Giving It All

by Christi Barth

  A man could hold out for only so long. Brooke sounded damned sure of what she wanted. Clearly they needed to put a hurricane exemption into the code. Something else to add to his to-do list for his short trip home.

  “Brooke?”

  “Yes?”

  “There’s nothing I want more than to put the smile back on your face.” Logan captured her hand. Flipped it over. Pressed a kiss into the center of her palm, then licked a spiral out from it.

  Her breath hitched in, held for a couple of seconds. “You don’t have to do the whole seduction dance. I’m yours for the taking.”

  “You picked the when and the why. I get to pick the how.”

  Logan assumed her room was the mirror image of his own. Hands on her shoulders, he walked Brooke back a couple of steps to the bed in the utter darkness. Reminded himself to take his time. That it didn’t matter he hadn’t had sex in more than three months. The important thing was that he’d never had sex with Brooke before. Oh, he’d thought about it. Thought about her while using his hand on himself at age sixteen more times than he could count. Regardless, this couldn’t be rushed.

  So he used his thumbs to brush her hair back from her face. Brushed his lips across hers. Back and forth. Slowly. Teasingly. Barely touching, but touching enough to have her sway into him. He deepened the pressure. Brooke’s hands latched into his hair. She sort of shimmied against him. Against all of him—including the hard-as-a-rock spot below his waist. That move almost destroyed his intent to not rush. Made him revise the plan to at least take longer than two minutes.

  He ran the backs of his knuckles along the undersides of her upraised arms and down to her ribs. Planted his hands there. Well, planted his palms there while he swept his thumbs along the generous curves of her breasts. It took only a couple of sweeps along that heavy softness before she moaned and opened to him. Logan took advantage of it to move his tongue inside the sweetness of her mouth. Warm and wet and wild. He figured he was already inside the eye of the hurricane.

  Yeah. Kissing Brooke was great. So great he just kept at it for a few minutes. No moves. No upping the ante. Just long, hot, deep kisses. Not because he’d always wanted to do that back in high school. But because it was so damned terrific with her right now.

  The driving wind and rain acted like white noise, insulating them to only the sounds of sucking and licking and pleasuring. She made the sweetest damned mewls of pleasure. They whispered into Logan’s ears and straight down to his dick, each one making it pulse with need. Crazy, desperate need, considering they’d just gotten started. But, God, he wanted her. Right then and there, he decided once wouldn’t be enough with Brooke. No, he’d need to have her—and keep having her—all night long.

  Running his hands down her back, Logan discovered she was in a T-shirt. Just a T-shirt. One that barely hit the top of her silky thighs. Yeah, taking it slow was officially off the table.

  Making sure to ease the neckline away from her face, Logan whisked off the shirt. Started to shuck his shorts, but then remembered to grab for his wallet and its single emergency condom. Felt his way over to the nightstand by running his hand along the edge of the bed. He put the condom on it, along with his phone, and dropped his shorts.

  A creak of the bed told him that Brooke had jumped ahead on the agenda. No complaints. Logan’s inner sixteen-year-old wanted to take a running leap. But he knew better. Carefully he slid into bed until he was propped on an elbow along her side.

  The dark was torture. Of course he remembered what she looked like from their time at the Emerald Pool. The image of her in that red bikini was pretty well seared into his memory banks. He wanted to see everything, though. Wanted to see the color of her nipples. Wanted to watch them harden to tight peaks as he touched her.

  Logan skimmed his hand from her shoulder straight down her body. Her skin was so soft it was almost like stroking water. Back up, this time along the inside of her thigh to circle around her belly button, which made her squirm and giggle. “Ticklish?”

  “You don’t remember?”

  Oh, he did. High school was full of tickle fights with the cheerleaders, back-rub chains, any lame excuse to touch and grab. He remembered one Friday night in particular. She’d just come off the top of a pyramid of other cheerleaders. They’d screwed up. The guy who was supposed to catch her got pushed out of bounds by a linebacker from the other team. From the sidelines, Logan had watched Brooke fly high in the air, do the splits, and start to plummet to the turf.

  He had barreled off the bench to catch her. Barely made it. He hit the field, cushioning her in his arms, so grateful he’d made it in time. But showing that relief would’ve gotten him hell from the team. Would’ve gotten him yelled at by his girlfriend. And probably would’ve gotten an uppercut to his jaw from her boyfriend.

  So he’d settled for rolling her beneath him and tickling her mercilessly. “My job’s to catch the ball, not you, Escarlata,” he’d teased. She’d flushed pink, and then her cheeks darkened even more as she squirmed and squealed beneath him.

  Yeah. He remembered, all right.

  So Logan changed course. Turned his hand so that his fingers grazed through the fine hair between her legs to the velvety wetness beneath. That cut off the giggles. Turned them into a gasp. And then another. “More,” she demanded.

  Oh, he’d give her more. Because he needed Brooke to be just as urgent, just as ready to explode as he was. Logan shifted down the bed. Slid one finger inside her even as he licked a line straight down her center. Her hips snapped up to meet him. A long moan split the humid silence. Logan pumped his finger in and out. It gave him the chance to inhale her arousal. Spicy. Strong. So damned enticing that the scent alone made him even harder.

  He lapped at her, circling his tongue around the nub that made her quiver every time he touched it. Brooke’s fingers laced through his hair. Pressed his face against her harder. Logan added a second finger. Crooked it just a little. Too soon for him to have picked up all her tells. To know exactly what sent her over the edge. Although he would by the end of the night. But for now, adding the internal pressure along the side sure did the trick. Brooke bucked against him.

  No point in waiting any longer. They both needed to get the first orgasm out of the way. Get the burning desire under control so that he could take his time to learn and linger on the next round. Logan surged up to grab the condom. Ripped it open with his teeth. Brooke took the package from him.

  “I have to feel you.” She scooted up. Slowly rolled the rubber down his length, petting and stroking and circling so it felt like it took a hundred years. Logan recited the entire Manchester United roster twice in his head to keep from shooting his wad as those clever fingers squeezed his balls.

  If he couldn’t see her, couldn’t watch those sea-glass eyes roll back in her head, then he’d damned well get to keep touching as much of her as possible. Logan laid back down on his side. Pulled her down until they were spooning.

  Brooke huffed. “Hey. I thought we were having sex? You haven’t earned a cuddle yet.”

  “Have a little faith.” Her hips moved restlessly, but Logan had a plan. He lifted her top leg over his. Pinned her other ankle with his bottom leg. Opened her up wide with his fingers. And then slid inside in one slow stroke.

  Brooke was his wet dream come true. Except reality was so much fucking better than the fantasy. He nudged the heavy fall of hair with his face. Too much to deal with, so he just grabbed it all with his hand and used it to tip her head back. It gave him all the access he wanted to her neck. All the access to clamp his lips over her pulse to feel it skitter and race beneath his tongue.

  Logan encircled her with his right arm. Filled his palm with her breast. Loved how there was so much of it that it spilled out of his grip. It was enough to hold what he could and tweak her nipple between his fingers.

  Her hands scrabbled back around at his ass, urging him closer. He pinched her nipple every time he fucked her with an in-stroke. Logan kept the same rh
ythm with his hands and his hips. Couldn’t manage to get his guttural rasps for breath in that rhythm, though.

  “Logan, you’re amazing,” she panted. “You’re filling me up so much, so well. So full. So perfect. But I want even more.”

  “So talkative all of a sudden.”

  Brooke undulated against him like a breaking wave. “I just…I just feel so good. So different than I have…I can’t hold it inside, pent up.”

  “Don’t hold anything in. Don’t hold back at all,” he commanded. Then he nipped at her earlobe, to press his point home.

  “I couldn’t if I wanted to,” she laughed. “Make me feel even more.”

  Logan loved how she kept asking for more. Because he sure as hell wanted to give her everything he had. He picked up the pace. Pistoned against her with all the determination and desire in his bloodstream set free. The sound of their skin slapping together almost drowned out the storm.

  He was right at the edge. Logan let go of her breast to put his hand at the juncture of her thighs. As soon as his thumb grazed her clit, Brooke came apart. She screamed. She writhed and squeezed him inside and out, sending him straight into an explosion that milked him longer and harder than ever before.

  Holy shit.

  That was one for the record books. Her pulse throbbed beneath his lips. Logan brought his arm back around to someplace that already felt like home, with her breast nestled in his palm. That haven lasted only a moment.

  Brooke pushed backward until he was flat on his back. She straddled him, the tips of her hair tickling his chest. “Distract me some more,” she demanded.

  Chapter 5

  “Not that I’m complaining,” mumbled Logan, his face smushed against the pillow, “but why did you bring two dozen condoms on your solo vacation?”

  Thankful that the dark hid her suddenly burning cheeks, Brooke said, “I didn’t.” She wouldn’t have thought to do so in a million years. And she certainly didn’t want Logan to think of her as the kind of woman who’d use twenty-four condoms in a week surrounded by total strangers. “My best friend, Katrina, sneaked them in my bag when she drove me to the airport. I found them when I unpacked.”

  “I think Katrina’s my new best friend, too.”

  “I’ll be sure to let her know that you approve of her bon voyage gift.” Truth be told, Brooke owed her friend. Owed her a giant bottle of champagne. A massage at the swanky spa in the Mandarin Oriental hotel. Heck, she’d do pretty much anything Katrina wanted for an entire weekend to pay her back for the foresight of those condoms.

  Because she absolutely had not been finished with Logan after the first time. Or the second. Or the third, in the shower. And really, not even now as they got their breathing back under control after the fourth time.

  The man was a sex machine. A sex god. Every woman’s fantasy. Inventive. An incredibly generous lover, who’d brought her to more orgasms than he’d gotten himself. Which was amazing, since before tonight she’d never experienced a double orgasm. Whereas they kind of seemed to be Logan’s trademark.

  “Is Katrina a teacher, too?”

  The thought—the mere mention of Katrina trying to corral a room full of teenagers while wearing Louboutins and a stack of diamond bracelets—made her burst out laughing. “No. Katrina doesn’t do…well, anything.”

  Logan flipped his head over to face her. “Huh?”

  “She’s recently divorced. In her words, she used to be full-time arm candy. Until she discovered her husband reaching into several different candy bowls, if you get my drift.”

  “He fucked around.”

  Her hand, which had been pleasantly occupied tracing the shape of his taut butt, stilled. Twelve hours a day with students kept Brooke’s language clean and chock-full of euphemisms for anything that wasn’t. Most of her friends were teachers. So it kind of shocked her when people just came out and bluntly said things like that.

  “I would never put it that way, but yes.”

  With a huge rustling and reset of the sheets, Logan turned all the way onto his back. “I hate people like that.” A soft thump of his fist into the mattress. “If you want to fuck around, have enough respect for the person you’ve promised to love to get a divorce first.” Two strong yanks of the sheets that ended in a net zero gain of anything but a showing of his frustration. “You don’t have to promise forever. Just promise not to be a douche bag.”

  “Is all this fervor perhaps aimed at your father? Because if you’ve got a secret half sister, well…” Brooke didn’t want to spell it out and rub it in any further. But it didn’t take a degree in psychology to put the pieces together and realize the wound—albeit twenty-four years old—was raw for him.

  “Probably.” This time he reared up to wallop a divot into his pillow that probably would’ve sent feathers flying all over the room if it’d been down instead of foam. Then he fell back with a sigh.

  Boys might change into men, but some of their intrinsic tells never changed. Logan had always been super physical. The one who shook off a bad grade by running an extra ten laps. Or got over a fight with his parents by going on a daylong hike along the Appalachian Trail. “Are you getting it all out of your system now so you can be calm when you confront your dad?”

  “I was calm. Loose. Two minutes ago, a jellyfish had nothing on me. Sexing you up put everything out of my mind.”

  Brooke eased her leg on top of his. “See? I knew it’d be the perfect distraction.”

  “Huh-uh. It was only a good distraction during the sex. Then you started in on some seriously weird shit masquerading as pillow talk.”

  Okay, it hadn’t been her finest romantic moment. Definitely not something she’d imagined discussing while sharing a bed with Logan. Not that she’d ever really gone beyond imagining kissing him. Until today. Until the Emerald Pool. Then her imagination had kicked into overdrive. And, happily, everything she’d imagined had come true over the past few hours. And then some.

  She slid her foot up and down his calf in a hopefully conciliatory manner. The fact that she loved feeling the crinkle of his leg hair against the arch of her foot—that she relished everything so overtly masculine about Logan, from his thick stubble to his bulging biceps and that crazy sexy trail of hair that arrowed down his abdomen—was just a bonus.

  “I didn’t plan to bring up cheating. I’m conversationally savvy enough to know that’s not an appropriate post-coital discussion topic. I was merely explaining why I have so many condoms.”

  “Good. Let’s stick to the condom story.” Instead of beating up on the bed linens anymore, Logan curled his palm around her breast. Which was a much better use of it. “What happened to your friend?”

  That had to be the fastest—and least graceful—segue ever. So he didn’t want to talk about his father. She got it. Logan didn’t owe her a heart-to-heart. They weren’t in a real relationship. They were in an amazing bubble, outside of time. Brooke had just thought that talking about it might help him. Although she knew from experience that talking about bad things, upsetting things, often just focused you on the bad and made you feel worse.

  Or maybe that was just her.

  Because there were times when she thought that if one more person kindly crinkled their brow and said, Let it all out, honey. Just talk about your feelings…well, Brooke had never been one for violence. But she had just taken up a kickboxing class in order to have an outlet. In order to keep from punching that next well-meaning person in the face.

  “Katrina kicked David to the curb. Thanks to their pre-nup, she pretty much emptied his bank accounts. Kept the country club membership, the house, the beach house, and the dog, too. Now she has everything but a purpose.”

  “A bored socialite, huh? D.C.’s got almost as many of those as spies.”

  Although her friend could, on the surface, be that easily dismissed, Brooke wouldn’t let it happen. Not even by the man whose single touch on her left breast warmed her entire body. “She doesn’t want to be bored. She’s kind of h
aving the time of her life figuring out what to do next.” Brooke grabbed her phone off the nightstand. Scrolled through her texts. “Listen to this: ‘Some hotels let you check out a goldfish for your stay. What if I opened a store like that? A pet-lending library? So when you’re lonely you could have a pet for a few days to cheer you up?’ That’s her latest business idea.”

  Logan snorted. “It sucks. It’s a recipe for disaster. And a shit ton of dead animals.”

  Well, that was probably true. Refreshing, though, that he didn’t sugarcoat it, like she had to. Habit kicked in with her defense of Katrina, nonetheless. “It’s called brainstorming, Logan. You toss every possible idea into a pile and then sort through to find the good ones.” The darkness, the quiet, the knowledge that anything she said to Logan didn’t have the slightest chance of getting back to Katrina gave her the freedom to keep going. Unable to hold back the pent-in laughter of fielding these texts for several months, Brooke let it roll out and turn into a belly laugh. “She hasn’t had any good ones yet. Not a single one.”

  “Sure she has. She got the idea to put condoms in your luggage.”

  More laughter gurgled out of her, and Logan joined in. They laughed together like that for probably longer than his joke called for, but it just felt so good. So incredibly normal, even after ten years, to be laughing and talking with him. As easy as their laughter when she’d tutored him in Spanish on long bus trips to games.

  “Do you still remember any of your Spanish?” she asked, suddenly curious if even that tiny impact she’d had on his life had maybe stayed with him at all.

  “Sí. Estoy con fluidez. Lo uso todo el tiempo.”

  The words rolled off of his tongue with perfect diction and lightning speed. Which astonished Brooke. And stumped her, as she used her rusty Spanish only when she went to Toro Toro for brunch and their Bloody Mary Bar. “Uh…qué?”

  “I’m fluent. I use it all the time for work. I mean, not on this particular trip to Kazakhstan.”