by Lindsey Hart
Overheating, yes. Boiling. Her heart was wild. Her pulse was a mess. Her stomach was so tight it would be a miracle if it ever uncoiled. Her breathing was a train wreck. Still. She opened her legs for Ross like a natural born seductress might. She was damn proud of herself.
Especially because she’d been waiting for this moment- okay, well, maybe some PG-13 version of it when she was way younger- for almost a decade.
Ross closed the distance to her bed in a single long stride. He wrapped her up in his massive, burning, muscled arms and kissed her ravenously. She kissed him back like she’d waited her whole life to do it. They kissed each other like if they didn’t, there wouldn’t be a tomorrow. They kissed until it felt like her lips were going to fall off and her face burned, even though Ross was fairly clean shaven.
He kissed her until they had to come up for air or actually risk passing out from lack of oxygen. Even then, he didn’t stop. He trailed kisses down her chin, hot, open mouthed, lush, delicious kisses that banked the fires taking over her chest and belly. It felt like someone had surgically placed a chain inside of her and that chain was attached to Ross and every single time he moved or breathed or so much as blinked, the chain wrapped tighter around her internal organs, the friction causing an unbearable heat that made everything weighted and heavy below her legs.
She was soaked. And not because she was still wet from the bath. She was pretty sure there was an actual embarrassing puddle forming below her on the comforter.
Ross trailed those open-mouthed kisses down her throat, over her shoulders, and the chain tightened to the point of unbearable. She rubbed her legs together, trying to ease the friction. He noticed. Of course, he noticed.
As he claimed her breast, his hand slid down between her legs. He groaned around her nipple when he realized how wet she was. Frick. Even she hadn’t realized how wet she was. She was so slick that his finger slid right through her folds, straight to her entrance.
Her mouth dropped open. “I- I need to- tell you something,” she panted.
His hand found her clit and circled it gently and she lost all capacity for words. His mouth was doing something to her breast that was unbelievable too. Her thighs trembled. The heat raging inside felt like it was going to scorch her from the inside out. She half expected to glance down and see flames erupt from her belly button.
“Ross…” She tried again, digging her fingers into his scalp.
His toyed with her clit, circling. Circling a little harder. Dancing over and back. Circling again. He was driving her crazy with just his hand.
“Ross I-”
Her nipple popped out of his mouth with a wet slurp that made her want to die. Why the hell was that so hot anyway? Why was all of it so good? It hadn’t been good with anyone else. She’d tried. She’d tried so hard. It just didn’t happen.
Ross could just look at her though and cause spontaneous orgasm. He was well on his way doing what he was doing to her and then his head dropped lower.
“I know what you need, my little bear,” he said in that deep, sexy, Ross voice that she loved so much. “Don’t worry. I’m not going to make you beg. Much.”
“Ross- I- that isn’t- argh!”
Alix lost all capacity for words when Ross kissed a hot path down her belly button, right around those flams, and kept going. All of a sudden, her shoulders arched completely off the bed her hands were tangled in his hair again, ripping and pulling, and her legs were spread open and his mouth was there. On her sex.
Ross didn’t do anything halfway. She already knew that about him. When he wanted something, he got what he wanted. Some people might say that he was unmotivated and even lazy after high school was over. She knew he was just trying to find what he truly wanted. She didn’t think he just rolled the dice on stocks. He’d put in the time. She knew that. He’d done his research. It wasn’t random, like she’d said before. Ross wasn’t like that. He wouldn’t have risked his parent’s money on anything less than a sure thing.
What she’d wanted, for such a long time, was for him to want her the way she wanted him. Now that it was happening, she was half afraid that she was going to be a letdown. That maybe it wasn’t what he wanted after all.
That thought was obviously way stupid because Ross ate her like he was starving all over again, like her mouth had just been the appetizer. He lashed his sex with his tongue, attacking her clit and exploring the rest of her before he angled his mouth and put his tongue inside of her.
Inside. Of. Her.
She was aware that she was soaked, that there was moisture all over the bed and her thighs and Ross’s face and that she was rolling her hips wildly, rocking them into his face, grinding on his beautiful mouth and his wicked, sinful, amazing tongue. She was wonton and out of control. Oh, and there were sounds, coming at her like she was in a fog. The sounds of him eating her out. The sounds of her moaning and whimpering and saying his name over and over.
There was a muffled thump too, but that barely even registered.
What did register was the horrified yell that came from the open doorway. “What the fuck?”
Everything happened so fast after that she wasn’t even sure if it was real or just a really terrible nightmare. The worst kind. The kind where your brother comes in and catches you having sex with someone. The someone who just happened to be his lifelong best bud.
“What the fuck? Get the fuck off my sister!” Chance tore into the room. He grabbed Ross by the ankle and when Ross spun around to kick back at him, Chance let out an actual shriek. “Ross?” Then, “Ross!”
For a minute, everything stopped. No one did anything. Then all hell broke loose, and yes, it truly was hell.
Chance let out a yell of range and ripped Ross off the bed by his ankle. Ross hit the floor hard, rolled and tumbled, his years of football training saving him from a broken limb from the force of how he’d been torn away. Alix scrambled up on the bed. She snatched the comforter up and wrapped it around herself, turning herself into a human burrito.
Chance and Ross rolled on the floor together, Chance trying to strangle Ross, Ross trying to get him the hell off.
“Get your dick away from me!” Chance screamed as he punched out, narrowly missing Ross’s nose. He hit him in the jaw instead and Ross let out a muffled grunt of pain. “Get your dick away from my sister!”
Ross kicked out and caught Chance off guard, so that he could roll him over and gain the upper hand. He pinned Chance to the floor.
“You said you didn’t have a problem with me dating Alix. You always joked about us getting together.”
“Only because I didn’t think it would ever happen! She’s not even your fucking type!” Chance hocked and spat in Ross’s face. The greasy glob landed right on Ross’s cheek. He flinched and it was all the time Chance needed. He kneed Ross straight in the groin.
“Stop it!” Alix screamed as Ross doubled over, coughing, sputtering, and retching up strings of spittle. “Chance! Stop it!”
Chance pushed himself up to a sitting position. He stared at Ross with wide eyed horror, but his teeth were still bared.
“You- you knee bagged him!” Alix shouted. “Why the fuck would you do that?”
Chance’s head whipped around to her. She so rarely said the f-word that when it dropped, people took her serious. “Al, I-”
“I don’t care,” she half screamed while Ross groaned on the floor of her room a few feet from her brother. “Do you know how long I’ve waited for this, you bastard? No, of course not because you’re so wrapped up in yourself and trying to bang every single woman in this city that you wouldn’t realize that anyone else even exists. You made jokes for half my life about how Ross would never want me, and I swear you had to know that I wanted him.” She squeezed her eyes shut, but tears leaked down the corners anyway, scalding her cheeks. She ripped them open, just so she could nail Chance on the spot. “I love him. I love him, Chance. I’ve loved him since I was thirteen and that might be wrong and twisted and messe
d up. I might have done a hell of a job showing it or acting like it. I might have been a brat. I might still be a brat, but you don’t get to make this decision. I do. He’s your best friend and now you’ve ruined any chance I might have for happiness. Jesus. We didn’t even get to the good part. And by the way, Ross took condoms from your room. Thanks for the fact that he won’t ever need them again because you’ve probably wrecked any chance he had to reproduce!”
“Alix…” Ross wheezed.
Right. He didn’t need her to defend him. He didn’t need her to embarrass the holy hell out of him either. It was bad enough she’d dropped the L-bomb ten seconds after her brother destroyed his nuts, she didn’t have to try and castrate him all over again by talking about future children or lack thereof.
“You can’t love him!” Chance looked at Ross murderously. “He’s like a brother to you. That’s just sick. It’s just wrong.”
“It’s not wrong!” She realized she was nearly hysterical, and her brother would probably make some rude comment later about her being on her stupid period or something because he figured all women were crazy at that time, but there was no toning it down. “It’s not wrong because he’s not my brother. I never saw him like that. And he doesn’t see me like a little sister anymore. I’m a grown woman.”
“That’s obvious,” Chance spat. He whipped his head around to Ross like he wanted to kick his ass all over again, no matter what kind of unfair advantage he’d have. “Jesus Christ. I can’t believe I just walked in on you eating my sister out. Do you have any idea how that’s going to scar me for life? Couldn’t you shut the fucking door?”
“We didn’t think you’d be home,” Alix shouted. “You’ve been gone for days! How was I to know you were going to come back when it seems like your mission is to repopulate the entire state.”
“That’s not my mission. I don’t want a brat. Ever. I always glove up.”
“Yeah, well, then it’s your mission to make sure your dick falls off before your next birthday,” she shot back.
“Didn’t you just hear me? I say I always use a glove.”
“First of all, that’s disgusting.” She made a gagging sound. “Second, they’re not always foolproof. Third, you need to get the hell out of here before I really lose my shit.”
“Lose it. I dare you.”
Alix made sure her eyes were a watery mess and she let her lips quiver. “I’ll cry. I’ll cry and I won’t stop.” It was the one thing Chance hated the most. When women cried, especially her or their mom. “I’ll freaking cry and I’ll sit outside your door all night doing it, telling you how you’ve ruined my life. I’ll follow you around all week in tears. I’ll find out where you’re going and I’ll come there and I’ll wail outside the window, I’ll-”
“Stop!” Chance pushed to his feet. He didn’t offer to help Ross, who was still gasping for air like a dying fish. “Alright! Just stop. I’ll go. We can talk about this later. I need to go puke out everything I ate for the last week and wash my eyes with bleach.”
“Are you sure you don’t mean go for an anal bleaching,” Ross shot back. “Because you seriously are acting like an uptight chick.”
“That’s an insult to women everywhere,” Alix cut in.
Ross just coughed and beat the floor with his fist.
“Don’t ever fuck my sister again!” Chance pointed an accusing finger at Ross. “Or we’re done. Got it?”
“Chance! Come on! You can’t say things like that,” Alix snapped. “That’s not your call.”
“It’s not my call on who I want to hang out with? I might not be able to control him banging you- which is so disgusting I probably won’t be able to stomach food for the next lifetime, but I can say who and who I don’t hang out with.”
“Don’t ruin a lifelong friendship over this,” Alix begged. She tried to sound firm, but her voice came out as more of a whine than she would have liked. “Please. Chance, just calm down. We’ll talk about it. All of us. Later. In an hour.”
“My balls aren’t going to be better in an hour.”
“Shut it!” Chance hissed. “If I catch you with Alix again, I’m cutting them off, douche face, and stuffing them into your ears.”
“Why is it always the balls with you?” Alix asked, more than pissed at her brother. More than done with his little tirade. “You’re always about balls this, balls that. Why don’t you grow a set yourself and listen to me. This. Isn’t. Your. Decision. Act like a grown up for a change. You said you didn’t have a problem with it. You egged us on half the time. You goaded him. So just stop.”
“You stop!” Chance shot back like a five-year-old. “I’m out of here. He better not be here when I get back.”
“Oh yeah? Or you’ll cut off his balls and use them on our tree this Christmas? Make a ball sack skin bag for yourself? Use them to make a new pair of boots? Feed them to the neighbor’s cat? Hang them from your rear-view mirror? What’s it going to be this time, Chance?”
Her brother shook his head, his blonde hair flying all over, his blue eyes sparking with outrage. And humor. She didn’t miss that little gleam that he obviously wished he could hide from her, and she smirked at him in satisfaction. She almost never stood up to him. She took his shit. His teasing. His crassness, his being an asshole, because he was her brother and she’d just learned to deal with it over the years. Chance was just Chance, but this time, he wasn’t getting a free pass.
“I don’t know, but it’s going to be worse than all of those. It’s going to involve cakes and feeding them to him after.”
“You just said that because there’s a cake mix sitting on the kitchen counter. How original.” Alix rolled her eyes. She pointed to the door. “Go! Close it on your way out!”
“Next time close it yourself!”
“I thought you said you didn’t want there to be a next time.”
Chance let out an aggravated sound that wasn’t entirely human before he stalked out of the room and slammed the door. A minute later, the bang of the front door reverberated through the house.
“Jesus,” Alix muttered. Her cursing had really got worse since she’d come back home, but she couldn’t actually find any shits to give in the moment. She threw off the comforter and got down next to Ross. She looped her arm around his heaving shoulders. “Are you okay? God. What can I do? Do you need an icepack?”
“I think an icepack would freeze them right off. Have you ever had frostbite on your nuts?”
“No. Of course not.”
“Neither have I. There should definitely not be a first time for everything.”
She had to laugh. It was a small, horrified laugh, but it was still a laugh. Ross groaned. She slipped her palm between his bare shoulder blades. He was warm and damp with perspiration. He was huge and feral and shaped so perfectly and beautifully that it made her want to weep. This was Ross. Her Ross. Her. Ross.
“I’m so sorry,” she breathed. “Chance can be such an asshole.”
“I’m well aware.”
She hooked her hand under Ross’s arm and helped pull him up. He wavered, but she led him over to the bed and watched as he pretty much fell into it. He swung his legs in, breathing hard at the effort, and groaned as he curled into a tight ball on his side.
“Fuck, that shit hurts. Never been kneed in the bare nuts before.”
“Yes, well, first times are a real bitch.”
She sat on the edge of the bed and covered Ross up with the comforter. She stroked his hair gently, amazed that he was still there and so was she. He hadn’t peeled himself on the floor and bailed on her. He was there. Naked. With her. Still. He’d been doing things with her. Willingly. Gladly. He was just as hungry for her as she was for him. And this time, there was nothing sad between them, nothing forced, no threats, no deals, no impending doom. He was with her because he wanted to be with her. This time, it was right. Or at least it had been until Chance burst in on them.
“Can I get you anything? Really? Some water? Your clothe
s?” She kept smoothing her fingers through his hair and his breathing slowly changed from the sharp barks of pain to something that resembled normal. “Do you want to leave?”
Ross tensed. She tensed too. Her hand stilled in his hair.
“Do you want me to?” he finally rasped.
“No!” Alix ducked down so she could see his face, not just his side profile. “No. God. You’ve had the worst time. You came here for a restful day and this happened.”
“It was pretty good before the whole knee to sack thing happened.”
A smile wobbled over her lips. Ross’s turned up at the corners too. “I’m sorry what I said. About the whole love thing. I just wanted Chance to leave. I figured that was pretty much the only way to get through to him.”
Ross’s eyes darted away. Her hand was still resting on his hair, which was impossibly soft. Softer than she ever would have thought it could be.
“Don’t be.” His voice was so soft that she had to lean in to hear him. “You pretty much told me as much on the water tower.”
“The whole word doesn’t have to know.”
“It’s okay,” he breathed. “Really.”
Alix swallowed hard. “I’m going to get you a glass of water and some vitamins. In case you really are coming down with something. Or maybe just so- you know- I heard vitamins help cells regenerate faster or something.”
“My balls aren’t going to regenerate,” Ross half groaned, half chuckled. “I hope they won’t need to.” He reached over and set his hand on her knees. “You’re naked. It’s cold. Get some clothes in case Chance comes back. If he sees you naked ever again, I’ll kill him. And anyone else who tries.”
His words, half joking, half serious, made her so warm inside that she felt like she was going to turn into a puddle of goo and slide off the bed.
“Right. I’ll- I’ll go get some Advil too. I’ll be right back.”
Ross didn’t stop her. She knew he watched her though, while she grabbed her robe from the back of the door and threw it on before she scurried off to the kitchen. She was amazed that her bones were even still there and that her body was functioning all together as a unit, walking, thinking, talking, still breathing.