Beard Necessities: Winston Brothers Book #7

by Penny Reid

  And then she pulled away, turned away, and marched up the last few steps. “Go get the chair and meet me in your room. See you in a minute!”

  Chapter Eighteen

  *Billy*

  “Those who restrain desire do so because theirs is weak enough to be restrained.”

  William Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell

  This was torture.

  Her hand on my shoulder, under my jaw, positioning my chin like she wanted; her knee braced on the chair between my legs; the light touch of her fingers, her body incidentally brushing against mine.

  Torture.

  And she’d changed. I’d shown up with the folding chair, using the five minutes of our separation to mentally fortify for the beard trim, just to discover she’d changed into some sort of white cotton nightgown that ended mid-thigh. Which was why, when she’d offered a warm towel to cover my eyes, I’d accepted, figuring I’d be able to distract myself, keep my mind otherwise engaged if I couldn’t see her.

  My mind was not cooperating.

  “For the record, I like your face. A lot,” she said, a smile in her voice.

  Do you? Want to sit on it? I clamped my jaw shut at the errant thought, just one of a plethora of ungentlemanly suggestions that had occurred to me in the last ten minutes.

  She’d already trimmed the excess length, shaped it with the scissors, and brushed away the clippings. Now she was finishing up with gentle fingers.

  “Shoot,” she muttered, her hand on my shoulder tensing before pulling away. “Just a second. Are you comfortable?”

  No.

  “Mmm.”

  “Okay. Don’t move.”

  I heard the rustle of fabric, maybe a towel, and then she was back, the heat of her body a gravitational anomaly. I had to dig my fingers into my thighs to keep from reaching for her and maybe encouraging her to sit on my lap and put those gentle fingers to better use.

  Torture.

  Her hand cupping my jaw; the press of her knee between my thighs; her gentle breath falling over my face—did she have any idea? Did she understand how every feather touch and soft sigh doubled the ache in my body, the excruciating need to put my hands on her?

  I’d been pushed over that edge between pleasure and pain, ecstasy and agony. I couldn’t think, every inhale like fire. I was suffocating and I’d officially reached my limit.

  But just as I’d lifted my hands to set her away, she said, “There. All done.”

  The towel at my eyes was tugged to the side, used to dab at my face, as my hands—now without purpose—sought her hips and I comprehended how truly thin the fabric of her nightgown was. That too was torture, but not as severe since my mind quite suddenly determined pushing her away had ceased to be an option.

  I opened my eyes. She hovered above me, her attention following the progress of the warm towel at my jaw.

  “Do you want a mirror?” she asked, and my stare dropped to her mouth.

  She was so damn sexy, a goddess of both carnality and sweetness. Now that I’d tasted her, I also knew all her colors. The shade of her lips was the exact same shade as her clit, a fact I would never cease to forget every time we kissed.

  “No,” I said, my hands moving down her hips to the hem of her nightgown. Without asking permission, I brought my middle finger to the apex of her thighs and gently stroked her through her underwear.

  Her movements stilled.

  “I need you,” I said, meaning the words in so many different ways.

  She closed her eyes, a rush of air leaving her, her hands dropping to my shoulders, gripping them as though to hold herself upright.

  My other palm caressed the back of her thigh and I was held transfixed by the chaotic arrangement of her features, her abrupt loss of composure. Sliding my hand into the back of her underwear, I kneaded the flesh of her bottom as I continued my feathery stroking at her center.

  “I need you,” I repeated, gently pulling aside the scrap of fabric and drawing a tender circle around her entrance, finding her just as I remembered—hot, wet, and so fucking soft.

  Scarlet’s legs seemed to wobble, and she swallowed, her hands at my shoulders grabbing fistfuls of my T-shirt. “Please, Billy,” she panted, her voice high and strained. “I—I need you too. So badly.”

  I stood, drawing her nightgown up as she stumbled backward, the chair behind me upended in my haste. Her bra was off next and I lifted her in my arms, carrying her to the bed in three large strides. Her fingers in my hair, her mouth fused to mine, I relinquished her lips only long enough to tear off my shirt and lie beside her. I could not stop touching her body, my hand at her breast, cupping her exquisite softness, glided down to her backside, grabbing hold. I wanted to feel her everywhere, all at once, with every part of me.

  She tore her mouth away, gulping in air. “Billy.”

  “Too rough?” I asked her neck, climbing over her, needing the feel and sight of her beneath me.

  “No, God, no, I just—take off your pants.”

  My hand slid to the front of her hip and then lower, cupping her, encouraging her to open her legs for me so I could reach within her panties and dip my fingers inside. I groaned, raw and unsteady, I bent to bite her jaw, her neck, drawing her wetness from her body and painting the circle around her clit with two fingers. “I want to make love to you.”

  “I want you too,” she said on a short, choppy breath, her hands frantic at my fly, yanking down the zipper and shoving her fingers inside to grip and stroke me. I hissed, pressing into her hand, my hips jerking. Fuck. I needed to be inside her.

  In a hurry, she helped me push off my pants and boxers, but I captured her hands before she could remove her underwear.

  “Let me,” I said, hungry, starving for a taste of her velvet sweetness.

  Her lips parted as I slid down her body and bit her waistband, tugging her underwear lower with my teeth. Sliding the lace to her knees, then ankles, I knelt between her open legs and bared her body to my eyes. And then, my mouth watering, I tasted her arousal with the flat of my tongue, holding her gaze beyond the soft mounds of her breasts, teasing the back of her legs with my fingertips before entering her with two fingers.

  Scarlet pressed her head back against the mattress, her back arching off the bed. “Wait . . . I need, I want—”

  I knew what she needed, what she wanted. With one more sucking French kiss, I rose up and settled my hips against hers, using my erection to stroke her with no preamble but a whole hellavalot of restraint.

  She gasped, her eyes rolling back as her eyelids closed, her fingers twisting in the sheets at her sides and as her back arched again. She spread her legs wider, as though anticipating and accommodating the weight of me, baring all her most vulnerable places for my gratification—her neck, her breasts and stomach, the clenching entrance to her body.

  An invitation.

  “Billy,” she said with a desperation verging on anguish, and it fed some starved part of me. I couldn’t get enough of her desperation, of her pleases, of her asking for and wanting me. I bent again to taste her skin at the juncture of her neck and shoulder. My fingers plucked at her nipple, taking a bite of her as I continued stroking the softest part of her with the hardest part of me.

  There. The heat of her pulse point beat beneath my lips, her heart raced. Her chest rose and fell with harsh breaths, like she struggled with the anticipation of what might come next.

  “Billy, God, please.” A hitching whisper and a moan, a hint of frustration. Her lashes lifted and she stared at me, her eyes hazy and frantic and beseeching.

  Gripping myself, I lifted to my knees, positioning the head of my cock and moving a thumb to trace the swollen and slick bundle of nerves above her entrance. Curses escaped her as she continued to pant, her gorgeous breasts bouncing with each jolting rise and fall of her rib cage, shifting her hips to force and speed my progress.

  I entered her.

  She shuddered and so did I, and I savored the moment.

  I sa
vored the sight of her willing body on display—sunrays, moonbeams, and starlight—the beauty of her vulnerability and surrender. I savored the hazy, lust-crazed look in her eye. I savored the feel of her silky heat around my cock and the fact that I knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, it would never be enough. I’d be chasing this feeling for the rest of my life, like a junkie, like an addict. This perfect moment where the anguish of our shared past met the bliss of our present and everything was exactly the way it should be.

  And then I moved.

  Anchoring one hand to her hip to control the angle, I leaned forward so I could roll my hips, ensuring her clit would stretch with every stroke. She whimpered, cursed, took the Lord’s name in vain, her hands kneading my muscles, her nails digging into my flesh. She seemed lost to her own desire, nonsensical, grasping and greedy and I loved it. I loved how I wrecked her, because she wrecked me just the same.

  But as soon as she opened her eyes and our gazes locked, she came like a comet, her canal tensing and spasming around me in violent bursts as her body bowed. She reached for me. A cry, a whimper, a moan, mindless sounds and sensations that pushed me beyond reason. I drove into her, my thrusts covetous and significantly less considerate of her pleasure as some primordial instinct demanded I claim her, coming inside her body, filling her with my release and hedonistically rejoicing at our lack of restraint.

  The desire to touch her unending, I gathered her pliant body against me as I rolled to the side, careful not to crush her with my weight. Where I directed, she followed, resisting only to place sleepy kisses on my chest and throat, her arms twining around my neck.

  “I love you,” she whispered between kisses, still breathless, clearly exhausted. “God, how I love you. I love every part of you and I want us to make love every day, ten times a day for the rest of our lives.”

  “Agreed.”

  She snuggled closer, nuzzling my beard. “I never want us to be apart.”

  “Agreed.” I encouraged her to wrap her leg over mine, my hand sliding up her thigh to her bottom.

  “That means we eat every meal together from now on.”

  “Agreed.”

  “And shower together.”

  Fuck yeah, I thought, but kissed her forehead, saying another, “Agreed.”

  Fact was, she could ask me for anything right now and the answer would probably be Agreed. Like Scarlet’s spirit, my happiness and satisfaction in the moment could not be confined. It was simply beyond expression.

  Or reason.

  Reason hunted me down in the middle of the night.

  I awoke with a start, not knowing where I was, tangled in the threads of a nightmare. Once I comprehended my surroundings—and that I was alone in bed—I wondered for a moment if making love to Scarlet had also been a dream. My eyes adjusted, the blood ceased rushing between my ears, and I heard the shower running. I was naked.

  Not a dream.

  Dread swelled just under my ribs and I rubbed my eyes with the base of my palms. We didn’t use a condom.

  This had been the seed of my nightmare, the irreversible fact from which multiple scenarios of chaos and misery had stemmed. In all iterations of my nightmares, Scarlet had been pregnant. But what happened next had been like watching a parade of horror stories written by Stephen King. At the end of each, she hated me.

  Standing from the bed, I walked to the bathroom. I needed to see her, to determine what she needed from me, what I could do in order to make things right and atone for my recklessness and selfishness. I pushed open the door, blinking against the brightness. She hadn’t turned on all the lights, just one above the glass shower, illuminating the form of her but not the details.

  I took two steps toward the shower before I stopped, a different kind of reason emerging as sleep inertia faded. Lucidity materialized like a wise bartender, pointing out facts I already knew. She doesn’t hate you.

  “Billy?”

  Scarlet came into vivid focus, peeking out of the door to the shower, most of her body hidden by frosted glass. A shy-looking smile hitched her mouth higher on one side as her attention moved over my body.

  “Did you want—” She huffed, rolling her eyes, her smile growing. “I mean, do you want to join me?”

  My mind told me to hesitate, to think. Whereas my feet were already carrying me forward. She opened the door wider, stepping back. Soon I was inside the small shower stall and sharing the hot stream of water with a watchful Scarlet, her arm making a valiant—and failing—attempt to cover her breasts.

  “Did I wake you?” she asked, her voice higher than normal and cracking a little on the last word.

  I breathed in the steam and responded without thinking, “I had a nightmare.”

  Her shyness vanished, her forehead wrinkling, and she took a half step toward me. “Oh no. Are you okay?”

  A light, self-deprecating laugh tumbled out of me when I realized what I’d admitted, and I lifted my eyes to the wall behind her. “It’s fine. I don’t know why I told you that. Still waking up, I guess.”

  Scarlet placed her hands on my biceps, shifting closer. “Let’s wash up and then you tell me about it, okay?”

  As though pulled, my gaze dropped to hers again and I studied her lovely upturned face, wondering what Scarlet’s real thoughts were about the condom issue. Was she worried about pregnancy? I didn’t even know if she was on birth control. We hadn’t talked about it. We’d been completely reckless.

  “Scarlet . . .”

  She angled her head to the side, peering up at me, her gaze soft and open. “What’s wrong?”

  “We didn’t use protection.”

  “Oh.” She blinked several times. “You’re right, we didn’t.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  Now she laughed lightly, her cheeks warming in a way that had nothing to do with the hot water. “I could’ve stopped us. I could’ve said something too, but I didn’t.”

  This reasoning went against my sense of justice. “I should’ve stopped us.”

  Her eyebrows pulled together like my statement pained her, her fingers digging into my arms, her lips pressing together in an unhappy line. “Please don’t say that.”

  “I should’ve—”

  “Please don’t be sorry about what happened.” Now she closed her eyes, her voice just above a whisper, like she was saying a prayer. “Please don’t regret it, not even a little, not any part of it or what it might mean. Because I don’t.”

  I stared at her and her momentous words, at the moisture beading in her lashes, the pink of her cheeks, the downward curve of her lips, and I memorized this moment. All traces of my earlier dread faded to nothing, a consuming sense of rightness and exhilaration taking its place.

  Setting my hands on her waist just to slide them around her back, I brought her soft body flush to mine, holding her, and praying to God she would never want me to let her go.

  Chapter Nineteen

  *Billy*

  “Mistrust all enterprises that require new clothes.”

  E.M. Forster, A Room with a View

  Venice was—is—beautiful. It’s one of those places that make you believe fairy tales are possible and is exactly how you imagine it to be. Except the presence of all the other tourists, and I blended in with the tourists.

  “You look like a peasant.” Cletus looked me up and down. “Or a personal trainer named Stefano from New Jersey.”

  I said nothing, refusing to show my irritation. Nevertheless, Cletus was correct. I looked like a peasant. Typically, I wore a suit to work every day. I enjoyed wearing a suit to work every day. I was not accustomed to dressing like a personal trainer named Stefano in public.

  This morning, at the very last minute, I’d let my twin brothers talk me into wearing workout shorts and a T-shirt to Venice. They’d shown up to my room, Beau wearing shorts and T-shirt, warning me that it would be hot and I’d be miserable dressed in fine clothes. Likewise, the rest of my family had been similarly attired as we left the villa for the station.<
br />
  Then, when the train pulled into the Venice stop, everyone changed in the bathrooms.

  “Oh. You thought I meant in Venice? No, no. I meant on the train,” Beau had clarified, wide-eyed and innocent.

  Liar. I could see through his deceptive statements just fine now.

  That had been some hours ago. Presently, we’d already been to the Palazzo Ducale, the Doge's Palace, and now were on our way to a midafternoon gondola ride. Beau seemed particularly anxious about making our reservation on time.

  “What you need to do is wear Italian shoes, black ones.” Cletus lifted up the pant leg (of his dress pants), showing me a pair of very nice Italian leather shoes. “Then you blend in with the locals. But you look like you’re from Jersey Shore or something, Stefano.”

  Someone bumped my shoulder on my other side, and I glanced over, expecting Jethro’s teasing remarks. He’d also dressed like a gentleman today. Everyone had. Except for me.

  But it wasn’t Jethro, it was Scarlet.

  My grin was immediate. “Hey.”

  After taking a mostly chaste shower together in the middle of the night, we’d gone back to bed tangled together. I didn’t tell her about the nightmares, no reason she should have to bear that burden too.

  In the morning, Scarlet woke me up with kisses but evaded my attempts to pull her back to bed, rushing off to get ready for the trip. However, she did leave me a cinnamon roll, a big cup of black coffee, and a haiku,

  * * *

  I loved you last night.

  I’d like to love you now, but

  There’s a train to catch.

  -Forest Fairy

  * * *

  Presently, she grinned up at me, affection and commiseration in her eyes. “I look like a peasant too.” She gestured to her yoga pants, sneakers, and T-shirt. “Jessica told me it would be hot and I shouldn’t dress nicely.”