Lover's Game (South Bay Soundtracks Book 3)

by Amelia Stone

  Yes please.

  My eyes roved up and down, again and again, soaking in the sight of her. With her untamed curls and her full lips and that plush ass that was practically begging for me to grab it with both hands and squeeze, she was the pinup girl fantasy I never knew I had.

  “Don’t laugh,” she said, and her shoulders hunched inward. “Jess picked it out, and of course I forgot to bring another suit, so I didn’t have anything else to wear.”

  I frowned, watching the anxiety flicker on her face. “I would never laugh at you.”

  Especially not while she was wearing that.

  Even if the suit was patterned with… were those blueberries? Yeah. Those were definitely little blueberries all over her sexy bikini.

  If that wasn’t the cutest damn thing I’d ever seen, I didn’t know what was.

  She closed her eyes, exhaling loudly. “I know that,” she said in a small voice, but it sounded like she was only just remembering that I’d always been on her side.

  “Besides,” I said, trying to lighten the mood, because I knew I’d never make any headway in my more-than-friends agenda if she was uncomfortable. “My shorts have penguins on them. If we laugh at anything, it should be that.”

  She opened one eye, taking in the bright, obnoxious print covering my hips and thighs.

  “Are those rockhopper penguins?”

  I grinned. “Yup.”

  “In space?”

  “Mmhmm.”

  “And are they… mating?”

  I chuckled. “They are indeed.”

  “You have swim trunks with fornicating space penguins on them,” she clarified.

  “I do.”

  She opened the other eye, and I grinned as both those dark blue orbs roamed from my shorts to my bare top half. Her gaze lingered on my tattoo, and my chest puffed out as though preening for her.

  But then her eyes narrowed as she took in my face again. “You are a strange bird, Seth Holt.”

  “Nah.” I gestured to the swim trunks a former teammate had given me for my birthday. “These are strange birds. I’m just Seth.”

  She shook her head. “You are definitely strange,” she argued, though her tone was affectionate. “And you were never ‘just Seth.’”

  I drew a sharp breath, wondering how she did that, how she’d always done that. How did she have the ability to make me feel like a goddamn superhero with nothing more than a few simple words?

  “Anyway,” she drawled, checking her phone before tucking it back in the tote bag. “It is now 12:14 a.m., and I have a conference call in less than eight hours. So let’s get this hydrotherapy show on the road.” She beckoned for me to join her at the pool steps.

  “All right. But I have to warn you,” I told her as I followed her into the pool. “I am a terrible patient.”

  “I never would have guessed.”

  I gave her the side eye. “But I will try not to grumble too much,” I promised.

  She turned to me once we were standing in the shallow end, a teasing smile lifting her lips. “I applaud your can-do spirit.”

  I chuckled. God, I’d missed her dry sense of humor.

  “Okay,” she continued before I could reply. “My research says it’s best if we start in the deep end, because deeper water displaces more of your body’s weight and causes less stress on your joints.”

  I frowned. I wasn’t thrilled that she was starting me at the baby setting, but I had promised to cooperate.

  “Lead the way.”

  “Good.” She gave me a hesitant smile before she swam to the other end of the pool with a few strong strokes.

  Christ, that was hot. The way her long, toned limbs cut through the water, so sure and efficient.

  “Okay, so we’ll start with a leg walk.”

  She lifted an eyebrow, and I shook my shoulders out, as though that would clear my head. Then I nodded, internally vowing to push my lusty thoughts aside and focus on the task at hand.

  But it was hard. Really, really hard. I followed her through a few different exercises, and she moved my limbs as needed. I knew she was just making sure I was doing everything correctly, but her hands on my body were driving me insane. My skin felt hot and itchy despite the cool water, and it took everything in me to keep my hideous swim trunks from tenting.

  “That’s it,” she finally said, about half an hour later. “That was a good start.”

  She grabbed the edge of the pool, resting her forearms on the concrete decking. I followed suit, and we both took a moment to catch our breath. Then she turned to me, her eyes warm and assessing.

  “How do you feel?”

  Like your hands are fucking magic. Like I want them everywhere. Like I want to put my hands all over you, too.

  I cleared my throat. Focus, asshole. She was staring at me, eyes wide and expectant.

  “Not bad,” I admitted.

  Much to my surprise, I’d gotten a pretty good workout from her exercises. I actually suspected my hips and back would be sore tomorrow; it had been a long time since I’d worked them that hard. But my knee felt better than it had in a long time. I might even get some sleep tonight.

  “I think I can work with this,” I added.

  “Great!” She beamed at me. “I’m glad it worked. Though it probably helps that your upper body is still so strong.” She poked my shoulder.

  I smiled, watching her eyes as they roamed my torso. She still wasn’t wearing glasses, and I was close enough now that I could tell she wasn’t wearing contacts.

  “What?” she asked, when she noticed my blatant creeping. “Is there something in my eye?”

  I smiled. “No. But you’re not wearing your glasses.”

  Her nose wrinkled. “Oh. Yeah. I had Lasik surgery.”

  “When was that?”

  As I waited for her reply, I wondered when I’d get to the point where our time apart wasn’t such a mystery anymore. I hated all the ways in which she was a stranger to me. There was a time when I knew her better than I knew anyone, better even than I knew myself. And I wanted to get back there again.

  “About nine years ago,” she replied.

  I floated a little closer. “I like it.”

  Those mesmerizing dark blue eyes bounced between mine. “Yeah?”

  “Definitely.” I nodded. “You can see your whole face now.”

  My voice was raspy, and I swallowed. She was so close, just floating there, inches from me. Close enough to touch. My hand lifted almost of its own accord, pushing a wayward curl out of her face. I tucked it behind her ear, and she inhaled sharply at the contact.

  “Krista?”

  Her lips were trembling, and her tongue poked out to wet them. “Yeah?”

  “What happened to your eyelashes?”

  Her brow wrinkled. “What do you mean?”

  “They’re darker.” My thumb swept over her cheekbone, right under the lashes in question. “They look different than they used to.”

  “Oh.” She bit that perfect, starfish-pink lip. “I get them tinted.”

  “Gotcha.” I had no idea what that meant, but I didn’t care. I just liked the effect.

  “I’ve just always been self-conscious about them and-”

  I cut off her sentence with my lips. On her lips.

  I kissed her.

  I fucking kissed her.

  Oh gods.

  Seth was kissing me. With his lips. On my lips.

  Seth Holt was kissing me! And not because he pitied me, or because I imagined something that wasn’t really there, or because I kiss-mugged him. He initiated it. He wanted to kiss me. So he did. He kissed me. He was kissing me right now.

  His lips were amazing. Better than amazing. They were… there were no words to describe them. I was too flustered to form sentences, even in my own mind.

  His tongue teased the seam of my lips, like he wanted to… oh! He wanted me to… Yes, okay. I could do that.

  I parted my lips, and his tongue swept in, tasting mine, twirling an
d teasing and any number of other words that started with T, words I couldn’t think of right then. Gods, that felt so good. He felt so good. His hands gripped my waist, pulling me closer, and I let go of the pool deck and wound my arms around his neck. The water was too deep for either of us to stand, so I clung to him, planting my feet against the wall to keep us both from sinking.

  But then he made a little sound in response, a sound that was achy, needy, like he had to have more immediately. And basically, I went crazy. I pressed myself even closer, until our bodies were flush, and still it wasn’t close enough, so I wrapped my legs around his waist.

  Wait. Was this too forward? Was I supposed to let him take the lead? Seth had always been a go-with-the-flow kind of guy, but maybe he was different in the bedroom – er, in the pool. Ellie had made me read a romance novel with her once, and the nice guy hero was a total dirty-mouthed freak in private. Was Seth a dirty-mouthed freak?

  And more importantly, did I want him to be a dirty-mouthed freak?

  “Fuck yes,” he rumbled, pulling his lips from mine, but not before he nipped my lower lip, tugging it between his teeth. “Squeeze me with those sexy long legs, Krista. Grind your pussy up against me.”

  His hands slid from my waist to my ass, and he squeezed my cheeks, groaning as though the touch affected him as much as it did me. Then he recaptured my mouth, covering it with his like he was laying claim to it. Laying claim to me.

  Oh. My bathing suit bottoms flooded with wetness that had nothing to do with the pool, and my knees felt wobbly, making me suddenly glad he was basically supporting all my weight.

  Okay. He could be a dirty-mouthed freak if he wanted to.

  His hips shifted, and I felt the long, thick ridge of his erection pressing against me, right where I wanted it. I let out a moan that sounded incredibly loud in the dark, still night.

  The sound was just enough to slow the lust train. I pulled my lips away, blinking at him as though seeing him for the first time. His pupils were blown out, his awestruck expression was likely a mirror of my own, and his shallow breaths puffed out, warm and sweet, through his swollen lips.

  Swollen because I’d kissed him. He’d kissed me. We had kissed each other.

  Gods.

  “What are we doing?” I whispered.

  He smiled. “What we should have done a long time ago.”

  Before I could think about what he’d said, his mouth was on mine again, and it felt so damn good that I could barely remember my own name. He took deeper and deeper pulls, and soon I felt dizzy and breathless from lust and wonder and pure, all-encompassing, wit-stealing need.

  I needed his kisses, his touches, the rumbling moans that were vibrating through his chest, and more. I needed so much more.

  “Hang on,” he murmured, his lips brushing against mine with each word.

  “Huh?”

  I frowned. Were we stopping? No. Stopping was bad. I didn’t want to stop.

  He let go of my ass, and his arms flexed, extending behind his back. “Hang on to me.”

  Oh! I locked my arms around his neck, and I gasped as he pulled us up and out of the pool using nothing but the strength of that spectacular upper body.

  He wiggled a bit, pushing his ass back until he was seated securely, with his legs dangling in the pool. My own legs automatically moved to straddle him, and my hips moved on their own, aligning my parts with his parts.

  “That’s better,” he rumbled, his voice even deeper than usual.

  He grinned up at me, his dark, fervent gaze taking in every inch of my face before moving lower. His breath hitched, and it wasn’t hard to figure out why. My breasts were right in his face, which seemed to be A-OK with him, judging by the way his hands skimmed up my sides until his thumbs brushed the undersides of my bathing suit-clad flesh.

  My head tipped back, and I let out another absurdly loud moan. He hadn’t even touched my nipples, and I was already hot and bothered. How did he do that? How did he ignite every nerve ending in my body, make me feel absolutely everything there was to feel, with just the ghost of a touch?

  I wasn’t sure, but I knew I needed more. I needed it all.

  “Love these freckles,” he murmured, his lips ghosting across my collarbones. “Been dreaming of this for so long.”

  He had a strange definition of ‘so long,’ since we’d only reconnected a little over twenty-four hours ago. But I was too far gone right then to quibble with his choice of words. I just wanted to feel more of his oh-so-necessary touches.

  His magic fingers climbed higher, teasing me, squeezing the globes of my breasts, and I pressed my pelvis down, mindlessly seeking relief for the unbearable ache that had bloomed deep within me. My eyes squeezed shut as my hips rolled, back and forth, circling his, pressing against the hard length of him.

  “Oh my gods,” I whispered.

  “Yes,” he growled, his fingers pulling the cups of my bikini top down until my breasts spilled out. “Fuck yes, Krista, use me to get yourself off.”

  A wordless plea climbed up the back of my throat, and my body rubbed against his artlessly, urgently, overwhelmed by the need for release.

  But it wouldn’t come. I whimpered, the sound plaintive and needy, as he pinched my nipples between his fingers.

  “Come on, babe. Come for me.”

  His voice was deeper and rougher than I’d ever heard it, and it was almost enough to push me over the edge.

  Almost.

  “Seth,” I cried.

  “Fuck.” His fingers tightened on my breasts, and the pressure was delicious and so, so right.

  “I need…”

  “Yes,” he grunted. “Tell me, Krista. Tell me what you need.”

  I felt his tongue sweep my nipple, and I jolted. Gods, that felt good. His cock was pressing against the seam of me, rubbing against my clit with each undulation of my hips, and it was wonderful, but I still felt so… empty.

  “Need you,” I groaned.

  But the words weren’t sufficient to convey the depth of my frustration. I’d always had trouble coming with a partner, but I had hoped it would be different with him. I huffed as my eyes popped open again. The stars were so bright tonight, and I shivered in the cool, early-summer breeze. It felt like the heavens themselves were pressing down on me. Seth probably knew the names of all the constellations surrounding us, but he was busy lavishing my nipples with attention at the moment. I’d ask him some other time.

  “Tell me,” he urged, his lips pressing kisses all over my breasts, my collarbone, up to my neck. He sucked on the sensitive skin behind my ears, and I moaned. Then his hand squeezed my ass again, pulling me closer, and I knew what I needed, finally.

  “Need your fingers,” I whispered. “Please Seth, touch me.”

  He immediately moved his hand lower, under my ass, until his fingertips brushed against my center.

  “Yes. There.” It was barely a whisper, the sound almost swallowed by our panting breaths, but he heard me.

  He quickly pushed the fabric of my bathing suit aside. But then he teased me for an endless beat, his fingers skating up, down, back again, but never where I needed them to be. My eyes closed again, and my head tipped forward, until my forehead was resting on his shoulder. I nipped his skin, my tongue darting out to taste the salty-spicy-sweet flavor of him.

  “Please, Seth.” I was whimpering now, begging him to fill me with those long, rough fingers. I needed him inside me more than I needed air right now.

  “I’ve got you,” he rasped, his breath fanning over my ear, and at long last, I felt him push two fingers inside me.

  I spasmed, and my hips slammed down, crushing his hand between us as I shamelessly rode it, seeking the release that had been eluding me. He didn’t seem to care, though, as he continued to pump in and out of me, curving his fingers to hit that perfect spot. His thumb reached up to press against my clit, and another cry escaped me as the orgasm finally crashed over me.

  I continued to ride his hand until the sensation
s overwhelmed me, and my hips stilled at last. Then I did nothing but sit there for an endless beat, until my breathing had finally slowed. His fingers slipped out of me, and I felt a sudden sense of emptiness.

  Because his fingers had just been inside me, filling me up. And now they weren’t.

  “Oh my gods,” I breathed.

  “Yeah.” His chuckle rumbled through his pectorals, past my still-sensitive nipples, and into my own chest, settling somewhere in my ribcage. “That.”

  I’d just hooked up with Seth.

  With Seth.

  And he’d given me an orgasm. On the first try.

  Gods.

  “Thank you,” I whispered, not sure what else I should say. This had to be the most pressure-laden post-coital experience of my entire life.

  But he let loose a full-bodied laugh at my words. “So polite.” His lips skimmed my shoulder. “You’re welcome.”

  I huffed. “I mean, you didn’t have to do that.”

  He leaned back, one of his hands gently gripping my chin and tipping my head up. His beautiful dark eyes seemed almost black, their expression unreadable in the faint light.

  “Sure I did.” He leaned forward, giving me a quick peck of his perfect lips. “When you have a beautiful woman in your lap, grinding herself on your cock, you make sure she has a good time.”

  Right. This was just what one does. This little hookup was nothing special to him, nothing more than a way to pass the time. No big deal.

  Except it was a very big deal to me. It was the biggest deal.

  But of course it wasn’t for him. No, this was just another game between friends. Just more practice for when I eventually found my forever teammate.

  “Well, thanks,” I repeated, trying not to sound too sad.

  “It was my pleasure,” he assured me. His eyes flicked down to where his ‘pleasure’ had spilled between us, splashed all over his stomach and mine in thick ribbons.