First to Fight Box Set: Books 1-5

by Nicole Blanchard

  I try to move back and put some breathing room between us, but she winds her legs around my hips to hold me close. My muscles clench and unclench in an effort to maintain my composure.

  I groan as she moves against me. “What are you doing here? With me?"

  She deserves more. She deserves better. And I want to be the man to give it to her.

  Her gaze meets mine. “Because I want you. I’ve wanted you for a long time. No one makes me feel the way you do. I saw you today, and I couldn’t let you leave again without seeing if you’re still as good of a kisser as you were at nineteen.” Her arms tighten around me until I can feel the thunder of her heart against my own. “Be with me for a while, Ben. Please.”

  I decide to give in, just once, just a little. Just one time. To have a memory that will last through the blood and loss. Loneliness and regret. One perfect night to help me make it through the next year of empty ones.

  “I can give you one night, Oliva.” I pull back enough so that she can see my face. “One fucking great night, but that’s it. I’m not the kind of guy who can give you the white picket fence, but I can promise you that it’s a night you’ll never forget.”

  “As if I could ever forget you,” she whispers, just before my mouth closes over hers.

  She gives in with a sound of pleasure that goes straight to my dick. Fuck if it isn’t already better than I remember. She plasters herself against me as my tongue strokes hers into submission. I shift backward until she’s sitting on my lap with her arms wrapped around my neck.

  It starts to rain, the sound of the raindrops hitting the top of the truck become the peaceful soundtrack to our stolen moments together. A sound that blocks out everything else. For a moment in time, nothing can touch what we have. For a moment, we’re locked inside a perfect bubble where nothing matters but the feel of her pressed against me.

  Everything I don’t have the balls to say is translated into this moment. I want to tell her how much being away from her is going to kill me. God, I’m going to miss her. My girl. A fierce possessiveness burns through my chest and I growl into her mouth, one arm wrapping around her little waist to press her even more firmly down on my lap. She breaks apart with a gasp and her hips jerk instinctively against me.

  “I’ve wanted to do this for a long time,” I tell her.

  “How long?” Her voice is barely a whisper.

  “So long that your brother would kill me if he ever found out.”

  She shakes her head. “What does that mean?”

  “It means if he knew the things I’ve thought about you, he’d find a way to get me permanently stationed overseas.”

  Olivia gives me a satisfied little smile, her hands braced on my shoulders. “What have you been thinking about me?”

  I grin. “Why don’t I show you?”

  I use the arm wrapped around her waist and the hand on the curve of her ass to slowly guide her against the thick bulge of my erection as I renew the kiss. Her fingers dig into my shoulders, and she slows the kiss until it’s nothing but our lips barely touching and our breath mingling between us. She glides one hand to cup the back of my head and the other holds my cheek.

  Her hips begin to move of their own accord, tentatively at first then with a steady, jerking rhythm that elicits the most erotic of moans from deep in her throat. I have to close my eyes against the need to take her. Her flimsy summer dress and bathing suit are little protection against me and even though the layers of clothes separate us, I can feel every single movement as if we’re skin to skin.

  “That’s it, baby.” I whisper against her throat, “God, you sound so fucking good.”

  “You sure you don’t want to go back to my place first? Somewhere with a bed?”

  I scoot down in the seat to give her a better angle and press more firmly against the center of her. She moves her face to the crook of my neck, lips flirting with the shell of my ear. Her desperate little pants are definitely going to star in my fantasies in lonely months to come.

  “No,” I tell her, “I don’t think I can wait. Later.”

  “But—”

  I silence her with a kiss. As the movement of her hips intensifies, I slip a hand between us, teasing her until the cab of my truck is filled with her breathless sighs. Her grip around me tightens until I’m caged in her arms. I can feel her heartbeat through her chest and each heave of her entire body as it’s racked with her cries.

  She stiffens, stops breathing, and a low moan reverberates throughout the steamed-up cab of the truck. My own body tenses completely with the need to follow her over the edge. The temptation has never been so goddamn all-encompassing.

  The remainder of her orgasm makes her shiver against me, and I grit my teeth against the riot of sensation. I feel her smile against my neck, as she smothers a laugh and stretches.

  When she pulls back, her eyes are sleepy, half-lidded and lit with satisfaction. My hands trail up from the soft skin of her lower back to cradle her head so I can soak every moment of this in. Like a kid on Christmas morning, I never want it to end. Too soon, she stirs against me and groans, breaking the cocoon of silence that had surrounded us.

  Carefully, I move to place her a safe distance away from me…like all the way across the state.

  But she doesn’t let me. Instead, she wraps her arms more tightly around my neck.

  I move to pull back and look at her questioningly, to no avail. “Livvie?”

  Her hands plot a dangerous course down my chest, her fingers snagging against the material of my T-shirt until she reaches the taut skin of my abdomen. She tangles with my belt buckle, and the sound fills my ears as if it were amplified a thousand times.

  I’m torn between need and duty. Responsibility and recklessness.

  Then she kisses me. One soft brush of her lips, feather-light against mine, and I fall straight into madness after her.

  I cover here again, gripping her hair with both hands, as if I need to keep a steady hold on her or else she’ll somehow escape me. Urgency tastes like firelight and the cherry-scented lip balm she favors. Somehow, while lost in the simple pleasure of her lips on mine, she manages to push my pants down enough to grip my hard length in her torturous hands.

  The contact sends a shockwave throughout my entire body, and through my heavy-lidded eyes I see her smile in triumph. Dear God, if I thought she had me wrapped around her finger before, I was wrong. Dead wrong. She could demand anything of me in this moment, and I’m not sure I could deny her.

  Then she slips off of the seat, down to the floorboard and slides the wet heat of her mouth over my cock. My eyes shutter closed and all I can do is fist my hands in her hair and surrender to the sensation. The slick, wet sounds of her tongue gliding up and down my length drive me fucking crazy. I finally regain the ability to open my eyes and feast upon the sight of her on her knees, thighs spread to kneel before me, her dress essentially a foregone conclusion, hiked up around her waist like an invitation.

  I loosen one hand from my grip on her hair and grab the hem of her dress, pulling it farther down until the hastily tied knots around her neck give, pooling the dress around her knees. The expanse of her milky white skin is now only covered by a few scraps of material that match the pink blush covering her cheeks.

  The thought of her breasts tipped in the same color consumes my thoughts. I need to see if they’re a match for my fantasies. I barter with myself, as though I’ll stop after I get just one more taste. When, in truth, I know there’s no stopping me tonight.

  My hands reach for the strings of her bikini top with a mind of their own. Two tugs and her top gives way, the cool air bringing a chill to her flushed skin.

  I press against her shoulders and she sits up. The playful gleam in her eyes has been replaced by a burning need that matches my own. I kick off my pants the rest of the way, and she’s straddling my legs before I’ve even managed to shrug out of my tee.

  She traps me that way, with my arms tangled in the material of my shirt and
still positioned over my head. Her mouth finds mine and everything about her is emphasized in sharp relief at the darkness. Her sweet scent surrounds me, drives me crazy. Nimble fingers grip my length, and I arch and buck against her.

  “Fuck, baby, you’re killing me,” I murmur hoarsely.

  She releases my arms and I attack. My fingers are no longer teasing or tempting as they strip her of her bikini bottoms, but insistent. The moment she’s completely bare to me, she slicks herself over the length of my cock like she can’t resist the simple friction of skin against skin.

  “Ben,” she manages to choke out. “I can’t—”

  I capture her lips. “I can. Just hold on to me.”

  She sobs with pleasure as I guide myself to her entrance, her fingers digging into the muscles of my shoulders. Lowering herself down an inch, two, she groans softly, sweetly. I arch my neck, nearly delirious with the rightness of it.

  This, is all I can think. Everything about this and only this.

  I grip her hips and pull her the rest of the way down until we are thigh to thigh and I can’t get enough. She pauses for a beat, maybe two, before she begins to move over me, seeking her own pleasure. I nip at her neck, repeating the simple movements I know make her crazy, arching my hips in time to tease her clit, nibbling her ear.

  “Is that how you want it, Liv?” I ask. She mumbles something unintelligible in response. “Are you gonna come? I want to feel you come for me.”

  I don’t even have to do anything other than urge her hips to keep our passionate rhythm and whisper all the filthy things I want to do to her before she tightens over me again—a tangle of want—and explodes.

  I only manage to keep the sweet, steady pace long enough to work her through her orgasm before I follow right behind, lips pressed to her neck, clutching her around the waist like my life depends on it.

  And my last thoughts as I follow her toward ecstasy are of how I want her to remember this moment as much as I know I will. I want to burn the memory of this night into her very core. I want her dreams to be of me, of this. I want the ghost of my touch to haunt her every day until I come back.

  Olivia

  Sweat slicks our skin together, but I can’t seem to find the energy to move. I’m drunk on the scent of him. Of us. Aftershocks dance along my spine causing me to shiver against him. We fell into Ben’s hotel room at some point, several hours ago, in a tangle of arms and tongues and moans. Our relentless exploration of each other frenzied with hurry like we cannot get enough, while lazy and reverent at the same time, like we never want it to end.

  His hands tighten against me and he groans. “Don’t move for a second.”

  I look down at him. “Why? Got a cramp?”

  “No, you feel so good and considering that I’m going to be surrounded by a bunch of dudes for the next year, I want to remember this feeling.”

  My mouth drops open and I slap his shoulder. “You are such an ass.”

  He smiles and I feel his cock harden inside of me. My eyes widen in response, and I let out a soft groan. “I fuckin’ love it when you get feisty. Must be the red hair.”

  He moves below me and all of the sensitive nerve endings he’d stoked to life send ripples of pleasure throughout me. “It’s not the hair, it’s because you can be a jackass and unlike the other bimbos in your life, I’m not afraid to tell you.”

  “No,” he says, “I don’t think that’s it. You just like arguing.”

  He angles his hips and hits a spot that has lights playing behind my closed lids. As the muscles in my stomach tighten, I try to focus. “I do not.”

  “Don’t worry, Spitfire. I like it when you argue with me. You turn pink in some of my favorite places. If you come for me again, I’ll show you where they are.”

  “I do not!” I try to protest but it’s pretty useless because I can’t stop smiling.

  “Mmm-hmm.” He slips a hand between us and my head drops back. “We can move over by the mirror, I’ll set you up in front of it and make you watch while I show you. How does that sound?”

  My body thinks that sounds like the best idea ever and within seconds, I come with a muffled scream.

  “I think you like arguing with me, too,” he whispers in my ear.

  It’s morning and I’ve been up for hours trying to turn back the clock. I got little to no sleep and I have the resulting aches and pains from a night of furious marathon sex to prove it. I stretch and feel the reassuring hardness of him at my back. The arm wrapped around my waist tightens and pulls me even closer to his warmth as he wakes.

  My stomach clenches in delicious anticipation. Although I’ve done some crazy things in my past, I can’t even begin to explain how I wound up in bed with my brother’s best friend.

  The jacket he used as a makeshift sheet comes loose as he tugs. It caresses the length of my body, and I feel it as potently as I did when he first touched me. I lie on my side, turned away from him, but I sense his gaze following the movement of the jacket as it reveals the side of my breasts, the dip of my waist and the flare of my hips. The scent of leather heightens my awareness until I’m nearly trembling in anticipation.

  He pauses, studying me for a moment, and my breath catches in my throat. Then I hear the rip of a condom wrapper. After our impetuous sex in his truck, he made a point to wear a condom for each subsequent bout between the sheets. He pulls my body flush against his, and the heat of it feels like a brand. I can’t help the moan that escapes my lips, even if I tried. His left hand snakes under me to turn my head to his kiss, while his right cocks my thigh over his leg.

  I can feel the roughness of his fingers as they whisper up and down the length of my leg. They dip around my hip to the source of my wetness, and a mewl catches in my throat.

  “Morning,” he murmurs from behind me.

  His fingers enter me in a prolonged stoke. “Good morning,” I whisper brokenly.

  “I can practically hear your brain working over there and it’s too damn early for that.”

  The palm of his hand presses right where I need him as his fingers speed up. “I’m just wondering where I can hide you, so you don’t have to go. I have a closet at home I think you’ll fit in, maybe,” I manage to say around a gasp.

  He shifts his weight on top of me and I frown, having lost his fingers. “Hey, now. We’re not going to think about all that, remember?”

  The rush of emotion startles me and I cover my face with my hands. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. Just give me a second and I’ll be fine.”

  Ben kisses my fingers. “You don’t have to apologize. I would miss me, too.”

  My responding laugh is watery. I wipe my eyes and peer back up at him. His dirty blonde hair is ringed with the buttery early morning light. I take a mental picture of the moment and pull his lips back down to mine.

  His mouth doesn’t leave mine as he slides inside. His thrusts this time are achingly slow and instead of being about quenching a thirst, this time feels like something else…something more. The solemn feeling that gripped my heart as soon as I woke up merges with tenderness, and I drape my arms around his shoulders in an effort to keep him as close to me as possible.

  His thrusts deepen along with his kiss in a moment that feels endless. His hands worship my body with gentle caresses and the sounds that he makes in the back of his throat send ripples down my spine.

  No matter how many times he tells me that all he can give me is sex—to satisfy a need—his actions say something completely different.

  They say he doesn’t want to leave me either.

  I reach the realization just as I climax, breaking the kiss with shuddering breaths. His crystal-blue eyes meet mine and he grips my shoulders as his thrusts become more urgent. He lifts my legs over his arms and attains an angle that takes me from the peak and flings me even higher. As I clutch his shoulders he buries his face in my neck and we fly over the edge together.

  “Oh fuck, Liv,” he grunts out as he slams into me one last time. His back, damp w
ith sweat, trembles beneath my touch.

  His face stays tucked in the spot on my neck as we both come down, our heavy breaths beginning to relax. He’s there so long I almost think he’s fallen asleep.

  “I’m just going to stay here,” he says. “Hope I’m not too heavy.”

  “Not at all. You’re pretty much a cuddly teddy bear.”

  “Great,” he mumbles. “I’m sure the guys would get a kick out of that.”

  I smile. “What are they like?”

  “Assholes, every single one of them. And they’re all ugly as shit.”

  Laughter bubbles in my throat. “Do they have such nice things to say about you, too?”

  I hear his sexy throaty chuckle. “I’m sure whatever shit they say about me is much worse.” He untangles himself from me and leaves to dispose of the condom.

  When he climbs back into bed he positions me so that I’m draped over his chest with my head tucked under his chin.

  Eager to learn more about him, about the life that takes him away so much, I continue, “Are they good guys?”

  His hand trails idly up and down the arm thrown over his stomach. “Some of the best. I’d die for them in a heartbeat.”

  My voice catches in my throat and I try to erase that thought from my mind. “How long will you be gone?”

  “About nine months.”

  God, that feels like such a long time. “That’s not too bad.” I try to sum up some courage to ask my next question. “Will I hear from you?” God, I hope that didn’t sound as pitiful as it did to my own ears.

  He squeezes me a little tighter. “I’m gonna be honest, it may be a while before you do. The place we’re going isn’t what you’d call developed, so there may be some kind of rough internet connection, but there may not be.” I feel him drop a kiss to my forehead. “I’ll do what I can though. That’s not a line or a shitty excuse. It’s just the way the job goes…” He trails off, and for a moment, I think he isn’t going to say anything further, but then he continues, “It’s also why I tried to stay away from you for so long.”