A Time to Fall (Love by the Seasons Book 1)

by Jess Vonn

  “Please touch me. I—” She gasped, her head arching back. “Your fingers.”

  “What about them, Briggs.”

  “I need them,” she said. “On me. In me. Please, Cal. Please make me come.”

  And with that final request, the game was over. He couldn’t deny the woman any longer or he might be the one who burst. He’d never known anything as singularly erotic as Winnie Briggs, nearly naked in the night air, begging him to get her off.

  And a gentleman didn’t keep a begging woman waiting.

  From his position on his knees between her thighs, his thumb ever so gently brushed against her aroused clit.

  She cried out, her voice finally rising above a whisper. He stroked her again, amazed at what the back of his broad thumb could coax from one square inch of this woman’s glorious body.

  The fingers of his other hand slid near her opening, the warm evidence of her desire slick to his touch. One knuckle brushed into her sex, his other thumb still devoted to its work above, and then he gently pressed one finger inside her folds. Up higher, deeper, to where her hot wetness surrounded him.

  She cried out in pleasure and he nearly joined her. Jesus, the hotness of it. The rightness. He slipped in a second finger and pushed deeper, wanting more of her surrounding him. Wanting to get lost in that most erotic embrace. His dick and his mouth protested, not understanding why they weren’t invited to the erotic exploration.

  “Yes, Cal, yes,” she muttered mindlessly, frantically, beneath the work of his hands.

  His fingers fucked her slowly, unhurriedly gliding across the hot syrup of her desire. Her clit pulsed beneath the steady, rhythmic stroke of his thumb. It might have gone on like that for a while. He’d have gladly stayed there, busying himself with the work of satisfying this woman. But he looked up at her, and everything heightened. Still propped up on her elbows, her head fell back, her mouth hung open and her breasts heaved in rhythm with her moans. Wanton for him. Her hips squirmed beneath his touch, wanting more than his hands could offer.

  “Look at me, Briggs,” he ordered. It wasn’t enough to feel her orgasm burst around his fingers. He’d denied himself the pleasure of mouthing her for the very purpose of maintaining an ideal vantage point for her climax. He needed to watch it in her eyes as well.

  She shook her head softly, as if awaking herself from a daze. When those huge brown eyes, frantic with the discomfort of not-quite-met desire, locked into his, and her mouth begged him please once more, his hands intensified their focus, stroking her, rubbing her. Her gaze held his right up until the moment the sensations overtook her and she closed them in a broken cry of pleasure. He tried to process it all at once, tried to burn the dozen elements of Winnie Briggs’s rapture into his memory to preserve indefinitely. How her lips cried his name in gratitude. How the slick cushion of her sex clenched his fingers inside of her. How trembling overtook her body as she struggled to regain her breath.

  Moments later, as her shuddering eased, he pulled back his fingers and put them instinctively to his lips, tasting her desire for him. Foretasting future pleasures.

  Winnie didn’t move for a good long while, and he smiled, cuddling down next to her, proud of the pleasure coma she’d slipped into. Her gaze stayed steady on the stars above and a small smile spread across her lips as she reveled in the aftershocks of climax.

  Slowly her head fell to the side, and her eyes met his. They looked softer now, relaxed, not dark and wild and needy like they’d been just minutes before. She surprised him by throwing her arms around his neck and pulling him in for a tight hug that pressed her bare breasts up against his shirted chest.

  “Thank you,” she whispered near his ear as her hands softly raked through his hair. The sweetness of those words, her earnest gratitude, grasped his heart in a surprisingly powerful way. It was almost as if she had no clue that he’d gotten as much out of it as she had.

  “You’re very welcome. The pleasure was all mine.”

  “Now that is not even remotely true, but addressing your pleasure just happens to be the next item on my to-do list.” Her eyes glinted deliciously and suddenly her mouth was on his, hot and desperate to return that most glorious of favors.

  “Have I ever mentioned how much I adore your to-do lists?” he managed breathlessly before his hands slipped into her hair, grabbing handfuls of curls and pushing her deeper into the kiss. Tasting, exploring. He wanted his hands on her breasts. Her ass. God, he wanted to make her come again already. Wanted to make her body sing until his name was the only word her brain could formulate.

  But before he had a chance to complete even a fraction of what he intended to do with the woman, a sudden rustling in the trees behind them caused her to sit up in shock. She hastily pulled together the sides of her unbuttoned shirt.

  “What was that?” she asked, her face suddenly filled with a mix of worry and modesty.

  “That was a very inconsiderate squirrel, interrupting us like that,” he teased, his hands reaching up and trying to sneak their way back into Winnie’s shirt and onto her fantastic breasts. “You must have woken him up in your throes of pleasure.”

  She punched his arm lightly and ease began to replace her fear-- that is until the sound came a little closer and a little louder, as if two animals were having some sort of territorial squabble in the rustling leaves. Cal wasn’t the least bit concerned with anything other than getting his hands on the woman in front of him, but she gasped again when a particularly aggravated animal yelp sprung from the dark trees behind them.

  He sat up, pulling her into an embrace.

  “You okay?”

  “Umm,” she hedged. He had to smile. The truth was that he didn’t have a lot of experience with city girls. He wasn’t afraid of woodland animals in the night, but Winnie clearly was. At least her fear helped bring his desire slightly into check.

  “We can get out of here,” he said, the back of his fingers gently stroking her cheek.

  She sighed, her eyes scanning over his body hungrily.

  “We’ve got nothing but time, Briggs,” he said, before reluctantly reaching down to either side of Winnie to grasp the two ends of her front-opening bra. He stretched them to her center, and twisted the tiny clasp in place until the contraption covered her bounty. It felt like a crime.

  He kissed the top of one full breast where it crested above the lace, then did the same on the other side before beginning the work of slowly buttoning up Winnie’s blouse. For as much as he didn’t want to tuck her back away behind her clothing, the act of dressing the woman was surprisingly sexy.

  Then again, he was beginning to believe that Winnie could make damn near anything sexy.

  Neither of them said much on their slow walk back down the hill, but Winnie had begun her nervous hair twirl with the hand that wasn’t holding his. What was going through her mind?

  Damn it, this wasn’t how he wanted the night to end, and he didn’t like not knowing how long it might be before they’d get to resume their investigations of one another. But Winnie was startled, and his body wouldn’t allow him to beg for her touch if her mind wasn’t at ease. For better or for worse, he was slowly learning to live with the low hum of need he felt constantly now that Winnie was in his life. Blue balls had become the norm.

  Damn squirrels.

  They passed by a storage shed tucked into the shadows at the base of the hill when Winnie suddenly stopped.

  “You okay?” he asked, turning back and scanning her face. Maybe the rustling in the woods had scared her more than she let on.

  “No,” she said, her voice shaky and her face unreadable.

  “It was just—” he started, but he didn’t get the chance to offer his words of comfort.

  “It’s not okay.”

  “What isn’t?” he asked, starting to get genuinely concerned. Perhaps he’d done something wrong and hadn’t even realized it. Coaxing a climax out of Winnie had been an unspeakable pleasure for him, but maybe the moonlight tryst had g
one one step too far for her. She pulled him to her side, then back farther still, until they stood in the shadow behind the concrete structure.

  “We can’t leave it off there, Cal,” she said, her voice hinting at the desperation he heard in it earlier. Her hands pushed on his chest until his back pressed up against the scratchy concrete of the structure. His dick responded in full at the feel of her hands on him again. At the implications of her words. “It’s not fair.”

  In seconds, her mouth met his. Hungry. Demanding. Her fingers grasped at his chest. His hair. At his hips. They slipped below the back of his shirt until they found the hot skin of his lower back and she scraped her nails along his flesh, coaxing a growl from his throat.

  So disoriented by the sudden change in the trajectory of their evening, the sensations overwhelmed him and he hardly knew what to do with his hands. They fumbled in Winnie’s hair. Reached down and scooped up her ass until she pressed hard against his erection. He could take her right here. Turn her around. Hitch her up on the side of the building and thrust into her until she shattered again.

  Her hands tore him from the fantasy, though, as they squeezed between them and grasped his hard length through his jeans.

  “Jesus,” he groaned at this woman. Her touch. The hungry way she grabbed at him. Making quick work of his button and fly, she pulled down his briefs until the full hardness of his erection strained out into the evening air.

  She gasped at the sight of him before dropping to her knees, and he promptly lost all semblance of control.

  “I couldn’t go home without feeling you,” she panted, her fingers encircling his cock and rubbing the length of him.

  He should say something. Respond. Encourage this divine act. Thank her for being the goddess she was. But he couldn’t form a thought beyond please don’t stop. It was only sheer force of will that had kept him from coming at her very first touch.

  “Cal.” Her voice was soft and her breath hot. “I have to taste you,” she said, kissing the tip of him before her tongue stroked his length. She tasted her way down to his balls, and when they sank into her mouth, profanity was the only sound he could manage.

  Mercifully, her plush lips encircled his cock, tenderly at first, getting a feel for his size and shape. Then faster. With more force. The tight, soft wetness of her mouth foretold of other sensual pleasures her body held for him and he knew he couldn’t avoid his climax for long.

  One of her hands grabbed the base of his cock and the other curled beneath him to cup his balls, making sure not an inch of him went without her glorious attention. She stroked him into the warm depths of her mouth. Even with her mouthful of him, she groaned hungrily. He’d never known a woman to take such pleasure in this act. Winnie’s enthusiasm for satiating him unmoored him. His hands grabbed hastily at her hair as her head worked over him.

  “It’s too good,” he sputtered, wanting this moment to last forever, but knowing, as her grip quickened and tightened, that he was seconds away from coming. He wanted to give her fair warning, not sure where she wanted him to spill himself. But as his climax became more imminent, she doubled down and showed no sign of switching gears. His hips pushed forward to meet her mouth more fully, knowing that he could never be deep enough in this woman. Heightened by the unexpected location and Winnie’s unbridled enthusiasm, Cal’s orgasm shuddered through him, and he pumped into her hot mouth with one final groan of pleasure. He thrust a few more times for good measure, not wanting to disconnect from this woman’s body, but eventually his hips crashed back against the wall behind him as she swallowed, catching her breath. Her hands stayed on him, gently stroking the hardness that still lingered. She tenderly kissed the tip of his shaft, then nuzzled into the patch of hair at the base of his cock.

  She clutched his hips and pulled herself back up to standing, swaying ever so slightly, as if her body was as unsteady as his own from the intensity of what just passed between them. He pulled her tightly into his chest, knowing exactly what he needed to say but lacking the mental capacity to form the words. The only word he could conjure in his mind was good. She was good. It was good. Life was good. She kissed his chest. She kissed the crook of his neck that she loved so much, and simply said, “That’s better.” Her eyes met his once more, mischievous and satisfied.

  “Good night, Cal,” she said, dropping one soft kiss on his lips before making her way out to her car in the lot. He stood there, still hanging half hard out the front of his jeans as his mind desperately tried to catch up with what his body just experienced. At the sheer unexpectedness of Winnie Briggs.

  He’d proposed this arrangement with the intent to teach her about pleasure, but with each passing day, it became apparent that the woman had as much to teach as she had to learn.

  Chapter 18

  As Winnie walked into city hall Tuesday morning, she wondered, briefly, if she’d become transparent. Could everyone see what she’d done the night before on Cosgrove Hill? Did everyone know just how transformed she was courtesy of the sexual favors of one Mr. Cal Spencer?

  When she awoke that morning, she had shot straight up in bed, awash in a variety of emotions inspired by the outdoor tryst. Pride. Pleasure. Embarrassment. But more than anything else? Astonishment.

  What Cal had done to her body… The way he worked over her and in her with those clever fingers. The way he perched above her in the moonlight and watched her intently as she burst into a thousand shards of light. That had been rapturous. Transforming. Divine.

  But what she did to him at the back of that concrete shed?

  Her lips curled just at the memory of it. The Winnie of the past would have never taken what she wanted. Hell, former Winnie would have never wanted a man in that way with even half the enthusiasm. That, combined with the sheer shock on Cal’s face… that she’d rendered a magnificent man into a speechless, desperate, groaning animal. That was a power she’d never known, and now that she had experienced it, she only wanted more of it.

  Yet here she was, reporter Winnie, back on the beat, going on about her professional business as if last night hadn’t been life-altering. She had trouble making eye contact with people on the street, lest her new insatiable wantonness show. How could it not?

  Making her way into the city council chambers felt like déjà vu. The chairs in the audience sat empty, save for Chief Conrad flipping through a notebook near the back. The only difference was that this time, the mayor was in place before the meeting began. He didn’t look any more composed—his sandy-white hair still stuck out in tufts around his head, and his crumpled Polo shirt looked as though it had been picked up off the floor only a few minutes prior, but at least he was here.

  Winnie’s stomach flipped when she considered Carter in a new light. He was no longer just the friendly and sexy-as-hell police chief. Now she also knew him as Cal’s best friend. Did he know anything about what Winnie and Cal were up to? Would he judge her if he did? Maybe she should just sit up near the front today, and avoid that particular situation.

  Just when she was about to do so, Chief Conrad’s mesmerizing blue eyes flickered up to her and a grin unleashed its dazzling brightness. He gave her a small wave, and she knew that she’d go to him.

  “Hey, Chief,” she offered as she plunked herself down on the folding chair next to his.

  “Hey, Winnie. Please, call me Carter.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yeah. As long as I’m not arresting you, Carter suits me just fine.”

  “Okay, I’ll keep that distinction in mind.”

  She grinned, grateful for his teasing. Even if he did know anything about what she and Cal were up to, Winnie suspected he wouldn’t hold it against her. Relief flooded her, given that next to Cal and Evie, Carter was the closest thing Winnie had to a friend in Bloomsburo.

  “So how are you settling into town?” he asked.

  “Oh, pretty well. Each day seems to introduce some new challenge or challenging personality, but it’s all part of the job.”
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  “Yeah, we have our fair share of challenging personalities around here. But most in our town have pretty good hearts.”

  She nodded. His gaze met hers, as if he wanted to ask a question he couldn’t quite allow him to utter.

  “Did you ever make any headway on the pancake sabotage?” she asked, fully aware of how ridiculous the phrase sounded. Before he had a chance to answer, though, the gavel struck and Mayor Simpson called the meeting to order. He still seemed suspiciously rusty at running a city council meeting, but he went through the approval of the last meeting’s minutes (a step he completely skipped over last time, though Winnie doubted that previous minutes were even taken.)

  “Our first order of the day is to discuss the issue of temporary special permits,” Mayor Simpson began. “It’s come to our attention that the city is not managing its costs adequately on these special events, and that we may need to raise this fee.”

  Winnie raised her hand, and the mayor looked at her in annoyance.

  “Yes?”

  “What types of events require these special permits, and what is the current fee?” The mayor looked over to Councilwoman McDonald, who cleared her throat loudly.

  Winnie wasn’t shocked that the mayor didn’t have the answer himself.

  “These permits are used for special one-time, annual or semi-annual events, such as seasonal sales of holiday merchandise, farmers markets, festivals, fairs, carnivals, special sheds or structures needed on construction sites, et cetera.”

  Winnie nodded as she took down notes furiously. So basically, they were talking about the kind of events that were the bread and butter of Betty Jean’s Blooming Ladies.

  “The current application fee is $150. Some events require a deposit as well. The length of the license varies based on the nature of the activity.”

  “Thank you,” Winnie said, rounding out her notes.

  The mayor continued. “These sorts of special events can put extreme pressure on city resources, including law enforcement, facilities and clean up teams,” the mayor explained, somewhat dramatically.