As if my expression cannot bend anymore in pure shock, my mouth falls and all amusement is thrown aside. Holy shit! I seriously never thought I’d hear something like that from her mouth again.
“You do?” my voice cracks, but I quickly clear it away to move on past my thrill and back into the zone. “So how close should I get?” I’m half screwing with her, knowing Piper isn’t going to move this fast after years of being apart, but also trying to feel her out and get a grip on where this situation is going.
“Well…” She rests her hand over mine, allowing the pressure of my hand to sink into the thick sweater and feel a bit of her body heat merge with my own. “I liked how close we were a while ago.”
There’s no holding back now, my grin grows as I shift and move closer until our faces are only inches away from one another’s.
“Oh yeah. You liked that, huh?”
Her whole body shivers beneath my hand as she bites out a laugh. At this point, I may have to have my smile surgically removed, because it is plastered on.
Licking my lips, I look at hers, gauging the whole situation. I have one of my hands folded and resting beneath my head, the other is happily settled on her rib cage, then there is the way she’s looking at me expectantly as if silently saying ‘Lay it on me, baby’.
No more talking.
Leaning forward, I move inch-by-inch so that I can give her every chance to stop me if I’m misinterpreting this in any way, because the fact is, I am going to kiss her; I have to and she needs me to. I stop abruptly, only a millimeter away. Her breath whispers over me, hitting my skin at an elevated rate and meeting my ears. I pay attention to it all as I always had; reading the warning signs. Again, her entire body shudders, but if I had to guess, and that’s all I can do, I’d say this is a good reaction. A response she used to always have to my touch. Through curved up lips, I take a breath and go for it; all the way.
My mouth meets hers again and it’s not only felt in my lips; the spark shoots through my entire body, zapping every organ in me down to my core, intensifying and causing a pronounced reaction that may hurt later. I keep my hands still, only proceeding on her go.
The plump flesh of her lips lock with mine in a gentle, luscious pace of soft pecks mixed with a few nips until her mouth widens enough for me to ease into something deeper. I tilt my head and use my arm above my head to pull myself up higher so I can fully get into this as I dip my tongue barely in for a more intense kiss that I hope will make her toes tingle. I graze her tongue, thrilled as hell when she joins in, meeting each move I take to taste her. My insides vibrate with need and desire, but I shove it down; however other reactions aren’t as easy to get rid of.
She scoots closer and closer, and with each nudge, I pull my lower body back just enough to make sure I don’t surprise her with any unwanted ‘hello’s’. A small whine seeps out of her mouth and between our lips and that is all it takes; I may very well explode. I pull back, not having a choice. Breathing like I just ran a race, I drop my head back to my pillow, wanting to do a major smack down on my body for getting so worked up.
“What’s wrong?” Piper’s breathing sounds labored as well.
That only makes my situation worse until I have to pull my hand from her waist and use it as a shield to conceal my massive arousal.
She quickly notices my hand not so subtly sitting at my crotch like a waving neon flag to my dilemma.
“Ohhhh…” she breaths out, flicking her eyes down and back to me with a small smile.
“Yeah, well, you know…it’s bound to happen,” I point out, drawing my eyes wider and putting forth my best effort to joke, although my anatomy is screaming that it should be taking the train to hump-town by now. Shaking away thoughts of how close the necessary body parts are to putting this locomotion into gear, I continue in my efforts of warding off my hard on with humor. “It’s really like a dog with a bone. It gets just a taste and it’s all in, you know, and ready to devour it.”
I shut up fast, widening my eyes and dropping all traces of a smile. That did not help matters at all. My whole body lies lifeless on the cot in front of her, depleted of blood and energy since over half of it is rushing to limbs that aren’t going to find any sort of relief anytime soon. Poor fella; sucks for you. I have no doubt that in about two-point-five minutes he will more than let me know just how much it sucks with a mind cursing pain like someone is squeezing the hell out of my balls. Whoo, can’t wait.
Piper remains amused with a smile and bright eyes that form little creases beneath them. She quickly draws her hand over her mouth and spits out a laugh as I scrunch up my face from the intensity of the moment that was lost. My body slowly responds with a gradual ache along with a bit more room in my sweats. I close my eyes and just pray there isn’t any sudden movement from her to get closer or even any unexpected moans from the next room.
“I’m sorry,” she whispers. “I just don’t think I could…I mean I don’t think I’m ready for…”
I snap my eyes open and look up at her. “Oh, no…I didn’t expect anything. Hell, we were about to drown each other in the lake about a day or two ago, so yeah, it’s cool.”
“I know, but I just…well, I didn’t think we would end up…um…like this.”
Shit. My face heats with embarrassment that I decided to move in earlier, but the wiseass in me decides to challenge that thought.
“So you’re saying, you weren’t checking me out like I was a piece of chocolate cake?”
Her lips twitch, but she simply shakes her head subtly; I call bullshit.
“Ok, and you weren’t staring at my lips and daydreaming about how good they’d feel.” I roll my eyes and snicker. “Fantasizing about me again, are ya?” I twirl my hand above my head dramatically, messing with her. “Maybe dreaming up the first time you kissed me, or some sappy thing we did together when we were younger?” I try to tone down my grin the more I say, because I know her thoughts more than likely didn’t venture there.
Piper looks at me with a slight smile, not near the one I’m hoping for after my teasing, but it is still a welcoming sight. Her eyes don’t leave mine and suddenly this cot seems much smaller and the cabin a whole lot less populated. Glancing down once again, I catch her checking out my lips and a bolt of satisfaction shoots through me, so I go on, pestering her as I always have.
“I mean, come on…after the look you took of me in the shower…” My grin grows and I widen my eyes to dramatize how she looked me up and down. “…I know you’ve got to be going crazy now.” I raise my voice a couple of octaves to mock an excited girl tone, “Oh.my.gosh…Evan has really grown…” I look at her with an over-the-top amazed look and press my hand across my cheek. “…up. I just can’t believe how huge…”
Piper bursts out laughing, slapping me across the chest. “Get over yourself, Evan,” she barely gets out before looking around. “Oh, ooops.”
I grin wider than I have in ages, but don’t bother to look and see if Jake has awakened; I really don’t care. My eyes don’t leave her as an impulse swarms my entire being and catapults me forward until my lips are crashing into hers…again.
Piper’s words are clipped on a muffled whine. I don’t bother closing my eyes as I let my lips linger on hers, and revel in the silky smooth texture. She closes her eyes as I gently and slowly ease my hand back to her side, feeling my way down her rib cage. Scooting a bit closer, I softly move my mouth in a sucking motion against hers. She responds with the same action, opening her mouth just enough for me to taste the sweet tang of fruit, as if she just ate cherries and pineapples straight off of a Christmas ham.
My body temp heightens on this and I sink fully against her, sliding my hand up her side. Every woven detail of her sweater is felt beneath my touch and if I wasn’t concentrating on keeping other things in check, I might very well be able to count every stitch in it. My body is in high gear and attuned to every movement, every breath and every noise she makes. I pay attention to it all, not wanting to
push her to a point of panic or fear.
A soothing sigh ignites from Piper and for the life of me I have no idea how it managed to escape. Our mouths are sealed together in hot morsels of nibbles and caresses that has my blood pressure rising, my spirits soaring and other parts of my body ready to take off for flight. I cannot get a grip on it, there is no use trying. I pull away reluctantly, both of our breathing elevated.
Before I can get any sort of excuse out, Piper speaks up, “What time is it?”
I remove my hand from her body where it was leisurely grazing close to a zone I’ve wanted to be at since this summer when I saw her drop her top out on the beach. Damn. Leaning across her body more so I can stay close but also because I remember dropping my phone to the floor by the bed, I press my finger to light it up.
“Ahhhh…you’re crushing me Evan.” Her fingers dig into my chest as she nudges me off of her, but I stay there, grinning from ear-to-ear.
The need to pester the living hell out of her is alive and rearing to go.
“Evan…” she giggles, huffing out my name in a way that almost excites me more.
I squirm around, my torso laying over her chest with my head hanging down towards the ground. My phone goes back to sleep mode, but I stay comfortable, shifting my ass back and forth in a pathetic attempt to taunt her.
“Ev…vaaaan!”
Fingertips dig into my side, squeezing the flesh beneath my armpit. I grit my teeth and jump, twisting to the side with a burst of laughter.
“Ah ha…I don’t think so.” Twisting my torso at the same time that I clasp her small hand, I pull up to my knees then thud down against her as she laughs uncontrollably. “There will be no tickling; you know how much I hate that.”
“I know that’s the spot that gets you every single time,” she says through a wide smile and breathy giggles.
She’s right; that’s the place that she always went for after a silly night of her testing to see if I was ticklish. I had claimed I wasn’t, which seemed to inspire her to investigate my declaration by squeezing and pinching along my stomach, the inside of my leg and then up my side. Finally, right above my ribcage she triggered a place that was actually sensitive to her playful pinching technique. I bolted up with a laugh, but I’ll never forget the gleam in her eyes as she realized she had something on me. First, she proved me wrong and wouldn’t let me live that down. Second, she had a go-to place that would have me unhinged in an instant. I’d muster up my most serious expression and tell her I didn’t like being tickled there, but she knew me too well; she saw through that, only making her more relentless in her pursuit of driving me into a kicking frenzy when she’d assault that particular spot.
With her hand still in mine at the side of her face and my other arm supporting my weight, my grin grows until it cannot stretch any further. She twists and squirms, probably assuming she’s in for it, but as my laughter dies down, she stops as well.
An easy silence falls over us and I can’t help but glance up to our joined hands, a glow of warmth engulfing my heart at how much she trusts me, even though she has claimed not to for years. She may not trust my mouth, and who could blame her for that, but she does trust me with her well-being; she trusts that I will not hurt her and that means the world to me. I swing my gaze down to her lips and pause, not wanting to talk, but needing to keep at a pace she is comfortable with.
“So…” her gentle voice blends in with the quietness of the cabin and jolts my eyes back to hers, which carry that same gleam I had seen back then. “What time was it?”
I really don’t want her to leave. “11:15,” I force it out, knowing she’ll probably use that as a reason to escape.
“Oh wow…it’s late. I have a lot to do in the morning.”
All of my hopes fall along with the smile on my face. I’m not sure what I was expecting, but her leaving wasn’t topping my list.
“Brrrrrr…it’s kind of cold, huh?” Piper nuzzles near me with a subtle scoot while lowering both her hands and bringing them onto my chest.
Flurries of tingles spread through my stomach like I just raced down a hill at full speed. Lowering my brows in confusion, yet excited that her follow up words to the time wasn’t ‘I have to go’, I shift to lower the comforter out from under us. Piper lifts her hips as I push it down and then carefully pull it over our bodies, making sure that she is fully covered. A thump followed by another one fills the void of the room and makes me look down.
“Oooops.” She grits her teeth and swings her face to Jake as I realize she just kicked off her shoes. Holy shit.
A swarm of excitement blazes through me on this. “It’s ok. I think he is out for the night.”
I pull in closer to her, placing my hand on her stomach. The bottom edge of her sweater lifts as she jostles around onto her back. As soon as one of my fingertips make contact with the smooth texture of her skin, my body springs into action. I may very well die tonight. This has got to be tough on the little guy, going from one extreme to the next.
I ignore the obvious which has got to be more than noticeable to her as she nudges her hip against me almost in a sexual, teasing way. Holy geez, we’re gonna be looking at a second Ice age with the amount of cold showers I’m going to have to take after this.
“Are you doing that on purpose?”
I close my eyes, moving my fingers beneath her sweater, but not pushing the limit. I keep them idle, letting the temperature of her skin combined with her wooly garment at the back of my hand, serve as a glove to warm one of the only places on my body that is still chilled. The rest of me is like an oven with a path of flames raging beneath my sweats.
She doesn’t answer, but another shift from her hip and thigh brushes against me and I know; it’s fully intentional. Piper has never been the aggressive type, of course, but she always knew how to draw attention to her needs. Suddenly, I feel as though we are years older, knowing each other’s movements, wants and desires as if they are our own. I open my eyes.
Her gaze pierces me like an arrow as she presses her lips together shyly with a sliver of mischief and longing beneath it.
“What do you want, Piper?” Her expression changes fast, twisting into a shocked glare. Shit; insert foot. Dammit. “I mean, do you want me to touch you?” I just put it out there; no way am I sugar coating this.
A line forms above her nose and her eyes darken into a gloom that shatters the moment. She shrugs, seeming unsure and hesitant as if she is thinking one thing and saying another. I slide my hand up, enjoying the way her stomach tenses.
“Yes?” Smirking, I wiggle my way up her stomach another inch. She sucks in a breath and I pause. “No?” I whisper, trying to read her.
She doesn’t make a sound and for a minute, my heart plummets and I search her face to be sure she is breathing. Her stomach sucks in and chest rises on a breath; at that same instance, my panic melts away as my hand slips further up her satiny skin a millimeter or two.
“Hmmmmhmm.”
I barely catch her whiney reply giving me the green light and although the sound is damn near equivalent to a crisp leaf falling to the ground in a forest, it’s the most exhilarating thing I’ve heard all night.
I give up the patient path my fingertips have taken and go all in, diving in head first, well hand first actually, as it lands on lace. Surprising myself, I hesitate, running my fingertips to the center of her bra instead of taking in a whole handful like other parts of my body are screaming for me to do.
“Piper.” I nudge my face above hers while just lightly tracing the line of her undergarment with my index finger. “Do you…”
My mouth is five seconds away from capturing hers, my heart is on the verge of rupturing and there is truly no more room in this cot for me to be any further turned on. However, even with every fraction of my body propelling me forward, a part of me doesn’t feel right just jumping into this sort of thing after years of us not even discussing what all went down that day. I clear my throat and pull my head bac
k a couple of inches.
“Can you stay, maybe for a few hours? You know, like old times?” I smile, not sure how ‘like old times’ will be received.
The sparkle in her eyes vanish and the barely there smile that was ticking at the corners of her mouth falls. I instantly regret my decision to put the brakes on. Am I stupid? What man in his right mind would stop right here? I glance down at her fuzzy sweater and how it rises and falls with each of her breaths. What am I thinking?
“I’d like that,” she whispers, causing me to immediately snap my head back level with her face.
She has an innocent yet excited grin across her lips; those damn lips that I want to spend the next five hours tasting and enjoying, but I won’t. My entire inner being seems to be waging a silent battle of good versus evil. My hand is pleading to jump into this and save the talking for later; we’ll let our anatomy get on the same page and go from there. However, my mind keeps an idle grip on the emergency brake, remembering that I need to go slow with her, to always go at her pace; exactly the way she needs it to be taken.
To hell with no tasting. I drop my head forward, moving swiftly and capturing her bottom lip between mine so I can savor its sweetness. Her lips reply with an exciting amount of eagerness as her hand falls on my shoulder, pulling me closer and tighter to her. My hand seems to have won that earlier war as it acts on its own, ignoring the barrier of lace separating it from her tender succulent flesh.
A groan vibrates up my throat at the same time that my ears pick up on her amplified breaths mixed with a soft whimper-like sigh. The sound is the exact feeling that is building within me, a finally or Thank God sensation that makes my own lungs have to keep up with all the air that I continue to suck in at an over anxious pace.
She breathes heavier, shifting to the side towards me as our lips move in sync. My brain starts flashing lights and blaring sirens to throw all gears into park until after her and I talk, but my hands, my lips and my grinding hips that have taken over the act of a crazed dog on the scent of a fluffy little pooch in heat, all of them definitely have not gotten that memo.
Breathe With Me (The Breathe Series Book 3) Page 16
