by Louise Bay
I shook my head and smiled up at him. “A gentleman at heart.”
“An uncowboy.” A familiar grin flickered at the corners of his mouth, then was gone. “Will your boyfriend mind you wearing another man’s jacket?”
“I don’t have a boyfriend.”
Blake’s chest rose as he inhaled. “Your fiancé, then.”
I pulled his coat around me, wishing it were his arms. “No, Blake.” Why couldn’t I find my words? “I told Phil in the car ride to the airport that we weren’t right for each other. I’ve not seen him since.”
Blake looked at me and I could see his mind whirring. Was that what he’d wanted to hear? “I shouldn’t have got into Phil’s car, but he deserved an explanation.” Blake nodded slowly, his eyes flickering from my mouth to my eyes. “I knew in my heart he wasn’t right for me. I’d always known it. The problem was what I felt for you was so different, unfamiliar; I didn’t realize what it was. My heart was telling me you were special but I didn’t listen.”
“Mackenzie—”
I put my hand up to silence him. The alcohol seemed to have left my body and my brain was clear and determined.
“Please let me finish. I was hoping for more between us, but I didn’t want to slip into old patterns and I didn’t want to tarnish something that had been so perfect. Being with you showed me how good it could be. I thought if I had that memory, kept it preserved, it would give me hope. But that was stupid. No memory could ever be enough. It would only remind me of what I didn’t have. I wish I’d said yes to dinner. I wish I’d trusted my heart. Trusted you.” I took a breath.
“And now I know I don’t deserve you to say yes, but I wondered if you wanted to go out sometime.”
There, I’d said everything I needed to. All my energy had gone into that rambled speech and I was exhausted and relieved and thankful to still have my heart in my chest. I stared up at him, waiting for him to say something.
“I should have fought for you,” he said quietly.
Fought for me? I gazed up at him.
“I wasn’t sure what you wanted. I should have made my feelings clear when we still had time.” He reached out for me and this time he didn’t stop himself as he cupped my cheek and I leaned into his hand. “I was an idiot. And angry at you for not being strong enough to tell Phil what you wanted, but now I realize I never asked for what I wanted, either.”
“What you wanted?” I looked at him.
“Yes.” He nodded vigorously. “Oh God.” His face lit up. “You thought you were the only one who had to ask for what you needed. But don’t you see? I’m just as guilty.”
His gaze bore into me. “I want you. And I never told you. I love you and I never said anything.”
He loved me? He wanted me? Could this be happening?
I let the words wash through my body. I’d heard them before but never from someone I loved back. “You want me?”
He stroked his thumb over my cheekbone. “Since the moment I saw your ass bent over that jukebox in Jimmy’s, but more than that, I love you.” His hand left my face. “I just had to say it.” He took a step back and stared at his feet.
“The being-in-love thing takes some getting used to, doesn’t it?” I asked and he met my eyes. “I love you, too. I—” There was no time to finish my sentence, to think about what was next because his fingers were in my hair and his mouth was on my lips and I was right where I needed to be.
His tongue found mine, pressing and circling, joining us. Before Oklahoma, kissing had always just been . . . kissing. With Blake it was different, intimate, as if we were swapping secrets. I swept my hands up his arms, ensuring nothing had changed since I’d last pressed my skin against his.
I slid my palms against his chest. His heart was racing, just as mine was. I took his hand and placed it over my chest.
“I don’t know if it’s nerves or happiness.” My voice was breathy.
“What do you have to be nervous about?” He trailed kisses down my neck.
“You. What you’re thinking. Whether you’re going to break my heart. I’m not sure I’d survive it.”
“I’m thinking about you—I only ever think about you. It’s relentless. You’ve taken me over. I constantly wonder where you are, what you’re doing, who you’re talking to, who you’re touching.” His hand smoothed down my body and between my breasts, lighting my skin on fire underneath my clothes. “Who’s touching you.”
No one could ever touch me like he could.
He tucked my hair behind my ear and kissed up my jaw. “I love you. I love you. I love you,” he whispered.
This was what I’d been waiting for—the part that came after the talking.
The part when he wanted me as much as I wanted him.
The part where we were in love.
“Let’s go inside,” I said. It was silly to be out in the cold when we were standing in front of my apartment.
“Do you want a coffee? Or water?” I asked as I unlocked the door, Blake’s arms wrapped around my waist.
“No, just you. You look completely breathtaking in the Boston moonlight,” he said, leaning toward me, pulling me tighter before bending and kissing me below the ear. Any thoughts I’d had about whether it would be the same between us outside of Christie disappeared. It was as if we’d known each other for years and been lovers forever. “You smell like lilac still. I was hoping that wasn’t an Oklahoma thing.”
“You’re still hot as hell. I was hoping that wasn’t an Oklahoma thing.”
He smiled at me, holding my gaze as he put one hand to my lower back, pulling me toward him so our bodies were pressed together, his other hand rounding my ass. He dropped a small kiss on the corner of my lips. It was a good thing Blake had such a tight hold of me because the feel of him made my knees week and I drooped in his arms. I slid my hands down his torso and up his broad, hard back and he growled, his lips vibrating with the sound.
Every muscle, tendon, bone in my body melted. It was like coming home. It felt right, as if this was how it was meant to be.
He pulled away slightly and rested his forehead against mine. “I don’t want to push anything. Are we rushing?”
I shrugged. He took that exact thought from my brain. How could I have ever thought it might be awkward between us?
“I’m going to let go. Can you stand on your own?” Some men might have sounded arrogant, asking that question, but Blake came off concerned. He understood the effect he had on me. I was unable to hide it.
I nodded again and he chuckled. It was as if I didn’t need to form words. He knew what I was. I’d never felt so cherished.
Gently, he released me and I allowed my arms to drop from around his waist. He groaned as I stepped away. “This is what I mean. I always want more. How is that possible?”
“It’s the same for me, too,” I replied.
He nodded. “God, I’m an idiot. I’ve wasted so much time. I should have fought for you. I’m sorry. And—”
I pushed my fingers against his lips to stop another apology. “I should have said yes to dinner. It’s in the past. Kiss me. I don’t want to wait any longer.”
His smile spread under my hand as he bent toward me.
I fumbled at his fly as he pulled at my top. We were all legs and arms, desperate to be stripped down to our skin, to be naked and pressed against each other.
We moved toward the bedroom, undressing each other on the way, naked as we crashed through the door. His hands slipped down my back, and I shivered as he pressed me against him in exactly the way I knew he would and was desperate to feel.
It felt so easy, so right. Like we fit in every way.
“I can’t stop touching you,” he breathed into my ear as he ran his hands over my breasts, his fingers flicking my nipples and sending sharp spikes of pleasure coursing through my body. I leaned back onto the wall.
“I don’t want you to.” I couldn’t imagine a time when I wouldn’t want—no, need—to be physically connected to him.
I reached between us, skirting my palm down his hardened cock.
He groaned and slammed his fist on the stucco behind me. “Fuck. I’ve waited so long.”
I smiled. “It hasn’t been that long.”
His fingers traced my jaw and he looked into my eyes so intently it made me shudder. “It’s been forever. Don’t you see? I’ve been waiting my whole life for you.”
I took a deep, jagged breath. I knew what he meant because I felt the same. It was as if everything before had been preparation for him. All my previous relationships had been just a warm-up to the real thing.
“You get that, right?” he asked.
I nodded. “I do.”
He reached under my ass and brought my thighs up around his waist, and I rested my hands on his shoulders. He walked to the bed and laid us down, running his dick along my sex, teasing me, teasing himself.
“Fuck, condom. My wallet is—give me a minute and I’ll—”
“I’m on the pill. And I’ve never . . .” I didn’t want there to be anything separating us.
He stared into my eyes. “I’ve never. Not with anyone. It’s a rule.”
My stomach churned with disappointment, but in the next moment his tip nudged my entrance.
“Blake, you just said . . .”
“Not with anyone because I wanted to wait for the woman I was going to spend the rest of my life with.” He plunged into me, pushing the breath out of me, his eyes not leaving mine.
I was overwhelmed by his words, his body, the feeling of security that he enveloped me in. But I wasn’t surprised by what he’d said, because I felt it too. Somehow I knew we wouldn’t, couldn’t be separated again. Nothing could come between us.
He dropped a kiss on my shoulder. “I love you.”
And I knew he did—felt it in my every molecule.
He started to move, surrounding me, filling my body and soul.
“I love you,” I whispered back.
He pushed into me, deeper this time, making me gasp.
“I want to be closer,” he said.
I understood. It was a physical need to become one person, to be all of him and all of me together. I pressed my fingertips into his shoulders, savoring the hardness of his muscles. His movements were small and tight and intense, our mouths open and on each other moving just every now and then.
He pushed into me again and a dam of pleasure burst and crashed over my entire body. “Blake.” My legs shook and my sex started to pulse.
“I love when you call out like that.”
He rammed into me again and I could do nothing but cry out for him.
“I’m here, Red. I’m not going anywhere. Never again.”
His pace increased. It was all too much—his breath on my neck, his hands on my hips, his teeth on my skin, his dick filling me up. “I love you,” I cried out as I spiraled into my climax.
I felt him explode just as I started to fall and his muscles tightened under my hands. “I love you.” His words, like his movements, were urgent and sharp, as if he had to say it, as if his heart hadn’t given him any choice.
I smiled at him and he shook his head as he smiled and kissed me on the forehead. “You’re incredible,” he said.
“You’re incredible,” I replied.
“We’re together now.” It wasn’t a question. Just a statement of fact.
We crawled up onto the pillows when we’d got our breath, Blake rolling to his side so we were facing each other. “This reminds me of Oklahoma, lying here like this. Except we don’t have to worry about getting caught or being quiet.”
We lay naked opposite each other, my fingers tracing the hard outline of his muscles, him smoothing his hands over my sides as we talked about nothing and everything.
My fingers began to dip lower as my desire for him kicked in and his hands found my sex. I pushed my hips towards him, aching for his touch there.
“You’re wet again.”
I nodded. “You’re hard again.”
“You see, perfect for each other.” He grinned and hitched my leg over his hip, opening me for him.
I smiled as he rubbed his wet fingers over my nipples, stretching and pulling before bending to lick and suck.
“You taste so good.”
I pulled at his wrist and sucked on his index finger.
He drew in a breath. “Jesus, you’re everything. Sweet and luscious, yet so sexy with a little dirty in there too.”
“You make me sound like a cocktail.” I slid his hand back down between us, onto my clit.
“I want to get drunk on you.” He pushed inside me, his eyes never leaving mine as he started to move, slowly, as if he were letting us both absorb every single sensation—the heat, the slide, the slickness. He gripped my shoulders, holding me still, pressing me down onto him, concentrating every movement to elicit maximum pleasure.
But it was his eyes that pushed me over the edge. In them I saw nothing but love and forever.
Blake may not have been part of the plan that I’d had for myself at seven years old, but he was better than anything I could have ever imagined.
Eighteen
Blake
Having Mackenzie naked, in a bed with sheets and pillows, was something I was planning to get used to. She shifted and I wrapped my arms around her, pulling her closer, her back to my front.
“Again?” she asked, as I pushed my stirring erection against her ass.
“I can’t help it. You’re naked and beautiful. I have no control. Anyway, we have to make up for lost time.” We’d slept only a few minutes here and there since she’d found me on her stoop last night. It seemed just seconds had passed, but the faint buzz of traffic from outside Mackenzie’s window indicated that I was usually at the lab by now.
She pushed up onto her arms, her glossy, dark-red curls tumbling down her smooth, creamy back and looked back at me. I smoothed my fingers up her spine and she shuddered.
“Hold that thought. I have to pee.” She pulled on my shirt and escaped to the bathroom.
Part of me resented the seconds she was gone—time I wanted, time I should be getting with her. I waited for her to appear. She seemed to have been gone ages. “Come back,” I called.
She opened the bathroom door and walked toward the bed, looking at me as if I were nuts. “I had to pee.”
“I know, but I want to touch you.”
“And brush my teeth.”
“Teeth? God damn.” I leapt out of bed and rushed past her as she began to giggle. “Can I use your toothbrush?” I called into the bedroom.
“Sure, but are you peeing with the door open?” she asked. “We don’t know each other well enough to pee with the door open.”
“I disagree.” Last night had been perfect. Unexpected, but exactly what was meant to be. And the sex had been better than ever.
As I walked back into her bedroom, she’d taken off my shirt and was sitting up, just the sheet around her, her smooth skin flawless, her eyes wide and bright, despite the lack of sleep. “You are so beautiful, Red.” She held her hands out, beckoning me toward her as she moved so her feet were hanging over the edge of the bed
She reached for my cock in a deliberate, hungry way, and it was so unexpected, it winded me. She was asking for what she wanted. Her free hand encouraged me to step forward between her open thighs. I didn’t know whether or not to watch her pussy, her hands around my dick or her mouth.
The decision was made for me as she took almost the whole of my half-erect dick in her mouth. I couldn’t help but groan as I watched the head of my cock disappear between her lips. She spread her palms against the cheeks of my butt, pulling me toward her. Jesus. As I hardened, she pulled back, her hand replacing her mouth as she gripped firmly at the base. She circled the crown with her tongue, once, twice, and then suckled while holding me firm with her other hand.
I dragged my fingers through her hair, sweeping it away from her face. I wanted to see every tiny facial expression she made. Her
hands began to twist in opposite directions as her lips stayed wrapped around my tip. Had I died at some point? Was this what heaven was like?
“Fuck, Red, your mouth. Jesus.”
She grinned and circled my crown again before pushing down and taking me into the back of her throat, so deep I wondered if I’d ever hit the back. Incoherent sounds of pleasure ripped from my chest as her moan vibrated around my hardness. She pulled back, with just a hint of teeth, the way I’d always wanted to ask for from a girlfriend but never had.
She was magnificent.
I watched, mesmerized, as my cock disappeared into her mouth again. Her fingers pressed into my ass as she pulled me toward her, as if she wanted to go deeper, faster—as though she wanted more.
It was the same for me. I wanted to touch her, to taste her, to fuck her. All. The. Time.
“Let me lie down, Red,” I growled. I had to feel how wet she was.
She looked up and I got onto the bed, tossing the pillows onto the floor, so I could lie flat. “Sit on me. I want to taste you, right now.”
She looked confused and wasn’t moving quickly enough, so I grabbed her hips, lifting her leg so she was straddling me, facing away. She caught on and positioned herself over me. I smelled her before I tasted her—sex and Red. It was sweet and perfect, and I pulled her lower and dragged my tongue along her slit. She cried out, jerking away as I hit her clit, but I held her hips firmly and her cries turned to the moans that I recognized.
I’d never had a girl sit on me before. But I’d never wanted to be surrounded and consumed by a woman before, either. I wanted everything Mackenzie would give me.
Her fingers pulled at my cock, tacky and sticky, and then her mouth was on me, her lips surrounding my tip again, sucking and circling. The blood sped to my dick. I was so hard I thought I might burst. The smell of her, the taste of her, the feel of her soft skin under my fingertips, and then the wicked things she was doing to my cock—it was all almost too much.
She began to rock her hips. At first I tried to resist her but I realized she was taking me deep each time she moved away from me. Who was I to deny her? She thrust onto my cock, then against my tongue in a perfect rhythm of pleasure. Her moans against my cock were sending vibrations straight to my balls and up my spine. I could feel my orgasm threatening to take over. But I wanted to stay like this, just shy of my climax, for as long as I could.