His arms clenched tight around my waist, tugging me into him, pressing my stomach and my hardening nipples and my aching core flush to his body—giving it exactly what it wanted but with too many clothes and too much public space cloaking it.
When we finally broke the kiss, we stood there, still holding each other, gasping.
“There’s one thing you need to know,” I said in a ragged whisper. “I fucking hate country music.”
Ryder—Bryan—kissed me again, smiling against my lips. “I’m done for the night.” he said softly, waiting for my reaction.
“Are you going home?”
“Yep. Can I give you a ride?”
I grinned, flooded with a mix of relief and pure lust. “I think that would be really good.”
Bryan reached down for my hand and tugged me toward his truck. The moon shone bright and icy blue overhead, and I took a deep breath of the cooling air, savoring the feel of his hand in mine. After we reached the truck, he kissed me one more time, hard on the lips, and brushed the hair back from my face. “Will you stay with me tonight? At least think about it?” he asked, giving me that same look, drowning in emotion and longing, as he had just the other night.
“Well, I forgot to grab those sheets you left me at work,” I said breathlessly. “So I’ll have to use yours anyway.”
“Nothing would make me happier,” he said, unlocking the door with his keys, opening the door with a pinky finger, and practically throwing me into the truck.
He jogged around to his side, and I tried to calculate exactly how many minutes it would take us to get home.
I couldn’t believe I had actually thought of this place as “home.”
We took the ride in silence, occasionally glancing at each other and grinning like we shared some huge secret. And really, we did.
Exactly eight minutes and twenty-eight seconds later, we pulled into the parking lot and tripped up the stairs. I had a vague, fuzzy memory of this route from the other night, but something about doing this completely sober was that much more thrilling.
Bryan wrenched the door open, and we barreled inside, falling against the wall in a flurry of lips and tongues and tearing clothes. Before I knew it, my blazing hot skin felt the cool air of the room across my back and my belly. Bryan’s mouth soon followed, kissing a path between my breasts and down to my belly button, unbuttoning my pants along the way and pressing soft kisses all over the front of my cotton lace panties. My fingers threaded through his hair, and I moaned with the memory of what his mouth had been able to bring me to, trying to tell him without words that I wanted more from him tonight. I wanted all of him.
As painful as it was, I pulled away from his kisses and dragged him up from under his arms to kiss me. My hands flew to the snap at his jeans.
I broke a nail prying it loose, and I didn’t even care. When the back of my hand brushed his hot length for the second time that night, I lost it. I had to have him naked and on top of me. Now. I tugged furiously, and the jeans fell to the floor. Ryder stepped out of them and guided me toward the bed. He fell backward and pulled me down on top of him, and the refrain thank God thank God thank God ran on repeat through my head.
I sat up, straddling him, and went into command mode. “Take your shirt off. I want to see you.”
“Haven’t you already seen enough of that tonight?” he laughed.
“I saw Ryder,” I said, pushing my hands up under his shirt, shivering as I felt the hard ridges between his stomach muscles. God, I could lick them over and over again and never get tired of it. “Now, I want to see Bryan.”
A soft smile curved his lips, and a look of pure adoration crossed his eyes. And then, I was flying through the air because he’d sat up so quickly that he’d flipped me down onto the mattress. “Take off your bra for me, baby,” he said. “You’re not the only one directing here.”
Holy shit, I loved that. In all of my sexual encounters so far, it’d been all nervousness and uncertainty, all shaking hands and stammering dirty talk. Being with a guy who knew what the hell he was doing, what the hell he wanted, made me feel powerful—because I could give it to him, and I wanted to. Without any more thought, I unsnapped the front of my bra and wiggled my arms out of the straps, making my boobs sway in the process.
“Holy shit, you’re gonna kill me,” Bryan growled, planking over me and dipping his head down to take one of my nipples between his teeth. An electrical jolt shot through my entire body, making my back arch off the bed. I groaned while he took more of me into his mouth, swirling his tongue and sucking until I was mindless. If he kept this up, I’d end up coming right then and there.
Then his hands moved down and pulled that ridiculous thong of his off. I would have laughed at the heavy, crinkling noise as it hit the floor if I hadn’t been so desperate to see him.
He released my nipple with a loud pop and sat back on his heels.
The most incredible hard-on I’d ever seen bobbed up in the air. Thick and smooth and waiting for me. Before I could say a word, before I could breathe, he was on top of me again, pressing between my legs, already hot and slick even though a scrap of lace panty still separated us. His mouth descended on my other nipple, giving it the same incredible attention, and between that and the way he was grinding against my clit, I felt the pressure building to a boiling point.
When he nipped at the sensitive skin just underneath my breast, lining my rib with his tongue, I whimpered, half because it sent waves of warm electricity spilling through me and half because of the agony of that hardness no longer pressing between my legs. So with one hand, I tugged him up to me, and with the other, I pulled down my own panties because I was so desperate for us to be skin on skin that it hurt.
Bryan started to devour my neck, finally making his way up to my ear and growling, “You’re so wet.”
I wrapped my arms around his neck tighter, wanting more of him touching more of me. “I want you so bad,” I murmured.
He moved his hips the slightest bit into me, crushing himself against the tiny spot between my legs that felt like it was about to catch on fire, and when he did, the entire world exploded over me. A cry spilled out of my throat as I threw my head back and tried to catch my breath, sated for the moment but definitely, definitely not satisfied.
“You are so fucking incredible,” Bryan murmured as his lips returned to my breasts and his thumb dug into my belly button. His other hand stretched over to his bedside table and tugged the drawer out, tearing into a small box of condoms.
As if the post-orgasm nirvana wasn’t enough, something else swept over me—reassurance and safety. If he’d been screwing a new girl every other night, his drawer would have been stocked with condoms ready to go, or at the very least, he would have been buying them in the big twelve-per-box packs.
“Bryan,” I panted. “You really haven’t slept with anyone in a while, have you?”
He moved back up, letting his face hover over mine. That same deep, captivating look in his eyes stared down at me as he shook his head slowly, and then a smile crept onto his face.
“What?” I smiled back.
“Say my name again,” he pleaded.
“Bryan?” I asked softly.
His mouth crushed down onto mine, his fingers tangling in my hair and his tongue languidly stroking into my mouth in the most passionate kiss I’d ever, ever had. I was already aching for him again, that same pressure—insatiable, it seemed—rebuilding deep in my belly. So when he finally broke the kiss, I arched my neck up toward him and said it again. “Bryan.”
That elicited a needy groan and the most incredible neck- and shoulder-kissing ever. My lips parted.
“Bryan.”
He trailed a hot path down to my stomach, nipping at the soft flesh there, blowing across the wet skin as he went. A tremor rumbled through me.
“Bryan,” I said again, but when he
sucked at my hip bone, I was done for.
“Need you,” I managed. “Now.”
He sat back on his heels, his chest heaving, his eyes hungry. I could see, even in the pale moonlight shining through the high window, that his hands were shaking.
I almost asked if he was okay, but I bit my tongue. From the way his dick sprang up toward me, I knew he was okay enough for the activity at hand. When he finally got the condom out, he rolled it on easily enough, but after watching him for so many seconds, each one ticking by as if it were an hour, I was so ready I couldn’t restrain myself. I sat up, grabbed his shoulders, and pushed him down on the bed beside me. I wrapped my fingers around him, and he throbbed against me. I had never, ever in my life wanted something more than I wanted him inside of me at just that moment.
He was absolutely freaking huge, but I was dripping wet and as ready as I’d ever be. My knee flew to the other side of his waist, planted itself on the bed, and I sank down on top of him, taking in every exquisite inch with a gasp and a sigh. A deep groan rumbled out of him, and it was just about the damn sexiest thing I’d ever heard. I rocked my hips in and down, over and over again, trying to feel and memorize every inch of him. His thumbs dug into my hips, and his fingers grabbed my ass, pushing me on with such urgency that I thought I would burst. We were both trying to keep our eyes open, but the almost unbearable pleasure of every movement was too much. The most sensitive part of him stroked the most sensitive part of me in a new, more intense way each time.
We moved together like we’d been made for it, groaning and sighing at exactly the same moments, rocking together with a perfectly synchronized rhythm that made me wonder how people ever had sex that wasn’t this good. Or how people who were lucky enough to have sex this good ever stopped.
A few minutes later, though, a burning in my thighs gave me the answer. My movements became shallower, and he looked up at me, his brow furrowed. “Bryan,” I whimpered weakly, and before I could say another word, he was flipping me onto my back. I practically sobbed when he pulled out of me and cried out when he thrust back in again.
“Are you okay?” he asked between hard breaths.
“Perfect,” I panted. “I’m amazing.”
Still, he moved cautiously from then on, easing into me and back out again like we would just do this forever, like this was all he could imagine doing for the rest of his life. That made perfect sense to me. That is, until he shifted and hit that same spot inside me that his fingers had brushed when he went down on me. Suddenly, I was desperate again, aching to have him pumping inside me, hard and fast. I wrapped my legs around his waist and dug my heels into the backs of his thighs. He responded by wrapping one arm full around my waist, pulling me up and into him, and grabbing at the headboard with the other. My world spun completely out of control around me; there were no colors, no sounds, no heat, no life outside these walls. Every movement added to the huge buildup of lust and longing and pure, desperate need spiraling inside of me until Bryan bent his forehead to mine and whispered, “Come with me, baby.”
In that final, earth-shattering thrust, the energy condensed to a speck of dust, and then it all exploded, shooting waves of pleasure down my legs, around my torso, through my whole body.
With his forehead still against mine, Bryan let out a short, ragged laugh, then pressed a soft, lingering kiss to my lips. I wanted to memorize that feeling, one that was intense and tender at the same time, one that was so completely made for me that I wasn’t sure if anything would ever come close again.
Our chests heaved together, the curves of my breasts rising with each gasp of air. Wild thoughts raced through my head. What if everything else was a dream and this was real life? The thought was a shock, mostly because it was so utterly and completely true.
“I’ve never felt anything this real,” I murmured.
“Oh, Andi.”
Bryan let his eyes fall shut for a moment, then pulled out, reaching for a box of tissue to wipe up. He dropped it on the floor and grabbed another, tenderly pressing it between my legs. “Thanks,” I murmured as he tossed that, too, then lifted himself up enough to pull the covers out from underneath us.
“Come here,” he said. I scooted to his side, my own last words ringing in my ears. I pressed my face to his chest and turned my head to kiss him there. My eyes fluttered closed as we lay there tangled up together and our breaths slowed. He squeezed my side possessively, and a purr of satisfaction rumbled in my chest.
“Tell me more,” I murmured. “About you. About Bryan.”
He took a deep breath and kissed my forehead. “When I came to Vegas,” he said, “it was because I had nothing left to lose.” His quiet, measured voice rumbled through his chest and into mine. “I had an amazing scholarship to USC. Football.”
I nodded, letting my fingers trace the lines of his abs.
“The week before the championship, I had an accident. Thrown up in the air by a guy on the other team, landed on my head. Pushed two of my vertebrae together, cracked one, and before I knew it, I was paralyzed from the waist down.”
“Holy shit,” I said, pushing up on one arm to look at him. He tugged me back down and kissed the top of my head.
“I had this girlfriend. She was perfect. We were perfect. But then I couldn’t walk. She had plans to go to USC already, and with all my scholarship money gone, I didn’t really fit into her plans anymore. She told me as much. Suddenly, my entire world turned upside-down. Turned out, it was just a temporary thing. Slowly, my spinal fluid built back up, and after some serious recovery time and lots of physical therapy, I was more or less normal. Lost a lot of my muscle memory for all the football shit though, and by then, it was too late to get my scholarship back.”
I nodded again, snaking my arm around his waist and squeezing.
“Things with Chris got real bad at the same time.”
“Your brother,” I murmured, pressing a kiss to his shoulder.
Ryder nodded. “He’s only two years older than me, and he’s always been a hothead. Giving our mom shit, drinking, staying out too late. When he decided to go to boot camp, Mom and I were so relieved. We thought it would calm him down, straighten him out a little, but he did a tour in Afghanistan and ended up beating the crap out of one of the other soldiers. They sent him home, saying it was PTSD, but it turns out he’s bipolar, too.”
“What does that mean?”
“Basically, the most intense mood swings on the planet. The depression is really dangerous, but the violent temper when he’s manic is just as scary. He moved back home, and I had just graduated high school with no college plans, so when mom got a secretarial job at a construction company here in Vegas, we both moved with her. Things were booming so much in the housing industry that I decided to train as a realtor. I did a pretty decent job—sold a few houses, made enough to get my own place. Made enough to help Chris out when he was having trouble.”
“Trouble like…?”
“Losing jobs, running into creditors. I even co-signed a loan for him because he had this idea for a business in one of his manic episodes back before we knew what was really going on. His condition made things almost impossible, and my mom couldn’t support him. Half the time because he wouldn’t let her. But I love him. I was only able to pay for most of his shit because I started stripping.”
“What does your mom think about all of it?”
“She doesn’t know the half of it. She thinks I’m helping with groceries and maybe his rent occasionally, but I know the whole story. I take him to his appointments because she’s been moving from job to job and never had the time off. It would break her heart.” His voice broke at that. “So now you know every little trashy truth about my life.” He laughed, even though I knew he didn’t think any of this was funny at all.
After a few moments of basking in the calm sound of Bryan’s breathing, in and out, cradling me, I pressed another
kiss into his chest. “Thank you for telling me.”
“I figured if you’re going to make the decision to be with a stripper, you might as well know why I do it. Everything I told you back there was true. I never kiss any of those girls. In some places, the guys get head from the girls they bring up on stage, yeah, but I never let it get that far. No one has ever even touched me. It’s strictly for money. Kat treats me well, and I’m good at it. But I have a plan to get out, just as soon as the real estate market rebounds.”
Already, the stress was building back in his voice.
I let go of his waist and reached up to stroke my fingers down his jaw. “Can I tell you a secret?” I murmured.
He hooked a finger under my chin, pulling my lips up to meet his. “Sure,” his voice rumbled against them.
“When I was on stage tonight, it was completely and totally out of character. Like, I would never, ever, ever have done anything like that back home. I haven’t even really been with a guy for over a year. I don’t party. I don’t do drinking and bright lights. I’ve never seen a stripper.”
“But?” he asked with a hopeful look in his eye.
“But when I was up there on stage with you, I had never wanted anything more. Ever.”
He chuckled. “Well, yeah, I’m damn good at it.”
I rolled my eyes. “No, not the music or lights or thong or weird dancing.”
“Hey,” he said, pulling me up for a deeper kiss. “It’s not weird. I did that choreography myself.”
I giggled. “Whatever. What I’m saying is that I only saw you and me up there. And I wanted you all to myself. No matter what else was going on.”
The warmest, most exhilarating feeling shot through me as he pulled me in for one more kiss, his tongue tracing my lips slowly, pulling them gently between his teeth. I’d never been in love, but I would have bet my tips from the whole week that this was getting close to it.
Jumping into something feet-first—just another thing that was so not me.
Drop Everything Now Page 13
