"Why don't you pack a change of clothes," I told her. I dropped a soft kiss on her lips. "Just in case."
"Just in case." She hummed, tucking her hands into the front of my belt. "I like just in case."
She kissed me again, and while she was up on tiptoe to reach my mouth better, I ran my hands up and down the lithe line of her back, down along the denim covered curves of her ass. I wanted nothing more than to peel every inch of clothing off her body, see all the things that I'd only seen in my mind as I laid in bed, or stood under the pulse of my shower.
If I was fortunate enough, I'd be able to have her in both of those places very, very soon.
Her phone started ringing on the island, and she glanced over, forehead bunching in confusion. "What on earth?"
"Who is it?"
She lifted up the screen and showed it to me. "Maxine Barton is FaceTiming me."
I laughed, holding my hands up. "I'll stay out of sight if you want to answer it."
Grace chewed on her lip, then hit the button. "Hi, Maxine."
"Young lady, I didn't catch you in the middle of anything, did I?"
Her eyes zipped to me. "Nope."
I grinned.
"Mmmhmm," Maxine hummed. "I don't believe that for a second, but anytime a young person doesn't make me feel like a burden, I'm inclined to give you the benefit of the doubt. I have a business proposition for you."
Grace's eyebrows popped up. "What kind?"
"Pictures. I see you lugging that camera everywhere, and since it looks more expensive than my car, I figure you know how to use it."
She smiled. "I do. What kind of pictures do you need?"
"I've got a family reunion a couple Saturdays from now, and I figure we might as well get some pictures taken. First time all these derelicts have been in one place in ten years."
I stifled a laugh, and Grace gave me a warning look over the edge of the phone.
"Miss Barton, I'd love to do it." She held up a hand. "But, I can't guarantee how good I'll be at family photos. Normally I take nature shots, candids, things like that."
Maxine huffed. "I don't care if you give us warning for fake smiles and fake poses, young lady. Can you take nice pictures or not?"
"I can."
"Then you're hired. How much will you charge me?"
Grace rubbed her lips together as she thought. "How about five hundred for two hours? Maybe a few informally posed shots? All the files will be high quality for prints, and I'll edit everything I send you."
"That five hundred better include takin' off my wrinkles, young lady. I don't want to look like a haggard old woman."
"You'll look like a queen," Grace promised gravely.
"Well, then you've got yourself a deal."
"Great." Grace smiled happily. "Thank you for thinking of me."
"Don't thank me yet. You haven't met my grandsons," she warned before disconnecting the call.
Grace squealed, flinging herself for me. I wrapped her in my arms and kissed the top of her head.
"See, you might find that photographer job after all." I tilted her chin up with my thumb. "Congratulations, Pretty Girl."
Her eyes darkened, her hands running greedily over my chest.
"Take me to your place to celebrate?" she asked.
"Yes, ma'am."
She ran to throw some clothes in a bag, and I started those multiplication tables again.
Chapter 46
Grace
Tucker, like the closet sadist he was, drove just under the speed limit the entire way to his house. I followed behind him in my car and fought against the irrational urge to plow into the back of his truck to see if I could push this train along a bit more quickly.
At first, I couldn't understand why I didn't just ride with him, but as we drove through town, about a dozen people waved at him. Probably more. And he greeted them with a lazy lift of his arm that was hanging out of the drivers' side window.
Me? Their eyes slid right past, something they would not have done if I was in the passenger seat of his truck.
He said something on our date about the rhythm of a small town, and if it didn't fit you perfectly, Green Valley would never feel like home. I couldn't stop thinking about that with each person that looked through me with a blank expression, not a single flicker of recognition.
I liked the ebb and flow of Green Valley, but whether it liked me was a different matter entirely.
One person, a little old man wearing a green plaid shirt and a John Deere hat, hunched over on a bench in front of the MMA studio, lifted a crunched-up, arthritic hand in my direction, and I gave him a sunny smile. See? He liked me.
Then his hand moved up to his hat so that he could shuffle it on his head, and I slumped dejectedly in my seat.
Tucker flipped on his right turn signal, for my benefit, no doubt, and I followed as he left the downtown area. The houses got a little farther apart, and the trees filled in along the streets. I caught a glimpse of the Smokies as the road curved, and the tree-tipped mountains made me smile.
His truck slowed, then he pulled it into a dirt driveway that ended at a small white house connected to a two-stall garage by a breezeway, something that had gone by the wayside somewhere around the eighties.
It was clean and simple, no frilly landscaping, with shiny black shutters and a red front door. The lawn was short and lush and well-tended, and the backyard was all trees. He waved me into the empty garage stall, and I sighed as I pulled my car in. Maybe next time I'd dress as a ninja and paint my face, sneak in under the cover of darkness.
He was stretching next to his truck when I got out. On the drive over, he'd unbuttoned his dress shirt and yanked off his dark blue tie, and my brief frustration at the necessity of hiding my vehicle fled at the sight of the sliver of skin on his chest.
It was slightly tan and the crisp hair stretching over his skin was the same shade of brown on his head. I wanted to press my nose in it and inhale. Everything about him always smelled so good, clean and masculine, and I could only imagine that that one patch of skin would be the same.
"I like your house," I told him, doing exactly what I imagined, dropping a kiss right in that opening of the unbuttoned shirt.
He slid a hand over my hair and wrapped me in a hug. "The inside is a mess, so enjoy it while you can."
I snorted. "I don't think you could be messy if you tried, Tucker."
"You're probably right about that." His knuckles brushed along the skin on my shoulders.
Burrowing my face into him, I couldn't stop the sigh that escaped my lips. I'd never been around a man that was this unafraid of affection. He sought it out, if anything. I wondered, as he held me so close, if he felt as starved for it as I did. It made me sad for him, because at least I'd been single and missing this kind of closeness with someone.
Tucker hadn't been alone, and I couldn't imagine anything worse than feeling lonely when you were in a relationship.
"Are you going to show me in the inside, or are we going to hug it out in your front yard all night?"
His chest vibrated with laughter, and I loved the way it felt under my skin. He held my hand, our fingers woven together, as we walked through the garage and into the breezeway. He hit a button on the wall and the garage door slowly unfolded with a squeak and the grind of metal wheels, effectively hiding my presence from the world. I didn’t want to be hidden, and as the sight of my car disappeared, I fought against a brief moment of sadness that we didn’t have much of a choice.
The garage door shut and closed to the light of day flipped a different switch entirely. We were alone, really, truly alone for the very first time.
A burst of bright nerves erupted, wings beating furiously against my insides.
Was it like this for everyone? It had to be.
My heart was inextricably tied with his now, and we'd barely done more than kiss, a little dry humping, some over the clothes fondling. How much bigger could my feelings for him get, once I knew was it like
to be with him?
Tucker started telling me things about the house, something about windows and renovations and I could barely hear his voice over the unrelenting buzz of my thoughts. Sex had always been, well, perfectly fine. Mostly underwhelming, nothing that made me think about things like forever love and marriage and babies, but as I kept my hand clutched in Tucker's, I knew I'd probably do something horrible like cry after we were done. I hadn't even seen the man naked yet, and I could already feel the welling of tears in my eyes at the thought of making love to him.
"This is awful," I whispered unthinkingly, and Tucker froze in the middle of the kitchen.
"The cabinets?" he asked. His face was all confusion as he looked from me to the white shaker cabinets lining the small, tidy space.
I laughed. "No, those are great."
And they were. I liked his style. The walls were a little bare, desperately in need of some artwork, but he favored a clean color palette and sturdy lines in his furnishings.
He turned and grabbed my other hand, anchoring me in place so that I had no choice but to face him head-on. "Then what's so awful, Pretty Girl?"
How did he do that? In so many ways, I barely knew this man. The first time I laid eyes on him was less than two weeks earlier, and somehow, he looked straight into me and asked me what I was afraid of in a way that didn't feel threatening or intrusive.
The story of the curse was perched on the tip of my tongue, but I licked my lips and shoved it aside. I'd sound crazy.
I took a deep breath and the words came out in a rush. "I'm nervous about having sex with you because it feels bigger and more important than any sex I've ever had, and I'm afraid I'm going to cry when we do."
For one long, long moment, I was terrified that my honesty was too much.
So much for the girl who tossed her sexual freedom in his face the first day they met, cursing and railing about being able to do whatever she wanted without judgment. If I wanted to freak him out any more, I might as well blurt that I was desperately, and quite inexplicably, in love with him and already imagining what color eyes our children would have.
He stared at me, blinked, blinked again, and then one side of his mouth hooked up in a slow, crooked smile.
"One single glistening tear?" he asked in a rumbling voice.
"Maybe." I punched him in the shoulder, and he laughed. "Asshole."
Tucker gathered me to him again. "How do you know I'm not going to be the one crying?"
I looked up and felt a blush cover my cheeks at the look on his face. Crazy or not, inconsistent or not, this man was looking at me like there was nothing in the world he adored more.
That one look settled everything inside of me that needed to be settled.
"Do you want to show me the bedroom?" I asked, holding his gaze steadily.
He nodded. "Yeah."
Instead of turning us to lead me there, he took a step forward, which forced me backward.
With each step, he made calculated movements to ratchet up the heat.
One. He stripped off his shirt and dropped it on the floor.
At the sight of his bare chest, I whimpered, which pulled a cocky grin across his face.
Two. He tugged at the bottom of my shirt, pulling it from where it was tucked into my shorts. His hands bracketed my waist when it was fluttering to the ground, a place to hold so he could steer me around a table that I couldn't see.
Three. His thumbs pressed against my hip bones underneath the waistband of my shorts, and I sucked in a short breath.
Four. He slipped the button of my shorts out and used the back of his knuckles to brush against the top of my underwear.
I was shaking by the time he took the next step.
Five. Instead of turning into the bedroom, he stopped, pushing me gently so that my back hit the wall.
"I like this," he murmured, drawing a hand down the front of my chest, his thumb and pinky finger brushing the lace of my bra with deliberation.
"Then let's take it off," I suggested, reaching for the closure, ready for fast, rough movements, gripping hands and sucking lips.
He smiled. "Whoa, how about you let me do that?"
I huffed and dropped my hands. But instead of reaching for me, he undid his belt, pulling it from his pants and letting it drop with a noisy clank on his floor. I shivered at the sound, and his grin was wolfish, all white flashing teeth and predatory eyes.
"Feeling restless, are we?"
Over my shoulder, I glanced into the bedroom that was darkening slowly as the sun started disappearing in the sky. The bed was big, and I wanted to feel it against my back, Tucker spread over top of me like a blanket.
"Yes." I hooked a thumb in that direction. "Let's go in there, please."
"Impatient Girl," he said, dipping his head to suck at my neck. I arched into the contact and felt a sudden rush of pleasure at the thought of him marking my neck.
My hands traversed the hot skin over his chest and stomach and arms, memorizing muscles and bones, all the hills and valleys that made up his powerful body. Tucker wasn't a gym rat, there was no perfect stack of squares that made up a six-pack, but what he had was so, so much better in my mind.
It was something innate, something about him that was strong and natural and perfect. His biceps, shoulders, and pecs curved with strength, the flat planes of his stomach begged me to trace them with my tongue, and I had every intention of doing so when he was all laid out in front of me like a gift.
"Go lay on the bed," I told him.
His eyebrows lifted in surprise. "What if I want you to go lay on the bed?"
I whipped off my bra, and he swallowed audibly. "Tucker," I said.
"Huh?" He was staring at my breasts, his hand coming up to cup the weight of one. My knees trembled, but I kept my voice firm.
"Go lay on the bed, then you can touch all you like."
So good at listening, he was, tugging my hand and rushing us into the room as I laughed. Only letting go of me to tug his pants; I did the same, shucking my shorts off and kicking them away from my feet. He turned and pinned me with a look so charged, so heated, that it was hard to stand.
Tucker spread his arms wide. "How would you like me?" he asked.
With two hands, I pushed him backward, climbing over him as he fell with a shocked laugh.
His palms skimmed up my sides, my hips, my back. Mine spread wide across his chest, and we kissed deeply, not deeply enough. My hair fell around our faces, and he pushed it out of the way, fisting it loosely as I rocked over him.
No part of him went untouched as I sat over him, my bare legs bracketing his strong thighs. He groaned when I used my mouth on his stomach and lower, a hiss and a tightening of his hand in my hair when I brought him too close to the edge.
"Not yet," he begged, tugging me up so that he could take my mouth again. "I want to go with you this first time."
He turned us with a quick flip, and I wrapped my arms around his neck while he rolled his hips against mine. I was surrounded entirely, nothing else I could see except Tucker, nothing else that I could feel or taste or smell.
On my back, with my knees tucked up against his sides, it was his turn to use his lips and teeth and tongue on me, first torturing me across the sensitive skin of my breasts as I clutched his head to me with demanding force. He nipped at my ribs under my skin, and kissed the edge of my hipbone, kissing a straight line to the other side before he pried my thighs wide and settled his broad shoulders in between in my legs.
I cried out loudly at the feel of him feasting, my hands gripping the sheets in tight fists as his fingers dug into the soft flesh of my inner thighs.
"Tucker," I warned breathlessly. He pulled back and yanked open a drawer in the nightstand, the telltale crinkle of foil came next.
His eyes were practically black as he levered up over me and braced a hand next to my head. He looked dark and foreboding as a storm cloud, and I wanted him to unleash all that force onto me. I wanted the boom and roll of t
hunder and the sharp crack of lightning, I wanted it all, but only if I could have it with him.
"You are perfect," he whispered, taking my mouth in a deep kiss as he pushed forward, forward, forward. Retreat and thrust, again and again and again, until I braced a hand on the headboard and took everything he had for me and met him with lifts of my hips, clutching hands, and whispered pleas for more.
I had to grit my teeth against the rolling, violent rise inside of my body, because I wasn't ready for it to be over, I wanted to live here, exist in this space with him for the rest of my life.
His forehead braced against mine, he chased after that feeling with the strength of his body, the unrelenting, perfect rhythm until I struggled to hold it at bay. Our breath met in harsh pants and he growled into my shoulder, increasing speed, increasing strength until I was stretched tight over the precipice, my skin splitting at the seams.
"Grace, Grace, Grace," he chanted, and made one harsh, painful snap of his hips.
I flew apart with a hoarse cry, the light bursting out in sharp shards, such an overwhelming, unending roll of pleasure, that I had to bite down on my lip so that I didn't tell him I loved him. He slowed, curling over me as my hands held him to me tightly, even though our skin was coated in sweat.
Slowly, so slowly, I came down from the high, gasping for a full breath. He turned us, and our arms and legs were so tangled together that it shouldn't have been comfortable, but it was.
He pulled back and searched my face, seemingly as shaken as I was, by the way his hand shook when he cupped my cheek.
"No tears," he whispered, wiping this thumb along the top of my cheekbone.
"Just wait," I told him in all seriousness. "We've got all night."
His mouth was smiling when he kissed me, and my heart, it had never been so happy.
Chapter 47
Tucker
Grace slept like she was a heat-seeking missile. If I turned, she plastered herself to my back, one leg sneaking in between mine and her arm over my waist. If I was on my stomach, she was buried in my side. If I faced her, her nose was glued to the middle of my chest, body burrowed under the weight of my arm and her knees tucked up close to my legs.
The Love at First Sight Box Set Page 40