Rough & Ready

by Tracy Wolff

  I don’t say anything in response to that. I can’t. Not when all I can think is that someone hurt this woman. Someone hurt my woman. Because she is, whether she knows it yet or not. I’ve wanted her since the moment I first laid eyes on her and now that I’ve made love with her, now that I’ve heard her secrets and held her while she slept, I know what she is to me. Know, even, what she’ll eventually become to me if she keeps letting me in and gives me a chance.

  She stares at me for long seconds, and when I still don’t say anything—still don’t trust myself to say anything—she eventually pushes herself out of my arms and out of bed.

  “Where are you going?” I ask, sitting up in alarm.

  “To the bathroom.” She stumbles toward the open door on the other side of the room.

  I sit up, too, then, feet planted on the floor, elbows on my knees, head in my hands, as I wait for her to come back. As I wonder if I should make an excuse to leave her alone, even as every instinct I have is screaming at me to stay and hold her. Protect her.

  But maybe leaving is how I do that, how I take care of her when she doesn’t know how to take care of herself. The last thing I ever want is for her to feel unsafe around me…or as if she needs to take care of me when it should be the other way around.

  I’m still trying to figure out what to do when I hear the toilet flush, followed by running water for several minutes. My emotions ratchet up to the boiling point as I wait for her to open the door, so much so that when she finally does, it takes every ounce of self-control I have not to babble out another apology. And another lame-ass attempt to walk away when all I really want to do is hold her and love her and keep her safe.

  As she steps into the room, though, all my words evaporate. Because Elara is naked—totally, completely naked, without so much as a towel for covering.

  I nearly swallow my tongue, because not only is she nude, but she’s also absolutely, positively the most gorgeous woman I have ever seen. Tall and strong, with powerful muscles, lush breasts and porcelain skin, she is very much the Valkyrie I thought of her as just a few days ago. More, she’s a goddess, the light from the bathroom shining over all that alabaster skin until it glows. Until she glows.

  “Sweetheart,” I say when I can finally manage to speak. “You don’t have to do this.”

  “Yes, I do.” She walks toward me, doesn’t stop until she’s only inches from me, her beautiful body right there for me to hold, to kiss, to love. “I need you to touch me. I need to feel your hands on me.”

  Fuck. Not reaching for her is one of the hardest things I’ve ever done, but everything we talked about is still in my head and I want to be certain—need to be certain—that she really wants this.

  “Are you sure, Elara? I need you to be sure.”

  “I’m sure.” She steps forward, wraps her arms around my neck and pulls my head down until my lips meet the soft, fragrant skin of her neck. “Please. I want to think about how good it is with you, not remember all the bad that happened before.”

  When she puts it like that, there’s no way I can resist her—especially not when I’m desperate to feel her clenching around me. Desperate to know that she’s okay, that she’s whole, and that she still wants me the way that I want her, despite everything she’s been through.

  I open my mouth, press soft kisses to her collarbone and the slender column of her throat. She moans a little, holds even more tightly to me and I answer her pleas by nipping softly at her skin.

  She cries out then—and it’s a good cry, not a pained one—but still I smooth my tongue across the small hurt until the sting goes away. I do it a second and a third and a fourth time, because I’m addicted to the sound she makes as my teeth close on her delicate skin. Almost as addicted as I am to the heat of her body as she squirms against me.

  “Tanner, please,” she gasps when I stay in the same spot for several long moments, savoring the taste and scent and feel of her skin beneath my lips.

  I want to tease her, want to keep going until she’s mindless with pleasure. Until all she can think about—all I can think about—is how good this feels. More, how right it feels. But she’s moving restlessly against me, body burning and restless with a need that humbles me. That makes me want to give this strong, resilient woman anything, everything, that she demands.

  I move lower and she shudders in immediate relief as I skim my lips across her shoulder and her breastbone until she arches her back, until her full, beautiful breasts with their hard, light pink nipples are an offering that sends lightning streaking through me.

  But I don’t go there, not yet, no matter how much I ache to taste her again. Instead, I work my way down her arm, pressing hot, openmouthed kisses every couple of inches until I get to the bend in her elbow. There, I do the same thing I did to her neck, nipping then sucking then licking the sting away.

  She’s moaning now, her hips moving restlessly—recklessly—against my own. My cock is throbbing, every cell in my body screaming at me to strip off my clothes and slip inside her.

  But she’s not ready for that…or maybe it’s that I’m not. All I know is that before I’m inside her again, I need to make sure that all she feels is pleasure. Powerful, overwhelming, all-consuming pleasure.

  With that thought in mind, I wrap my arms around her waist, then turn her so that I can lower her softly, slowly, to the bed. I shift her off my lap and onto the bed. Her beautiful violet eyes cloud with confusion. “Wha—”

  “Ssssh.” I arrange her so that she’s sitting on the edge of the bed, her feet on the floor. Then I slip off the bed, kneel between her knees. And take her mouth in a kiss that leaves us both breathless, both needing more.

  “Tanner.” One of her hands comes up to clutch at my dreads while the other curls around my shoulder, tries to bring me closer.

  “I’ve got you, sweetheart,” I tell her again, and this time she doesn’t protest. Instead, she takes a deep breath and just watches me, her grip relaxing a little as she waits for whatever I’m going to do next.

  Her trust humbles me and even though my brain is filled with all the delicious things I want to do to her—and all the fucked-up things I want to do to the bastard that took advantage of all this beautiful strength and vulnerability—I settle for kissing her. And kissing her. And kissing her.

  We kiss until our lips are swollen. Until my tongue is almost numb. Until the taste of her has crept so deep inside me that I don’t think I’ll ever get it out. Ever get her out. And then we kiss some more.

  She pulls away first and when I look up at her, I finally see what I’ve been waiting for all along. Her skin is flushed, her pupils blown out, her face taut with need. I focus on that, focus on her, and not the rage I can still feel crawling just beneath my skin.

  I know I’ll never be able to make up for what she’s suffered, but that doesn’t mean I can’t try. Doesn’t mean I can’t do everything I can to replace her bad memories with good ones.

  Which is why I don’t climb on the bed as she’s begging me to do. Don’t lift her onto my lap—onto my dick—and let her ride me like I’m dying for her to. Instead, I start back at her shoulder, kissing and licking my way down her arm in a leisurely path that has her crying out and arching off the bed.

  My head is swimming and my dick is so fucking hard that it hurts, but I tamp that shit down. Shove it back until all there is is her. Until all there is is Elara and her beautiful smile, her strong body, her incomparable soul…and all the pleasure that I can give her.

  I kiss my way down the back of her hand and along her fingers. I kiss each of her fingertips, then nip sharply at the pad of her thumb. She gasps and her body jerks against mine, so I do it again and again before slowly sliding her thumb into my mouth. I suck gently for a few seconds, running my tongue up and down her thumb before moving on to her palm, her wrist, the firm mound of Venus at the base of her thumb.
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  “What are you—what are you doing?” she gasps out as I trace my tongue across the various lines of her palm.

  “Making love to you,” I answer, my voice hoarse with the need to be inside her.

  “This isn’t—”

  I pause for a second, my lips lingering right at the center of her palm as I wait for her to finish that sentence. If this isn’t what she wants, if I’m doing something she doesn’t like, I want to know about it now, before it’s too late. Before she slides from desire into fear. Because I’m pretty sure it will break me if I ever see fear on her face when she looks at me.

  Elara doesn’t say anything else, though. Instead, she brings her other hand up to my face, cups my jaw in her palm. Strokes her thumb along my cheekbone.

  I turn my face into her touch, relishing the feel of her fingers stroking against my stubble. But still I want to know what she was going to say. Still I want to know what she’s thinking.

  “This isn’t what?” I prompt.

  “Nothing. I just—I didn’t know it could be like this.”

  “Like what?”

  “So good.”

  Relief explodes through me and I lean forward to kiss her one more time, placing her hand gently back on her lap, then slowly, carefully, lift her foot off the floor. I kiss my way down her shin, swirl my tongue around her ankle, lick my way across the top of her foot. Then I sit back on my haunches, find her arch with my thumbs and press until she turns to putty in my hands.

  She moans a little as I continue to massage first one foot and then the other, her hands clutching at the sheets beneath her as I rub the last of the tension away.

  Then I put her right ankle over my shoulder and start to kiss my way up the inside of her leg. She gasps, startles a little, but I pet her hip until she relaxes again. She starts to lie back on the bed, but I hold her in place. I need to see her face for what I do next, need to make sure she’s with me every step of the way and not drowning in the past.

  She stares down at me with wide eyes as I lick my way over the inside of her knee and up the silky softness of her thighs. There’s a part of me that wants to rush wildly for the prize, to bury my face in her sex and sink my tongue deep inside her. I want to taste her, to lick her, to get her off again and again and again until all she remembers is me. Until all she knows is the pleasure I can give her.

  She’s mine, a voice inside me keeps saying. No matter how short a time it’s been since we met, no matter what happens next, she’s mine. I want to claim her as such, want to mark her in the most primitive way possible.

  I kiss my way back down her leg, caress her ankle, her calf, the sensitive spot at the back of her knee before finally moving back up. I lick my way along the inside of her thighs, going higher and higher and higher until I finally reach the heart of her. I inhale then, savoring the sweet, musky smell of her sex before placing my mouth as close to her clit as I can get without actually touching her.

  She moans again, arches off the bed a little as her hands tangle in my dreads and pull hard enough to sting. It’s a good hurt, though, one that ratchets up my need another notch or twenty and I put my hands on the insides of her thighs, spreading them wider so I can look at her. So I can see every part of her in a way I couldn’t in the dark gazebo.

  I glance up at her face, needing to make sure she’s still with me. And she is, her hands on my shoulders and her gaze steady on my own as she waits for whatever I’m going to do next.

  The level of trust she’s giving me—it nearly breaks me. Nearly has me coming, untouched, on the fucking carpet like some fifteen-year-old kid with his first girl. I take a few deep breaths, get myself back under control before I lean forward and slowly, slowly, slowly lick my way along her pussy to her clit.

  Chapter 19

  Elara

  Oh God. Ohgodohgodohgod.

  I can’t breathe. Can’t think. Can’t—

  “Oh God!” I gasp as Tanner circles my clit with his tongue.

  He lifts his head immediately, his green eyes electric in the dim light of the bedroom. “Okay?” he asks.

  I nod, even though I’m not sure I am. But then, I’m not sure of anything right now except that I want his mouth on me again. I need his mouth on me again.

  I don’t say that, but my desperation must be showing because he grins a little before lowering his mouth and licking his way along my sex again.

  I gasp at the sensations washing over me, dig my foot into his shoulder as I arch my hips off the bed in an effort to get closer. To get more. More pleasure. More Tanner. More everything.

  And he gives it to me. God, does he ever, as he thrusts two fingers inside me at the same time he gently sucks my clit between his teeth.

  It’s all I need and I come with a scream, my body spiraling completely out of my control as I break into a million pieces. I can’t talk, can’t think, can’t do anything but feel as pleasure careens through me, going on and on and on.

  I buck against Tanner’s mouth, against his hands, not sure I can handle all the sensations flooding me at once. But after a quick glance up at my eyes, he holds me still and works me through it, so that even as the pleasure ebbs it starts to build again.

  “Tanner!” I gasp, my hands tangling in his hair. “I don’t think I can—”

  “You can,” he tells me, his voice lower and harsher than I’ve ever heard it. This time, I’m the one looking into his eyes, and I’m trapped by the heat I see in their verdant depths…and the tenderness. “I’ve got you, sweetheart. I’ve got you.”

  And then he’s ducking his head again, and his tongue—his wicked, wonderful tongue—goes from long, luxurious licks to deep thrusts that have ecstasy slamming through me all over again. Rough and ready and real. So real.

  He delves deep, licking his way inside me until I can feel the past crumbling under the pleasure, falling in pieces around us. Until all I can think about, until all I know, is the heat and the pleasure and the joy that come from being held—being loved—by Tanner Green.

  He closes his mouth around my clit, sucks deeply as he slides first one finger and then another inside me. He’s stroking me, thrusting, taking, giving, driving me closer and closer to the edge of another orgasm as I arch and shudder against him. He finds my G-spot, runs his finger over it again and again. The pleasure is overwhelming now, swamping me, dragging me down, and I cry out even as I hold him more and more tightly.

  He pulls back a little, starts flicking his tongue against my clit as he runs his thumb over my anus. I gasp, arch my hips as I look down at him, wide-eyed and wild-eyed.

  He just arches a brow at me, his eyes hot and wicked as that thumb circles me again and again, setting fire to nerve endings I never knew existed before this very second. Pleasure crashes into me, slamming through me at a hundred miles an hour and I call out his name just as he slides his thumb inside me.

  I go into sensory overload, another orgasm ripping through me—fast and hard and never-ending—and this time I can’t stop myself from sobbing his name.

  I can feel him grinning, his lips curving against my sex as he once again pulls my clit into his mouth and starts to suck. I’m nearly boneless with pleasure at this point, boneless and overwhelmed and exhausted. I start to sink back onto the bed, wanting to lie down for just a minute—or forever—to recover—but once again, Tanner stops me, his free hand sliding around to my lower back and holding me upright.

  “Stay like this,” he growls and I do because right now I can’t deny him anything. Don’t want to deny him anything, even though I’ve never felt so exposed. The intimacy of this moment—of staring down at him between my knees while he looks up at me even as he continues to go down on me—is soul-stirring and overwhelming and terrifying and amazing all at the same time.

  He’s sucking me, licking me, spearing his tongue deep inside me again and again and again,
until one orgasm blends into another and all I can feel is pleasure. All I can feel is him.

  The more sensitive I become, the more he gives—and takes—until I’m bucking wildly against him, twisting and pushing in an effort to get away from the ecstasy that is burning through my every defense and turning me to ash. But he still doesn’t stop, still doesn’t let me go. Still makes me come. Again and again and again.

  Finally—finally—when I’m on the brink of insanity and my entire world is reduced to Tanner and this moment and the pleasure that slides along my every nerve ending, he pulls away. Then he’s fumbling for his wallet, pulling out a condom before stripping off his pants and shirt and climbing onto the bed beside me.

  “Come here,” he says, his voice low and guttural as he rolls the condom down his length and pulls me on top of him.

  He’s almost completely gone, chest heaving, hands shaking, body trembling with the need tearing through him. And still he hands me control, still he waits for me to take him instead of thrusting inside me and taking what he wants. As he does, he breaches my last barrier and I feel myself falling as I give another piece of my heart over to him.

  I straddle his hips, reaching between us to guide him inside me. His hands are on my hips, lowering me onto his cock and despite the need I can see on his face, he takes it slow, keeps me from taking all of him in one downward plunge of my hips. Instead, he watches my face closely, his gaze burning into mine as he lets me take him inch by excruciatingly slow inch.

  “It’s okay,” I tell him, pressing against his hands in an effort to take more of him. To take all of him. “I want you.”

  He growls deep in his throat and I lean forward to kiss him at the same time I twist my hips out of his grasp and sink down on him until he’s balls deep inside me.

  Tanner groans then, and I gasp, because he feels even better than he did in the gazebo earlier. “Fuck me,” I tell him, pressing hot kisses to his lips, his jaw, his throat. “Please fuck me.”