by Hart, Emma
“People brings ducks in there?”
“Where else are they going to take them? Urgent care?”
I showed him my middle finger. “I thought there was a special vet who went to farms.”
“Usually only for horses around here. There aren’t enough vets in town to split off like that, so it’s whoever is around at the time. I helped one of the farms just outside town save one of his lambs last year.”
“Oh, my God. I love lambs. They’re so cute and fluffy with their little wobbly legs.”
“Not so cute when they’re coming out the back end of a sheep.”
“And I am so glad I’m done eating.”
He laughed as I sat up and put the lid down on all the boxes before I stacked them. “It’s rewarding,” he said. “I like it that way.”
“But hard too, right?”
“Of course. I never like taking the babies back to be done, especially the girls. Spaying them is horrible, and I’m always arguing with my vet techs about how much fur they shave off before the operation.”
“I was talking about the—you know.” I stuck my tongue out of the side of my head and tilted my head.
“If that’s your impression of a dead animal, it’s absolutely terrible.”
“I didn’t want to say it!”
He laughed hard. “You’re crazy, do you know that?”
I held my hands out. “You’ve met my grandmother and my cousin. It’s not exactly a surprise, is it?”
“Your cousin? Oh—Imogen. Huh. I’ve never made that connection before.”
“Why would you have? I didn’t think you even knew I existed until a couple of weeks ago.”
His eyebrows shot up. “How the hell could I not have known you existed? We see each other at least every other day.”
“I know, but I assumed you had a supermodel girlfriend stashed away somewhere. Maybe the basement.”
“I did, but she was too tall for me so I had to let her escape.” He winked and leaned forward. “Besides, I knew you were here. I watered your plant last summer when you went away. Even though it didn’t need watering.”
I frowned. “What do you mean it didn’t need watering? Of course it did. It would have died.”
“Hannah, that’s a plastic plant.”
My gaze followed where he was pointing to—to the big, suspiciously green plant in the corner of my living room. “That’s not a plastic plant.”
“Has it ever grown?”
“I don’t know. I don’t pay attention to those things.”
Isaac stood and reached for my hand. He pulled me to my feet and across the room, then put my fingers against one of the leaves.
“See? Plastic.”
I blinked. Holy shit. It was plastic. I’d been watering a plastic plant for two years.
“Oh, my God,” I whispered. “I am such an idiot.”
He leaned into me, laughing quietly. “I watered it for three days until I realized. Then I only watered it on the last day so you wouldn’t think I was abandoning your plant.”
“And you never thought to tell me I’d asked you to water a plastic plant?” I stepped back. “Thanks!”
“I thought you had another plant somewhere you meant!”
“Did you look for it?”
“No.”
“Then why are we having this conversation? Oh, my God.” I dropped back onto the sofa and buried my head in my hands. “This is embarrassing.”
“It’s just a plastic plant, Hannah. I did the same thing.”
“Yeah, but you figured it out! I wasn’t even close to doing that! I’d be watering that fucking thing for the next fifty years without realizing.”
Laughing, Isaac sat down next to me on the sofa, closer than he had before. A shiver ran down my spine at the exact moment his knuckles brushed my knee when he reached for his wine glass. He hesitated for the tiniest second before he grabbed it.
He saw it.
Damn it.
I picked up my glass and sipped, looking at the boxes on the table. I didn’t want to look him in the eye right now, because sitting next to him was quite enough.
The texts.
The texts were all I could think about. They were buzzing around my brain, asking me all sorts of questions. Was he a dirty talker in real life? Did it sound hotter in a British accent? What would he do if I initiated something?
Which wasn’t going to happen. Besides, I didn’t sleep with people on the first date.
Masturbating to text messages didn’t count, okay.
I forced back a sigh. I didn’t want him to know that I was thinking about this stuff. Until now, until he’d taken my hand and sat right next to me, this had been easy. Like we were actually friends who were just eating together.
Now…
Well, now I kinda wanted to sit on him and kiss his face off.
It was problematic to say the least.
I think it was worse that I knew what it felt like to be kissed by him. I knew it sent tingles dancing over my skin and made my heart beat faster.
I think I was just scared to be kissed by him again. Scared to feel that way, scared that it would be the last time I ever would feel that way.
Which was irrational. I knew that. I knew that somewhere, in this world, there was somebody who would make me feel amazing with a kiss.
One of those somebodies was sitting right next to me, after all.
“What are you thinking about?”
“How do you know I’m thinking?” I turned my head the tiniest amount so I could meet his eyes.
“You’ve been sitting there with your lips on the glass, staring into the abyss, for a few minutes now.”
Right. Of course I had.
“Nothing in particular,” I lied, finally taking a drink and putting the glass down. “Pondering why the aliens don’t want to be our friends.”
“Well, I would imagine we’re not quite intelligent enough, our technology is far inferior to theirs, and we’re barefaced liars.”
“Am I that transparent?”
“The aliens wouldn’t need to use their technology to see right through you.”
I pouted, frowning at him. “There’s no need to be so mean about it.”
His lips tugged up. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to.” He sipped from his wine and set the glass next to mine. “You wanna know what I’m thinking?”
“You’re going to tell me regardless, aren’t you?”
“I wanted to give you a chance to give me an answer before I told you.”
“That’s very gracious of you.”
“I did think so. Well? Do you want to know?”
A thousand times yes. “I suppose.”
He moved over and pushed some hair from my face. His fingertips trailed down the side of my face, pausing briefly at the cusp of my jaw before they tickled their way along to cup my chin. “I’m thinking I want to kiss you.”
“Is it up for discussion?” I said softly.
He leaned in until he was so close that I could feel his breath as it skittered over my lips. “We can discuss it, but I’m still going to do it.”
I swallowed the lump in my throat and only just stopped myself from leaning into him, too. “Okay, so, here’s a really good idea why we shouldn’t—”
“Wrong answer,” he murmured.
Then he kissed me.
He tilted my head back and pressed his lips against mine. Gently at first. It was nothing more than a brush of his mouth, like a whisper of a kiss, testing to see if I would pull away.
I wouldn’t.
I didn’t.
There was no way I could.
I wanted him to kiss me. Even my protest hadn’t been thought through—there was every chance I would have said that I didn’t even have a reason why we shouldn’t kiss.
I reached for him, clasping the collar of his shirt in my hand. It was soft and crumpled easily, and I tugged him down closer to me. Isaac deepened the kiss until I could feel every part of my body respondi
ng to him.
The goosebumps on my skin.
The beating of my heart.
The throbbing of my clit.
My whole body was on fire, and all I wanted was to get even closer to him and just fall into him and this kiss.
Isaac moved closer, wrapping one hand around the back of my neck. I slid my hands up his chest and pulled him closer to me, relishing every touch of his lips as I fell back on the sofa.
He moved with me easily, adjusting his body until it was positioned over mine. I wrapped my hands around his neck and held him close to me as our bodies reacted to one other—mine opening for him, and his hardening in every way possible.
He fisted my hair, tugging lightly on it as I moved and parted my legs. He kissed me so deeply, moving his tongue against mine, that my entire body was on fire. Isaac slipped between my legs, and I was flat on my back on the sofa, holding onto him and kissing him for dear life.
It felt good. So, so good. I could taste his need, taste his want, feel every inch of that as his cock pressed against my lower stomach, touching tantalizingly close to my clit.
It took everything I had not to wrap myself around him like a koala and rip all his clothes off. It was the one thing I wanted more than anything in this wild moment; to give in to all my inhibitions, forget he was my neighbor and just let everything go.
Let myself go.
I gave myself over to the moment. I slipped my fingers into his thick hair as his tongue flicked against my lower lip. He did it again, and I parted my lips so the kiss could go even further.
It was heaven.
All my nerve endings came alive, tingling with pleasure and lust.
Isaac slid one hand down my body. His fingertips were like fire, leaving me burning wherever he touched me. He grazed his teeth over my lower lip at the exact moment his fingertips came into contact with my bare thigh and teased slipping beneath my dress.
Ahem.
I moved my leg and my dress fell, exposing my thigh almost in its entirety. Isaac moved, flattening his body right against mine and kissing me harder. I could barely breathe, but it was more to do with the fact he was setting my body alight in places I didn’t even know existed than it was the fact he was actually lying on top of me.
We all had our kinks, and apparently mine was minor asphyxiation by hot guy.
It could have been worse.
I just wanted him to keep kissing me. Even as his hand crept closer and closer to the top of my thigh, not hindered at all by my leg trying to wrap itself around his waist, that was all I could think of.
That he would keep kissing me. That he wouldn’t stop. That he would never stop.
Because kissing my next door neighbor was way better than I’d ever imagined it.
CHAPTER TEN – ISAAC
Never Ending Frustration
Kissing Hannah was fucking heaven.
Her lips were soft and full, and she moved her tongue against mine like she was starving and I was all there was to sate her. The wine we’d broke drank lingered on her lips.
The bare skin of her thigh was tempting. My hand was already halfway to the top, and she was curling herself around me like she never wanted to let me go.
I knew the feeling.
I’d never felt this way about anyone—and I wasn’t yet sure exactly how I felt about Hannah. All I knew was that I was crazy attracted to her, that she made me laugh, and that I was more intrigued by her than I ever had been about anyone.
I could kiss her forever if she’d let me.
I wanted to kiss her forever.
It was better than the alternative; that she would realize what I was doing and punch me in the nose.
I crept my hand up her thigh as I kissed her deeply, moving my tongue against hers. A tiny moan left her mouth when my thumb brushed closed to her pussy. My cock hardened even more in my jeans. It was already throbbing, pressing firm against my jeans in an attempt to escape.
I wanted to let it out.
I wanted to strip that fucking dress off her, rip off my own clothes, and make good on all the things we’d discussed in those texts.
Flip her on her knees.
Pull her hair.
Grip her hips and fuck her until she screamed.
My whole body was thumping with desire. I couldn’t control this if I wanted to. The need to kiss her, to touch her, to fuck her, was all-consuming—desperate, almost.
I fucking wanted her. Badly. So bloody badly I could barely stand it.
Hannah whimpered into my mouth, nipping at my lower lip. I groaned, tightening my grip on her hair. The longer this lasted, the harder it was to keep control, to not go too far.
I didn’t know if I could take it much longer.
“Ahhh!” Hannah screamed and shoved at me.
My arms gave out, making me fall before I could push away from her. “What?” I jolted back from her as soon as I possibly could, forcing myself up to sitting.
“That fucking kitten!” she hissed, sitting up and clasping at her ankle.
I stared at her. “He bit your ankle?”
“Bit my ankle? Bit my ankle? He just took my damn ankle off my leg!” She clutched it tightly and raised it onto the sofa, then slowly peeled her hands away.
She was bleeding like a bitch.
“This is why he’s not my kitten!” she ground out, moving to sit up.
“Where’s your First Aid kit?” I held my hands out to stop her moving. “I got this.”
“Draw next to the fridge.”
I walked into the kitchen and opened the drawer. There was a mini First Aid kit in there, and I unzipped it to find a flattened box of plasters—or Band-Aids as they called them here.
I carried it into the living room where Hannah was still sitting and mumbling curses to herself on the sofa. Blood was trickling down her foot, and I got there in time to pick up her leg before the blood dripped onto the sofa.
“It was about to drip onto the sofa,” I said softly and set the kit between us. There was a small packet of wipes, so I pulled one out, ripped the packaging open, and pulled out the wipe. Hannah hissed when I touched it to the tiny wounds, but I was able to clean her up with relative ease.
“You’ve done this before, haven’t you?”
I grinned. “More times than you know. I promise this looks worse than it is. His claws might be sharp, but they’re still small. Chances are this is one scratch where he just got you really good.”
She nodded, throwing her hand over her eyes dramatically. “This is why I live alone.”
I fought a chuckle as I opened the plasters and covered up the three worst offending scratches. “There. You’ll be as good as new in the morning.”
“Don’t wild cats have rabies?”
“Not in the USA,” I replied. “Besides, he didn’t bite you, he scratched you. I can see by the marks. Whatever it was, he obviously isn’t a fan of me kissing you.”
Her cheeks flushed as she sat up. “Forgive me for not asking you if you want to continue. I think I’m injured enough for today.”
“Forgiveness granted.” I zipped the kit back up with a half-grin. “I won’t hold it against you… For too long.”
Hannah rolled her eyes and sat up straight, tucking some hair behind her ear. “Well, clearly Lucifer knows I don’t sleep with people on the first date.”
“But you’ll sext a stranger.”
“Listen here, you—”
I pressed my finger against her lips. “Settle down. I have an early shift tomorrow, so I can’t be up all night fucking you until I pass out anyway.”
Her cheeks burned even redder.
Jesus, this was fun.
“Now I know you’re not going to bleed to death from your three very tiny wounds,” I teased, “I’m going to leave you to it before your kitten decides to attack my head.”
She sighed. “That’s probably a smart idea. I bet he would. He’s a jerk.”
“No, he’s just protective over you. You might not like
it, but you’re probably his human at this point.” I brushed my thumb over her lower lip and stood. “You mind if I take one of these pizzas?”
She shook her head and passed me the top one. “I won’t eat it all. Go wild.”
“Thanks.” I checked my pockets to make sure nothing had fallen out and headed for the door. Hannah was right behind me, and she paused a couple of feet away from me.
Her brown curls were a wild mess. Her mascara was smudged at the corners of her eyes, and she touched her fingertips to her swollen lips. “I enjoyed dinner,” she said softly, glancing away for a moment.
“So did I.” I smiled and reached out, hooking two fingers beneath her chin to tilt her head up so I could meet her eyes. “Even the rather abrupt ending was somewhat amusing.”
“Would you be saying that if it were your ankle he’d taken a chunk out of?”
“I’ve had bigger, scarier things try to bite me than a one-pound kitten with an ego.”
She paused, a thoughtful look crossing her face. “Actually, so have I.”
I laughed quietly, then leaned forward and brushed a kiss over her cheek. “Goodnight, Hannah.”
She coughed ever so slightly and took a step back, blushing once again.
God, it was adorable when she did that.
“Goodnight,” she said softly.
I smiled at her, catching her eye one last time, then left. She stood at the door as I did so, and I ignored the twitching curtains coming from Mrs. Keighley’s house as I walked to the end of Hannah’s front garden and turned onto my property.
Hannah was still there, waiting, watching me go. She bent down and scooped up Lucifer, cradling the little black ball of darkness to her chest. The second I reached my door, she raised one hand in a small goodbye and stepped inside. I didn’t have a chance to return the gesture before I unlocked my front door.
I let myself in and locked the door behind me, then paused to run a hand over my face.
What a fucking evening.
I was tired and really had to go to bed, but my cock was still hard. I didn’t have a bloody chance in hell of falling asleep right now, so I deposited the pizza box on the kitchen counter and went upstairs to the bathroom.
