by G. K. Brady
His words snatched the wind from her sails. “Um, oh.” Maybe she shouldn’t have called him “hot” and “handsome”—except it was true. Maybe it was time for that drink—ice water for her so she could pour it over her chest and let the cold dampen some of this charged space between them. Suddenly very self-conscious, she scampered to the open kitchen.
Yanking down a glass and a bottle of Breckenridge Reserve Blend bourbon, she shoved them at him and pointed at the Sub-Zero. “Ice is in that dispenser.” As he ignored the liquor and prepared a drink of water, she pulled a frosted shot glass and an iced bottle of Chopin from the freezer, resisting the urge to rub them against her heated face. Her fingers trembled, but the trembling wasn’t out of fear. No, it was all about the hot blond hockey player whose presence seemed to suck air from the room. She trusted him, felt safe with him, but she stood on the precipice of a deep abyss and had no idea what sort of void she might be leaping into. Whatever it was, it felt dangerous. She might get pulled up short, she might smash into bits when she hit bottom, or she might fall forever and ever.
She poured a measure of vodka into the shot glass, feeling the unrelenting weight of his gaze on her. The silence that hung between them was thick, ripe with sexual energy. Deafening. The only sound was the pounding pulse of blood whooshing through her ears.
Pulling in a breath, she turned and clinked her glass against his before gulping half her drink.
She jerked her chin at his drink. “Is your water okay?” Her voice came out in a squeak.
“Perfect.” Calculations seemed to race at warp speed behind the eyes he trained on her with intensity. He reminded her of someone computing the number of stars in the Milky Way or who was waging war inside himself.
“I’m still not sure why you came back,” she ventured in a softened tone, “unless it really is about the brunch thingie.”
Appearing as though he’d answered some great mystery for himself, he set down the drink and closed the distance between them. She craned her head back to look up at him. “Michaela,” he began, “much as I want to take you to the charity brunch, that’s not why I came back. And tasty as your water is, I can get that anywhere.”
She blinked, her only thought that the way “M” rolled off his tongue in that deep timbre was so much nicer than when he used her full name. He reached out a finger and began tracing her tattoo from her shoulder down, his touch deliberate and featherlight, his gaze following the trail. Shivers chased one another down her spine and radiated outward, puckering her skin with tiny goose bumps.
“What I can’t get anywhere else is this,” he murmured. He raised heated, haunted eyes to hers. Light green had shifted to verdelite, so deep and spellbinding she thought she might drown in them.
“A-a tattoo?” she stuttered.
His lips curved. “No, not the tattoo.” His hand dropped to hers. Weaving his long, thick fingers with her small ones, he tugged her toward him until her hip brushed his thigh. Her mind was blowing circuits left and right, and she couldn’t have stopped him if she’d wanted to. And she didn’t want to. The clenching she’d felt in her stomach minutes before was replaced with cottonwood fluff floating, floating, and other parts of her began to blaze. With his free hand, he lifted her drink from her grasp and placed it on the island behind her, then cradled her cheek. He lowered his head, hovering his mouth just above hers. “I might need more lessons.”
“Haven’t you been practicing?” she whispered against his lips.
“No. Didn’t want to practice with anyone but you.” His thumb stroked her cheek softly while his eyes searched hers. His reassuring words scattered her doubts like dry leaves in a stiff wind. Mesmerized, like a deer caught in a beam, she couldn’t move. His lips brushed hers, so warm, so soft, so tantalizing. “Tell me to stop, M. Tell me to go home.”
Her head was reeling, and she couldn’t hold on to more than a few tangible thoughts. Not with his moist breath caressing her lips or his heady smell swirling around her or his body so close his heat seeped into her dress. His hard planes angled toward her, and a single-purposed gleam in his eyes broadcast she was a morsel he wanted to consume. Hunger from deep inside her rose up, overtaking her, and she let herself sink against that powerful, masculine frame. “I don’t want you to go home,” she breathed.
Kiss me, kiss me. Then take me to bed.
Chapter 18
Storms and Other Electrical Phenomena
Blake was on fire. And it wasn’t because of the unexpected, stomach-turning sight of Ferguson and Tracy that greeted him when he’d walked into the condo. No, this was akin to a scorching wildfire that took hold as soon as M opened her door after his dumbass retreat, making the anger that had spiked inside him disappear in a puff of smoke. She was so … sinfully adorable. Innocent and worldly and hot as hell at the same time. How did she do that? Looking at her made him ache to tell Ferguson and Brad Hewitt and every man whose eyes had caressed her tonight to back the fuck off. Not that he deserved to claim her any more than they did, but he was here and they weren’t. Wasn’t that nine-tenths of the law or some BS he couldn’t reconcile at the moment?
He also had no ability to analyze the complicated intricacies—or the ramifications—of the foreign feelings invading him. One goal—that was his only focus in that moment, and it had absolutely zilch to do with a puck and a net. He was starved for her, as if the air had been vacuumed from the sliver of space separating them and she was his next inhale, his only way to continue breathing.
By some miracle, she had let him in. Well, she’d let him barge his way in. When she told him she didn’t want him to leave, desire and need and want had pinned him in place. Right now, with her soft, warm curves nestled against him, her lips parting as he lowered his mouth to hers, his world contracted to her and him. All other thought was sent skittering to a dimly lit corner of his mind.
Tonight she was his, if she’d have him. No more deferring to someone who wasn’t worthy of her. Not that he was any worthier than Ferguson, but at least he knew what he wanted and was willing to lay it all on the line for this one chance. He’d deal with the consequences later.
When he finally took her mouth, he took it hard, banding his arms around her, letting his pent-up desire spill over.
Pushing against his chest, she drew back and placed a staying finger against his lips. “Take it slow,” she whispered. “We have all night to explore.”
His breathing was ragged, his heart a runaway freight train trying to escape his chest. “Is that part of the lesson?” Don’t devour the mouth you’ve been dreaming about? Equal parts embarrassed and hoping he could rein in his overzealous libido, he eased his hold on her and waited for her lead. He didn’t have to wait long.
“Something like that.” A small smile curved her generous lips. Fisting his shirt in her hands, she pulled him to her and softly pressed those full lips to his, sucking lightly, nibbling, tasting him languidly, her body molding to his. Her dress made a crinkly noise where it brushed against him. Telling himself to take it easy, he ran the tip of his tongue gently along the open seam of her mouth before slipping it inside. She tasted like vodka and sweetness and Michaela, and a primal switch flipped on inside of him when she lightly sucked on his tongue, inviting him deeper, inviting him to explore. Her hands twined around his neck, and her fingertips dug into his shoulders. A low groan he couldn’t corral rose in his throat, and she responded with a surrendering mewl of her own. With insatiable hunger swelling inside of him, the soft, slow, sensuous kiss quickly transformed into a decadent plunge, and he feasted on her mouth, her tongue, and her lips while his hands roamed over her back, her arms, twisting in her hair, delighting in the feel of her.
She broke the kiss once more, her breathing uneven, and slid her hands to his chest. One of his hands was buried in her silky curls, the other skimming the small of her back, ready to snake down and cup her ass. Silver eyes peeked up at him through long, inky lashes.
“Do I need to slow down again?”
he near-gasped.
She shook her head. “No, that was perfect. You sure you haven’t been practicing?”
He let out a chuckle of relief—and pride. “Positive.”
“You’re a quick learner,” she murmured as she pushed up on her toes and landed her lips on his throat. Hands wrapping around his neck, she plowed her fingers through his hair. Her mouth began moving across his skin, and she laid down wet, soft kisses followed by the scraping of her teeth, and his eyes rolled back in his head. Jesuuuus, that feels good! Hot chills shot though his blood, lighting it ablaze. Soon her mouth was back on his, sucking and nipping at his bottom lip, and he responded greedily, spearing her mouth with his tongue. The little mewling sighs that came from her spurred him into a fervor he’d never experienced before.
While their tongues danced and sparred, his fingers fumbled with the zipper at her nape and slowly released the teeth as far as they would go, only midway down her back. He slid his hand inside, relishing the feel of her smooth back crisscrossed by bra straps. She moaned into his mouth. Her hands swept over his shoulders, down his back, gliding over his ass. His hips rocked against her flagrantly, his rock-hard shaft surging, anxious to grind against her softness, but all he got were the multilayered folds of her skirt.
This time he broke the kiss, his fingers splaying the opening wide at the back of her dress. “How does this thing come off?” he panted. Shit. Was he letting his impatient libido gallop ahead again?
Her head swiveled to a row of windows, blackened by the night beyond but softly reflecting their intertwined bodies in the kitchen’s ambient light. Wriggling from his embrace, she took a half-dozen graceful steps and flipped a switch beside the sink. Pendants that had illuminated the island were suddenly doused, leaving only the golden glow of under-cabinet lights. She executed a graceful pirouette and spun right into his waiting arms.
Tracing her fingertips over his pecs in tiny circles, she purred, “No peep shows for the neighbors.”
While he tried to get his breathing—and himself—under control, he caressed her upper arms, marveling at how big his hands looked against her delicate, pale skin. “What about me? Do I get a peep show?” He waggled his eyebrows in an attempt to keep things light, to hide the maelstrom of want swirling inside him. To forget his dick was straining against his fly, begging to be released.
Her swollen lips tipped up in a coy smile, the little tease. “If you want.”
“I want,” he practically shouted. “All night, I’ve been imagining what you look like under that dress,” he confessed. “I bet you look great naked.” Fuck! I couldn’t sound any more like a fifteen-year-old if I tried!
She burst out with a nervous laugh. “Trust me. I look much better with the dress on.”
“I’d really like to test that theory out for myself,” his fifteen-year-old, bourbon-emboldened self persisted.
Biting her lower lip, she caught his gaze with hers, looking as though she wanted to say something. She was probably weighing the merit of letting him into her bed. After all, what the hell would a girl like her—correction, a woman—want with an unseasoned idiot like him?
“Sorry,” he mumbled. His fingers stroked her neck. The skin was so soft, so inviting, and he fought the urge to sink his teeth into it. “That was a totally inappropriate thing for me to say.”
Her eyes swept from his chin up to his hairline, landing back on his mouth. His dick jumped. “Not really. A girl likes to know she can drive a man crazy.”
“Then you should be ecstatic because I’m verging on certifiable right now.”
She laughed softly and once more stepped out of his grasp. Hypnotized, he watched as she gripped the hem of her skirt and tugged it up. For the instant her head was stuck in the dress, he brazenly ran his gaze over her body, from her painted toes to the flare of her hips, stuttering on tiny black panties, over her trim waist, up to her chest, lingering on full, creamy breasts cresting the cups of a black satin bra. It revealed nothing more than the promise of what lay underneath, but it was the sexiest damn thing he’d ever seen, and his mouth practically watered.
An inner beast he wasn’t acquainted with roared to the fore. He leashed it long enough to help her extricate herself from the tangle of material, and before it had completely slid off her arms, his hands were on her, skimming over her sides, gliding over all that gorgeous skin.
“Turn around,” he croaked.
She did as he asked, glancing at him over her shoulder with a shy smile. With his index finger, he traced the rest of the tattoo that had been hidden from his sight. The vines curled around her right shoulder blade, ending in another full-bloomed red flower. He leaned forward, resting his hands on her small waist as he dipped his head and planted his lips on the flower, kissing it reverently. Then he dragged the tip of his tongue along the vines, up to her shoulder. Her skin tasted like salt and honey and heaven. He spread his fingers across her flat stomach and pulled her against his hardness so she had no doubt what she was doing to him.
She laid her head on his shoulder and melted against him with a sigh, then lifted her arms, hooking them around his neck and pressing her ass to his groin. Fuck yeah! He took his time laying a kiss on the bloom on her shoulder before working his way up her neck. Pushing her curls aside, he ran his tongue along the shell of her ear and whispered, “The dress looks beautiful on you, but I like you this way much, much better. You are breathtaking, M. Flawless. Everywhere.” And he meant every word. He wasn’t one for false compliments or talking before, during, or after sex, but this didn’t feel like … sex. Well, it did, but everything with her was different, went deeper, pulled at different cords inside of him as though she was playing a line of chorusing bells. He rang with his desire for her, but all he could think was how he wanted to make her feel, how he wanted to be the best she’d ever had. And how the hell he was going to make that happen.
Her foot came up and began stroking his calf as he nibbled her ear. His hands fanned over her stomach, nearly covering it, then slid up her sides until they reached her bra. He unhooked it and felt the weight of her breasts pull the bra forward as it released. Eagerly, he abandoned the confounding crisscrossing straps and swept his hands to her front, pushing the bra out of his way, cupping her soft, full mounds. A moan escaped her, and she arched into his touch as if offering herself to him. His hands barely contained all of her. Massaging and kneading, he pinched her nipples into tight pebbles, aching to get his mouth on them, to bury his face between her breasts.
“My God, you feel so damn good in my hands,” he breathed.
Her soft mewls about had him letting go of his load right there. Unable to take much more, he spun her around, picked her up, and plopped her butt on the countertop. Wedging himself between her legs, he slowed a moment to take her in while she lifted the bra over her head and flung it to the floor. Her eyes were glazed with want, and her beautiful, round breasts swayed sinfully with her movements. He dropped his head and latched on to one of her nipples. His hand toyed with the other one while his tongue stroked and flicked and laved the bead he held in his mouth. He suckled and bit down softly, then pulled in as much of her breast as he could, his teeth scraping the skin, his tongue relentlessly working over her flesh. She dug her fingers into his scalp as if to hold him in place while she moaned and gasped and bucked softly against nothingness, only releasing her hold long enough for him to switch and lavish the same attention on the other side.
That primal being inside of him purred its pleasure at pleasuring her.
He straightened, pulling away from her, and a little growl of disappointment rose in her throat, making him chuckle. “Greedy girl.” I love it. She seemed to want him as much as he wanted her, and the knowledge was more intoxicating than the cocktails he’d consumed. Hooking his fingers into her panties, he leaned in to kiss her. “Lift up for me.” Holding on to his shoulders, she raised her ass, and as he slipped her panties off her hips and down her legs, she showed him just how greedy she could be w
ith the kiss she took and returned. He didn’t want to break it off. Deepened it as he scooted her ass to the edge of the counter and spread her thighs farther apart. Wrapping an arm around her, bracing her, he slid a finger inside her wet heat. So wet.
She gasped into his mouth.
He began a slow pump. “I hope that’s a good gasp,” he murmured against her lips.
“Mm-hmm,” she hummed as he kissed her. She made a halfhearted attempt to undo one of his shirt buttons but abandoned the effort when he slid in a second finger and increased the tempo. Grinding against his hand, she wound her arms around his shoulders and sank her nails into his shirt and into the muscle beneath. Her mouth slid from his and came to rest against his neck, where she part-sucked, part-licked his skin between shuddering intakes of breath.
“Show me what you like and how you like it,” he whispered against her ear.
She hooked a heel around his thigh. “Mmm, this is good.” She dragged out the last word.
Could he make her come like this? Women didn’t always react the same way to his touch, and the effect his ministrations had on their bodies was somewhat of a mystery. He’d never put in the time to get to know one particular body, but he found himself desperate to learn what would send this body zooming over the edge.
He kissed her neck, her shoulders, her mouth—whatever he could reach—as his fingers stroked in and out of her. Every move, every kiss, every touch elicited an extra buck, a louder gasp, or a longer string of mewling. A wildness danced just below her surface, and he grew impatient to discover how to unfetter it, putting aside his own burgeoning need as his cock throbbed heavily inside his pants. He became lost in her soft, sensual noises and her undulations, his focus narrowing on bringing her closer to the edge.
He’d never been big on going down on women, but the urge to taste her, to bury his tongue inside of her, was too powerful to resist. Withdrawing his fingers, he dropped his head and clamped his hands over her thighs, pinning her in place. He ran his nose along her seam, pulling in her scent before running his tongue along the same path and tasting her. She jerked and let out a long, wobbly breath. He did it again, pausing to flick and suck, loving how she tasted and how her body moved. He repeated the motion over and over again, spiraling into his own carnal cloud with the sensation of her writhing against his mouth. Suddenly, his shoulders locked up from being bent over, and he struggled to straighten.
