“Fuck,” he moans. “I don’t know if that’s better or worse.”
“How would it be worse?” I ask.
We’re zipping down a two-lane highway now, trees on the right, open fields on our left, the moon high and half-full overhead. It’s beautiful out here, peaceful, serene, quiet. I can’t quite appreciate it, though—I’m far too laser-focused on Jesse.
“There’s less pressure now, so I’m not in danger of popping the zipper, but you’ve only gotten me partway to where I selfishly want you to take me.”
A tactful way of putting it.
I chew on my lower lip, trying to decide how far I want to take this. How daring am I?
I feel the thrill of a shiver run through me, and I know I’m not about to dial it back at this stage in the game. My hand is still resting on his solid thigh; I trace it upward, fingers dragging over the rough denim, across the cold teeth of the zipper, to the soft cotton and the firm-yet-soft bulge beneath. Alternating between watching my hands and his face, I hook two fingers under the elastic and tug it away and downward. The broad pink of him emerges, and I suck in a breath at the thickness of it. Holy mother of wow—seeing it in person, in the flesh is…my heart races, my hands tremble, and my breath shortens.
“Imogen,” Jesse groans, “dammit, woman.”
“What? Is this not helping?” I know damn well it’s not. He wants my hands around him as much if not more than I want it, just like I want his fingers inside me as much if not more than he wants them there.
“Define helping.”
“I could help all the way if you want.” I glance at him, watching for his reaction.
He tilts his head back, closes his eyes briefly, and lets out a long, tortured growl. “Fuuuuuuck. You know how crazy it makes me when you suggest stuff like that?”
“How crazy?”
“Crazy enough that I’m tempted to tell to you to do your worst. Or your best, depending how you look at it.”
Desire to see more him, touch more of him races through me, controls me, and I take his words as either a dare or permission. I do what I wanted to do moments ago—I delve my hand into his underwear and take hold of him.
My breath fails, and my heart stutters—he’s huge. Hot and hard in my hand, spreading my fingers apart. Soft, smooth. Ripples, and veins, and the smooth roundness of the tip under my thumb, moisture leaking. He groans and his hips shift forward, and I reach over the console with my other hand to tug the underwear away so I can see better. I let him go and just look at him—a massive thick shaft of pink flesh, the head bobbing against his belly with his breathing and the bump and sway of the truck.
He makes a turn off the highway onto a narrow gravel road that winds down a hill and through a copse of trees, up another hill, and then angles across a wide field of tall grass waving in the breeze. In the distance, a house sits on a hill surrounded by rolling green hills, a ring of trees in the distance.
“That’s my place up ahead,” Jesse murmurs.
I have him in my hand again, hot and throbbing. I stroke, once, slowly, downward, and he growls in his chest, hips flexing, and then his hand wrenches mine away.
“Not yet. You keep touching me like that, I won’t last half a second. I want you too bad.”
I almost whimper at the loss of him in my hand—it’s almost as maddening as feeling his finger inside me for a single delving moment. More—I want more. So much more.
Everything.
He’s hauling ass now that he’s on his own property; we jolt down a hill and over a rut, and then he’s skidding to a stop in the circular dirt driveway in front of his home. It’s a beautiful white two-story Victorian farmhouse, with a wraparound stretching around the entire home, twin dormers on the roof; the shutters are painted a deep scarlet, and the front door is red as well. An acre or so of grass around the home itself is mown, fertilized, and watered, but the rest beyond it is wild and untamed.
Dust swirls in the moonlight and in the twin beams of the headlights, and then he’s shutting the engine off and opening his door. He roughly refastens his jeans and hops out, circles to my side before I’m even unbuckled. My door flies open, and he hauls me out, carries me in his arms up the stairs to his porch, and sets me down to fit his key into the lock. I take the time, while he’s unlocking the door, to fix my dress. He fumbles a moment or two, and then with an impatient shove, the door swings open and we step in.
The interior is obscured in shadows and slices of moonlight at first, and then he flicks a few switches just inside the front door, illuminating the home, revealing a beautiful open-plan main floor with acres of polished hardwood, gleaming stone countertops, stainless steel appliances, open face cabinets, a deep leather couch, seascape and landscape artwork on the walls. I move around the main level, which includes the living room, dining room, kitchen, a small walk-in pantry, and a half bathroom. There’s a lovely rocking chair in the living room, handmade from the looks of it, and a matching side table. The dining room table and matching chairs all have a similar look as the rocking chair and side table, making me think all three pieces were made by the same person or company.
Jesse sees me looking at the rocking chair. “All the wooden furniture in here was made by Franco. He’s a master finishing carpenter, and he handcrafts furniture on the side. The chair, the side table, and the dining room set were his housewarming gift to me when I finished renovating this place.”
I glance around. “You renovated this yourself?”
Jesse snorts. “No—I, a professional builder, hired someone else.” He laughs. “Of course I did. Took me, like, two years to do the whole thing, but I wasn’t in a hurry. Obviously the guys helped. We’d finish work on Friday evening, come out here, and work on a bit here and there. This is where I spent pretty much every weekend for two years.”
“It’s really beautiful,” I say.
He digs his phone out of his pocket and scrolls through his photographs until he finds a set. “Scroll to the right. The first few are from when I first bought it.”
Standing in his gorgeous kitchen, I swipe through the photographs, and I’m truly amazed. I knew Jesse was skilled, but what he’s done here is artistry. The before photographs show a house that was probably seconds from being condemned. The roof was falling in, the front porch was sagging, and the siding was missing in places. More photos showed the inside, which was in even worse shape. Walls were missing chunks, the ceilings were bulging and sagging with water damage, there was old sheet-covered furniture and garbage and animal nests and inches of dust.
“I ripped the entire roof off, and tore out every wall that wasn’t load bearing. The real saving grace here is that the original hardwood floors had all been covered at some point by this god-awful shag carpeting, so they’d been really well preserved pretty much everywhere. The floors and the exterior walls are all that’s original; everything else has been totally rebuilt. All the wiring, all the plumbing, lighting, everything we did from scratch.”
“A real labor of love, huh?” I ask, handing him his phone back.
“Yeah, sure was.” He waves a hand at the kitchen. “So, want a tour?”
I gaze up at him. “Yeah, sure.” I lick my lips and go for the truth. “As long as the tour ends in your bedroom.”
His smile is predatory. “Who says we need a bed for what I have in mind?”
“What—what do you have in mind?”
He just smirks. “You’ll find out soon enough.”
God, I hope so. Now that we’ve backed away from the heat of the moment, my nerves are jangling on high alert. Need hasn’t abated, and neither has my desire for him, but knowing what’s happening, where this is going—the anticipation is making me vibrate with anxiety and doubt and self-consciousness, on top of the need and desire.
When my hormones are in control, I have no thoughts beyond getting what I want and fulfilling my desires, but now that we’re out of the moment, my brain is starting up again and questions are floating up from dee
p in the pool of my uncertainty and self-doubt.
What if, when I’m finally naked, I don’t look as good as he thinks I will? What if my butt is too big? What if the wrinkles and dimples on my ass turn him off? What if the fact that my belly isn’t taut and firm and toned—like, say, Audra’s—is a turnoff? What if I’m not as wild and adventurous in bed as he wants me to be? What if he wants things I’m not comfortable with? What if sex with him is bad? What if it’s incredible and I fall for him even harder than I can already feel myself falling?
He’s an avowed hound dog, a lifelong bachelor with no intention or desire to jump into anything deep or committed, and I’m not sure I’m capable of a casual, physical relationship. In a lot of ways, that’s exactly what I want—no-strings sex, fun and free and physically fulfilling, but without all the messy emotions that come along with being involved with someone. That sounds easy and simple and fun, and after my god-awful messy failure of a marriage and the ugly divorce being able to just have good sex and not put my heart at risk sounds kind of nice.
But I know myself. I know how my emotions work, and they operate on a hair trigger.
Jesse is eyeing me. “Where’d you go just now?”
I shake my head, clueless as to how to communicate any of this to him, let alone whether it’d be smart to do so.
What happens, happens—okay, Audra, I’ll try things your way.
“Hey, there’s no pressure, here, okay?” Jesse says, perhaps correctly assessing me.
He tosses his keys onto the counter beside the stove, digs his wallet and phone out of his pocket and tosses them down along with his keys, then leans back against the counter and unties his boots, toes them off and kicks them across the room to land willy-nilly by the back door. His socks join them, and then he turns back to me.
“We could skip the tour for now,” he says, moving closer.
“We could,” I agree, placing my palms flat on his chest.
“I’m a lot more interested in a tour of you.” He lets his gaze roam my body yet again, desire crackling in his eyes—it’s that look that gets me, every time. That look which says he wants me, that he can’t get enough of even just seeing me, fully clothed or otherwise.
“You’ve gotten a pretty good tour already,” I say, tracing the outline of his pec over his T-shirt.
“Nah, I’m gonna need the full, detailed, comprehensive tour.” He spans my waist with both hands. “An in-depth tour.”
“I think that could be arranged,” I say, my voice low.
Yet again, his eyes rake over me, head to toe, several times. “Have I mentioned yet how goddamn incredible you look this evening?”
I shake my head. “That hasn’t come up, no.”
He growls. “God, I’m an idiot. It’s all I’ve been thinking about tonight.”
“What have you been thinking?”
He gestures at me, sweeping his hand up and down. “You, in that dress—you’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.”
I laugh, a barking outburst. “Let’s not be ridiculous, Jesse. But thanks for the vote of confidence.”
His hands tighten, and he yanks me roughly up against him. “You think I’m joking?” he growls, unamused.
Any hilarity I may have felt vanishes abruptly at the hardness of his body against mine, at the heat and ferocity in his voice. “I—I haven’t felt that way in a long time, so it’s a little hard for me to believe.”
“You don’t have to believe it yourself,” he murmurs. “You just have to know that I believe it.”
“I think you maybe, possibly, are laying it on a little thick,” I admit. “You don’t have to, you know. I’m a sure thing, at least for tonight.”
Jesse’s growl is actually a little scary. “You’ve already accused me of that once, Imogen, and I don’t fuckin’ appreciate it.” His fingers dig into my hips and he holds me hard against his big body, so I have to tilt my head back to meet his fiery brown gaze. “You need to understand something about me, babe. I don’t lay anything on thick. I don’t flatter, or charm, or play games. I’m giving you the raw, unvarnished truth as I see it and feel it. So if I’m standing here telling you I think you, in that sexy-as-fuck little red dress and gold heels, are the most beautiful woman I’ve ever laid eyes or hands on, you best believe that down to your goddamn atoms. Because I mean that shit with everything I’ve got.”
“I believe you,” I whisper. And I do. You can’t fake intensity like that.
“Do you?” he rumbles. “I’m not so sure. I think maybe you need some convincing.”
I’m trying to formulate a sassy, flirty response still when he slides one palm up my back to cup the back of my head, and then his lips slant across mine. My breath catches as he kisses me—at first it’s a hot whirlwind of lips and teeth, his fingers clutching my nape and clawing into the flesh above my hip. And then he slows it, softening his grip on me, softening his mouth on mine and dipping his tongue against mine. I claw my fingers into fists in his shirt and lift up on my toes, a whimper in my throat.
I’m the first to go for flesh—I need more of him, of his skin, his heat, and his muscle. My fingers release his shirt and find the hem, and slip underneath to scour the hard plane of his stomach. Pushing upward, lifting the shirt, my thumbs following the centerline of his chest, up his sternum and between his pecs. He crosses his arms and peels the pesky T-shirt off and tosses it aside, and I moan in delight at the firm warmth of his chest under my hands. I explore his torso as we kiss, palming his pecs and roaming down his sides, up his back to curl my hands over his shoulders. With each touch, each exploration of his muscled body, I press closer, delving deeper into the kiss, devouring his lips and tongue and breathing his breath.
He rumbles in his chest as I roam his body. His hands leave my nape and hip, and begin their own exploration. He tugs the straps of my dress aside and shoves them down the sides of my arms, baring my shoulders, and then his hands skate down the outsides of my biceps, then jump to my waist. For a moment, his hands span my waist, and then they edge around to the small of my back; my breath catches in my throat and I moan into his mouth as he cups my ass in his hands. A firm grip, then, before he squeezes, kneads, smoothing in circles, teasing and toying with the heft and the bounce.
He breaks the kiss, his palms possessively gripping my buttocks. “Have I mentioned yet how much I love this?” He squeezes as he says this, making sure I know exactly what he’s talking about. “It’s perfect.”
I murmur a laugh. “Funny, because when I called Audra to come over this morning, she told me to get my big beautiful ass into some workout gear, and I got upset that she called my butt big. And she said she was pretty certain you—how did she put it? She said you probably, and I quote, ‘harbor a deep and eternal appreciation for the size and shape of my derrière.’”
Jesse’s response is to gather the fabric of my dress in his fingers, walking the hemline upward until my dress is hiked up over my hips, leaving my ass bare. And, did I mention the underwear I’m wearing is a thong? It’s nothing but a tiny triangle of red lace over my core, a strap around my hips, and a red string. When my ass is bared, he palms it again, with a long, deep groan of unmistakable appreciation.
“Your friend is more right than she knows,” he says. “Your ass is perfect.”
“I guess I’m just self-conscious. I used to be in great shape, but I’ve slacked off over the past few years.”
Jesse sighs. “Imogen. Stop. Just stop. You’re absolutely perfect.” He caresses my butt again. “I can’t get enough.”
I kiss his chest, and then his pec, and then his shoulder, my hands carving circles around his broad back and shoulders. “I think you’ve just gotten started, Jesse,” I say. “I know I’m self-conscious, and I know it’s annoying. It’ll take time for me to work past it. Time, and probably a lot of compliments I’ll have trouble believing.”
He grinds his erection against me. “Does this feel like a compliment to you?”
“I do
n’t know,” I murmur, grinning as I kiss his neck under his beard line. “There’re too many layers of clothing between me and you to be sure.”
“An easily rectified situation,” he says.
I unfasten his button and lower the zipper again, and his erection bulges free. This time, I push his jeans down over his butt. He steps out of them, kicks them aside, and I cup the hard roundness of his butt, over the tight gray cotton of his boxer briefs. I linger there, enjoying the feel of it, the hardness of it. And then I bring my hands between us and cup his erection.
“Feeling the compliment now?” Jesse asks. “Getting to spend time with you, getting to look at you, getting to put my hands on your incredible body…you do that to me. You make me so hard it hurts.”
“I think I’m starting to feel the compliment,” I say, caressing his length over his underwear. “But I think I may need to feel more of it to be absolutely sure.”
He laughs, capturing both of my hands in one of his. “Not so fast,” he says. “I have something else in mind, first.”
“Something…else?” I ask, my voice cracking a little.
He doesn’t answer. At least, not with words. Still pinioning my hands together, he reaches around behind me and unzips my dress. Keeping hold of my hands, he nudges the dress straps down, letting the dress sag a little lower. Instead of letting me go so the dress falls off, he transfers his grip on one wrist to his other hand, slides his fingertips up my arm, captures the other strap and drags it down. I’m breathless and helpless to do anything except comply as he guides my arm out of the loop of the strap, and then repeats this on the other side. The dress is tight enough that it won’t fall off on its own, requiring a little…help, to come off. Again, Jesse deviates from my expectations by leaving the dress on. It’s sagging, drooping, but catching around the bell of my hips. He still has a firm grip on both of my hands, refusing to let them go, retaining utter control over me.
He raises my hands over my head, transfers both into one of his and, with a brief, intense locking of eyes, presses his lips to my sternum, just above the valley of my cleavage. And then downward, to the slope of one breast. Slowly, with delicate gentility, his beard silky and scratchy at once against my skin, he kisses me, and then moves to the other breast. Down, kissing closer and closer to the edge of bra and the neckline. Back upward, then, up to my sternum, to the base of my throat. I gasp, and tilt my head back, and he accepts my offering, kissing up my throat to the underside of my chin, and then around to underneath my earlobe, behind my ear, then the shell of it, his breath hot on my flesh. I shiver, and a ghost of a whimper escapes me as he brings his lips to my cheekbone, the corner of my lips. My mouth opens, and I eagerly meet his kiss.
Hammered Page 16
