by Tessa Bailey
He hooked his hands over the stretchy waistband of my skirt, dragging it over my hips slowly. He deftly caught the edges of my panties, bringing them down over my legs where they fell with my skirt in a rumple at my ankles.
I looked down, and a little giggle escaped. I was naked, save for a pair of blue tennis shoes and socks to match. When I looked up, I found Lucas smiling slightly. At the sight of his smile, my belly spun in flips.
Chapter Nineteen
Valentina
Lucas crouched at my feet, bending on one knee. As I looked down at his dark, mussed hair, he deftly untied my shoes. I stepped out of each one and kicked them loose to the side along with my skirt and panties. I didn’t know if he forgot about my socks or just didn’t care, but he straightened swiftly. He stopped and stared at me for a moment, the heat of his gaze making my entire skin flush. I was so wet, the insides of my thighs were damp.
I wanted to see him.
To touch him.
To feel him.
Stepping closer, I curled my hand around the hem of his shirt and drew it up. He reached behind his neck and yanked his shirt off, slinging it to the floor behind him.
I sighed in delight, dipping my head and dropping a kiss in the center of his chest. I wanted to eat him up, but he didn’t give me a chance. Once again, he took control of the situation.
He lifted me with ease, sliding my hips onto the bed and smoothly pushing my knees apart to stand between them. Then, his lips were on mine again. He tugged my hips to the edge of the mattress and trailed his fingers through my drenched folds.
Meanwhile, his lips made their way from my mouth to my earlobe, sending a hot shiver through me, and down along my shoulder to capture one of my nipples in the warm suction of his mouth. As he teased my nipples, he sank one finger and then another into my channel.
I was breathless, awash in sensation with my hips rocking into his touch and my fingers tangling in his hair. I fell back on one palm, arching into him as his lips mapped their way across my abdomen. I felt the tickle of his beard on the inside of my thighs, a hot kiss on the hypersensitive skin there, and then his tongue licking through my folds.
I was nearly incoherent, gasping, occasionally murmuring his name, and pleading. He didn’t draw it out too long tonight. He fucked me deeply with his fingers, his tongue swirling around my clit before he gave it a gentle suck. Pleasure struck me, a sharp, hot, piercing brand right there at my core before it scattered through me.
When he rose, I whimpered because I didn’t want this to stop. Ever.
The weight of dragging my eyes open took an effort. My belly clenched tight, need boiling inside again at the look on his face. Dark and intent, he seared me with his gaze, and my mouth went dry. The lamp in the corner cast a soft glow on his bronzed skin. His fingers were damp from the juices of my arousal. I could feel them where they rested on my hip.
“So fucking hot,” he murmured.
I tore at the buttons on his jeans. His cock sprang free, a pearly white bead dripping from the tip. I wanted to taste it, so I did. Leaning forward, I caught it with my tongue. I glanced up through my eyelashes, expecting him to have something to say. I might not be an expert, far from it, but I already knew he liked to control the pace.
His eyes were on me, the rapid rise and fall of his chest, giving me a little thrill of power. I could tell he was controlled, his fingers tensing slightly where they rested on me.
Shifting closer, I swirled my tongue around the tip, a sense of satisfaction rolling through me when his breath hissed through his teeth. Then he took control. Again.
“Not now. Your sexy mouth is going to make me forget my promise.” The intent contained in his words sent another wash of heat through me.
He stepped back, and I watched as he reached in his rear pocket, flicking out his wallet and a condom. Everything happened quickly as anticipation coiled so tightly inside, and I thought I might burst into flames.
After kicking his jeans off, he rolled on the condom in no time. The mattress dipped with his weight as he stretched out beside me, lifting me farther up on the bed until the pillows were cool against my shoulders. Although little aftershocks from my climax were still rippling through me, anticipation and need were already building inside again like a tide rolling in and out.
As he came against me, his skin was hot and slightly damp. His features were cast in shadow as he brushed my hair away from my face. I was restless, rolling against him and stringing kisses everywhere my mouth could land.
With practiced ease, he took the reins out of my hands by pressing my knees apart. With his lips on mine, I was tumbling right back into the swirl of sensation.
He stilled, and I opened my eyes. I was about to protest, but he beat me to it. “Now would be the time for you to let me know if you want to stop.”
I shook my head sharply. “No,” I said forcefully.
His eyes searched my face, so I clarified my answer for good measure. “Don’t stop.”
His mouth kicked up at a corner, and he closed his eyes briefly before dipping his head and dropping hot kisses just behind my ear. His weight came fully over me, his hips settling into the cradle of mine. My body acted on instinct, my knees shifting open wider, inviting him in. I ached to the point of desperation. I needed him to fill me.
I felt his cock slide against my folds. He was long and hard—velvet steel. My hips rocked into him, and I let out a little gasp when he slid over my clit, still so sensitive from my climax.
“Tell me if I go too fast,” he said, lifting his head briefly from where he had been teasing one of my nipples.
I was so overtaken with sensation that I couldn’t even track where his touch was. It felt as if he surrounded me completely in a shimmering web of desire and pleasure.
I nodded my head jerkily, my eyes falling closed on a whimper when he rocked his hips into me again. He barely shifted between my knees, adjusting the angle of his hips. I felt the thick crown of him press into me as he moved at a controlled pace. He sank into me slowly, inch by inch. At first, the sensation was one of pressure. And then, there was a subtle burn. My body went tight, and Lucas froze. I felt him looking at me, but I couldn’t even open my eyes.
“Too much?” he asked.
I didn’t want to wait and rocked into him. There was a sharp, stinging pain as he was suddenly inside me, filling me completely.
I opened my eyes to find his concerned gaze staring back at me. “Valentina, are you …?”
His question trailed to nothing when I shook my head. “I’m fine,” I insisted.
After several deep breaths, I felt myself relaxing around him. It did hurt, but I was also completely fine. That sensation of fullness was profound. Even through the pain, it was what my body wanted. It slaked the pressure multiplying and intensifying in my core. He held still.
The soft sound of our breaths soothed me. I could feel his heart pounding, hard and fast, against mine. After another moment, my hips shifted restlessly. Every nerve ending felt as if it were on fire. Arching up, I pressed kisses along his collarbone. He leaned down briefly and caught my lips in a kiss, his tongue slicking against mine before he drew back, his head falling into the dip of my shoulder.
I loved the feel of him filling me, the stretch and burn of it, and his weight over me. I felt encompassed by him—his strength and his raw masculinity banging up against his quiet tenderness.
Chapter Twenty
Lucas
Sheathed inside Valentina’s slick, tight, hot core, it was all I could do to go slow. She felt so damn good. Her hips shifted restlessly under me. She’d torn the doors off my heart. Every step of the way, she took the edge, pushing a little farther, again and again.
“Valentina,” I choked out, “hold still.”
“I can’t,” she said, the low moan coming from the back of her throat nearly undoing me.
I breathed in the scent of her, along the side of her neck, savoring the feel of her skin under my lips.
> My cock was so hard it physically hurt. The next time she arched into me, I drew back slowly, expecting her to tense up again. She did slightly, but she flexed into me. The slide back inside her was delicious.
“You feel so fucking good,” I murmured, my voice slurred. If it was possible to be intoxicated on desire, I was.
I was supposed to be the one with experience. Hell, I knew I was jaded. I was cynical.
Yet here I was, brought to my knees in every way by a virgin. The depth of her response to me, her artlessness, slayed me. I’d had enough experience to know I was ruined.
With her red curls framing her face, her soft skin sliding against mine, and both of us sticky from the heat, I was drowning. She had freckles everywhere, and I wanted to kiss every single one. And the sounds she made? Sweet Jesus. When I heard the little catch in her throat, it made my heart speed up every time.
I clung to my control because I was going to make sure she found her release before I did. It might kill me first, but I was determined.
I kept the pace slow and the roll of my hips into hers subtle. The pull and glide of her core nudged me closer and closer to the edge of my control.
I opened my eyes. I had to see her fly apart. I propped myself up on my elbow, adjusting my angle as I reached between us to tease my fingers right at the point of our joining. Her clit was swollen and wet. Her eyes opened wide, and she cried out, her channel clenching hard on my cock.
My own release had been building, so tight inside. I finally let go, drawing out of her once more and doing my damnedest to control my surge inside her. Even then, I knew it was rough. Electricity sizzled at the base of my spine as my balls tightened. Everything spun loose and harsh pleasure thundered through my body.
I shifted my weight to the side, rolling so that Valentina was resting on me. I was fucking laid flat. By her. I felt wrecked and washed ashore as I tried to catch my breath and make sense of what just happened.
I was still inside her and could feel occasional ripples from the aftershocks of her climax. I didn’t realize it, but I was idly sifting my fingers through her hair, the silky locks sliding in loops.
After a few moments, I felt her lift her head. Opening my eyes, I found her wide gaze waiting for me. Her cheeks were still flushed, and her lips swollen from our kisses.
That was all it took. Just one look and I wanted her.
Again.
I wasn’t accustomed to feeling like this. I’d wager I never had. This was different. It stirred deep waters, sliding into the dark corners of my heart that I thought would stay permanently cast in shadow.
At first, Valentina’s gaze was contemplative, but a little glint flashed in her eyes. I felt her smile coming before I saw it.
“That was perfect,” she said.
I’d admit, I felt damn good. I felt my lips twitching. Instead of fighting it, I gave in with a chuckle, untangling my hand from the ends of her hair and tucking several curls behind her ear.
She startled me by pressing on her hands and rising up. Sweet hell. Valentina sitting astride me just might kill me. Her rosy pink nipples and those freckles—oh my God, those freckles. I loved every single one.
“Easy,” I murmured when she shifted, and I saw the slightest bit of a hint of pain pass across her features.
Valentina twisted her lips and cocked her head to the side. “You’re bossy.”
I laughed. I couldn’t remember the last time I laughed with a woman like that. Maybe not ever.
Chapter Twenty-One
Lucas
Rain struck my cheeks, coming down fast and hard. Thunder rumbled in the distance, and the sky lit up with a bolt of lightning, bright enough to illuminate the mountain ridge nearby.
“You got that?” I called over to Dawson.
“Got it,” he replied, his words barely audible through the downpour.
The storm had rolled in late this afternoon. Slashing winds brought a tree down across the highway and into the path of a car. Dawson and I were both on duty for the crew this weekend. We’d driven out to the accident scene together to rendezvous with the EMT team and the police.
By some miracle, the three passengers in the car didn’t appear injured; however, they were definitely trapped. Our chief had called ahead to get the power cut here because on its way down, the tree had knocked out two power lines.
I was frankly surprised the power hadn’t gone out on its own. From the looks of the sky earlier, I’d known this storm was going to be bad. It wasn’t even dark yet, but it might as well have been.
Dawson and I were tasked with getting this tree off the vehicle and out of the way. We were using a series of ropes with an assist from a man who lived nearby and had stopped with his chainsaw. Dawson deftly tied the rope I had tossed over around one of the massive limbs before he stepped back and gave it a good yank.
We worked in the heavy rain with thunder and lightning rumbling around us for a solid hour. When all was said and done, the parents and their young son were more scared than anything else. The tree had fallen across the front of the car, cracking the side of the windshield and crushing part of the roof, but otherwise, it missed them entirely.
Dawson and I drove back to Stolen Hearts Lodge a while later, drenched and tired. He took off to his cabin because he stayed here full-time, unlike me. He didn’t waste much time before he gave me a wave and jogged into the trees.
I stood in the rain with my bag over my shoulder for a moment, undecided. I was technically staying in a small room in the offices above the vet clinic. It was perfectly comfortable. Jackson had it set up for when he needed to monitor animals after surgery. Comfort aside, I didn’t want to go there.
I wanted to go straight to Valentina, but I didn’t know if she would be in her cabin yet, and I didn’t know if that was pushing things too far, too fast. Before I consciously made my decision, my feet made it for me, turning in the rain and striding toward Valentina’s cabin. With darkness falling, I didn’t expect anyone to notice me out here. Conveniently, for my sake, Dawson’s cabin was in a different direction.
A few minutes later, I lifted my head, looking through the blur of the rain to see the light on the porch of her cabin beckoning me. I couldn’t tell just yet if she was here. I knew from last night she left a light on inside.
Jogging the remaining distance, I stepped onto the porch and gave my head a shake. After a quick knock and no answer, I let out a sigh, brushing away a drop of rain rolling down my cheek.
The last time I felt comfortable just walking into some woman’s place when she wasn’t there was back when I was dating Melissa in college. Even though I’d gone on to marry Melissa and we had Rylie, I could safely say I hadn’t felt the kind of intensity for her that Valentina elicited.
Simply contemplating that reality almost sent me running, yet the force of my draw to Valentina was too damn powerful. I couldn’t seem to make my feet move and do the practical thing, the not-fucking-crazy thing and walk back to the vet clinic to stay there.
Just as I was considering what to do, I heard my name. With the sound of rain drumming on the roof above, I could hardly hear. Looking through the trees, I saw Valentina approaching through the rain. It was the hottest part of summer, yet the rain was still cool. Valentina didn’t even have a jacket on.
Her T-shirt was plastered to her, and her curls were flat. It wasn’t too far of a walk from the lodge to here, but it was a true downpour. Lightning cracked, lighting up the sky and illuminating her.
An unfamiliar sense of protectiveness hit me like a bolt, crackling like lightning. Before I knew it, I dropped my bag and stepped off the porch, running to meet her. I didn’t like that she was soaked, not with the lightning and the thunder vibrating around us in this hell of a storm.
Just as the sky lit up again, I reached her. And she smiled. My heart felt as if a ray of sun was shining on it.
“What are you doing?” I asked as I basically dragged her back with me onto the porch.
Out
of the rain, Valentina brushed her hand across her forehead and looked up at me through her eyelashes. “Walking home,” she said, stating the quite obvious fact. “What are you doing?”
“Coming to see you.”
My eyes, because they were greedy, dipped down to see her nipples pressing against her wet T-shirt, and I suddenly wondered who else had seen her.
Dude, what the hell?
That was my skeptical mind, my cynical mind. Because it made absolutely no fucking sense for me to be wondering who had seen Valentina like this. Logically, she left the lodge perfectly dry and got wet on her walk home. Given the rain, no one was hanging around to ogle anyone. Except perhaps me.
It was just that I didn’t want anybody else to be aware of how perfect her breasts were, particularly when outlined by drenched cotton.
“Come on,” she murmured, slipping her hand through my elbow and giving me a little tug. Snagging my bag, I let her lead me into her cabin.
If she had any thoughts about me unexpectedly showing up, she didn’t share them. We stepped inside, and I looked over at her. She was shivering. The cool air conditioning inside was chilly.
Rubbing her hands up and down her arms, she strode toward the bathroom, peeling her clothes off on the way. Dropping my bag by the bed, I wasn’t even thinking when I found myself following her. I paused long enough to kick off my boots and hang my raincoat by the door. Wordlessly, I stepped into the bathroom to find her naked and leaning into the shower to turn it on.
I was hard instantly. I wanted her.
So. Damn. Fiercely.
She was unlike any woman I’d ever known. Her refreshing openness, her comfort with herself just how she was.
“You need a shower too,” she observed, stepping close to me.
I dipped my head because there was a freckle I wanted to kiss on her shoulder. My lips traveled, finding that sweet spot in the little dip above her collarbone.