by Shayla Black
What is she thinking? Goddamn it, I wish we’d been able to finish our conversation… Does she realize that if she marries Makaio, she won’t be getting the kind of love she saw exchanged today? Or does she think I could never love her this wholly and she should back away from me?
Fuck, I sound like a pubescent girl, running through what-if scenarios and trying to anticipate what my crush is truly thinking. I have to be patient, wait for some privacy. I have to keep believing that we’re building something good.
The sun sets as everyone pitches in to tear down the folding chairs and put away the sheets. In three minutes, we assemble the portable dance floor Maxon rented. Keeley loves to dance, and as much as it makes him cringe, he’ll do it for her.
Soon, the deejay has his space set up. Earlier, the men set up banquet tables around the dining room table and on the attached lanai. We tied floral-print cloths to the legs to dress up the situation. Now, ladies bring out the food and punch, and when the music starts, we have a party.
Through the afternoon, the celebration gears up. Dancing ensues, along with bouquet tossing, garter throwing—I caught it, thank you—and lots of pictures, laughter, and toasts.
Finally, the deejay announces the last song of the night, mostly because we’re losing the sun and didn’t have any lights to string—not to mention the fact that Maxon is losing patience waiting to be alone with Keeley. It’s an Elvis classic, “Can’t Help Falling in Love.” While Harlow is playing tag with Jamie on the lawn, I grab Britta, despite her protests that she intends to clean up this mess for Keeley and Maxon so they can enjoy their wedding night without stress.
I pull her against me. “I’ve missed you all day, angel. And to answer your question, yes. I can handle not controlling how you make me feel because it’s you. I welcome it. The two of us together are stronger than either of us alone. It took me three years to believe that, but now I know it to my core. How can I help you believe that, too?”
“Griff…you’re asking me to take a leap of faith. It’s not that some part of me doesn’t want to jump with both feet, especially today with the wedding and everything. I just… Let me process that for a little while, okay?”
“Sure.” I don’t love it, but I have to respect it.
I’ve done my best not to touch her in any way that pushes her comfort level. I know I can’t force her to be ready to open her heart, and she can’t handle cheating. But I can’t handle not being with her right now. I want to touch her in any way—every way—she’ll let me that will show her how much I love her.
As we sway to the music, I wrap one arm around her waist. My other hand cradles hers. She puts her head on my shoulder. I absorb the moment. Other than sleeping, it’s the closest we’ve been in weeks. I’m loving the hell out of this. I miss her like mad. I want her so badly I can barely stand it.
“Britta?”
When she lifts her head and blinks up at me, lashes fluttering, our gazes fuse. She doesn’t answer me, just stares, as into the moment as I am.
I kiss her forehead, her cheeks, her temple.
“You’re pushing me.”
“What’s new?” I joke.
“Nothing. And everything.” When I brush my lips over her bared shoulders—first one, then the other—she shivers. A breathy protest follows. “That’s against the rules.”
“Hmm.” I rub my cheek against hers. “Just showing you how good we are together. Besides, we agreed that it’s not cheating if the intent isn’t arousal or penetration. I just want to worship you. You have to admit, this isn’t sexual.”
“No,” she says softly, painfully. “It’s romantic.”
“You didn’t tell me I couldn’t be romantic.” I smile as I turn her around the floor in my arms, then kiss her face again, this time dangerously close to her lips.
She pulls back. “What are you doing to me?”
Her voice is both jagged and pleading, but she doesn’t sound distressed. I’m curious about that. Fascinated, in fact. Something is brewing in her head, in her heart.
“I’m loving you. Is that all right?”
I kiss her jaw. I kiss her neck. I hear her draw in a sharp breath.
“I can’t exactly stop you…”
She can’t. “Would you like me to, angel?
“No.”
Oh, that’s almost victory. My gut tightens. My pulse races. Yeah, you can guess what my cock is doing.
“Then what would you like me to do?” I murmur in her ear.
“I think… Maybe you’re right. We are stronger together.” Her feet stop. Her lips part. She lowers her lashes for a moment, then meets my stare head on again. “You love me?”
Every muscle in my body seizes up. She wants to know for a reason.
“I always have.”
Britta swallows, then lifts her hand over my heart and eases closer. “Then take me home and show me how much.”
Three minutes after Britta softly delivered her bombshell, we’re speeding down the road in my sister’s rental, heading home. Well, to the Stowes’ mansion. Harlow spent last night with Keeley at the house, drinking wine and giggling, so she had her own ride at Keeley and Maxon’s place. Britta joined them for a few hours so they could give my bestie a mellow sort of bachelorette party. Tonight, my sister offered to drive my SUV to the house later and bring Jamie with her. Something about my expression or my urgency to leave the reception must have given my intentions away. Harlow offered to give my son a bath and have a slumber party with him tonight in her room.
I’ll thank her profusely tomorrow.
I clutch the wheel in one hand and clasp Britta’s with the other. Adrenaline roars through my system. And questions are hitting my brain.
The primal part of me wants to forget them until we’ve been as close as two people can be and sated our desire all night. Until we’ve cemented our bond again for good. The logical part of me is aware that probing for answers now could bite me in the ass. But I have to know.
“What changed your mind?”
“A lot of things,” she murmurs. “Mostly time and seeing how different you are. Things you’ve said. How honest you seem now. How willing you’ve been to work through our problems without burying them under sex. But you’re still pushy,” she scolds with a grin.
I send her a wry glance. “I can’t change every part of me, angel. Some things are just too ingrained.”
Her trilling laugh fills the car. “I wouldn’t know what to do with you if you weren’t forever challenging me to step out of my comfort zone. It’s one of those things that both infuriates and excites me. We’re so opposite.”
It’s true. I’m forever fascinated with how considerate and compromising she can be while gently but firmly standing her ground. Not barging and shoving is an art form I simply never mastered. I probably never will.
“And Keeley helped me clarify,” she goes on, confessing. “She gave me this song to listen to last night. Odd that music I’ve never heard could move me so much, but this tune perfectly summed up my situation. It helped me to acknowledge feelings I’ve had but couldn’t put into words. I’ve been playing it over and over since then.”
“Can I hear?”
She nods, then launches the song on her phone and flips the screen in my direction. “Lies” by Trifonic.
It’s sad, haunting, with an air of finality. This woman has been denying how much she wants her man because he left and she’s convinced he’s no good for her. Regardless of all that, she realizes she has to stop lying to herself and embrace her sweetest sin.
Me.
“That’s how you feel?”
“I have for a while. I just…didn’t know how to face it.”
“And now you’re sure about us?”
“Yes.”
She doesn’t even hesitate. Triumph spikes. I press my foot down on the accelerator a little more.
“You’re done with Makaio? You’re not marrying him?”
Britta unbuckles her seat belt and crawls across
the console, lying over my lap and plastering her chest to mine. She cups my cheek. “He doesn’t belong between us anymore. Now shut up and kiss me.”
Yeah, I’m not turning that down.
As we roll to a red light, I dip my head and seize Britta’s mouth, shoving her lips apart and tasting every corner of her sweetness. It’s like coming home but better. Just being near her turns me on, but this… I hold her tight against me with one arm, wishing like hell I didn’t need the other to drive. My tongue sweeps in, meeting hers, tangling until my heart threatens to thump out of my chest.
Someone honks behind me, and I look up to see the light has turned green. I slam on the accelerator, cursing the few minutes between here and our bedroom.
I half expect Britta to slide back into her seat for the rest of the trip, but no. She glides her plush lips up my neck, brushing them across my jaw, against a spot just below my ear that makes me shudder and the blood rush to my cock. When she unbuttons my shirt enough to skate her fingers along my hair-roughened skin, her mouth follows. Her tongue traces a loving path over my chest that makes my blood jet and my need soar. I want her so bad I almost can’t see straight.
“What are you doing to me?” I groan.
“What you do to me with nothing more than a look,” she murmurs softly in my ear.
My whole body shudders. “Oh, fuck… Angel.”
“Hurry.”
If I drive any faster, I’ll be speeding way too recklessly to stay on the road. “Two minutes.”
“Good.” She tugs at my bottom lip with her teeth as she caresses her way past my chest, to my abdomen…then toward the waistband of my pants. Her fingertips are flirting in dangerous places, and I’m trying to hold myself together. I have not waited over three years for this woman to lose my patience now, pull over on the side of the road, and snatch a quickie in the backseat of a compact. At six foot three, I don’t even think I’d fit. I definitely wouldn’t have the room to make love to her the way I want, to spread her out underneath me and leave her no question how deeply I feel for her.
I groan as Britta’s fingers find their way just inside my boxers. I swear she grazes the head of my cock.
“Griff…” Her voice itself is a seduction as she presses her lips down my neck, then nips her way back up to my mouth, delving into me.
I suck in a breath, try to keep my head on straight. Fuck yes. In every way, yes.
With a jerk of the wheel, I careen into the driveway. I lift my hand and stop steering long enough to raise the garage door. I refuse to let go of Britta.
Once I pull the car inside, I jam on the brakes. The vehicle lurches to a stop.
We bounce back into the seat, and I kill the engine. We stare, breaths coming hot and loud in the small space.
“I’m going to spend all night inside you, angel.”
“I was hoping you’d say that.”
Her answer makes my cock even harder. I didn’t think such a thing was possible.
When Britta cups my face again and leans in like she intends to kiss me, I grab her wrist to stave her off. “Not here. I’m on the edge. It’s been almost fifty days since I’ve had an orgasm—for any reason. I haven’t gone that long without since I was sixteen, and I can’t vouch for my self-restraint. Let’s get inside the house.”
She blinks, frowns. “Why?”
Why haven’t I exercised my sex drive? She really has to ask?
I take her face in my hands and will her to understand. “I was waiting for you. I only want you.”
Britta melts against me softly, sweetly. “I’ve been waiting for you, too.”
I want to know how long it’s been for her. Did she really not have sex with Makaio when they went away for the weekend? But I don’t ask. I refuse to have him in bed with us—in any way—tonight or ever again.
I manage to wedge my hand down enough to release my seat belt, then shove the car door open. Britta eases off my lap and makes it out the passenger’s door. We leave everything else in the trunk. It will wait.
When I hold out my hand, she takes it. I shove open the door to the house, and we enter the dark hallway. There’s a soft light on over the top of the stove and another on a timer in the adjoining family room. I contemplate the sofa for a long minute, but Harlow won’t be far behind us. I stifle my urge to be inside Britta right now in favor of having privacy all night.
But everything between us needs to happen faster. My sanity won’t last otherwise.
Without a word, I turn and lift Britta into my arms, clutching her to my chest. She yelps in surprise, then winds her arms around my neck and locks her gaze with mine as I stomp my way up the heavy stairs. “Griff?”
Is my impatience upsetting her?
I frown. “I’ve got you. I’ll take care of you.”
“I know,” she breathes. “I was just going to point out that if you had let me walk, I could have gotten undressed at the same time.”
I love the way her mind works.
I run double time until we’re in the bedroom we’ve been sharing for the last month and kick the door shut. I immediately attack my shirt, unfastening one button after the other and quickly shucking it onto the floor. “You could, but then you’d deprive me of unwrapping the perfect gift. How attached are you to that dress?”
She shakes her head, a slow smile spreading across her face as her eyes eat me up. “Not at all.”
An answering grin curls up my lips. “God, I love you.”
I grab a handful of the garment with my fist and tug her closer, then whirl her around to shove the sleeves down her arms. A moment later, I yank down the zipper while I’m jerking the garment down her hips. I’m hasty. I’m not even trying to be careful. The sounds of ripping fabric fill the air. The primal beast in me rejoices.
Once the little pinkish garment is in a heap on the floor, I glide a palm down Britta’s hip and use it to pull her against me. She must feel my erection prodding her back. She can’t be surprised by the fact I’m aroused as fuck. The only thing that’s keeping her from being completely naked is a pair of lacy, nude-colored panties barely covering her taut ass and a matching bra I can undo with one hand.
“Griff…”
I want her naked. I want that now. I want inside her, too. But I want to make her ache every bit as badly as I do first.
“Yeah, angel,” I murmur in her ear as I wind my hand around her waist, down the flat of her belly, under the waistband of her little panties. I skate my fingers over her bare sex, slick and plump and ready. Touching her again is a beautiful agony. I wouldn’t trade it for a hundred anonymous women.
I was being straight-up honest when I said I only want her.
When I walk my fingers between her folds and settle them over her clit, I have to grit my teeth to bite back a groan. Dragging my lips across her neck, I start rubbing her most sensitive spot slowly enough to ramp her up…but not nearly fast enough to provide relief.
Her entire body stiffens. Her back arches. She tosses her head against my chest and grabs my thighs, fingers digging in.
“Like that?” I croon.
“Yes…”
“Want it? Need it?”
“Yes,” she pants. “God, yes.”
I love hearing the desperation in her voice. She’s always been responsive to me, putty in my bed. But this is sweeter, somehow new all over again. Maybe in the back of my head, where I’m trying not to want to hunt down every guy she’s ever fucked, I’m aware she finally has a point of comparison so she can be sure how good I make her feel and this is what she wants.