The Third Best Thing

by Hughes, Maya

  Jules lifted her chin and smiled and I took the invitation.

  “And we’ve got one of the Fulton U Trojans here.” Avery held out her hands in her best showcase model pose.

  “Off a big win.” Jules grinned up at me and I couldn’t help myself. Keeping things as PG as possible, I stole a kiss like a robber in the night, even though I really wanted to throw her over my shoulder and carry her into the closest dark room to sample everything I’d missed over the past two days.

  “They’re definitely loving you, Big Man.” Max rubbed it in from her safe spot behind the camera.

  Jules covered my hand with hers.

  There was a tightness in my chest. One that wasn’t from pain or hurt, but from how hard it was to contain all the feelings she brought out in me. There was the hungry side of me that couldn’t wait to get her alone, the proud side of me that wanted nothing more than for her to be in front of these cameras and under the spotlights just like she deserved, and another part of me that couldn’t believe she was mine. Even if this didn’t last, even if she kicked me to the curb tomorrow, at least I had today. And I wanted to live in this perfect, vanilla-scented moment forever.

  “Earth to you two.” Avery snapped in front of our grinning faces, breaking the cheek-achingly sweet moment we’d been stuck in. “Let’s get baking.”

  I was tasked with jar opening and heavy mixing. Apparently, there was something going on in the comments section about my gray sweatpants and arm veins. Max chimed in from time to time with the comments coming in until she stopped all together. It seemed my appearance hadn’t been the ratings boost she’d been banking on. She closed the laptop and stuck it on the shelf under the counter.

  We wrapped everything up and I got to take my girl home with some warm, old-fashioned sour cream donuts. I didn’t know they could get any more delicious, but I’d been wrong. Dead freaking wrong.

  “You’re seriously not going to eat one?”

  Jules had the box balanced on her lap.

  My mouth watered for two different reasons.

  She shook her head. “I’m good. I’ll split one with you.”

  “Split one? Are you insane? I could inhale that entire box on my own.”

  She rubbed her chin and tapped a finger against her lips. “I made a few of them with extra large holes in the center. How would you feel about a donut blow job?”

  I swerved into the other lane.

  Jules’ arm whipped out and grabbed onto my arm to pull us back.

  A horn blared and I held up my hand in a wave of apology. “Are you trying to kill us both?”

  She laughed and shook her head. “I didn’t think you’d nearly run us off the road.”

  “I didn’t think I’d ever hear the words donut blow job. Looks like Frenchie is full of secrets.”

  “Nope. Totally boring.” She toyed with the edge of the cardboard box.

  “Says the pole dancing baker throwing out sex acts involving baked goods.”

  Cresting on the edge of the speed limit, I got us back to our street in record time.

  “That was fast.” She brushed her hair out of her face after my Formula One parking job.

  “Not nearly fast enough. Out Frenchie. Out right now.” I flung open her door and pulled her out of her seat and up the stairs to her place in seconds flat.

  We barged into her house like we were on a raid and skidded to a stop when I spotted the half-naked dude walking from the kitchen to the living room. Jules banged into my back.

  I glared at him. “Who the fuck are you?”

  “Jesus, Nick would you put some freaking pants on. Berk, this is Nick. Nick, this is Berk.”

  Jules grabbed my hand and dragged me toward the stairs.

  “That’s Zoe’s boyfriend. He’s apparently forgotten what pants are.”

  “Since when do you have a roommate?”

  “I’ve always had a roommate. She was our roommate when Elle lived here, but she never showed up. She’s here now with a plus one. Don’t worry about him. There’s a donut in this box with your name on it.”

  Her fingers tightened on my t-shirt, pulling me away from the murderous looks I was shooting toward Towel Guy and refocusing my energy toward this little experiment Jules was determined to undertake. Who was I to get in the way of sexual exploration?

  28

  Jules

  I’d never look at a donut the same way again. Before now, I hadn’t known blow jobs could be so funny, but Berk sitting on my bed propped up on his hands, watching me with tears of laughter in his eyes, I finally called it.

  I burst out laughing and wiped at the tears on my face. My sides hurt and I doubled over, clutching my sides. “Cosmo lied.”

  Or maybe cake donuts weren’t the right type to try this with, or maybe Berk was just too damn big for any further attempts at a donut blow job. “There was an attempt.”

  “There were three attempts.” He motioned to the broken donut pieces sitting in the box, taking a bite of one of the non-dicked dunked donuts.

  “I want to give it one more try.”

  “Jules, seriously? I think we’ve proven it’s not going to work.”

  “Let me have my fun.” I parted my lips, sucking his thick mushroom tip into my mouth.

  “Holy shit.” He threaded his fingers in my hair, tugging at the roots as I licked him from base to tip. The sweet sugar combined with his own musk created a heady combination I wished I could bottle up.

  Every hiss and groan ripped from his throat sent another thrill through me and I squeezed my thighs together as I was kneeling on the floor.

  Using my hand to work his velvety erection, I looked up at him.

  Our gazes collided and his thigh muscles bunched under my hand.

  He jerked his hips back, pulling himself free from my mouth and squeezed the head of his cock. “Fuck, Frenchie your mouth is too damn good. I was a second away from coming.”

  “Why didn’t you?” Who pouted about a guy not coming in her mouth? Me apparently, when it was Berk.

  “Because I need to get inside you and I need to wash all this residual sugar off my dick first.” A mischievous glint in his eye, he took my hand, helping me up from the floor.

  “What do you have in mind?”

  What he had in mind was the soapiest, sexiest shower I’d ever had in my life.

  I braced one hand against the wall and another on his shoulder.

  His fingers sank into the top of my thigh, anchoring my leg over his shoulder as he sucked my clit into his mouth. Each tug on the most sensitive part of me demanded more pleasure, louder moans, and even more gasps.

  My knees shook and his arm wrapped around my waist was the only thing keeping me up. I dropped my head back, squeezing my eyes shut at the avalanche of sensations pulsing through my body. My orgasm raced toward me in the rearview mirror, only a split second away from catching me.

  And he stopped.

  My head snapped down and I stared at him wide-eyed. “What the hell?”

  He stood up, teasing my pussy with his fingers.

  “Now that we’re all clean, it’s time to get dirty.” He grabbed a towel off the counter and dried me off, taking his time like we had all night. I was ready to come out of my skin, jump on him and nail our bedroom door shut.

  Barely wrapping a towel around me, I tugged him into my room without even checking on whether or not the coast was clear.

  He laughed, holding his towel around his waist. “In a rush.”

  I glared and he kicked the door closed.

  “It seems someone’s eager.” He spun me around and pushed me up against the door. Capturing both my hands, he put them over my head and stared into my eyes.

  “It’s my turn to make it up to you, Frenchie.” He kissed and licked along the curve of my neck.

  I squeezed my thighs together, ready to explode if he didn’t move his attentions a bit lower. My breath came out shuddering and shallow.

  “You can make it up to me by getting in
side me right now.”

  “I think you’ll like this better.” He didn’t let go of my hands until I let out every expletive known to man.

  With a strength I didn’t think anyone had, he lifted me and carried me over to the bed. My sexual torture was only just beginning and I was here for it.

  My toes curled and my back arched off the bed. I’d never known sex could be like this—well, I had from the last time Berk drove his cock into me as I clung to him trying to catch my breath, but this was even better.

  The noises coming from my mouth were halfway between wounded animal and a bliss so hot it felt like the two of us would be welded together.

  Berk’s hips pounded against my thighs and his fingers sank into my flesh, grabbing my ass like I was his only life raft in a raging sea.

  Panting, I held onto him as he held onto me.

  He collapsed on top of me, ruffling my hair with each breath. His body weight settled over me, not crushing me, completely wrapped up with me. Blanketing me with his warmth. I dropped a kiss on the top of his shoulder.

  “You nearly killed me, Frenchie.” He lifted his head and brushed the sweaty hair back from my forehead, kissing me. His tender smile sent flutters of happiness through my chest. The light brought out the caramel streaks in his mossy eyes and I was suddenly very happy he’d wanted to have the lights on. I wanted to bask in every moment and not miss a thing.

  “Aren’t you supposed to be the athlete?” I ran my fingers along his side, tickling him.

  He laughed and jerked away, tugging himself free from my body.

  We both groaned. My heated flesh ached and throbbed in the very best of ways. In a way that made me want to grab him and pull him right back on top of me.

  He got up and ducked out of the room to get rid of the condom.

  I rolled onto my side, not reaching for the blanket like I normally would’ve. He’d already seen all of me and there was nothing about our session that made me think he had a problem with it. He walked back in—I swear, dick first, with a cloth in his hand. “I’m an athlete, but you’re a next-level girl, Jules. I’ve got to step up my game.”

  “What’s that for?”

  “Taking my game to the next level.” He grabbed my ankle and pulled me down to the edge of the bed.

  “I don’t follow.”

  “You will.” He ran the warm, wet cloth along the insides of my thighs.

  Goosebumps broke out all over my body. I let out a hiss as the cloth rubbed against my clit. “Is this the next level?” The words were choppy and shuddery as the pretense of cleaning me up was punted out the window.

  “No, this is.” He dropped to his knees and slid his hands under my thighs, anchoring me in place.

  And in a flash, his tongue was on me. In me. Everywhere all at once. My hips bucked, but I didn’t get far. Damn he was strong. I wasn’t exactly a waif. “I thought this was foreplay. We already had sex.”

  “You think I’d only want to go down on you before sex? Frenchie, I’m ready to eat you any freaking time and any place.” And then his tongue did a magical thing that made me forget my name, how to breathe, and what my body felt like when it wasn’t attached to a live wire of pleasure.

  “Fuck!” I screamed and grabbed onto his hair, holding on for dear life through the sexual tsunami that was Berkley Vaughn.

  * * *

  “If you could have one thing in the world right now, what would it be?” Berk brushed my hair back from my face.

  He smacked my hand when I snaked it down his stomach through the covers. “Not that. So freaking naughty, Frenchie.”

  “If I can’t have that…” I tapped my finger to my lips and a pang of sadness nudged at my heart. “Books my dad used to read me.”

  “The Peter Rabbit ones?” He rubbed a messy curl between his fingers.

  “You remember that?”

  He nuzzled the top of my head. “There’s nothing I forget when it comes to you.”

  “Those ones.” Pushing aside the sadness, I focused on right here, right now. “What’s the next game I can come to?” I traced my fingers across his chest and my body buzzed and tingled, basking in the afterglow of sex beyond anything we’d done before.

  I’d run out of the bathroom practically naked. We’d had wild, crazy, loud sex in a house with other people. And I didn’t even care. He was a sexual distraction magician.

  “We have a home game in a couple weeks, right before Halloween.” His quick squeeze of my ass made me not hate the size of it. It made me sink deeper into his clutches, enjoying the way he didn’t seem to want to let go and the way he growled against my neck, making my stomach flip.

  “Can I come dressed up?” Lifting my head, I stared up at him, breathless and ready for another round. He had the uncanny ability to make me feel like nothing bad could touch me when I was in his arms.

  He skimmed his fingers down my spine.

  Goosebumps broke out all over my body and I bit back a moan.

  “I have a few things I’d like you to come dressed up as.”

  “Getting arrested trying to get into an FU game isn’t on my list of top tens.”

  “How do you know what I wanted you to dress up as? Maybe I was going to say a nun.” He chuckled. His chest rumbled under my ear.

  “Damn, and I wanted to dress up as a stripper. But I think your idea will be a better fit.”

  “Hold on a second.” He wiggled his fingers into my side.

  I shoved at him and rolled away laughing. “No take-backsies.”

  Hopping off the bed, I searched the room and grabbed my robe. Outside of the bed, the floorboards were like ice cubes and a shiver shuddered through me.

  “Nun, it is.” Triumphantly, I tied the fluffy sash of my robe.

  “How about you dress up as a nun for my game and we can have a private costume party back here?” He propped his head up with his arms, every muscle and vein prominent and tasty.

  There wasn’t an ounce of fat on him. Tanned. Solid. Athletic. He could’ve been a sculpture brought to life, and he was here with me.

  Behind these curtains and in these walls, everything else faded away and the voices in my head—the ones that had been there for so long I wasn’t sure if they were my own words or not—weren’t nearly as loud.

  “That might be something we could arrange.” I swung the sash in a loop.

  His phone buzzed on my nightstand. He scooped it up and his forehead creased.

  “What’s wrong? Did Alexis steal something again?” I meant it to come out as a joke, but after what the guys had said and how Berk always came to her rescue, I wondered if she hadn’t gotten into some kind of trouble again.

  “No, why would you say that?” He set the phone down again.

  “That was a really bad attempt at a joke. I’m sorry. Is there something wrong?”

  The frown lines and creases disappeared and he relaxed back against the headboard.

  “Everything’s fine, except for one thing. Why are you out of bed? It’s getting cold without you.” He pushed back the blankets, showing me a few more muscles I hadn’t explored.

  “I was going to make us some French toast. Maybe some bacon and eggs.”

  “I have a better idea.” He pushed back the blankets and swung his feet around to the floor. “Why don’t I cook and you can ogle me for once?”

  My head bobbed up and down. “Yes, please.” My grin at how homey that felt was uncontrollable.

  He grabbed his jeans and slipped them on.

  I looked out the window behind him and ran to it, staring out wide-eyed. “It’s snowing.”

  “In October?” He turned and looked out the window beside me. “They said we’d be getting some weather, but freaking snow?” The snowflakes didn’t dance to the ground blanketing it in a gentle blanket. It was coming down like this was the day before Christmas. There wasn’t anywhere we needed to be. The fridge was stocked. What better way to spend a snow day than with Berk?

  I grinned at him and r
ushed to my closet. “Come on. Let’s go out there.”

  29

  Berk

  I’d always hated snow. For a long time I’d hoped to get drafted to a team somewhere warm where it never hit. Growing up, snow meant walking through it with soggy socks, frozen toes, and plastic bags wrapped around my feet.

  No one was buying me boots or snow pants to go out and play or have snowball fights in it. It meant freezing temperatures in my bunk and dreading the morning when I’d have to slide my already frozen feet into ice-cold shoes. No, snow was public enemy number one, right behind rain.

  But watching Jules run around in an adorable blue and purple knit hat with a white pompom on top made me want to move to a winter wonderland. Her cheeks were bright red. The dark wisps of her hair stuck out from the bottom of her hat as she ran around with her arms out at her sides, getting covered with flakes like the most beautiful statue ever sculpted.

  “Do you think we’ll get enough to make a snow man?” She opened her mouth, catching flakes on her tongue and laughed. The snow whipped at us from all angles. The flakes clung to her eyelashes under her glasses, and the sight left me breathless. Another piece of my heart mailed to her in that second in a signed, sealed, and delivered envelope. I could imagine her doing the same thing with two little kids at her side, a boy and a girl that both looked just like her.

  And that vision was so vivid, so real, that I had to take a step back. The dreams of a kid who’d never had a family jumping way ahead of where we were now. There was so much uncertainty and there always would be. That restlessness never went away. I was always waiting for the other shoe to drop.

  It started coming down even harder, sleet mixed with snow.

  Shielding her eyes with water-splattered glasses, she looked over at me. “We should probably go in, huh?”

  “We can stay out here as long as you want.”

  “You don’t even have gloves.” She stared at my bare hands in my pockets. “Come on, let’s go in.” Holding out her mitten-covered hand, she pulled me in close against her body, cradling my hand in hers.