wake up from the best dream of my life.

  I turn my head, wanting his mouth on mine, and he gives it without question. His kiss, like the very essence of him, is hardness underlined with passion. Careful not to brush my bandages, he dips his fingers between my legs again, sinking two in deep.

  “You’re so wet,” he grunts against my mouth. “Fuck, I can’t wait to feel you come against my mouth.” When I press my hips impatiently back into his, he chuckles. “Okay, after you come on my cock—better?”

  And then, for reasons that I refuse to look at too deeply, I nip at his bottom lip and say, “I’m clean.” More specifically, I’ve never had sex without a condom. Have never wanted to, until now. Until him. “And on the pill.”

  Nick’s fingers pause. “You sure?”

  So much yes. The vulnerability of the moment squeezes my heart like a vice. “Yeah. I mean, so long as you’re . . .”

  “Jesus, Mina.” His eyes take on a wild bent, like he can’t believe this is happening. “Yeah, I’m . . . right there with you. Gamóto, you drive me wild. I need this. I need you.”

  The same sense of urgency pulses through me as he lays a hand on my back and eases me forward, until my forehead comes close to kissing the glass window—and I feel the heavy crown of his cock slip through the wet folds of my sex.

  This. Is. Happening.

  After all these years, it’s not Nick and someone else. It’s Nick and me, his sister’s best friend. His long-standing frenemy. The girl he’s known since he was eight. But this thing between us is more than all that—it’s unrelenting, combustible passion, something he proves when he mutters, “Hold on tight, koukla,” and thrusts inside me.

  My mouth parts in an O.

  Big, so damn big.

  His cock stretches me, my walls clinging to him tightly, and I hesitate on that fine line between pleasure and pain.

  And then he moves, pulling back, pulling out, before slamming home, and the pleasure turns downright euphoric. He grips my hips, hard, yanking my ass onto his cock just as he drives forward.

  “Mina.” His smoky voice echoes in my ears, muddled with the rush of pressure in my head and the sound of how goddamn wet I am around him. I need to find it in myself to feel embarrassed, but I can’t. Not when he growls my name again and definitely not when he groans, “You feel so good. Never—I’ve never—”

  Me either.

  Not like this. It’s never felt like this.

  “More,” I urge him, craning my head to look over my shoulder at his powerful body. The veins in his chest and neck strain with each of his thrusts, his chest burns a ruddy red, and those wild pewter eyes are locked on his cock slipping in and out of my sex.

  Heat curls through me, and I lose every inhibition.

  I push back, greedy for the way he makes me feel. Sweat beads on my brow. My thighs cramp from the bent-over position he’s folded me in. My breasts, unbound by a bra, small as they are, sway with the force of his hips.

  It’s divine.

  Raw as hell.

  And utterly perfect.

  Throat tight, I cry out his name. “I’m so close. Please—”

  My fingers dive between my legs, needing that direct bit of stimulation to throw me over the edge—but Nick bats my hand out of the way. I’m so wet that when he fingers the tight nub at the hood of my sex, they slip. His breathing audibly hitches as he goes back for more, circling, faster and faster, as his thrusts pick up speed.

  I hear nothing but the slap of his hips meeting mine, the sound of our groans as we teeter on the verge of orgasm.

  “Come all over my cock, koukla. Fuck, yes . . . just like that.”

  My inner walls clamp down on his hard-on. His fingers apply more pressure until I’m so fired up, so strung tight, that I have no choice but to do what he says. I come on a cry, my legs spasming as I struggle to keep up on my feet. It’s a futile battle, one that Nick rectifies by bolstering me up with his arm banded around my stomach.

  He plows forward, that big cock of his hitting me in all the right ways, until he gives me the slice of knowledge I’ve wanted to know since my teenage years when I used to slip my fingers under my panties and get off at the thought of him—with one, masculine groan, he disproves every hypothesis I ever had about him coming silently.

  His hands sweep over my back, and he bends over far enough to kiss me right between my shoulder spines.

  “I think I died,” I whisper.

  “That good, huh?” He’s all smug masculinity when he playfully slaps my ass. “Tell me you saw the pearly gates of heaven the minute you came.”

  Laughter climbs my throat. “Your ego, Nick.”

  “It’s almost as big as The Great One.”

  “You’re ridiculous.”

  “Yeah, and you love it.”

  I don’t, I tell myself. I really, really don’t. Yeah, I don’t believe myself either.

  Nick gently pulls out of me, and with a casually asked, “Bathroom?” we both hurry for the half-bath just off the parlor. I shoo him out while I pee, and Nick doesn’t even blush when he cleans himself off in front of me.

  Men. No shame whatsoever.

  Washing my hands, I watch as he leans a hip up against the bathroom counter. He studies me avidly, his gray eyes flitting over my legs and my hips and my breasts. “I don’t regret any of tonight. I need you to know that.”

  My heart hiccups. “I don’t either.”

  With a satisfied grin, he nods his chin toward my body. “Tattoo reveal time.”

  Nerves spring to life in my belly. “Yeah, okay.” I hope he loves what I chose for him. Earlier tonight, I was so confident that he would, but now, standing here naked with him, I worry. If he hates it, it’s going to be one heck of a painful removal process. I gulp audibly, and then reach for the clear tape binding the bandage to my chest.

  “Let me,” Nick says, interrupting my hands with his own. With his head ducked, a mask of concentration falls over his face. I stand, back straight, as he works to carefully remove each bandage from under my boobs. Already the soreness from the needle has worn off—for me, at least—and I hold my breath as one bandage lands on the counter. “We’ll look at the same time. Naí?”

  The second bandage lands on the floor, and we leave it there.

  “Do me now.”

  I quirk my lips at the innuendo in his words but get to work unwrapping him. “Eyes on me, Stamos,” I warn playfully.

  “Trust me, koukla,” he murmurs with heat, “I’m not lookin’ anywhere else unless I have to.”

  Goddamn him for making me want to s
woon after he already had me orgasming on command! I laugh, because his good humor is contagious, and finally ease the bandage from his skin. The tattoo looks gorgeous against the ropes of muscles that work as the backdrop. As much as I want to trace the intricate black lines with my finger, I force myself to step back and give him space.

  “Okay, we’re doing this then?” I ask.

  He grins. “You sound nervous. Need to hold my hand?”

  I swat his arm. Draw in a deep breath, then face the mirror. Immediately I drop my gaze to my breasts—the high-peaked nipples standing at full attention, thanks to Nick’s close proximity—and then lower, to the feminine cursive script. The words follow the natural, underside curve of my breasts, inked in delicate and thin font. It looks wispy, like if I breathe a little too roughly, the words might scatter away on a wild breeze.

  “Without the night,” Nick says, voice pitched low, “there are no stars.”

  I swallow, hard, hearing him repeat the words now etched into my skin even as I stare at them in the mirror for myself. My throat grows even tighter, and I press the back of my fist to my mouth. I don’t want him to see my lips trembling, but there’s no hiding the way I blink rapidly, chasing away the tears.

  “It reminds me of you,” he continues in a deep rasp. “No matter how bad it gets, no matter what you’re trying to claw away from . . . just remember that you’re Mina because of all those restless moments.”

  I don’t stop to let myself think twice.

  Twisting on my heel, I throw my arms around Nick’s waist. He hisses out, “Shit, tattoo,” and I immediately drop my right arm. One-armed hug it is, then.

  “Thank you.” I kiss his chest, as close as I can get to his mouth since I’m barefooted. “Thank you.”

  I feel him press his lips to the top of my head. Then, “My turn. Let’s do this. No arrows, right?”

  I ease back and hop up on the counter. “A huge arrow, like I promised. Look and see.”

  Slowly Nick turns toward the mirror, and I watch his expression, noting every change like I’m skimming through a flipbook. His brows rise first, and then his cheeks hollow out with a quick exhale. My own breathing kicks into overdrive, nerves eating away at me. Tentatively, he touches a finger to the top of the church spire.