For a moment, it looked like she was going to cry, but then a huge smile replaced the trembling lower lip. “I think we need to go and look at some land, look at some kit houses, and enjoy us becoming more of the everything we both want us to be.”
I fucking loved that. She was with me.
“Then that’s what we’ll do.”
I leaned in to kiss her, but she pulled back before I could reach her. “Stud, I know you have experience with red lipstick all over your face, but I’ve never looked like I’ve been shot in the mouth. Especially not on a date with my hot guy in a fancy new restaurant.”
Chuckling, I dropped her hand to cup her jaw and pulled her closer to me, lifting at the last minute to kiss her on the forehead. “We’ll save that for later,” I murmured against it, then pulled back to wink at her. “Okay, pretty baby, let’s go and check out what those two nuts have achieved.”
Getting out, I walked around and was just about to open her side of the car when Bond got there first.
“Allow me.”
I really wished she didn’t blush when she saw him and his brothers. I know they were good looking guys, but for the love of all things sacred, was it necessary for my woman to think that? I was secure enough in what we had, seeing as how we’d laid the foundations as friends before we’d changed our course, but come the fuck on.
Sighing, I lifted my chin at him. “Bond. Looking forward to tonight.”
Passing Tamsin over to me with a kiss on her hand—the dick shit fucker—he grinned cockily at me. “Everyone looks forward to what I can offer them.”
“Dickhead,” I coughed into my fist, sticking the middle finger of the hand that wasn’t covering my mouth up at him behind Tamsin’s back.
Bursting out laughing, he directed us toward the door. “You know, Zuri, whenever you want to come here, all you have to do is text me, and you’ll get the VIP treatment. Tell me, do you have my number?”
Sticking my leg out in front of his, I tripped him up as he got to the entrance. “Damn, you should quit the day drinking. You’re not driving home, are you, man?”
Glaring at me, he opened the door and winked at Tamsin. “Have a great time tonight. I’ll personally keep an eye on your food.” The way he looked at me when he said it made me suspect that perhaps he was going to spit in mine or do something dirty to it. Damn it.
As we were led to our table, though, Tamsin whispered, “I’ll order for both of us, so he doesn’t know who ordered what.”
“Thanks,” I muttered out of the corner of my mouth.
It all went perfectly after that, with both of us enjoying our food and laughing like we didn’t have a care in the world. It seemed like something had changed in Tamsin over the last week or so, and I would be lying if I said I didn’t love it. I also didn’t want to ruin it or rock the boat by pointing it out, so I just let it be and hoped she enjoyed feeling the way she was for the rest of her life.
Here’s the thing, when you care deeply for someone, you want them to be happy. You want to protect them from harm and all of the bullshit in the world. You want to protect them from assholes, bullies, bitches, fuckwads, trolls on the internet, the stains on society, but you also wanted to protect them from all of the little things that upset people normally. It isn’t possible, life isn’t that generous even if you have billions of dollars, but I was going to do my darndest to make it happen for her.
It was after we’d finished our main meals and were waiting for dessert when Katy and Jarrod turned up. I liked the guy, he was funny and quirky, but in a discreet way. She was pretty fucking cool, and I respected the fact she was a nerd, by her own admission. They suited each other, with him helping her feel calm and settled and her pulling him out of his shell a bit.
“Hey, guys,” Katy greeted. “How was dinner?”
“Yo,” Jarrod said, his deep voice making even me jealous. I swear, I had voice envy with him.
I was holding Tamsin’s broken hand over the table, so she raised her free one at them. “Hey, it’s great to see you both. Jarrod, your brothers are food geniuses. You must be proud.”
“Absolutely. They’ve worked really hard, and seeing the reviews online and hearing people talk about it is great.”
All of us chuckled when Katy licked her lips at a dessert a waiter carried past us.
“Are y’all here to eat dinner, or did you just come to say hi to your brothers?”
Shaking his head, Jarrod nodded at the woman who clearly made the earth spin for him. “We just had a family dinner at my parents, but Katy wanted to see the pains in the ass and have some dessert.”
Shifting closer to me, Tamsin pointed at an empty table behind them. “Do you guys want to join us? You could pull the chairs over from there. You’re related to the owners, it’s not like you’ll get in trouble.”
After getting a nod from his woman, Jarrod picked the chairs up from the other table and moved them to ours, making sure Katy was settled before taking his own seat. Almost like they smelled him in the air, both of his brothers appeared almost immediately.
“Let me guess, she wants the rosewater and pistachio cake again,” Canon said as he leaned in to kiss her cheek. “Great to see you, Kitty Kat. It feels like it’s been forever.”
Making a point of looking at her watch, she snickered, “It’s been just under two hours since I saw you at your parents’ house. But I never say no to seeing you guys.”
Bond winked at Tamsin across the table and made the sign to call him, getting a snicker from her in return.
“Have you told Zuri your thing about me, Jarrod, Bond, and Reid being quadruplets?” Canon asked Katy as he took some plates from the waiter who’d come over and started placing them down in front of the four of us. I didn’t know what we were eating, but it looked phenomenal.
“Okay, so, Zuri, back me up here. Don’t you think they’re four versions of each other? They could totally be quads.”
Blinking, Tamsin looked at me and then at the three brothers. “As in you’re saying they look so alike they could be quadruplets?”
Sighing, Katy got up from her seat and covered Bond’s mouth, making me smile widely. “From the nose up, he looks like Canon. But if I cover the end of his nose, he looks like Jarrod, too. If you cover the eyes, he looks like Reid. It’s like that with all of them. It’s like there were a few identical pieces, and their creators just mixed them around every time their parents bumped uglies and made one of them.”
“Take it back,” Canon hissed at her, snatching up her plate from the table and holding it over his head. “Our parents have never done anything like that.”
Tapping her foot, Katy crossed her arms and glared at him. “We’ve had this discussion before—immaculate conception isn’t a thing, and you’re not proof of it. Your parents did the dirty and made the four of you. Get over it, and give me my damn cake back.”
As she said this, Tamsin looked over at me and raised her eyebrow, reminding me that she’d said the same thing about my parents.
Putting her plate back on the table with a thud, Canon pointed at Jarrod. “You need to educate her, my guy. Mom’s a saint and would never do that. We also don’t look alike at all.”
Tamsin was just in the process of shoving a piece of the dessert in her mouth, but she paused for long enough to say, “Yeah, she did, and yeah, you do. You’re not identical at all, but I can see what Katy’s saying.”
Glaring at her, Canon reached in to take her plate away from her but snatched his hand back when she stabbed him in the hand with her fork.
“I don’t see what’s wrong with looking like me,” Bond shrugged. “You should be grateful to have some of my awesomeness.”
“Shit for brains,” I coughed into my hand, getting a laugh from everyone at the table, including Canon. The only one who didn’t was Bond, who was rubbing his eyebrow with his middle finger.
“Anyway, we hope you enjoy the cake,” Bond said, then looked at Katy and added, “again. And no, you can�
�t have the recipe.”
With a wave, the two of them moved away and split up to cover the other customers.
“Your bros are dope,” Katy mumbled around the mouthful of cake she had. “Dopedy dope.” Then, pointing at me, she said, “And your bro’s dope, too. He let me put the lights and siren on in his car today.”
Putting his fork down, Jarrod looked worriedly at her. “Why were you in his vehicle?”
Studying her cake closely, Katy just shrugged.
“Katy, why were you in a police car? What happened? Are you okay?”
Given what she’d been through not that long ago, I could understand his concern, so I decided to go with bro code and tell him what I knew.
“It was her electric scooter,” I told him, getting a glare from her. “She went out on a ride with her dog, and its battery died because she forgot to charge it. Raoul was driving by and gave her a ride back home, then made sure she put it on to charge.”
“Telltale tit,” she snapped, avoiding looking at Jarrod and turning her back to him, so she was facing Tamsin head-on. “I think there’s a flaw with the scooter, you know. I should probably write a strongly worded email to the manuf—”
“Katarianne, I keep telling you to put the damn thing on charge. And why didn’t you call me to say what’d happened? I would have come and got you.”
Wincing, she mumbled, “’Cos my phone was sitting on the box of tools above the charger for the scooter.”
Tipping his head back, Jarrod looked up at the ceiling like he was praying for patience. Once he’d found whatever he was looking for, he leaned in and whispered something in her ear, making her cheeks turn red and earning him a kiss from her.
Leaning in beside me, Tamsin whispered, “That’s some skill he’s got. Take notes.”
Pulling her closer into me, I nuzzled my nose into the side of her head. “I don’t need to take notes. You bring me so much peace that I know you were made for me.”
Tilting her head back, she looked up at me with shiny eyes and a small smile on her face. “Okay, that’s totally a winner.”
Even with the weight of what she was going through hanging over us, I felt lighter than I had in years. I wasn’t lying, with everything I was feeling that I’d never felt before, she was made for me.
The whole night had been a game of foreplay, and I’d reached breaking point as we drove home down the dark country lane. That said, I probably could’ve held off a bit longer if she hadn’t been rubbing her hand up and down my thigh since we’d set off, skimming closer to where my cock was with each pass.
Still, I had the sense to warn her. “Baby, you keep doing that, and I’ll start torturing you back.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw her look at me as innocently as possible. “What do you mean?”
That might have worked if she hadn’t decided to cup her hand over my erection, which was stuck down the left leg of my jeans, screaming at me for freedom, increasing the pressure as she moved up and down the length.
Figuring revenge was the best way to handle it, I took my time reaching over, building the anticipation, before rubbing my hand up her silky smooth thigh.
Hearing her sharp intake of breath at the move, I pretended to ignore the fact she’d opened her legs slightly farther apart and asked, “Did you have a good night?”
“What?” she asked, sounding like she’d forgotten we’d just been surrounded by a big group of people.
“Tonight. Did you have a good night?” I brought my hand higher up her thigh with each word until it went under the skirt of her dress.
“Um, yeah, it was great,” she whispered, her rapid breaths sounding loud in the quiet cab of the truck.
“I hadn’t expected there to be as many… Son of a bitch,” I growled, jerking the wheel to the side and directing us off the road and into a grouping of trees. Fortunately, their dense foliage covered us for what I was about to do.
See, on that particular skim, I’d managed to get high enough to feel her panties and had rubbed the knuckles of my hand into her, thinking I was just flirting with her pussy. Not once had I imagined that her panties would have a split right up the fucking middle of them so that instead, I hit her smooth, wet center.
Not willing to remove the hand that was already there, I used my free one to undo both of our seatbelts, then leaned over and caught her leg, angling her so that she was facing me more in her seat. With the lights from the dash, I pulled her legs apart and lifted the bottom of her dress so that I could see what I was feeling.
Sure enough, my girl was wearing a pair of split-crotch panties, and she was so fucking wet that I could see her glistening in the faint light around us.
Swallowing over the lump in my throat, I thought over the fact she’d been wearing these all night. We’d been surrounded by people, in a public place, with her in my arms, the whole night… and her pussy had been accessible the entire time.
“You’ve been wearing these all night?” I clarified, my voice sounding strained.
Nodding, she bit down on her lower lip. “Uh-huh. I got them yesterday, do you like them?”
Did she really need to ask me that?
“Fuck, yeah. Wait, you had these since yesterday? Why am I only seeing them now?”
Ignoring my question, she shifted slightly, her new position enough to reveal her clit now. “I wasn’t sure you’d like them, but now that I know, well, they come in other colors, too.”
These were red. A red cast on her arm, red satin nighties, red lace, red crotchless panties…
“I like red,” I croaked, clearing my throat. “Then again, I think I’d like them in any color.”
Her responding laugh was as strained as the words I’d just spoken. “Noted.”
Moving my hand so that the palm was facing upward, I skimmed my middle finger between her folds, groaning at how wet she was.
Willing myself to get some control back, I took a deep breath in and let it out, at around the same time that I hit her entrance. Torn between watching her face and watching what I was doing still, I slowly pushed my finger inside her, groaning at how tight and slick she was as she clenched down on it.
“Garrett, I feel like I’m gonna explode.”
And this was a problem why? “Do it. I want to feel you come, Tamsin.”
Her hips shifted restlessly as I moved the digit in and out of her, adding a second one when she least expected it.
“Your upholstery…”
I was so entranced by what I was doing and feeling that the words went straight over my head, and my usual OCD with the interior of my truck went to shit. All that mattered was her coming, now.
So, feeling the rough patch inside her, I started rubbing it with the two fingers while circling her clit with the rough pad of my thumb. She was so slick that I could see it on my fingers when I moved them in and out of her. Not even her grabbing my wrist and digging her nails into the skin could tear my attention away from the sight, it just showed me I was doing it right.
“Garrett,” she whimpered, her leg starting to tremble under my free hand.
Not even thinking twice about it, I removed my hand and hit the button to lower the back of my chair until it was all the way reclined. Just as I brought my hand back to her, she gasped, and her walls clenched down tightly around my fingers at the same time as her nails dug painfully into me.
There wasn’t a more beautiful sight than Tamsin coming.
And I wanted her to do it again.
With her body still riding the high, I picked her up by her waist and lay down on the chair, lifting her so that her core was right over my mouth, and then stuck my tongue inside her, groaning at the taste that hit me immediately.
I don’t know if what I was doing extended her orgasm or made her come again, but her thighs tensed either side of my head, and she moaned loudly.
Licking up to her clit, I sucked on it as I undid my belt and lowered my zip, freeing my aching cock from my jeans. As soon as I had my boxer
s pulled down enough, I lifted her again and then lowered her down my body so that she was directly over it.
She managed to regain some cognitive functions because she moved my hand aside and shifted slightly so that the tip was notched in her entrance, and then rolled her hips and sank a couple of inches down the length.
It felt like a hot, tight, silky, wet fist was gripping me as she raised slightly and then lowered back down again, taking me deeper this time.
“Holy fuck,” I rasped, bunching her dress in both hands and raising it so that I could watch what was happening.
Even with the glow from the dash the only thing lighting up the truck, I could see clearly how wet my dick was when she raised up it each time. I wasn’t a fan of the word glistening, but swear to God, that’s the only way I could describe it.
When she’d taken all of me, she stopped and ground down into me, shuddering when her sensitive clit met the hair above my cock.
Seeing how close to the edge she was again, I skimmed my hand up her thigh and once again engaged my thumb on her clit, alternating the pressure I was using on it. Every time I pressed down, she’d groan and grind down into me, but when I lightened it, she’d whimper and shudder, like she was still getting off on it. It was fucking beautiful.
I could feel each clench and twitch of her silky walls, and it took everything inside me not to come before she did.
But then she ground down into me at the same time as I rubbed harder on the sensitive bundle of nerves, and with a muted cry, she came. The feeling of her coming while I was moving in and out of her was enough to trigger my own release, shattering the control I’d been holding onto by a thread.
Pulling her upper body down so that she was pressed against me, I kissed her and groaned my orgasm into her mouth. Each clench of her got a corresponding pulse from me in return as I kissed her furiously.
It wasn’t until I shoved my face in her neck, panting as I inhaled her scent with each breath, that I realized what was different.
Just Good Friends (Cheap Thrills Series Book 5) Page 13
