by Lynn Red
For the first time in his life, he didn’t care if he ate asphalt or landed the coolest stunt from 1980s television drama with flawless perfection.
His first foot hit the pavement, Lexie cheered and grabbed ahold of him, never wanting to let go.
He fell, but it wasn’t from screwing up the stunt. She fell too, and when they ended up in a heap on the pavement, neither cared about the scraped knees or slightly frayed shirt backs. They had each other, and that was better than any stunt.
9
“It’s dark out here,” Lexie said.
They’d been in the woods for a hair over half an hour, and had made it approximately halfway through Eve’s list of coordinates. More than once, Blake had attempted to teach Lexie the finer points of orienteering, but she was too enthralled with the wild songs of night birds, and with dodging overhanging branches to pay much attention.
Well, that, and she kept watching the way Blake’s ass moved in his jeans. Truth be told, if he wanted to give her a lesson in orienteering, or hell, in knitting coasters, she’d listen to anything he had to say if she could watch his ass.
“Look out!” he called, and reached back quickly. He caught her head just in time, forcing it downward as a branch whipped past with enough force that she felt the wind. “Sorry,” he said, “didn’t expect that one to have quite so much spring to it.”
“Oh, it’s fine,” Lexie said. “I was so entranced watching your ass that I probably wouldn’t have noticed if it had hit me.”
“Shut up,” Blake said, laughing a little. “You know, you really should pay attention to how I’m doing this. You’ll never know when you’re gonna need to know how to follow map coordinates.”
“Right,” Lexie answered. “Next time I’m hopelessly lost in the middle of town, going back and forth between my kitchen, my office, and where I keep my wine, I’m going to really wish I had intimate knowledge of how maps work.”
Blake’s shoulders were shaking with laughter. “Yeah, okay maybe not so important. But still, you never know when it’ll come in handy.”
“We can talk about other things that might come in handy,” Lexie said, “but I think if I start in with all that, my clothes are gonna come off and so are yours, and we’re gonna end up really dirty. And we’ll both have leaves in places leaves have no business being.”
“Nothing ventured, nothing gained,” Blake said, spinning on his heel and pulling Lexie against his muscled chest. “Although I guess you’re right... if we’re gonna end up in some starlit clearing we probably should keep our pants on. It’s hard though,” he grinned. “Real hard.”
“Uh, yeah,” Lexie said with a glance downward and a brush of her hand. “Yeah, I can certainly tell. I’m actually a little afraid of what’s going to happen when you decide you can’t take any more waiting. I’ve never been broken in half before, but—”
“Trust me,” he said, “I’ll go so slow you’ll be begging me for more.”
A hot flush ran down Lexie’s neck, disappearing beneath the collar of her shirt. “I,” she stammered, “uh, I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone say anything that caused me to literally freeze in place.”
For a moment, Blake just watched her face. “How do you like it?” he asked. “Because the way you make me feel, I’ve got about a thousand more things I could say that’ll make you blush.”
“Oh shut up,” Lexie said, laughing as she cupped her big bear’s neck with her hand. “Just shut up and kiss me again.”
He did. Oh God did he ever. Her head went backwards with the force of his lips pressing against hers. She quivered as he lifted one of her knees, bringing her sex closer to where he was pulsing under his jeans. Through hers, she could feel Blake’s heat against her, and with each kiss she seemed to beg him harder and harder for more of what he promised.
His tongue swept against hers, then hooked inside her lip, exploring every nook of her. She shivered as his hands painted a hot track up her back, sliding under her shirt.
“What about the map?” she asked when she finally pulled away, but refused to unlatch completely. “I feel like she went to so much trouble that we oughta at least see where it leads.”
“And I,” Blake said, interrupting himself with another quick kiss, “feel like I don’t give a shit. I could bend you over that tree stump if you wanted.”
“What was it we were saying about leaves in places leaves shouldn’t be?” Lexie chuckled under her breath. “Besides, we have all these oysters and this huge blanket. And anyway, I’m kind of enjoying our little adventure.”
“It is romantic being lost out here in the woods with you. I can’t think of anywhere, or with anyone, I’d rather be.”
“Lost? I thought you were some kind of map wizard? Don’t tell me you’re—”
“Joking, my dear,” Blake said with a smile. He swept Lexie in a slow turn, as though they were dancing a slow dance in the middle of the floor while everyone around watched and waited for their turn in the spotlight. After a few turns, Lexie let out a soft, trailing sigh, and relaxed her head against Blake’s chest.
“What on earth did I do to find you?” she asked, softly, as though she was speaking to herself as much as to him.
With a gentle shrug, he moved his hand softly under her chin and lifted her face to gaze into his eyes. “Whatever you did, I’m glad for it. I keep thinking that if one little thing in this long series of things had happened just a little differently, I might be the one drinking beer with Eve, and Morales would be out here with you.”
She thought about that for a second. “I don’t think so,” she finally said. “I think somehow, this is just how the universe decided to work. And don’t take that as me being all weird about fate or whatever, but... well, I guess maybe I shouldn’t be so quick to discount things I don’t understand.”
He set her back to her feet, never letting his gaze leave her. “Yeah,” he finally said, “I think that’s a good idea for me, too.”
After another short moment of just watching her and smiling, Blake let her go. “Well, we have those oysters to think about. And all that trouble Eve went to, I think you’re right. We should probably finish our little trek.”
As they held hands, walking through the woods and changing direction every few minutes, Lexie just kind of breathed. She let herself be swept along, let herself be taken along, without resisting at all. For her, that was huge. It was so huge, in fact, that when she realized what she was doing, it was hard for her to actually accept it all at once.
Blake kept looking down at the map, and then back up into the woods, taking a place about a half-step in front of Lexie. He hadn’t noticed he was doing it, but taking the lead and protecting her from whatever snake or mole hole, or whatever it could be that would hurt her was an unconscious thing to do for him.
At first, she didn’t notice, but when a branch that would have clipped her right in the middle of the forehead was instead held back until she passed, it hit her like a train in the torso.
“Are you taking care of me?” she asked. “This is really like a dream I keep waking up in the middle of.”
Blake didn’t bother to look back. “I’ll always take care of you as long as I can,” he said without a second thought. How easily he’d said it made it seem second nature, like he’d been thinking the same thing for long enough that when the chance came to vocalize it, it was just a natural reaction.
She didn’t say anything. Nothing really needed to be said, after all, so she just smiled, hugged against his arm, and gave him a playful pinch on the ass.
Blake let out a laugh, and then stood still.
“Uh oh,” Lexie said. “Are you gonna punish me for being naughty?”
“No,” he said. “Well, yes, but that’s not why I stopped.”
“Wait, why did—oh my God.”
Before them, the most unbelievable clearing opened up. There was a hole in the canopy overhead that let the moonlight from the pale, silvery disc that hung in the sky above
stream through.
“This is incredible,” she said. “Oh and look! What a cute little table.”
There in the middle of the clearing was a wicker-topped table, set with a bottle of wine, two glasses, two plates and a bucket, presumably for oyster shells. Alongside the place settings were all the accompaniments any normal person—man or bear—could ever want for oysters. Some garlic, some hot sauce, some olive oil in a bottle that looked like a tiny whiskey decanter.
Lexie took the olive oil off the table, plucked out the stopper and took a whiff. “Oh wow,” she said, groaning almost sexually as she sniffed. She put her finger on the open end of the bottle, and upturned it. Before she could take a taste, Blake intercepted her finger, sucking the amber liquid off.
“That is not cheap,” he said with a smile. “Here, your turn.”
He took the bottle from her, put a drop on his fingertip and let her lick it off. Another groan shook Lexie to the core. “That is absolutely, positively, not cheap at all,” she said. “I don’t know if I’ve ever even had olive oil that tasted like... well, like that.”
“I’m used to the stuff that is pretty much clear, and comes in a plastic jug,” Blake said with a grin. “I’m guessing that’s not the top quality stuff?”
Lexie smiled and exhaled slowly, letting the flavor and scent of the oil drift out through her nose and over her lips. “Still,” she said, “it doesn’t taste as good as something else I can think of.”
Exactly on cue, Blake gripped both of Lexie’s arms and enveloped her in another kiss that sunk right into her core. First she tasted the fruity, slightly sweet olive oil, and a split second later, her nose filled with Blake’s scent. She tasted the oil on his tongue, and then a moment later felt nothing but his warmth fill her from the top of her head to the bottom of her toes.
“That was,” she exhaled again as he pulled away, sucking her bottom lip between his teeth for just a brief second.
“Incredible?” he finished for her.
Before she could react, she heard a cracking sound. “How do you like ‘em?” Blake asked.
“Big, hard and—wait, what?”
Laughing deep and loud, he slid his other hand down her back and let two drops fall from the oil decanter onto the oyster. “You’ll get the big, hard thing,” he said with a smile, “but we should at least eat a little bit. Terrible idea to do a bunch of exercise on an empty stomach. You’ll get all light headed and woozy and...”
“Oh my God,” Lexie moaned after craning her neck and claiming the shellfish. “That’s...”
Instead of continuing, she instead took the oyster knife off the table and opened one for her bear. Topping it with the oil, she offered it to him, and when he went for it, pulled it away playfully and sucked it down.
“Hey!” he protested, laughing along with Lexie.
“Too slow, Charlie Brown,” she said with a wry grin. “Try again.”
She cracked another one while Blake patiently waited, plotting his revenge. As soon as she drizzled the oil, the big bear snagged Lexie’s wrist and lifted it to his mouth. He nipped her gently just below the bend of her elbow, and then kissed all the way down her forearm to her wrist. When he sucked on her wrist, she felt her entire soul quail.
Tingles of electric pleasure worked away from where he kissed, and prickled the skin along her inner arm as they went. Her nerves flared, fuzzing to life and then warming out, like she hopped out of a cold stream and jumped right into a hot tub.
Her entire being warmed through, Lexie slid around behind Blake, wrapping the arm he kissed around his neck and draping the other over one of his huge shoulders.
She let out another soft moan, this one of complete relaxation.
“Are you ever gonna eat this oyster?” she asked, kissing him behind the ear, in the hollow where his jaw started. “I need my hands free.”
“Yeah?” Blake asked, smiling and turning his head halfway around as he did. “What for? You gonna open another oyster?”
“Gonna open something,” she said with a seductive lilt to her voice. Blake grabbed her wrist, kissed her palm, and then sucked the oyster out of its shell.
“Yeah?” he asked, holding her hand as she dropped the shell and kissing back to her elbow. Her other hand slid down the front of Blake’s shirt, and dipped below the waist of his jeans. “What are you planning on opening with just one hand?”
“You’ll find out,” she said, sucking on his earlobe again.
She felt the heat of his pubic hair against her fingertips as she stretched them out. As she found him and slid her fingers around as far as they could go, Blake let out a long, slow breath. He closed his eyes and tilted his head back, sucking air through his nose and then a split second later, warming Lexie’s wrist with a slow circle of his tongue.
“I’m thinking about opening something of my own,” he said. “But I’m having a tough time moving just now. Somehow, I don’t want what’s going on to end.”
Even as he was speaking, he turned around quickly, and pulled Lexie’s hand free of his jeans before pinning her back against the nearest tree trunk.
He pressed against her, so that his heat pressed hungrily against her sex. When she lifted her legs to wrap them around his waist, she could almost feel him inside her, he pulsed so heavily. With each breath he drew, the muscles of his chest flexed and relaxed. With every breath she took, she worked her ankles further around her bear.
The rough rasp of denim on denim sent a chill racing up Lexie’s belly and prickled every inch of skin between her neck and her hips. Her nipples stiffened into sweetly aching peaks that slid against the fabric of her bra. Another torrent of electric chills shot through her, but that time she grabbed two handfuls of Blake’s muscled ass to anchor herself.
Another gentle thrust of his hips gave her a nearly painful longing to have him—all of him—right then. When she tried to kiss him again though, he had other ideas.
Sliding down her chest, he dragged his lips over her shirt, leaving heat and anticipation all the way down. When he was kneeling, he looked up at her, ran his hands up underneath her shirt and cupped her breasts with a soft moan. He circled her nibs with his thumbs, leaving her areolas pebbled and aching for his kiss, or at least a circling of his tongue.
“Please,” she whispered, “this is like torture.”
“Only the best kind, I hope,” he answered with a sly smile in the instant before he kissed between her navel and her waistband. “I get the feeling we’re gonna have plenty of time to do this, but I want this first time to stretch on forever.”
Instead of responding, Lexie just relaxed her head against the tree trunk and let her hair fall in a cascade around her face. He nibbled gently, making her gasp in pleasure, and then unhooked the button of her jeans with his teeth.
“How on earth did you do that?” she asked.
“I’ve got a weird tongue,” he answered. “Genetic thing.”
“Can you do that thing with—unh—cherry stems?” her gasp came as he kissed again and then warmed her skin with the tip of that tongue. “The knot thing?”
“I’m allergic,” he said. “No I’m not, that’s a joke. And yes, I can. But I gotta tell you, there are things right now I’m a lot more interested in than cherries.”
His words disappeared as Blake lowered his head and he kissed her lower, lower, and then swirled his tongue against her sex. Somehow, the heat from his breath and the hunger from his desperate, sucking kisses passed through denim and warmed her to the core. Tendrils of snake-like pleasure worked up her back this time, making sure every inch of Lexie was ready for... whatever was coming next.
“You keep doing that,” she said in between whispered groans, “and I’m gonna throw you on the ground and start doing the work myself.”
Enveloping in her mouth, he breathed heavily against her once more and then grabbed the waist of her jeans, roughly yanking them down over her hips. They fell just enough to let him kiss her between the legs, and when he did,
he drew in a huge breath, then shuddered as he exhaled.
“Something about you,” he whispered, “your scent, the way you taste, the way you make my insides burn... I can’t say exactly what it is, but I can’t handle not having you.”
He turned his eyes up toward her again, and when he did, she saw they were faintly brighter than before. The golden flecks in his irises danced like tiny sparks coming off the top of a campfire and dying against the blackness of the night. Lexie looked down, her eyes relaxed in a half-closed position and her mouth hanging slightly open. “You can do whatever you want,” she whispered. “I couldn’t stop you even if I wanted. And trust me, I don’t want to.”
A growl from deep inside his chest vibrated through Blake and into Lexie. The caress of his breath, the heat slightly mitigated by the chill in the night air, had her turning loops inside her brain. Her nerves all seemed to be taking turns alternating between hot and cold, and a few moments later when his fingertip tested her entrance, through the soft cotton of her panties, Lexie’s knees joined in the game.
First they went weak, then they caught her weight before wobbling again.
When his tongue slid along her button and Blake pushed her panties aside and pushed his finger into her wetness, there wasn’t anything stopping the fall.
Except him.
With the arm that had been massaging her breasts, Blake caught Lexie as she slumped, and then he kissed her deeply, enveloping her mouth, as he helped her to the ground.
“How about that blanket?” he asked. She could taste her own scent on his lips, which drove her somehow crazier than she already was. “Not that I care about leaves getting into places they shouldn’t—”
Lexie interrupted her bear with a kiss that pushed his head back. Their tongues swirled against one another, and then just before she thought she’d faint from lack of breathing, he pulled away, sucking a kiss off her bottom lip.
Sparks flooded her vision, and her nerves twinkled underneath her skin. “Shirt,” she said with a gasp. “Take yours off.”
Her halting words were enough to get the point across. Blake shrugged out of his tee and laid his weight gently against her body. He moved his fingertip back inside her, hooking it and rotating gently against her sweetest spot. With his palm, he ground on her button, sending a shiver, and then a gasp, running from her lips.
