by Tessa Bailey
He didn’t wait for her to move but spun her himself. Droplets of water had the privilege of spotting her face, her neck, her tits, reminding him of where he’d come their first time together. How she’d looked wearing him in the filtered moonlight.
“I’m coming between your thighs this time, understand?” Russell nudged her belly with his pulsing dick. “Ah fuck, what I’ve got stored up for you . . .” He scraped the foil edge of the condom wrapper down Abby’s spine and felt her shake, heard the whimper he’d missed like hell. Craved. “We’ll catch it with this for now, but someday, there won’t be a goddamn thing between us.”
She nodded, her gaze dropping to his boxer briefs and the flesh they barely contained. Watching her closely, Russell jerked the waistband halfway down his length, letting the elastic hold it up against his stomach. Her tongue skated out, her body dipping, as if she meant to service him from her knees.
With a harsh noise, Russell gripped her arm and pulled her upright. “No, Abby.” He steadied himself with a fortifying breath. “When I said I’ve got it stored up for you, I meant it. I haven’t touched myself since we were together. I wouldn’t last a second in that mouth.”
She traced a finger down his chest, ending at his belly button, circling it once. Twice. “Later?”
His throat dried up. “Are you asking me if you can suck my cock later, Abby?”
“Yes,” she breathed, hazel peeking out from beneath her eyelashes. “I’m asking you.”
The way she made him feel in charge was again releasing the powerful urges he’d allowed to run free that night on the beach. He reminded himself that she hadn’t been upset or hurt. That she’d wanted more. More. Russell reached behind Abby and gathered a handful of shower spray, bringing the water between their bodies and letting it wash over his erection. “Look down at me.” He nudged the waistband down a little more, revealing another inch of himself. “Does it make you want to touch your pussy?”
“No. It makes me want you to touch it.”
His moan echoed off the wet tiles. “You have that soap that makes you smell like white-grape sunlight? I’m going to rub it over every inch of you.”
As if magnetized, their mouths hovered closer as Abby reached blindly for the plastic bottle. “Can I wash you, too?”
“Later.” He brushed their steam-coated lips together. “A lot of things will have to wait until later, angel. Right now, I’m just trying not to jerk off to the sight of you.” When her eyes went glassy, Russell laughed through the pain. “That turns you on, doesn’t it? My girl isn’t so innocent anymore.”
She was staring at his lips, giving him no choice but to kiss her . . . and kiss her and kiss her until her thighs turned restless against his, her stomach pressing and lifting where it met his cock. Tight nipples dragged through his chest hair, making him feel too big for his skin all over. He rolled the condom on and dropped the wrapper, freeing his hand to palm her wet backside, massage the taut cheeks in time with his tongue dipping past her lips. The ends of her hair tickled his wrists and forearms, a product of her head falling back to receive the rapidly intensifying kiss. If he didn’t break away from her mouth, he’d lift her onto his erection and take her too hard. But no. He wanted to take his time. It had been over too fast on the beach. He’d come here to fix everything, to reassure her. Had he accomplished that? No, not yet.
With a low groan, Russell tore away. “Everything is going to be okay now, Abby. No more games, okay? Everything is fixed now, okay?”
She slipped the bottle of body wash into his hand. “Talk after.” Russell wanted to clasp both sides of her face and talk, talk, talk until everything poured out . . . but his body agreed with after. After he got over the worst of his lust and could focus. She needed it, too. As if to prove his thoughts true, she shoved his briefs down, making his dick drop heavily between his shower-dampened thighs. Fuuuuuck. “Stop thinking, okay? The way you look . . . it’s making me so hot.”
“Stop.” Russell slicked a hand down her belly, nudged her pussy with his knuckles. “I can’t concentrate when you say things like that.”
“Good.”
Stepping back to get an eyeful of her wet curves, Russell poured some body wash into his hands and set the bottle aside. “Is that where your fantasy ends? Being washed by me?”
Abby shook her head, making her sexy, palm-sized tits jiggle. “No.”
“Good,” he said, echoing her sentiment. His hands gravitated to those pretty mounds first, squeezing and lifting, rubbing her nipples with his palms. The harder he rubbed, the more she moaned, so he followed his instincts and pinched them between his index and middle fingers. He felt her knees shoot together, the rough touch affecting her where it counted. “I’m going to learn every little thing that gets you off. I want to know a hundred different ways.” He grabbed the bottle and poured more body wash into his hand. She must have known what was coming because she held her breath as he reached down and cupped her pussy. “This is where your fantasy ends, isn’t it?” He knelt in front of her, working her sensitive flesh, feasting on her with his eyes. “I’ll never fuck you until you’ve been licked here, angel. It’s a personal rule. Need to worship it before I take it.”
“I can live with that,” she gasped. He gathered a handful of shower spray to wash away the soap, his cock jerking at the sight of water rushing over her smoothness. Compelled, he licked out and took his first taste, just a gentle lapping of her clit. And oh shit. That white-grape scent that drove him crazy was now a flavor, going all the way back to his throat. His hands moved on their own, digging into her ass cheeks and yanking her forward, grinding her pussy against his mouth. He delved with his tongue and sucked, her cries to keep going entirely unnecessary. Making him stop would be like dragging an alcoholic from their first morning drink. “Russell, I’m . . . going to—”
When she broke off in a scream, the wet, shaking perfection against his lips would have sent him crashing to his knees if he weren’t already there. His hand dropped from her ass to stroke his length, fast and rough, mind spinning in circles with the taste of Abby. But when her foot slipped on the bathtub floor, and she wobbled, Russell shot forward with a shout, wrapping his arms around her middle. Somehow, the residual fear of Abby’s getting hurt only made his urgency to get inside her soar. “Need to get you out of this tub . . . you could slip—”
“No. Please, I need—”
“Can’t chance it.” He was already out of the shower, dragging Abby into his arms and carrying her to the sink vanity. And Jesus, Abby dripping wet, looking well pleasured and slightly miffed, was just about the sexiest goddamn thing he’d ever seen in his life. Feeling a surge of love and protectiveness so strong he could barely breathe, Russell pressed their foreheads together. “Do I need to remind you I’d lose my mind if something happened to you? Do I?”
“No,” she whispered, the irritation fading from her eyes, once again being replaced with heat. “Even if I don’t understand it . . . it’s you. My Russell.”
“Say that again,” he begged, squeezing her hips in his hands.
She surprised him by turning around, locking her gaze on his reflection in the fogged-up mirror. Then she pressed her ass into his lap and twisted her hips, ruining him for any other experience life had to offer. “My Russell.”
His cock surged under her declaration of ownership—ownership he hadn’t known he’d been craving—blowing his restraint out of the water. He gripped his throbbing inches and tucked the head between her smooth thighs. “This how you want it, angel? A little dirty? You want to watch me try to hold back and fail?” He pushed the top half of her body forward, looked down at her sweet, perked-up ass. “Ah, Christ. This is going to end with you screaming.”
She reached back and urged his hips forward. “I want to scream.”
Goddamn. Russell wedged his forearm between her stomach and the vanity, refusing to leave a single mark on her body this time. He gripped her chin in the opposite hand, tilting her face up. “I
don’t ever want to be inside anyone else, Abby. I want you to unzip my pants whenever you’re wet and know I’ve been waiting—just fucking waiting—to get inside my girl’s pussy. I want you to forget how it feels to sit down anywhere but my lap, right on top of my dick. Yours. It’s yours. I’m yours.”
Her eyes had darkened with each word, her breath joining the steam to fog up the mirror. “I want that, too. All of it.”
“You have it.” He pressed his mouth to her ear, gave a quick pump of his hips against her still-slippery ass. “You’re tight enough without your thighs squeezed together. Spread them for me, Abby.”
She’d only put a sliver of room between her legs when Russell thrust his entire length inside her. His hand dropped from her chin to catch her when she fell forward with a muffled cry. “Oh my God. So big . . . so big.”
“Jesus.” He spoke through clenched teeth. “Don’t say that.”
Her breaths came out sounding more like sobs. “Y-you don’t like hearing that?”
“Every guy likes hearing that, Abby.” He ran his teeth up the side of her neck, struggling like hell to maintain some sense of control. Over his body. Over his emotions. “Just save it for next time, okay? When I don’t have five days’ worth of needing to fuck you weighing down my balls.” He reared back and thrust deep, felt her pussy stretch around him. “You feel it?”
“Yes. I feel it, I feel it.”
Knowing he only had a few minutes before he lost the battle with his lust, Russell dropped his forehead onto Abby’s shoulder and set a slow rhythm. “It’s got to be inside you this time. I’m not pulling out of all this tightness.”
“I don’t want you to,” she breathed. “Please, don’t.”
Ah God, the little muscles in her pussy were gripping him, making each stroke mind-blowing. So fucking hot that his pace kicked up a notch, as he’d known it would. The heavy flesh hanging between his thighs slapped her with each pleasure-seeking drive, echoing off the slick bathroom tile. He was grunting like a goddamn animal, and he didn’t give a fuck, it felt so good.
Abby pushed her legs apart a few more inches, and white light flashed in his vision. No way he’d just sunk even deeper. No way. He lifted his head to see her eyes closed tight, mouth open, tits bouncing as he broke her off.
And felt his control begin to slip. “Hips tilted back. The way you do when I’m giving you my mouth. I want your ass up on my stomach. Do it.” His hand found her backside, palm tingling with the need to slap it. But he tamped down on the impulse and drove into her harder, instead. Harder, harder. “Ask me for it, Abby. Ask me to give you what I’ve been storing up.”
Her voice vibrated as she bounced. “Please, can I have it?”
“This?” He reached around and found her clit, teased the bud with his middle finger. “You want this?”
“Yes,” she whimpered, imploring his reflection. “But I want . . . I want you to use your hand on me. I can tell . . . can tell you want it.”
Russell cursed at the realization that his left hand held her ass in a punishing grip, to prevent himself from spanking that supple flesh. Fuck, the sight, her request, made him thrust all the harder. “No. Not until I know how not to hurt you.”
She fell forward onto the sink, bracing herself on two elbows. “Please.”
Slap. Slapslapslap. The pinpricks of disappointment in his lack of restraint were eclipsed by Abby’s response. She moaned, body writhing as the flesh that held him captive tightened on his cock, shaking the climax right out of him. Demanding he follow her into the oblivion she created. Russell buried his forehead into her upper back and growled as achy pressure drained from below his waist. His arms banded around Abby, dragging her upright. Absorb her. Crawl inside her. Mine. Mine. Can’t get close enough. Love her. Love her so much.
ABBY CAME BACK to reality by degrees. Since that night at the beach, she’d been blocking the memory of what her body felt like postsex. Well used. Replete. Satiated. It was almost as good as the act itself because relief blanketed her mind, the pleasure of satisfying herself, satisfying a man making her limbs heavy. A smile curved her mouth. And there was the knowledge that another buildup would start right away, leading to more. More of Russell inside her.
One emotion she hadn’t blocked successfully throughout the last five days? Love. That love for Russell had manifested itself in anger. Drive to break free of the debilitating work cycle. But it had been there, pushing at the backs of her eyelids, swimming in her stomach. Love so tangible that it eddied around her ankles, rising and rising like a warm current until she started to spin with it in slow circles. She wanted to throw her hands up to the sky and demand rain. It made no sense, and it also made her want to laugh.
But there was something. A tenacious . . . something, pacing in the background. Russell’s words echoed as they’d done in the shower, pinging off the insides of her skull before finally sticking. Everything is going to be okay now, Abby. No more games, okay? Everything is fixed now, okay? Before today, she’d known Russell was holding back something from her. She’d known. It was a familiar feeling.
And she’d grown sick of it. Resentful, even. This morning had been her first step toward never feeling in the dark again. Taking control of her future. Owning her actions instead of other people’s owning them for her. Hearing that Russell had “fixed” everything and it would all be okay . . . God, she was afraid to hear the rest. They had no choice but to talk about it, though. Impending dread made the bathroom seem darker, the steam thicker. Abby wanted to stay wrapped in his arms forever, but the longer she did, her chances of staying strong began to wane.
She laid a kiss on his bicep and eased away, wrapping a towel around her body on the way to shutting off the shower water. Feeling Russell’s eyes on her, she pushed open the fogged-glass window to let the steam out and turned to face him. “I’m ready to talk now.”
“Okay.” He stood very still, obviously not caring about his nudity. Really, his confidence was entirely justified. It took a considerable effort on Abby’s part not to stare at his sculpted thighs, his ridged abdomen. He was incredible, but his expression was anything but cocky. No, he looked wary. “You going to stand across the room while we talk, Abby? Because I have to tell you, it makes me nervous. Makes me wonder if you’re going to listen.”
“I’m listening.” She pushed her wet hair back, an attempt to distract herself from the foreboding using her heart as a trampoline. “But if you hold me while we talk, it could turn out different.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of.” He stooped down and grabbed his boxer briefs, cursed to find them still damp, and dragged his jeans on without underwear. His forehead was marred as he completed the jerky actions, as if mentally preparing. When the task was complete, he faced her, bare-chested. “I got the business loan. I took your suggestion and reworked my ten-year plan into five—and I got it.”
“Oh my God.” Giant bird wings flapped in her chest. Happiness for her friend, and the man she loved. “That’s amazing. Why didn’t you say—” She pressed both hands to her cheeks. “You must be so excited. All the ways you can improve and expand. I—”
“Abby.” He looked almost pained by her enthusiasm. “I did it for us. Maybe it makes me an underachiever, but the business is a distant second to you. Everything is.”
“I don’t understand,” she murmured, even though the picture was beginning to clear, just like the fog in the bathroom. “For us?”
His chest rose and fell with a heavy intake of breath. A bracing breath. “I know what kind of life you’re used to, angel. Comfortable. Happy. I can give it to you now, okay? I couldn’t before, so I kept away. Kept you away. Just until I was sure. I needed to be sure.” He took a step closer. “But I fixed everything. I’m going to work hard and give you everything you could ever ask for. If you’ll just trust me and give me the chance.”
It was almost too much to process at once, but some part of her had been prepared. With each realization that rushed in, she bera
ted herself for not seeing. Not knowing. “Russell . . . I don’t need the kind of life my parents have. I don’t want it—”
“You say that now,” he interrupted, taking a step toward her. “And I know you believe it, too. But I’ve seen what happens when someone settles. When someone gets stuck. I didn’t want that to be you. I couldn’t fucking bear it.”
“So this whole time, you wanted to be with me . . . but the money stopped you?” He nodded, the intensity in his eyes robbing her of oxygen. One masculine hand reached out for her, but she stepped back. “Was it your lack of money . . . or the fact that I have too much?”
His hesitation told her the answer. “Both.” He tried to shrug, but his shoulders seemed so tense, it came off awkward. “That morning on the beach . . . I thought I could get past it. I could get past anything if you’d sleep beside me, right?” His hand flexed at his side. “Then the lawyer offered me the money, and I knew it would be in my face, every second of the day. Your parents, people you work with, would never stop reminding you how much better you could do. Better than me.”
“What money—”
“So I went out, Abby. And I got better.” His deep voice vibrated through the small space. “I’ll never be good enough for you, but I’ll try harder than anyone.”
“What money are you talking about?”
It visibly took him a second to focus. “Mitchell flashed a bunch of hundred-dollar bills, told me you wanted me gone. That you wanted to help finance Hart Brothers. A parting gift.”
She lowered herself onto the edge of the bathtub, her knees going weak. “And you believed him?”
“After I thought I hurt you, I wanted to keep feeling shitty, Abby. I didn’t deserve to feel any other way. So I believed anything that would keep me feeling shitty.” His eyes were haunted as they ran over her, head to toe. “I’m sorry I believed it for even a second.”
