Then his control snapped, and he closed his mouth around her clit as he slid his fingers from her wet channel. Adding a third, he pushed them inside her, rotating his wrist back and forth so he could work them deep.
With his second knuckles enclosed by her velvety heat, he began to suck.
In seconds she was coming, keening, her body shaking. His heart rate jumped, his ego expanded, all of him electrified by the sound and feel of her taking angel flight.
As the crisis waned, he lightened the suction, giving them both a chance to savor the orgasm. When her tremors subsided, he rearranged them, leaving Ash on her back and him sitting beside her hip so he could look into her face and stroke her hair from her forehead.
Her eyes blinked, her expression sex-groggy. It made him smile, even as he glanced down at his erection, shiny with her saliva and ruddy with need. Feeling her gaze, he stroked himself with his hand.
“Do you think you can take this on?”
Ash shifted, opening her legs wider to reveal her private flesh. Staring at the wet, pink softness there, Brody lost his breath and then his mind. He brought his fingers—the ones that had been inside her—to his nose, breathing in her scent that lingered there.
“You smell like a dream, Ash. Taste better.”
Her eyes widened, even the one circled in the purple-blue of an incipient shiner. He was so far gone that his rage at that couldn’t temper his lust. Cupping his balls, he took another long look at the paradise exposed to him.
Then, fuck him, she reached down and spread those plump lower lips wider. Oh, yeah, the fairy girl had left any hang-ups far behind.
“Fill me,” she said, simply, then held up her arms for him.
Brody didn’t need to be asked twice. He fumbled for protection from the pocket of his jeans, covered himself, and then covered her. The tip of his cock slid through her wetness to find the notch of her entrance.
He pushed in slowly, fighting to keep his eyes open. It was so damn good, the heat, the tight clasp of her, but he wanted to watch. Etch it in his memory.
Her body surrendered to his penetration in tiny increments that only jacked up his heart rate until he could hear it in his ears and feel it at the back of his throat. He wanted to ask her if she was okay, to find out if it felt good, but his voice was swallowed up by the burning pleasure overwhelming him.
So he scrutinized her expression for any discomfort as he swung in and out of her. She bit her bottom lip and arched her neck, and when her hips began lifting into his thrusts he knew he could bring her there a second time. He continued moving, rolling into her spread thighs, pushing her up and up and up until he saw lightning crackle in her silvery eyes. Staring into them, he insinuated his hand between them and stroked her clit as he drove home over and over, the sound of their skin slapping together both primal and erotic.
Her eyes shut, her hips stilled, and then she was shuddering, shuddering, as he pumped his hips in the short, jerky thrusts of a brutal, claws-in-his-back orgasm.
As it left him, Brody was the groggy one now. But he forced himself to deal with the condom and then rearrange Ash again—boneless and possibly already deep in dreamland—next to his body. He tucked her close and then dragged a blanket that was over the back of the couch on top of them.
Further movement he found impossible.
Instead, he stared at the flames in the little stove as she buried her head against his shoulder. He stroked her soft hair, winding the loose curls around his fingers as a weird sensation overcame him.
Contentment.
What the hell? he thought, bemused. Everything he knew about himself, every past experience told him this situation would end in disaster, yet she’d fucked the foreboding right out of him.
For the moment, at least.
Closing his eyes, he let himself wonder if it might be different this time. If he might possibly find a way to keep hold of what he wanted most.
Chapter 9
Ashlynn grinned to herself as she tiptoed about the kitchen making coffee, her spirits as light as her footsteps. She’d survived the night!
After all her trepidations about the possibility of sex with Brody stripping away her protective layer, she’d come through the dark hours just fine. Maybe her face felt a little whisker-burned and her body a bit pleasantly used, but the operative word was pleasantly.
Okay, okay, that description might be a tad too tame.
She paused and gave herself an exuberant hug, then tried out other phrases. Deliciously used. Wantonly used. Brashly used.
Brody hadn’t held back, and neither had she.
Go, Ash!
She danced to the cupboard, pulled out a mug, and made herself coffee just the way she liked it, extra hot with a generous helping of cream.
The same way she liked sex.
A giggle tickled her nose, and she slapped her hand over her mouth to keep it quiet. Dirty thoughts for a dirty girl.
Go, Ash, go!
In the back pocket of her jeans, her phone vibrated. Sliding it free, she checked out the caller on the display then cast a glance toward the living room. Brody continued to sleep, a blanket flung over his big body. When she’d refilled the well of the pellet stove a few minutes earlier, he hadn’t stirred, so she figured she had time for a morning chat with her best friend.
With mug and phone in hand, she exited the kitchen door and dropped into the Adirondack chair on the small covered porch. She balanced the mug on the flat ledge of the arm and accepted the call.
“Hello, Marcy!” Even to her own ears, Ash sounded more chipper than the birds twittering in the nearby trees.
“Is that you, Mary Sunshine?”
“You got her.” The name fit both her mood and the current weather. Brave rays of the yellow stuff were breaking through the low cloud cover. “What’s new?”
“How much sleep did you get last night?” Marcy asked. “I can’t tell if you’ve had a solid twelve hours, or if you’ve pulled an all-nighter like we used to in college. Both give you that same giddy voice.”
“I’m not giddy-voiced,” Ash said, trying to lower her pitch. A quick calculation told her she’d nabbed nowhere close to six hours of shut-eye, let alone a dozen. “I’m just…”
Happy?
She tried the word out loud. “Happy.” It tasted fine. True.
Marcy seemed to digest that for a moment. “Uh, to what do we owe this sentiment? A perfect report card from the creepy restaurant inspector?”
Ash waved off the thought of Conroy. “Just had a good night, is all.”
“I get it!” Marcy crowed. “I get it! You had another night of your ‘needs’ being met.”
Taking the phone away from her ear, Ash frowned at it. Was she so transparent?
“Maybe that’s none of your business,” she said into the mouthpiece, her tone prim.
Marcy was laughing as Ash returned the phone to her ear.
“I’m your best friend, of course it’s my business. Give me all the scoop. Every detail.”
Ash frowned again. “I don’t insist on a blow-by-blow of your nights with Gavin.”
“Okay, you gave him a blow job,” Marcy said in a matter-of-fact voice. “What did he do for you?”
Ashlynn rolled her eyes even as she remembered being on her knees before Brody, then being on her knees over Brody. Face burning, she squirmed on her seat.
“This is highly improper.”
“What you’ve been itching to be for, like, all your life,” Marcy pointed out. “But the least you can do is tell me who the lucky guy in your bed was last night.”
“We were on the sofa,” Ash said. “If you must know.”
Marcy hooted. “Sofa sex! I love sofa sex. It makes me feel sixteen again. We pretend Mom and Dad are upstairs, and we have to be extra-special quiet—”
“La la la,” Ashlynn sang into the phone. “I’ve got my fingers in my ears because I don’t want to hear this.”
“Oh, Ash,” Marcy scolded.
&n
bsp; “You’ve told me about your little role playing on the sofa before, remember? Gavin comes over to ‘tutor’ you in Math, and naughty sophomore Marcy pretends she still doesn’t know her multiplication tables. Frankly, it all strikes me as a little perverted.”
Her best friend snorted. “It’s fun. Maybe you haven’t had the opportunity to find that out yet about sex…but I hope you do. When it’s new, the act can feel so serious—it’s not easy to bare yourself to someone after all—but other times, and with the right man…”
Ash swallowed. “Go on.”
“If you trust him and you trust yourself, you can have a hell of a good time. Like I said, fun.”
She’d been too wound up last night for what happened between her and Brody to qualify as fun exactly, Ash decided. Too worried about her defenses, even when her inhibitions had been lowered to below sea-level.
“Well, we might not have played stern tutor and failing student, but I’m not complaining.” A ray of sun struck her face, and it warmed her from the outside in. She stretched out her legs. “Not complaining at all.”
“That’s more than fine,” Marcy said, then hesitated. “And I don’t want to kill your buzz, but…”
“But?”
Marcy sighed. “You mother called this morning. She implored me to talk you out of trying to run the roadhouse.”
“I’ve been running the roadhouse.”
“As in a permanent plan.”
Ash grimaced. “She told you about that, huh?”
“I noticed you didn’t.”
“Maybe I was avoiding an argument about it,” she mumbled, trying to ignore the prick to her conscience. “Or another nay-sayer.”
“Ash.” Marcy sounded hurt.
“I’m sorry.” She rubbed the beginning of a headache from her temple. “I didn’t mean that.”
“You know I’m behind you, whatever you choose to do.” Her friend’s voice turned sly. “Whoever you choose to do. Give me his name, and I’ll forgive you.”
Just then, the door behind Ash opened. She turned her head, saw a stunning specimen of decadent male beauty pause in the frame. His jeans hung low on his hips, and his feet and chest were bare. His jawline bristled with a morning beard, and his hair hung messily over his forehead.
But his blue eyes were as startling and as sharp as ever, and they took her in from top to toe. Even though dressed in jeans, running shoes, and a long-sleeved T-shirt that read “Topanga” down one arm, she felt that hot gaze all the way to bare skin. He must have approved of what he saw, because after a moment he smiled.
“Good morning.”
In her ear, Marcy was screeching for attention. “I hear him! I hear him! Who is it?”
“Brody, good morning,” she said, by way of greeting and to appease her friend. Then she ended the call, even as the other woman was sputtering over the line.
Standing, Ashlynn faced her nighttime companion, eyeing him as she tried to imagine him with a pointer and chalkboard. Nah. Couldn’t see it. No schoolgirl and tutor scenario would work for them. Now, barbarian and innocent peasant lass perhaps…
One of his brows quirked up. “What are you thinking?”
Whoops. She stifled the urge to fan herself. “How you might like a cup of coffee,” she said and stepped to slip past him and into the kitchen.
He caught her arm as she brushed past. “Are you okay?”
His hold was heated but gentle, and she liked the connection, liked it a lot. A sense of safety washed over her, making chide herself for all her concerns of the night before. How wrong she’d been to be so worried.
“I’m doing well. How about you?”
He smiled then brushed a kiss at the point where her hairline and forehead met. “I like to see you smiling.”
Oh, yeah, she was doing really well, she thought, almost skipping into the kitchen when he released her. This morning-after thing was a piece of cake. She served him some, too—a piece of the homemade coffeecake that roadhouse regulars Irv and Viv had presented to her a couple of days before.
Afterward, he insisted she fetch a tube of healing ointment. Then, he tipped up her face with one hand and dabbed some of the gooey stuff over the cut held closed by the butterfly bandages. She stared at his spiky lashes and firm mouth as he paid serious attention to what he was doing.
“You’re looking at me in that weird way again,” he murmured, then stepped back to cap the tube. “What’s going on in your head?”
“It’s that… I just…” She shrugged. “I may be looking at you weird, but this isn’t.” Her hand waved between the two of them. “Thanks for that.”
He smiled again.
Good God, he was handsome.
“Welcome,” he said, then stepped close again and kissed her forehead once more. “Can I borrow your shower?”
“Of course.” She towed him toward the big one on the first floor. “Let me get you fresh towels.”
Once supplied, he disappeared behind the bathroom door, and she listened as the water shushed on. It was nice to have someone in the house with her, she decided, and the sound of water running reminded her of what she’d been tasked with doing that day. Though she avoided the third floor as much as possible, in this mood she felt capable of tackling anything.
As she mounted the stairs, she hummed to herself. How long would Brody hang out? Would he leave shortly or stay a while longer? Now that her fears about him had been put to rest, she wouldn’t mind his company a little longer.
Three doors opened off the third floor landing—one to the bedroom, one to the bathroom, and another to a storage room that had served as a playroom when she was small. Taking a deep breath, Ashlynn turned the third knob, crossed the threshold, and flipped the light. From the plethora of boxes in haphazard stacks came a mildewed odor.
She sighed. The guy who’d been working on her roof had suggested she clear out the space because the obvious damage above meant the items in storage could be damp if not downright waterlogged.
It smelled as if he was right.
Wishing it wasn’t so didn’t change a thing, she reminded herself, so she moved forward to address the first tower of cardboard.
Ten minutes later, her hands were filthy, and she’d divided the landing into areas she mentally designated as Garbage, More Garbage, and Why Did Anyone Keep This Trash. She brushed her hair off her forehead with her arm and waded in to inspect another pile as she heard Brody climb up the stairs.
He smelled clean and she felt bedraggled as they met in the doorway, her arms around a box of old magazines.
“A set of National Geographic from 1978,” she said, as he peeled open the dusty flaps to peer inside.
“They could be worth something.”
“Damp magazines from 1978.”
“Oh.” He released the flaps. “In that case, keep your eyes out for silver fish.”
The box slipped from Ash’s loosened grasp and dropped like a stone to the floor between their feet.
Humor glinted in his eyes. “Not a fan?”
“Not a fan.” She stepped back and gave a wary glance to the boxes she’d already dragged onto the landing. “Maybe I can do this another day.”
After an extended visit by an exterminator.
“It seems to be mostly junk anyway,” she added.
Brody looked around the landing then over her shoulder at the still-loaded storage room. “Tell you what,” he said. “I can stuff what you have out here into my car, and I’ll get rid of it for you this afternoon. Why don’t you poke around and see if there’s anything you want to save. Whatever’s left I’ll get my crew to collect and dispose of for you.”
She was too smart—and too bug-averse—to demur. So as he made trips up and down the staircase, she waded cautiously back into the storeroom.
Near the rear wall she found it, sitting on a low stool and wrapped in a threadbare sheet covered with faded yellow roses. She stared, its shape giving it away, and cold traced her spine like a wandering drop of ra
in.
As she unwound the fabric to reveal the childhood toy, her belly hollowed. Her knees buckled.
Her butt hit the threadbare braided rug, and she stared at the dollhouse as if it were a crystal ball in which she could watch the past. An apt, she thought, description.
The miniature had been crafted by an artist friend of her father’s. He’d painstakingly recreated the Topanga Canyon Childe house, from the turquoise front door to the third floor bedroom with its twin beds... including the two little blonde girl dolls who now lay like accident victims on the space between those beds.
She picked up the Braelynn figure, dressed in tiny jeans and a red shirt, with a golden Wonder Woman-inspired crown and matching bracelets. Her hair was in a messy braid, and there was a scratch on her plastic arm from the time she’d duked it out with GI Joe. Brae had left him tied up in one of the dollhouse closets, though he seemed to have escaped.
Ashlynn left her replica where it was, in a Sunday-best blue dress, white tights, and white Mary Jane shoes. Her hair was smooth and her eyes were open, staring sightlessly at the ceiling.
“What’s this?” a deep voice said.
Then Brody was on his knees behind her, his big body radiating a warmth that barely penetrated her frozen one. Even though he’d used her shampoo, he mostly smelled like himself, a minty, masculine scent.
“What have we here?”
My life. What I was banished from. My regrets, my grief, my great failing.
It was all of those things, captured between three walls and in two similar but disparate little figures.
The bleak and bitter poison inside her started to bubble, seeking any cracks in her heart in its need to release. But she shut her eyes and visualized closing fissures and impenetrable walls and breathed deep to force back the panic. What was inside her was too big, too intense, too violent to release. If she let it free she would shatter into a zillion pieces that the poison would then destroy, eating them away to nothing.
Wild Child (Rock Royalty #6) Page 14
