by Jill Shalvis
He lifted his head, his hair all sexy bedhead, his eyes hot by flickering candlelight. “If you don’t know, then I’ve forgotten how to do this.”
“You’re being careful,” she accused.
He blinked once, slow as an owl. “Careful,” he repeated. “And here I thought I was being the sexiest guy you’ve ever had.”
If he only knew. He was the sexiest guy she’d ever had and he’d barely touched her yet. “I told you I’m not that scared. I don’t want you to be careful.”
“So you’d like me to what,” he said, sounding a bit like she was amusing him, “just jump you?”
Yes, actually.
He took in her expression, laughed in disbelief, and rolled to his back on the mattress, covering his eyes with a forearm.
She turned her head and stared at him. Was it wrong that the first thing she noticed was how the muscles in his shoulder and biceps were flexed? Probably.
In any case, he didn’t move.
She came up on an elbow and poked him in the chest. “Hey.”
“Yeah.”
“What are you doing?”
“Trying to figure you out,” he said.
“Is that going to take a while?”
“I’m quite certain yes.”
Biting her lip, she chose her words as carefully as she could. “I don’t need anyone to take care of me,” she said. “Never have, never will.”
Lowering his arm, he met her gaze, his eyes glittering in the dark, his skin looking golden by the candle’s glow. “I get that about you,” he said. “I admire that about you. But sometimes a guy wants to take care of the woman he’s about to make scream his name. It doesn’t make you weak, Olivia. It makes you mine to take care of, at least until one of us walks away.”
She had a hard time catching enough air in her lungs. “Yours?” she repeated, trying to decide if she was pissed at the possessive display, or—damn it—even more turned on.
“Until one of us walks away,” he said again, not apologizing, not looking away, just meeting her gaze and waiting for her to decide.
She went with humor; she had nothing else. “We going steady, Cole?”
He didn’t play. Instead, he raised his head and nipped her jaw. Not gently.
She sucked in a breath and felt herself go wet. Damn.
Lifting his head, he looked at her. “I haven’t slept with a woman in two years,” he said, “so steady has little to do with what I’m feeling right now.”
Two years…Since Susan then. “Good to know,” she finally said.
“Something else you should know. Once I get inside you, I won’t share you. No one else for either of us, not until—”
“One of us walks away?” she asked softly.
His blue, blue eyes hadn’t wavered from hers. “Yeah.”
So they were going to do this, and if they kept doing it, there would be no one else until they were done.
“Olivia.”
He was waiting for an answer. “I can live with that,” she said.
Heat and something else flared in his eyes, and he kissed her until everything left her brain but this, the feel of him, here and now. She didn’t breathe as his hands familiarized themselves with her body. Nothing slid past his intense exploration; he touched and kissed everything—her shoulders, her breasts, her stomach, her hips, her thighs, and then he pushed them apart and held them there, bracing his weight up on an elbow, his gaze never shifting from hers. “You’re beautiful,” he said.
“You’re not even looking.”
He shook his head very slowly from side to side, his expression starting a slow burn deep in her belly. “I’m looking right at you,” he said, and then before she knew what he was about, he slid back up her body, wrapped his fingers around her wrists and tugged her arms up so they slid around his neck.
“Better,” he said, and rolled so that she was on top of him, pressing all his sinewy, hard perfection into the mattress.
The truth was that he was the beautiful one, all long, lean planes and hard muscle. She had no idea how long this thing between them could possibly last, but she didn’t fool herself. It wasn’t forever. It wasn’t even long term. She’d ensured that already by not being honest. Because she knew that it was only a matter of time now before that came back and bit her on the ass.
But when this was over, she’d miss him. She’d miss his laugh, his wit, his inner strength…She’d miss everything, including just looking at him. She wanted to memorize him, every single inch: his square jaw and the perpetual scruff, his sexy chest, the cut of the muscles at his hips, his thighs, and what he had between them—which, for the record, was just about the most gorgeous thing she’d ever seen. And that was saying a lot, because in general, guy parts weren’t all that gorgeous.
It was then, halfway through her inspection of his body, that his warm breath tickled her ear as his teeth sank gently into her earlobe. His tongue flickered over the spot before his lips slid down her neck to the hollow at the base of her throat, and that slow burn in her belly spread south.
His scent was already familiar to her and still so erotic, making her dizzy with longing. “Cole…”
“Kiss me,” he said, as if he was feeling all the same things. And then, without waiting for her, he yanked her down and kissed her, a soft, openmouthed connection that made her gasp as the tip of his tongue outlined her lips. She opened for him, but he pulled back.
Watching her, eyes hot, he smiled. She stared at his mouth, wanting it back on hers so badly she could taste him.
He gave in with a soft, fleeting kiss. And then another. One more…
He was teasing her.
“Cole.”
“Come here, Warrior Woman,” he murmured, and gathering her in, he finally gave her what she wanted. It was a really great kiss too, hot and sexy, with just the right amount of tongue to make her breathing quicken and her entire body quiver for more.
He knew what he was doing.
And she didn’t. Not when it came to him. Oh, she knew the mechanics, but he’d taken it so far beyond simple mechanics that she felt a little lost, and more than a little panicky.
“You feel good,” he said, tucking her beneath him. “You feel right.”
His words infused her with confidence, and not done with being on top, she rolled them back.
And right off the bed.
She gasped and he laughed as he planted his fists on either side of her shoulders to lift his weigh off her. But she liked it, and wrapped her legs around his hips to show him how much—
A knock sounded on the wall right above them. The wall that she shared with the next apartment over. Callie’s.
Both Cole and Olivia went still.
“Hello?” came Callie’s voice through the wall. “Olivia? Is that you? Are you okay?”
Olivia stared wide-eyed at Cole. “Yes,” she said, but had to clear her throat of the sexual rasp and try again. “Yes, it’s me. I’m—”
Cole slid down her body and put his mouth to a breast, sucking her into his mouth hard, and her entire body quivered. “Oh, my God.”
“What?” Callie asked. “You got a spider? Did you fall? It sounded like you fell.”
“Thin walls,” Olivia whispered to Cole.
Lifting his head, he flashed a grin and switched to her other breast, which he licked and nuzzled, and then gently closed his teeth over her nipple.
“Oh, my God,” she gasped again.
“What?” Callie asked. “You keep saying that! Listen, I’m coming over—”
“No!” Olivia sucked in a desperately needed gulp of air as Cole shifted down her body. “No,” she said. “I’m—” God, his tongue was shockingly talented. For a guy who professed to not having done this for two years, he hadn’t forgotten a damn thing about a woman’s body. “I’m fine,” she managed, squirming as Cole kissed her hip and worked his way inward from there. All she could see of him now was the top of his head and the broad width of his shoulders, gleaming
by candlelight between her legs.
“You sure?” Callie asked. “I’ve got a lantern. We could—”
“No!” Sweet baby Jesus. She tried to soften her voice, but Cole had her about to sing the Hallelujah Chorus. “Don’t come!”
“Well, jeez. Okay,” Callie said.
Again Olivia lifted her head and stared down her torso at Cole. He had a big hand on each of her inner thighs. Holding her gaze for a beat, he then dropped his head and locked in on her goods.
“Beautiful,” he mouthed, and let his thumbs brush her core.
And then again, and this time his thumbs were slick from her arousal.
Eyes on hers, he brought one of those thumbs to his mouth and sucked her wetness like it—she—was a delicacy. Her mouth fell open, and she must have made some sort of sound because Callie knocked again. “Olivia? You sure you’re okay?”
Not appearing to be concerned that he was driving her to the very brink of sanity, or that she was trying to shoo Callie off, Cole bent his head back to his task, using his tongue now, up and down, and back up…
Olivia arched into him, managing to rasp out “I’m sure!” to Callie. She looked at Cole. “She’s not coming,” she whispered.
“Good,” Cole said. “’Cause you are.”
Oh, goodie! cried the devil on Olivia’s shoulder, jumping up and down with excitement.
“No,” she gasped. “We can’t, the insulation—there’s no insulation— She can hear everything—”
“Then you’ll have to be quiet.” He accompanied this with another devastating stroke of his fingers.
And another.
More whimpers escaped her, unintelligible.
“Shh,” he murmured. “Not a sound or we’ll have to stop.”
“If you stop,” she gritted out, “I’ll kill you.”
With a badass smile, he brought her hand up to cover her own mouth, squeezing gently, silently telling her to keep a lid on it.
She tried, she really did, but she moaned when he slid back down her body. She lifted her hand enough to whisper, “Maybe we should just get to the main event.”
“No.”
No? “I’ve got a condom in my bathroom,” she whispered, “but I’m on the pill and haven’t done this in a long time, either, so it’s probably okay—”
His mouth closed over her and she whimpered again, tightening her hand over her lips as his talented fingers joined the fray and…drove her right over the edge. Her hips bucked and she shuddered wildly as she came.
In less than five minutes.
In another time and place, say when her head was actually sitting on her shoulders, she’d have to think about how he’d managed to do what even she couldn’t do for herself. Oh, she could give herself an orgasm, and so could a guy. It just usually took a lot of effort and some general fantasizing about Channing Tatum.
This time it took nothing but Cole.
By the time she came back to herself, he was pulling a condom from one of the myriad pockets of his cargoes. “Someday you’re going to show me what else you keep in your pants,” she said.
With a snort, he brought her hand to his impressive erection.
“This,” he said. “This is the most important item—” The laughter seemed to back up in his throat with a sharp inhale when she stroked him slow and long.
“Jesus, Olivia,” he groaned.
“Shh,” she said, mocking him. “Not a sound or we’ll have to stop.” And then she guided him home.
He pushed inside her, a delicious, warm, wet slide, and she had one last thought before a tidal wave of sensuality took her away.
She needed to enjoy the hell out of every single second of this, because just as surely as the sun would rise tomorrow and then set tomorrow night, Cole would eventually walk away.
Chapter 16
Holy mother of God. That was Cole’s only rational thought. He was balls deep inside Olivia’s tight body and reeling from sensory overload. It took everything he had to bite back the groan that wanted to escape.
She was having trouble keeping quiet, too. Her hand was still over her mouth, fingers white from pressing so hard. Leaning over her, he kissed those fingers as he pulled out of her and…pushed back in.
She caught his hips, wrapping her legs around him, digging her nails into his ass as he began to move, keeping him close and deep.
Right where he wanted to be. He couldn’t get enough of her. He loved her body, loved being all over it, and especially loved the reactions he got from it. But then she rocked up into him, tightening her long legs around him, and his entire world narrowed to senses, to how wet she was, to the way she clutched at him, the sound of her panting, the heat of her skin.
Planting an elbow near her head, he lowered himself enough to kiss her fingers, nudging them away from her lips so he could cover her mouth with his.
Beneath him, she shook as she came again, and watching her took him right along with her.
It might have been five minutes, an hour, or a lifetime later when he opened his eyes. He was warm. Actually he was toasty as hell, thanks to the woman curled into his side.
She was all over him. She had a leg thrown over his, an arm across his chest, her face pressed into his throat.
Either she was in a sexual coma or he’d killed her. “Olivia.”
She mumbled something and cuddled closer, rubbing the cold tip of her nose against his throat. Nope, not dead. “Supergirl.”
She tightened her leg and arm on him and then shifted her hips closer.
Yeah. He was on board with that and considered round two. The thought was tempting, so fucking tempting. How long had it been since he’d lost himself in a woman?
Since Susan.
Two years…
He hadn’t missed having someone in his life. He’d been busy holding on to his hurt, his fury. Holding on to it, nursing it, enjoying it even. But now, for the life of him, he couldn’t remember why.
Moving on was a much better strategy, and he was mad at himself for not thinking of it sooner. Brushing the hair from Olivia’s face, he watched as her dark eyes opened.
“Hi,” she said softly.
“Hi.”
“I was sleeping a little bit.”
“And drooling,” he said.
“I was not!” But she wiped her mouth and then narrowed her eyes when he laughed. “I don’t drool.”
“Okay, maybe you were just snoring,” he said.
She blinked. “I snore?”
“Loud enough to rattle the windows.”
She started to slip out from beneath him, but laughing, he tightened his grip and held her still. “My mistake, it was just the thunder.”
She fell to her back, and he leaned over her and kissed her, a long, lazy, hey-how-ya-doin’ sort of kiss that was perfect for stormy nights with no electricity and nowhere else to be in any hurry.
“What?” she asked, pulling back. “You’re smiling at me.”
“You’re purring,” he said, and laughed when her dark eyes narrowed to slits. “You are. It’s cute.”
“Well, you’re smug as hell. And it’s not cute.”
