He’d brought her this meal many times when she was younger.
Dream date, indeed.
Chapter 16
DALTON WAS MORE nervous driving Holly to the old factory off Reynolds Road than he was about what was going to happen tonight. But before he lavished her in kisses, plied her with champagne, and buried her in thick, Egyptian cotton, he wanted her to know—really know—who she was going to bed with.
She’d challenged him to prove he was “better” and the dare wasn’t one he’d taken lightly.
He drove into the empty, crumbling parking lot of Winsor Tool & Die. On Saturday night, no one was working overtime. He was amazed anyone still worked here at all.
“What’s this?” she asked, two slim French fries between equally slim fingers.
“Don’t eat all mine.” He grasped her hand and shoved the fries into his mouth.
“Hey!” she said with a giggle. Then she quieted as she studied the building beyond the windshield. “Interesting backdrop for dinner.” She reached into the bag and divvied up the sandwiches, handing him a full container of fries. “See? I was only eating mine.”
They sat just outside the circle of the parking lot security light and ate. When he finished his sandwich, he crumpled up the paper and tossed it into the bag.
“This should have been my life,” he quietly admitted, letting the confession stretch between them before he continued.
“My dad worked here his entire life, which wasn’t very long. Died in a factory accident when I was nine. My mom raised me by working two jobs, and she always told me—always—that someday, I’d work there, too. ‘Get you a good salary, good benefits,’ she’d tell me.” He said it in her scratchy smoker’s voice, which he missed a lot more than he’d ever admit.
“I never wanted to work here. Never looked forward to it. How could I? My father took his last breath on that concrete floor.” His mother never was the same after Dad died, and Dalton swore he’d never let someone depend on him the way his mother did his father, only to leave them behind. There was some deep psychology there to visit, but not tonight, and not with Holly, so he finished with a joke. “Shit, from the outside, this place looks like the building where Frankenstein brought his monster to life.”
Holly smiled lightly and continued to watch him.
“Anyway. Then I met Jace Larson during the one year of basketball we played. God, we were awful at it.”
“You guys really were terrible,” she agreed with a nod, eating another fry. Her eyes moved to the cracking building. “Everyone always told him ‘you’re so tall, you should play.’ Little did they know.”
“He’s worse than I am, and that’s saying something.”
He earned a soft laugh for that one.
“Before long we were skipping practice to—” Pick up girls. “Uh, go to the…mall.”
She sent him a disbelieving glance. He smiled. She rolled her eyes.
“I never knew anyone who lived like you guys. You had this enormous house, these badass sports cars, and the food. Man.”
“Mom’s salmon tartare couldn’t touch this,” she commented, waggling her empty sandwich wrapper and dropping it into the sack now serving as a trash bag.
“Her food was better than anything I ever had. It was years before I knew fish came any other way besides deep-fried or from a can.”
She watched him, not judging, not speaking. Just being her usual, watchful self.
“I never should have said what I said to you in Brownsboro, Hol. You’re not spoiled.”
“You never said I was spoiled.”
“I implied it.”
“You didn’t mean it.”
“Holly.”
“Dalton.” She discarded her fry container, then his, and stashed the bag behind the seat. Then she faced him, and with earnest eyes, said, “You were hurting and you had every reason to. That had to be painful. Watching the house you were raised in go up in smoke. I was being insensitive. I never thought about one of those three houses being yours.”
“I could have told you.”
“You could have, but you didn’t. I understand why.”
“Maybe you’re too understanding about everything,” he said with a frown.
“Maybe you should wake up and see what I love about…um, what I love about the town.” She gestured out the window with jerky movements. “Even this. Even here. I love Hartford. Every inch of it.”
Was that a blush that stole her cheeks just now?
“Thank you for showing me this,” she said. “I like knowing this side of you.” Her soft green gaze found his face and his heart squeezed. “I’m glad you chose Larson Land Management. We’re lucky to have you.”
His throat clogged. He was beginning to think he loved every inch of Hartford, too. Because without it there’d be no Holly Larson. No chance to feel this worthy, this special, this important to her. No chance to have anything better to look forward to other than McDonald’s after a double shift at Winsor Tool & Die.
“Don’t worry, Princess Larson,” he teased, pleased when she shot him a glare. “Tonight isn’t going to be about slumming in Hartford. I have another surprise for you.”
Chapter 17
HER PALMS WERE sweating. And not because Dalton had booked a room for two at the Four Seasons. Fancy hotels, she was accustomed to. What was about to transpire inside of one, not so much.
The elevator doors slid shut behind them and he reached over and took her hand. “No regrets, right?”
He smelled too damn good. He looked too damn good.
“Zero,” she admitted, locking with his warm blue eyes.
He kissed her as the doors opened and then stepped out and angled down a corridor to a suite with its own private hallway.
“Holly Larson,” he said, lifting the keycard.
She started sweating more.
“You came to me with your Lust List and challenged me to fulfill your every fantasy. When you told me the secret behind the third one, I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.”
He closed in on her, lowering himself to meet her gaze.
“Really dirty sex,” he murmured and she swore her nipples stood at attention.
“About that…”
“Uh-uh.” He held up a hand to silence her. “I’m not finished yet.”
He hoisted an eyebrow and she crossed her arms over her chest and waited.
“I considered fifty shades of possibilities.…” His grin broke free and she knew he was joking. “Every one of them fell short. And then I realized. I know you. I may not know you biblically…yet”—a drove of tingles shot through her limbs—“but I know you. I’ve known you for over ten years. Surely, I could figure out what you like without asking.”
He made a show of crossing his fingers.
“Here’s hoping.” He swiped the card into the lock, and opened the room door, revealing—
“Oh, my gosh.” Her hands went to her mouth as she tried to process what she was seeing. Pink balloons on the ceiling—hundreds of them—strung with gold ribbon. She waded into the sea of pastel hues.
“I love them. What is this?” She reached for a string and tugged, noticing gold foil confetti in the bottom of the balloon—in the bottom of each and every one of them.
“Come on, now. You know.” He let the door shut behind them as he moved to a chilled bottle of champagne in a bucket. “Your twenty-first birthday.”
“I know that.” Her parents had thrown her too many extravagant birthday parties to count. There was always an overabundance of something—streamers, balloons, that disastrous one where they hired a retired boy band to perform. “I mean why did my twenty-first birthday party stand out more than the others?”
He offered a champagne-filled flute, his smile infectious, his eyes dancing in the softly lit room.
He was right. He did know her.
“Because that night,” he said, tapping her crystal glass with his and before he drank down his champagne, “was the firs
t time I wanted to kiss you.”
She stood still, digesting what he’d just said.
“It’s true,” he said.
“You asked me to dance,” she whispered, her voice retaining its dreamlike quality, further exaggerated by the fact that they stood in the center of dangling gold ribbons and balloons. “I wanted you to kiss me that night.”
And every night thereafter.
“Tonight, I’ll make that up to you.” He took her champagne and his and set the glasses on the nightstand. Oh, the bed. It was huge. Her heart raced faster as he crossed in front of it; as she imagined them falling into it together.
He took her hands, lowered his face. They came together naturally, as if they’d kissed a thousand times before. His mouth slanting over hers, widening to accept her tongue and sparring in turn. Those same droves of tingles returned, making her whimper with want and need.
“This is perfect,” she whispered when he took his mouth from hers.
“You’re perfect.” He brushed her cheek then ran his knuckles over her collarbone, her shoulder, down her arm. He followed that path with his mouth, kissing and licking, suckling her pulse as she raked her fingers into his hair.
While his lips moved down her body, she took a mental snapshot of the image overhead, the blur of pink balloons, dreamlike and heavenly, strung as if by fourteen-karat-gold tinsel.
Dalton walked her backward, his fingers finding the zipper on her dress and sliding it south.
“You’re good at that,” she breathed.
His smile nearly took that breath away.
She went for his shirt buttons next, undoing them one by one to reveal the chest she’d long admired but had never touched. Chiseled, sculpted, with the scantest bit of chest hair whirling over two flat male nipples. Abs marched down to a line of hair that arrowed into his pants—where her fingers went next.
“Hol.” To her pleasure, his voice shook with his next exhalation.
Glad she wasn’t the only one.
“Don’t tell me to stop.” She wouldn’t let him. She refused to lose the heat of this moment—have it evaporate like steam into the air.
“Don’t worry. I won’t.” His fingers nested in her hair and she smiled back at him a second before he laid his lips on hers. He worked her dress down her body as she fumbled with the button and zipper of his pants, nowhere near as calm and collected as him.
When she closed her hand over his straining erection though his boxer briefs, his breath snagged and his lips left hers.
“Dalton.”
“Don’t stop,” he said, his voice a low rumble.
“Don’t worry.” She released his cock and put her lips against his bare chest. “I won’t.”
Chapter 18
THIS NIGHT WAS supposed to be about Holly, for Holly, so when her lips brushed over his belly button, he immediately moved his hands to her shoulders.
“You promised you wouldn’t tell me to stop, and I promised you I wouldn’t.” Green eyes stared up at him as she tugged his boxers off his hips. She sat on the edge of the bed, leveling his waist with her mouth.
Then she took him on her tongue and his mind erased completely.
Her blond head moving between his legs, the wet, slick assault she was delivering made him weak in the knees. Literally. He had to lock them to remain standing, anchor his hand in her golden hair to keep from falling on his ass.
He dropped his head back on his neck, allowing his focus to only be with her and what she was doing to him.
Loving him with her mouth.
In a flash, he realized that’s what he’d been doing to her since she’d asked him to help her with her list. He’d been loving her in the ways she asked him to. In ways he’d never allowed himself to before.
Fingers resting on her head, her tongue turning him into Silly Putty, he wondered if he should back away before she ruined the rest of his plans for the evening. Gently, his hands on her face, he pulled from her mouth, which was an act of sheer, superhuman willpower.
“What’s wrong?”
He bent and answered her with a kiss, sliding his tongue into her mouth. He hooked an arm at her waist and laid her backward onto the bed. When she was flat on her back, he sat up and admired her. White lace bra and panties, a delicate gold necklace resting at her throat. He’d never seen anything so beautiful in his life.
“Told you that you’d be excellent at that,” he croaked, his vocal cords as stiff as his hard-on.
“Really?” She grinned.
“I never had any doubt.” He climbed off the bed and stripped, watching her watch him with hungry eyes. “You kept that up, I’d have blown. I want to be inside you when that happens.”
Her mouth dropped open into a tantalizing O.
He came to her, undressing her with sole-minded focus. Unhooking her bra and kissing each breast, murmuring how gorgeous her erect nipples were. Then he trailed his tongue down her stomach and hooked her panties with his thumbs. As he dragged them down to her knees, he caught her watching, resting on her elbows, teeth grazing along her full bottom lip.
“I haven’t had enough of your taste yet,” he said.
Lust bloomed in her eyes. She watched as he lowered his mouth to her thighs, then spread her knees wide. He wasted no time swiping his tongue over her most sensitive, private part. She moaned, her pleasure turning him on even more. He repeated the movement, snaking one hand over her belly and pinching her nipple.
Her breathing sped, her fingers clutching the bedding. He kept at it—another tweak, another round of licks—until her orgasm took over.
“That was fast,” she panted after a shallow cry. Her cheeks were ruddy from her release, her breasts lifting and falling rapidly.
“The next part won’t be. We’re just getting started.”
“Oh?”
“Hol. Dream date,” he reminded her with a wink. He retrieved a condom from his discarded pants and rolled it on, settling over her. She held his face and cradled him between her legs, hooking her heels on his thighs.
“I’ve wanted this for so long,” she whispered, her eyes sparkling with moisture.
Their friendship had always been just that: friendship. Being with her tonight, completely naked, made him see how part of him had been marked by Holly a long time ago. She’d left an indelible, irremovable mark on his soul. He never would have believed a girl of her stature would look twice at a guy like him. He’d never believed she should.
Yet here she was. About to make love to him.
“Me, too,” he told her, meaning it.
With a tilt of his hips, he took his time sliding deep, watching as her eyes fluttered and tears slid into her hair. Her body closed around his cock like a warm fist, hugging him tightly, making the world fall away.
There was only her.
Only him.
Only this moment in time as they learned each other’s bodies. As they synced their rhythm.
He slid in and out again. She opened her eyes and watched him boldly. She held on to his shoulders, fiddled with the hair at the back of his neck.
“I knew you’d be amazing,” she said, raking her fingernails over his chest.
“Honey.” He smiled down at her. “You ain’t seen nothing yet.”
This was her fantasy. He wanted it to be perfect for her. It was no less than she deserved. With his elbow under her knee, he lifted her leg slightly and drove deep. When he hit a secret spot deep in her core, she let him know, crying out in staunch satisfaction. So he did it again.
And again.
He rode her, watching a shallow divot form between her eyebrows, enjoying the way her mouth fell open in ecstasy, memorizing the way her hair cascaded over the pillow like thousands of gold ribbons.
He’d missed out. Every soft, smooth, giving inch of her. Every blatantly beautiful part of her—inside and out.
The way she glued her gaze to his as she crested blew him away the most. She kept her eyes open. She took turns watching him and their bod
ies as they separated and came together.
“Oh! Dalton, oh, oh…”
She was close. He released her leg and dropped to his elbows, feathering her hair at the temples and laying a soft kiss on her lips. He wasn’t finishing her off without tasting her cry of release. Not this time. He wanted all of her.
“How’d you know?” she panted between hectic breaths as he slammed into her again. “What I like.”
“I know you.” He lowered his lips to hers, slid one hand between their bodies, and brushed his thumb over her intimately.
Her back arched. Her eyes closed. She was the most gloriously beautiful thing he’d ever seen.
“Now come for me.”
A few more strokes as he pumped into her had her winding tight and then her orgasm overtook her. She called his name on a broken cry. Her inner muscles clamped down on him as a buzz shot from his spine to balls.
He tumbled behind her and sank into an abyss of blond hair, pink balloons, and the taste of his name on her tongue.
Chapter 19
A GUTTURAL MALE groan escaped Dalton, his breath leaving him with such force, Holly’s hair lifted from her forehead. His muscles went taut and rigid for a few throbbing beats, then relaxed. He collapsed over her, giving her his weight, his heart hammering against her breasts.
Incredible.
She ran her fingers into his thick hair, one hand sliding down his back to hold him to her as he came down. She was as out of breath as he was.
Mind-blowing sex with Dalton Thomas.
Check.
The thought paired with a distinct stab of regret. They’d reached the end of the list, which meant she’d have to let him go. She pushed the unwelcome realization away, marinating in the sparks dancing down her body instead. Specifically from the several inches embedded within her.
Yum.
He lifted his head and dropped a kiss to her lips, then smiled—a blindingly stunning smile. The same one that’d been turning her to jelly for a decade. Then he paid her the compliment of her life.
50 Hidden Desires Page 7
