Leakage: A Friends-to-Lovers Romance

by Harley, Karen

  "Jas," he groaned. "I'm sorry." He started pulling out.

  She reached around him to his buttocks and pulled him back down. "I want it," she said.

  "Are you sure? We haven't—talked about it." But he was already rotating his hips, filling her so deeply with his flesh she knew she wasn't going to stop him. It was intimate. Right.

  She should have felt scared. She wasn't that aroused that she could ever say she'd lost her head. She knew what she was doing.

  "It's what I've always wanted, too," she told him.

  His body hardened. He started moving uncontrollably and it was so atypical that Jasmine pulled back, trying to see his face. It almost made her explode on the spot to see him staring at her with naked longing. She clasped him tightly with her arms and lifted her legs and wrapped them around him. He smelled of whiskey, sweat, laundry soap, and himself.

  She wanted to tell him she loved him so bad. Then she almost laughed to realize she was free to say it. So she did.

  Matt grunted explosively and thrust deep. The rush of heat inside her was new and startling. Jasmine watched in fascination as his face froze with that curious blankness that this time looked not like a mask but the opposite, a surrender.

  "Never careless," he panted when his orgasm was over. "Till now."

  "I wanted it, you nut," she said.

  "So did I. And that," he said as his cock finally eased out of her, "was sweet. And selfish as hell. But this floor has to go." He rolled smoothly to a crouch, picked her up, and laid her on the bed.

  She started to stretch out but he did a kind of rag doll thing with her body, knocking her over onto her side, sweeping her legs up and fetal then curving his body behind her to spoon. This made her happy even before, easing in from the back, his thumb filled her and the arch of his hand covered her pussy.

  "I love you," he said in her ear, and hearing it from him brought such a feeling of wonder that she almost missed his provocative question. "What do you think about a good fondling?"

  "A what?" she said.

  "Just tell me when you want to come, Jas." With his face buried in her hair, his fingers spread her and one fingernail flicked the tip of her clitoris.

  Jasmine's body jerked in shock. "Matt."

  "Mm?"

  "You did that blind."

  Matt laughed, then made a purring sound and then went to work, fingers leisurely rubbing and sliding while his thumb did ecstasy-inducing things in her passage. He really did know her architecture from memory. Dazzling but disconcerting, too.

  Although it felt heavenly to have his body plastered against her back, it was his hand that was the fount of pleasure. Jasmine strained against it up to the point that the climax started to take her. He halted it by the simple act of going motionless. Then she understood what his last injunction meant.

  "Now please, now," she said frantically.

  Then her leg was up and his shaft was pressing, deliciously invading. It was the last thing she expected. Perfect. He shifted her, grabbing a pillow and sliding his arm underneath her for support while that other hand, the one slathered with her wetness and his leaking fluids, slid across her belly and found her open sex. Two seconds later, she came.

  "Oh, Jas, just keep doing that. I need that."

  While her body churned blissfully around him, he drove in and in, triggering one orgasm after another. It just didn't stop. Not until she felt the hot sluicing of him within and then her cervix went haywire clenching on his last deep thrust.

  Afterward, they cuddled while he softened inside her. To Jasmine it felt like pure luxury. When his cock slid out, it was replaced with his finger, strumming the aftershocks in one of the most exquisite post-coital pettings she'd ever imagined.

  Sex, thought Jasmine, was supposed to be lonely.

  Not end on a note of togetherness and hope.

  Thank you oh thank you.

  "Comfy?" he murmured.

  "Oh, yes." And giddy and happy and optimistic like never in her life.

  "Hey. Did I mention that I love you?" he said, as though it had suddenly occurred to him.

  "Just twice."

  "Counting them, Jas? You'll make me blush."

  "You? When was the last time you were embarrassed?"

  He laughed, crooking his finger and making her moan. "It'll grow old," he said regretfully. "I'll have to vary it up so it doesn't get boring."

  "It never will. I'm not used to hearing it."

  "Tell me about it." He kissed her neck, his lips soft on the nape of her neck. "This is just the beginning, Jas. I'm going to make love to you all night. And then all day tomorrow. And for the next year. Hell, for the rest of our lives. Sound good to you?"

  "Do you really think you'll want me for the rest of your life, Matt?"

  The finger inside her stilled, slid out. "Jas?"

  She turned over onto her back. Reality was a rude intrusion she couldn't ignore. "You've been with a lot of women. How many of them have you loved?"

  "Ah." He sounded pained. "Okay. I fell in love the first time when I was eight years old. A girl named Amanda. Then in the sixth grade, with a Mandy, go figure. Ah, shit, who was…oh, yeah, Jodi DeSante. I must have been fourteen. She refused to go out with me on account of I liked the wrong music. Nobody since then. As far as the grown-ups go, you're it, Jas."

  She searched his face, lifted her hand and traced his jaw.

  "None of the women you took to bed?"

  He shook his head. "I evolved into a serious asshole. Pretty much bailed out of the love game till I met you." He paused. "I didn't always hate screwing, Jas. For a long time, it was fantastic. Essential." He stroked her belly. "Sex is one of the few reasons I'm still alive."

  Sex? A reason to live?

  "That's a new one," she said dryly.

  He stilled, then disengaged with her and put space between them, sliding backward to sit against the headboard, his legs sprawled out, one foot grazing her hip. As always, his total unselfconsciousness was as alluring as the shape of his musculature.

  He regarded her sardonically.

  "There's not a lot to say about growing up with shitheads," he said. "You know better than most how it is. But the end result is you pretty much think of yourself as a shithead, and then you have to find a reason to stick around. Pleasure is one of those reasons. Unlike the assorted poisons people use to destroy their lives, it doesn't hurt anyone. And it's the sweetest escape there is. For a while, anyway."

  She snorted. "Not for me. I have a lot in common with Harrison. I don't excel at sex."

  Matt's tongue poked in his cheek. "Uh, newsflash. Sex isn't a sport."

  "You're saying that?" she teased. "You?"

  "It's not about competition," he said lazily. "It's to feel good. To keep away the cold."

  "Can screwing really do that?"

  "When you make it last and last and take pleasure to its limits…yeah. For a time."

  "Well, there's something wrong with me, then," she said. "I don't like it. It's a hurdle to go through in dating, like telling your life history. Guys generally consider me frigid."

  He laughed. "Jasmine, you're responsive as all fuck."

  "With you. I can't help that."

  His eyes consumed her. "Come here." When she was in range, he made himself into her armchair, apparently his favorite position tonight. One arm wrapped around her, holding her close, claiming her abdomen with his hand. "You know what the problem with us is, Jas?"

  "What?"

  "That first day I should have just trusted my instincts and hauled you up and said, 'Mine.' Not given you a choice. Do you know what being inside you is like for me?"

  She shook her head.

  "Nuclear. Eternal heat. Except it does end. And the Challenge drove me crazy, cutting us off at midnight."

  "You seemed to take it in stride."

  "Sure," he drawled. "I learned how Prince Charming felt. Getting heated up, blasting your cum to infinity, then being thrown back into a fucking cold universe b
y the clock and a condom."

  "Was that what turned you off of screwing?" she asked. "When the Challenge started?"

  Matt's body tautened against her.

  "You don't have to tell me," she said quickly.

  "Mm. You're wrong there. I have to tell you everything you want to know, Jas. That's how we keep from hurting each other." He said it matter-of-factly, like it was a long-thought-out policy. Jasmine set the idea aside to examine later.

  "So what did it?" she said.

  "It happened long before the Challenge." He sighed, shifting his legs. "Last summer was fucked up, and not just because of Mom tossing herself down the trash. Dad was whipping his guilt trips right and left, Regan was acting half her age, and I wasn't much better, trying to deny the whole thing had happened. I made some shitty decisions. The pleasure lost its potency. The only thing going right was the blog; that went big time and widened my options. But the big thing was when you told me you wanted kids."

  "I what?" She reached back. Last summer. That day. "I remember," she said slowly. "The pills. We all talked about what kind of parents we'd make."

  "Yeah. You said that and I got impatient with the rest. Waiting. Living day to day. What was the point when all I wanted was to make a life with you—and if you kept running scared, then at least with a girl who made things better."

  "My God, Matt." Her voice was hushed. "I don't know what kind of a parent I'd make. I have no idea how to act around kids."

  "If you don't want them, it's okay, Jas. I want them like anything. But it's your call. I'll take you however I can get you."

  "But I do." The confession was wrenched out of her. "That's the thing. I just don't think I have anything to offer them. Can you see me as a mother?"

  He laughed. "Daily. You know, you have a strange idea of your own value."

  She twisted around to look at him. "What do you mean?"

  He ticked off his fingers. "What you said about yourself. Cold, cowardly, insignificant, pessimistic. It's a one-eighty to how I see you. But it explains some things."

  "L-like what?"

  "Like why your claws are so sharp. Why you cry. Why you have as hard a time with trust as I do."

  "I guess we're both messed up." She lifted her chin. "But you'd be a good father."

  His arm tightened almost painfully around her. "I don't want them for the betterment of mankind. I just like them and I want them to be part of my life."

  She leaned back against him. His body felt so good. "So. Screwing," she prompted.

  For a moment he was silent. "Ah. Right. I forgot what we were talking about."

  "I like this," she said, smiling. "Talking with you. Learning you. You're different."

  "Mm." He took her hand, stroked her fingers, the nails. "Did I thank you for telling me you loved me?"

  "Yes."

  "Good. So after that night, I stopped screwing around—literally. No sex since then. I've dated, shopped, looking for something more. It was a promise to myself."

  "Since August, you said."

  "Yup. Then Sara, gorgeous Sara, threw out the Challenge."

  Jasmine smiled. "And you caught it and threw it to me."

  "I couldn't believe it when you agreed to do it. I'd pretty much given up on your coming to me. That's when life began again as far as I was concerned." He kissed her hair, weaving his fingers into it and sending tingles of delight throughout her scalp.

  "You seemed so casual about the whole thing, while I was flipping out."

  "Haven't you figured it out yet?" He rubbed her nipple. "I'm not casual."

  "You put on a good act."

  "Mm, except the day I rafted in on vodka to find you sharing this," his fingers gave a twist of the titanium shield, "with someone else. I lost it then. I started shopping for sex again. Reflexive habit. I regret that."

  "Are—" She tried to steady her breathing from the jolt through her nerves and what it signified. "Are you still angry about my getting naked with Harrison?"

  "Yes. It wasn't that you were naked, Jas. It's that you're mine, and you wouldn't give me what you freely gave him. Offer to others what you make a point of denying me and it will make me insane."

  His possessive statement settled on her. It should have outraged her. Threatened her. Freaked her out. But it didn't. It reassured her.

  Intimacy used to be the scariest thing of all. With Matt, it appealed.

  The idea of telling him her innermost thoughts. Not having to worry about walls. Protections.

  Trusting him.

  "It was easy to be naked with Harrison because it didn't matter with him," she said slowly. "He could never hurt me. We talked about nudist beaches and we basically forgot we had no clothes on. I guess that's the problem. I didn't trust you not to hurt me."

  "Which is an effective way to eviscerate a guy."

  She shook her head. "I'm afraid I'll hurt you again, Matt."

  "Yeah. And I'll hurt you. And if you forget for a while that I love you, just say, 'Matt, you're being an asshole.' And if I don't go down on my knees and worship you immediately, rip into me. I won't fight back. And you'll know. All right?"

  She twisted around, searched his face. "Yes. Maybe…"

  "Yeah?"

  "Maybe this will work," she whispered.

  "Trust me, sweetheart. We'll make it work. I'll get my act together one way or another."

  "You're not—" She swallowed. "You're not irresponsible, Matt. Or lazy."

  "What about perseverance?"

  "What?"

  He grinned. "You thought I had no perseverance."

  "I probably said that to rile you. You have more than enough perseverance. I knew that from your teasing."

  "I'm glad you think so. Because the blogging has kind of taken off. There's no hurry for you to find a real job. In fact, it probably makes sense for you to help me with the blog rather than try to get hired somewhere else. If you wanted to."

  "Your toy blog? Seriously?"

  "And some others."

  "How do those things make money, anyway?"

  "This and that," Matt said. "I'll share my state secrets if you do something for me."

  She knew that tone of voice.

  "W-what?"

  "Long ago, far, far away, there was a pink toy of delight…"

  "Oh, God, Matt."

  "Closet. Top shelf. Small bag."

  "Um, is there a point to these directions?"

  "You never had that thing inside your pussy, Jas. Tell me you didn't want it inside your pussy. You know you did." His tone was positively wicked.

  "I like you inside my…inside, Matt."

  "Oh, I'll be inside you, don't worry."

  That set off all sorts of chaotic thoughts.

  She told herself she only went to the closet to humor him.

  It smelled like him. It was surprisingly sparse. He had so few possessions, and what he did have he'd consider essential. Jasmine had strong suspicions of what was contained in the lidded plastic bin next to the bag she lifted off the shelf but resisted the urge to investigate.

  "Is that your famous arsenal," she said as she came back and handed him the bag, "in that white bin in your closet?"

  "Yup. I'll trash it if you want, but we'd need replacements."

  "How kinky are you really, Matt?"

  "As kinky as it takes," he said blandly. "The first night you came to me, I assumed you were more experienced than you were. I pushed you way too far. You have to learn to tell me when you've gone past need into pain."

  "I liked it."

  "I liked that you let me. It gave me hope." He overturned the bag, revealing its singular expected item.

  "Since we're talking about the first Challenge night," she said, eying him flipping the innocuous object into the air a few times, "There's something I've been wondering."

  "What's that? Sit here," he said, patting the spot by the pillows.

  She crawled onto the bed. "Why wouldn't you come in my mouth that night?"

 
; He paused. "I fucked that up. You were beautiful, Jasmine. Part of it is that I was petrified."

  "Petrified? You?"

  He squeezed her hand. "You were this close to backing out of the Challenge. Letting you swallow wasn't worth the risk. If you didn't like it, I wasn't getting any second chances."

  "You thought."

  "I thought," Matt agreed. He knelt between her spread legs, easing her knees apart.

  "And the other part?"

  "Oral sex," he said absently, "is complicated. There's a strong vein of power, submission, and trust woven into the proceedings. You tried to make me lose control. I was a lit fuse. It was a bad combo for me. We'll talk about this, Jas. But another time."

  "I wanted to make you lose it," she said. "It was only fair. You made me. Your idea of foreplay…."

  "Oh, sweetheart, you have no idea how much fun we're going to have together."

  "Your kind of fun," she said, "makes me nervous sometimes."

  "Yes." His eyes shut briefly. When they opened again, they were sober. But not his words. "Love you, I."

  "You flake, I won't ever find it boring to hear you say that."

  He bent to kiss the top of her thigh, the bone of her hip, licking his way to her mound. She felt the sting as his teeth tugged the small hairs there, then a soft kiss on her abdomen.

  "I'll hope you never do," he said.

  Still being gentle, he kissed up her sternum and settled his mouth wide on one nipple, lightly suckling. The contrast between where his mouth was hot and where sensation was blocked by the nipple shields was luscious.

  He raised his head and palmed her breast not quite as gently as he'd suckled. "Now that you're mine, you're mine, Jas."

  "Matt?" His sudden intensity startled her.

  "This. You. Everything." He spread his hands over her breasts, compressing them, then sweeping out to her arms and sides and underneath to her buttocks while his mouth took her other nipple, sucking hard.

  Pleasure burst all over, inside and out. Jasmine reached down and wound her fingers into his silky hair. She thought of all the times she'd wanted to do this, to touch his head as if he were hers, an act as personal and proprietary as handling his cock.

  His groan said he agreed.

  "You're mine, too," she said. "No more shopping."