Chapter 6
“I haven’t seen your apartment in a while. Looks nice.”
Gen fought the tremble that plagued her hands. She didn’t want the drink she was pouring to slosh over the side of the glass, betraying her nervousness. She couldn’t let him know he had that kind of power over her.
Their dynamic had always been casual, but in her mind, she’d been the one in control. She liked that. Being in control was the only way she felt comfortable. She’d always lived by the relationship maxim that whoever cared less had more power, so she figured she must have the power because she definitely didn’t care much about Gavin.
Right?
She breathed in and set the bottle of bourbon on her countertop and turned to face him, glasses in hand. She adopted a casual air, determined to maintain her who-gives-a-damn façade.
She didn’t know where this onslaught of butterflies making themselves permanently at home in her belly since she found out Gavin was moving home had come from, and right now she didn’t really care as long as she could keep them from showing. That was priority number one.
“Yeah, I guess we usually meet up in your hotel rooms, huh? I never thought about it.”
She was lying through her teeth and she knew it. She’d thought about the hotel room locations of their hookups very carefully every single time she’d suggested it. She’d told herself it was to make it harder for people to find them out, but the truth was, she liked the impersonal nature of the interchangeable square rooms. They were easy to get in and out of without letting anything that transpired in them affect her personal life.
A sort of “what happens in hotel rooms stays in hotel rooms” situation.
Now, she was welcoming Gavin into her private space—no euphemism intended—and it felt awkward. And nerve-wracking. And weird. And, in a way, awesome—the part she had the toughest time accepting.
Things between them had always been all physical. All feeling and no feelings, so to speak.
Was that changing now? If so…was it a good thing? If not…could she stop it?
She wasn’t prepared to answer any of those questions and had no desire to delve into them either, so she did what she did best: shoved her feelings down into a place so deep they wouldn’t crop up again unexpectedly.
That was the plan, anyway. It never seemed to work out exactly like that. But, what the hell. May as well keep trying.
Gen set the two tumblers on the coffee table, the amber liquid glowing in the warm light of her living room lamp. She sat on the couch and smoothed her skirt, keeping a professional distance between them. She wanted to make sure things didn’t get confusing.
“All right,” she said, straightening her shoulders, “let’s talk about heading the committee together.”
The edges of his lips curled up just the tiniest bit, and he inched closer. It was so subtle that if she hadn’t had her eyes glued to his body, she might not even have caught it. “Is that really what you want to talk about?”
The gruff timbre of his voice sent a thrill down her spine. God damn, the man had a rumble in his deep voice that could just about make her orgasm from the sound of it. He knew what he was doing; she was sure of it. That’s how he used it to such great effect.
She fought the tingles filling her belly and straightened her spine, doing her best to turn that column of bone and cartilage into pure steel. “Yes. That’s why we’re here.”
He slid his hand across the space between them and brushed his fingertip against her knee. “Is it?”
Her head spun and she closed her eyes to keep her mind steady enough to maintain consciousness. Not to mention maintaining her “you don’t affect me at all” façade. That was a whole other level of control she wasn’t even sure how she was managing.
When she spoke, her voice had a breathless quality that betrayed her, despite the studied blasé manner. “Of course. Why else?”
He replied with a light teasing tone, one that always sent her libido rocketing straight to the stars. “You tell me.”
Gen swallowed hard. “We’re here to discuss the committee.”
He leaned in so close that the faint heat of his breath feathered her neck and cheek. “Then answer me just one question, Genevieve. Why aren’t we at the Bar and Grill right now? Why are we in your apartment?”
She gritted her teeth, hoping that if she held her jaw tight enough, it would give her the strength to make one last argument. “We don’t want people to get ideas.”
His eyes glinted. “What if those ideas are right?”
He closed the remaining distance between them and kissed her neck, the gentle touch of his lips spreading fire across her skin. What little resolve she had melted… alongside her panties.
As if of their own accord, her hands tangled in his hair, the soft-yet-strong feel of it so familiar it was like coming home. Gavin’s hair had always been like that. It was firm under her fingers but… damn…it felt nice to touch. Kind of like Gavin himself.
Even though she’d hooked up with Gavin a thousand times in the past, this felt different. This was more personal. This was more real.
She’d spent years of her life trying to tell herself that “personal and real” was the last thing she needed, but judging by the way her body reacted to that difference with Gavin, she’d been selling herself a line of bullshit without even realizing it.
“Oh, God, that feels good. So fucking good,” she moaned as he brushed his hand lightly up her thigh. He wasn’t even under her skirt yet, and he already had her moaning. That was real skill.
“Yeah. It does,” he said, turning her words around on her as he gave her thigh a squeeze. “It feels incredible.”
She couldn’t wait one minute longer to devour him. It was a unique Gavin ability—the way he could take her from neutral to burning alive with desire in zero point seven seconds.
She pulled his head back slightly from where he trailed his kisses and pressed her lips against his with a desperation and hunger that couldn’t be contained.
She slipped her tongue into his mouth and angled her body so that her breasts were pressed up against his muscled pecs. There was no getting close enough. She was ravenous.
The way she felt with Gavin on the couch at that moment put every other time they’d had together to shame, and they hadn’t even gotten their freaking clothes off yet.
What the hell is happening to me?
Before that thought could worm its way into her brain and make her overanalyze the situation, though, an answering sentiment chimed in her mind.
Who cares what the hell is happening to you, girl. Just enjoy the ride!
She surrendered fully to the experience. With a wicked little smile, she put her hands against his shoulders and pushed him against the couch, swinging a leg over his and straddling him.
His long, masculine fingers wrapped around nearly her entire waist. She loved how that made her feel like a small China doll in his powerful grip—delicate, beautiful, and taken care of.
She grabbed her blouse in her hands and whipped it over her head in one smooth movement. It seemed like she had no sooner grasped the hem than the piece of fabric was sailing across the room.
Gavin’s eyes widened at the sudden movement and darkened with hunger as they traveled over her creamy skin.
Her breasts were covered with nothing but a black, lacy bra. It was a small slip of lingerie, more for decoration than any kind of real function. Unless, of course, that function was to be sexy—if that was the case, then judging by Gavin’s expression, it was more than doing its job.
His hands tightened around her waist, the pressure that his fingers put on her lower back increasing to urge her forward. She planted her palms against the back of the couch for leverage and tilted her head so that her long, dark hair dangled over his face, encircling him in a silky curtain.
He moaned. She got wetter. Yeah, some things about the two of them might be slightly different, but there were clearly some things that were
exactly the same and working like clockwork.
Chapter 7
Genevieve’s skirt rode up just far enough on her thighs that, when he dipped his head and looked down, he could see the dark triangle of her black panties. He could guess that they were lacy and barely-there, just like the bra she wore, and the thought made him hard as a rock.
Add that to the fact that he could feel the heat radiating from between her legs all the way through the thick denim of his jeans, and his cock may as well have been nothing but a giant mass of throbbing pressure.
He slid his hands up the warm, silky skin of her torso and used both of them to cup her face. He opened his mouth to speak but was struck for a moment by her sheer beauty—the way that her eyes were so wide and eager and full of life as she looked down at him.
Damn. She was exactly the same as she’d always been. As long as he’d known her, she’d had a special spark, some divine glow that poured from her, and somehow through all the shit that life handed out, she’d managed to keep it.
He certainly hadn’t. He’d seen too many things happen right in front of his eyes that would’ve made him swear he was in hell if it hadn’t been for the fact that he couldn’t imagine hell being so cruel.
But when he was with Gen, he still felt that sense of possibility, like anything and everything good in the world might happen. More than that, he felt like he deserved it.
What does she feel when she’s around me? What the fuck do I have to offer other than pain and darkness? And now I can’t even fly my way out of it.
He squeezed his eyes shut. He’d made it through the shit by training himself to never indulge in those kinds of thoughts. It wasn’t productive. It distracted from survival. So, he did what he always did: shoved them down.
They would surface later. They always did. He didn’t care. That was later’s problem. His only concern was now.
He opened his eyes again and took in the sight of a gorgeous half-naked Genevieve on his lap. A small smile touched his lips.
If that’s what now has to offer, then now is pretty great.
She was still looking at him expectantly. He’d been about to say something when he’d been hit with those shitty thought grenades. He had to get himself back in the present.
“You’re beautiful,” he growled. “Let’s go to your bedroom. I want to take you in your bed.”
She drew in a sharp breath, and the skin across her chest blushed a dusky rose.
She sprang to her feet, and he barely had time to miss the heat of her center against him before she was holding out her hand to him, and then he stood and followed her to the bedroom.
His eyes roamed her body as she glided ahead of him, every movement as lithe as a panther. Everything about the moment felt surreal, like a dream, right down to the shadow-filled bedroom lit only by moonlight.
As soon as the door closed behind them, he drew her into his arms. She was warm and soft, and her energy seeped into his skin along with her body heat.
He was seized with a sudden desire to see her naked, to rake every inch of her body with his eyes, to look at her gorgeous flesh bathed in the magic moonlight.
He’d seen her naked a hundred times before. Hell, a thousand. But this was different, somehow. It was like everything was new again between them. Like he was touching her, kissing her, and seeing her for the first time. It made his blood rush hot and electric through his veins, made him feel like he could conquer the world.
His cock was so stiff that it threatened to burst right through his jeans. If he didn’t free the monster soon, he wouldn’t be totally surprised to see a red imprint down his shaft from where it had pressed so hard against his fly.
His discomfort was nothing compared to his desire to feast his eyes—and his hands and his mouth—on her beautiful, perfect skin.
Instead of moving toward her and tearing her clothes off—and his along with them—like he usually would’ve done, he stood stock still. “Strip,” he ordered. The command was clipped and forceful. Her eyes widened in response, and her breath sped up.
He could barely detect a tiny tremor in her hands as she unfastened her bra, but she did that smoothly enough. The fabric slid down over her shoulders and arms, coming to rest in a pool of lace at her feet.
She stood still for a moment before continuing. Her chin tilted up, her shoulders back. Her pink-tipped breasts thrust forward proudly. Everything about her said she was putting herself on display for him, and yeah, he was a more than appreciative audience.
Her eyes met his. A slow, languorous smile spread across her lips, and she continued taking off her clothes.
She unfastened her skirt and it quickly joined the bra on the floor. Then she stepped out of her heels and paused again. He liked that. There was a rhythm to her striptease and the moments of stillness added every bit as much as the moments of action.
She was now clothed in nothing but a slip of black lace panties, and she spun slowly before sliding them down her legs so that he could watch her delicious ass as she bent deeper and deeper.
She was the hottest thing on two legs.
When the lace undies joined the rest of her outfit, and she slowly rose to face him, he took a long second to take in the glory that was naked Genevieve, but then he could hold out no longer. He had to touch her, feel her, taste her, take her.
He covered the distance between them in one fast stride. He was like a blind man trying to do the work of his eyes while his eager, exploring hands shaped every curve and contour.
She moaned and melted under his touch, which only drove him to further heights of frenzy. This was more than he could control, and he was beyond even wanting to. Every bit of him that he’d always held in check with her, kept at bay so as not to be too wide open and vulnerable, he let go of.
He was coming home to Valentine Bay, but he felt now that he was coming home to her as well. Regardless of what ultimately played out between the two of them he recognized how, more strongly than he ever had, that she was a big part of home to him. She was his soft place to land.
He was going to have to let go of his old life, and that was fucking brutal, but being here with Gen now showed him a glimmer of promise that there could be something good on the other side.
He swept her slender body up in his strong arms and carried her across the room, setting her down on her bed with a gentleness that spoke more about the true depth of his feelings for her than he ever could with words.
He bent and took her nipple in his mouth, sucking it up into the hot depths and swirling his tongue around and around it. The hard tip felt like a sweet pebble against his sandpaper tongue, and it felt almost like a game, trying to make the small nub as hard as he could, then moving on to the other one. He would play the same game with that one and then return to the first, repeating the process over and over.
I like this game, he thought with a small inner grin. It’s one where everybody’s a winner.
He loved the feel of her skin. It was soft and warm under his hands, which filled him with a sense of comfort and belonging. Home, which was a concept he’d been thinking a lot about. But more than that, it was like sensual silk under his touch, and caused a fire to burn in his belly that could only be quenched by touching her more, kissing her, pulling her to him and holding her against his body.
She was like a work of art, a sculpture, and he was molding her with every movement of his firm hands over her flesh.
He slid his palms up the outside of her legs, trailed his fingers over the flat expanse of her belly, and then cupped her breasts in his hands from underneath. Taking a moment to appreciate their soft heft and the heat coming off of them and radiating through his skin, he squeezed them and appreciated the moans that came from her in response to his actions.
He’d been with her so many times over the course of their lives, but her body never failed to amaze him. Every time he saw her, or touched her, it was like the first time. He knew that was a cliché. It showed up all over the place, i
n movies and songs and books. But, because of Gen, he knew that it was only so widely written and sung about because it was true. Maybe rare, sure. But he could tell from personal experience that it was possible.
Gen’s breathing was shallow and rapid, like she’d been running a marathon. Her nipples were deep red and hard, standing out against the pale pink skin of her naked breasts and torso.
He could barely breathe when he looked at her. She was so beautiful it was hard to even process. But when her body showed signs of powerful arousal like this, it was even closer to impossible.
His dick swelled painfully watching her chest flush, and rise up and down with her heavy panting. He knew he wasn’t going to be able to keep up the foreplay much longer. It was rapidly approaching the time that he was going to have to be inside her or he’d explode.
He squeezed the handfuls of her breasts in his grip, just tightly enough to make her nipples stand out even further and increase their sensitivity. He tightened the tip of his tongue to a point and flicked those sensitive tips again and again, until his hair was tangled in her fingers and his ears were filled with her moans and whimpers.
When he reached the point where he really couldn’t stand it for one moment longer, he sprang to his feet and stood next to the bed. “I have to have you, baby. I can’t wait one more second.”
She stretched her arms above her head, her eyes filled with mischief, and said, “Sounds good to me. Yeah, I can definitely deal with that.”
He made quick work of undressing and rolling on a condom. He had some more exploring to do with his hands and his mouth, but the explosive pressure in his cock as he looked at her there, laid out on her bed, told him it wasn’t going to be very long at all until he drove his dick into her. He wanted to be prepared when that moment arrived.
He climbed back onto the bed, naked now, and lowered his head to her nipples again. Even though he’d just devoted so much attention to them, it was an entirely new and more layered experience to lick and suck them while their naked bodies were pressed together down their entire length, feeling her hot and silky skin along every inch of his body.
Rescuing His Heart Page 3
