by Amy Andrews
A loud banging on her front door startled her, causing her to almost choke on her breath mints. “Tilly! It’s me. It’s Tanner! Open up!”
Tanner?
Matilda’s pulse leaped as she practically levitated from the bed. If she’d had her wits about her, she might have cared that she was in a T-shirt that said “Journalists do it on the front page,” instead of her slinky, clingy red lace negligee. Or that her eyes were probably bloodshot to hell, and her hair probably looked more punk than pixie. Or that she probably still stunk of booze.
All she cared about was getting her hands on her man.
Her man.
She could get used to that.
She was at the door in ten seconds flat, her hand fumbling with the dead lock. Then it was open and he was standing there in a pair of knee-length chinos and a T-shirt soaked in sweat. More sweat poured down his forehead and neck, his golden-blond hair dark at the roots where perspiration had saturated it in clumps.
“Yes,” he said grinning at her. “Yes.”
Matilda didn’t care how sweaty he was. She threw herself at him, crawling up him to kiss him on the mouth, whispering, “Yes, yes, yes,” against his lips.
Somehow they ended up inside her apartment on the other side of her door, pressed against it, kissing like they’d never kissed before, like the world was about to end and this was the way they’d chosen to spend their last moment.
“I love you,” she said eventually, sinking her hands into his sweaty hair, pressing her forehead to his as she sucked in lungsful of much needed air.
“I love you, too,” he said simply.
“God,” she said, on a half laugh. “You sure as hell played it cool. I thought I’d blown it.”
“No.” He shook his head. “I’m sorry. I’ve been in the far west of the state, unplugged since Thursday afternoon. I only saw the article about an hour ago.”
“So you…” She brushed his sweaty fringe off his forehead. “You ran all the way here?”
“Practically. I got caught in a traffic gridlock due to some accident. Nobody could go anywhere so I mounted the kerb, parked the car, and ran the last eight kilometres.”
Matilda laughed incredulous. “That’s crazy.”
He shook his head. “No. It’s the sanest thing I’ve ever done.” He kissed her again, and Matilda’s heart sang as she held him tight. “Do you have a shower in this place?”
She grinned at him as she wriggled down. “Follow me.”
A trail of their clothes lay strewn on the floor by the time they both hit the shower, completely naked. Tanner turned on the cold only, and Matilda gasped but he soon wrapped her up in his arms and kissed her senseless against the tile, urging her to wrap her legs around his waist.
But she refused to go, turning him so his back was to the tile instead and kissing down his chest. And down lower. And lower.
“Tilly,” he said, pulling gently on her shoulders. “I want to be in you.”
“Later,” she said, rising on her tiptoes to place a playful kiss on his mouth before sinking to her knees in front of him.
Cold water sprayed down all around her, beading her nipples to tight points, and her head was level with the thick, long jut of his erection. She looked up at him, past the flat of his belly, the spread of his ribs, the wide expanse of his chest, the whiskery length of his neck, the brooding line of his mouth.
All the way up to the lust-fuelled blue of his eyes. “I want to taste you.”
The rings of cartilage in his throat bobbed as he swallowed. “You can have whatever you want. I’m all yours.”
Matilda smiled at him, pressing her knees into the grout of the tile in case she actually become so light with happiness she floated. “Good answer.”
Then she grasped the base of his cock in one hand, cupped his balls with the other and sunk her lips down his shaft, taking him right to the back of her throat.
She just heard the thunk of his head against the tile over the sound of the water and his long, low, “Fuuuck.”
A surge of pure feminine power streaked through her system, and Matilda withdrew, sucking hard all the way before eating him up again, going as far as she could, alternately squeezing and rolling his balls.
She glanced up to find him, head back, eyes closed, his palms flattened hard against the tiles behind him, his knuckles white as if he was trying to stop himself from moving or touching her. But Matilda wanted him to move. To thrust. She wanted him to touch her. She wanted to feel his hands on her head, in her hair, urging her on.
She wanted him to watch her blowing him, watch her making him come with her mouth, watch her swallow everything he had to give.
She withdrew all the way, letting the plump head sit gently against her lips. He roused shortly, his eyes fluttering open before he looked down.
“I want you to watch me,” she said, her voice husky. “Hold my head. Guide me.”
His low groan went straight to her belly, and she swore she could see the tightening of his abs. His gaze fixed on hers as his hands slid into her hair, and she felt the subtle pressure of them as they urged her back onto his cock.
Matilda shut her eyes in deep satisfaction, opening to take him all, moaning as he thrust slightly to push deeper, protesting as he pulled out then sucking greedily as he thrust in again.
Now they were a team. It wasn’t just her on her knees servicing him. He was a part of it. Fucking her mouth. And she freaking loved it. He was hot and slippery against her tongue, tasting like salt and musk, the chill of the water lubricating and cooling all at once.
When his legs started to tremble, she knew he was nearly there. His balls drew tighter, and he started to thrust faster. Matilda matched him, sucking harder and faster, clawing at the back of his thighs to stop herself from dissolving into a puddle of lust and washing down the drain.
“Oh…yes…baby,” he muttered, his hands clamping in her hair, his hips suddenly jerking to a stop. A deep bellow echoed around the shower as his hot seed spilled into her mouth. She swallowed until he was spent, clinging to his legs as he eased from her mouth, pressing her forehead to his thigh as blood pounded through her head.
“Come here,” he said after a beat, reaching down for her, hauling her up his body as the cool water flowed down her back before he turned her around. Her legs automatically wrapped around his hips as he leaned heavily against her like he was having trouble holding himself up.
“That was amazing,” he muttered, before his mouth descended hot and a little crazy on hers. “God,” he groaned. “Tasting me on you is such a frickin’ turn-on.”
Matilda laughed, her heart about as full as it could possibly be. “I know how you feel.”
He nuzzled her neck for a moment, obviously needing some recovery time. “Why’d you change your mind?” he asked, his voice muffled.
Matilda stared into the water spurting out of the showerhead. “Because we were kids but now we’re adults, and it was well past time for me to get over it. Because your intentions were good, even if your execution sucked. And because as much as I didn’t still want to love you…I still did.”
He lifted his head from her neck. “I am sorry,” he murmured, his blue eyes earnest, despite the sexy cling of water droplets.
“I know.” She pressed a soft kiss to his mouth. “So am I.” And she kissed him again. “Are you sure about the getting married thing? I kind of put you on the spot a bit there. We don’t have to. We can take it slow, see how it goes.”
“No way.” Tanner shook his head emphatically, the water droplets flying from the ends of his hair and his eyelashes. “I’ve waited eight years for this, and I’m not wasting another minute. This isn’t maybe love or probably love or even definitely love anymore. This is forever love, and I want that to start right here, right now. Today.”
Matilda grinned at him. “Forever love?” Exactly what she wanted from him. “Can we hashtag that?”
“Sure.” He grinned back. “Later. Right now there’
s another hashtag on my mind.” He unlocked her ankles from around his hips, eased her legs to the ground then dropped to his knees in front of her as she had done to him.
Matilda’s heart skipped a beat.
“Hold on, baby,” he said, gripping her right leg, bending it at the knee and urging it up and over his shoulder, splaying her wide open before him. “Captain Cunnilingus is in da house.”
Matilda gasped and shut her eyes as he put his mouth to her. She pushed a hand into his wet hair, her body coming alive, her heart glowing big and bright and full in her chest.
Forever love was going to be freaking awesome.
Did you love this Brazen? Check out more of our steamy titles here!
Glossary
I’ve probably used some words in here that some readers may not know—both rugby ones and strange Aussie-isms alike. So I thought a handy dandy glossary might help. It is, of course, written entirely from my perspective so is heavily biased, female-centric, and quite possibly dodgy. It probably wouldn’t stand up to any kind of official scrutiny…
Footy – We love this term in Australia. The confusing thing for most non-Aussies is they never know which game it refers to because we have three separate but distinct codes of football in Australia:
1. Rugby League (Jarryd Hayne played this code before he went and played Gridiron).
2. Rugby union – The code the Sydney Smoke play and the one this series is based upon (Jarryd Hayne now trying his hand at this code as well…).
3. Aussie rules football – Different altogether. Tall, fit guys in really tight shorts.
There is also soccer but we don’t really think of that as football in the traditional sense here in Australia.
The confusing thing is we refer to all of them as the footy e.g. “Wanna go to the footy, Davo?” And somehow we all seem to know which code is being referred to at any given time. Even more confusing, the ball that is used in each code is often also called the footy e.g. “Chuck me the footy, Gazza.”
Pitch – Apparently the rugby field is called a pitch but colloquially here we just call it the footy (see, I told you we liked that term) field. A pitch is more a cricket term. No, don’t worry, I won’t ever try to explain a game that lasts five days to you…
Ruck – No, not a typo. That’s ruck with an R, ladies! Happens after a tackle as each team tries to gain possession of the ball.
Line-out – That weird thing they use to restart play where each team lines up side by side, vertical to the sideline, and one of the guys throws the ball to his team and a few of the guys from that team bodily lift one dude up to snatch the ball out of the air. It’s like rugby ballet. Minus the tutus. And usually with more blood.
Scrum – Another way to gain possession of the ball. I’m going to paraphrase several definitions I’ve read: A scrum is when two groups of opposing players pack loosely together, arms interlocked, heads down, jockeying for the ball that is fed into the scrum along the ground. It’s like a tug of war with no rope and more body contact or, as I like to call it, a great big man hug with a lot of dudes lying on top of each other at the end of it all. Very homoerotic. Win/win.
Try – A goal. Except in rugby union we don’t say someone scored a goal, we say someone scored a try after they’ve dived for the line and a bunch of other guys have jumped on top to try and stop it from happening. Very homoerotic. Win/win. A try is worth five points.
Haka – A ceremonial dance performed by all Polynesian cultures but made famous by the New Zealand All Blacks rugby team who perform it before every match in an awesome, spine chilling display of power, passion, and identity. I’m sure it’s only coincidental that it’s also crap-your-pants scary. There are few things more fearsome than an advancing All Black haka!
WAG – Wives and girlfriends. These are partners of the dudes that play rugby. Although we also use the term here in Oz to refer to partners of our cricket players. I think in the UK WAGS is also a term used for football (soccer) partners.
Pash – Not a footy term but one I used a couple of times which confused the heck out of my editor. A pash is a kiss e.g. “Did you pash him, Shazza.” It’s the Aussie equivalent to the British term snog.
Acknowledgments
My thanks, as always must go to all the team at Entangled, particularly those who work on the Brazen imprint. You are all superstars.
Extra special thanks to two gorgeous men who are my rugby gurus and the guys I go to for much needed info as I write this series. To David Grice and Jon O’Brien who, between them, have answered my crazy queries via text day and night. Questions about rucks (not a typo), hooters (no, not those kind), blood rules, goals, tries, salaries, those weird line out thingies…the list goes on. These two men—husbands of dear friends—are on speed dial and will be for as long as this series continues. I’m not sure they fully knew what they got themselves into when they agreed to be my rugby guides…but I am forever grateful to both of them.
About the Author
Multi-award-winning and USA Today bestselling author Amy Andrews is an Aussie who has written fifty romances, from novellas to category to single-title in both the traditional and digital markets for a variety of publishers. Her first love is steamy contemporary romance that makes her readers tingle, laugh, and sigh. At the age of sixteen, she met a guy she instantly knew she was going to marry, so she just smiles when people tell her insta-love books are unrealistic because she did marry that man and, twenty-odd years later, they’re still living out their happily ever after.
She loves good books, fab food, great wine, and frequent travel—preferably all four together. She lives on acreage on the outskirts of Brisbane with a gorgeous mountain view but secretly wishes it were the hillsides of Tuscany.
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