A Field Guide To Catching Crickets: ( a sexy second chance tearjerker romance )

by Unknown

  He points to his house, which is lit up top-to-bottom, fifty feet away from us. I’m not sure why, but the second he tells me that’s his home, I get butterflies, my curiosity piqued to see where the boy I knew—who, ten years later, is this amazing man—lives.

  We stroll up an ecologically designed front path that’s lined in an assortment of grasses and succulents. He fingers in his security code then tells me what it is. We roll our eyes at each other, and I wonder if his heart trips around like mine does when he says the numbers that match the date I lost my virginity to him. Those very numbers, along with many other dates, tattooed on my arm.

  “Now you know all my secrets. You can get into the Batcave any time you’d like.” He presses his forehead against mine, laughing.

  All of his secrets. Shit. “Shit,” I mutter quietly, though not quietly enough.

  “I heard that.”

  Every sense of mine stands on edge as he opens the door. So this is his house. Indeed, it is—his scent, the feel of him, the very essence of who he is.

  “Let me show you around.”

  We enter a crisp, white, beautifully lit room with a sweeping view of LA’s glittering landscape.

  “This is spectacular. Holy smokes.” I gasp as I spin a three-sixty, taking in the room and its oddly-similar-to-mine furnishings.

  Midcentury with a nice smattering of eclectic thrown in to give it a funky, well-lived-in feel. I stop dead in my tracks as my gaze falls onto a wall covered in black frames filled with all-too-familiar imagery.

  “You still collect gravestone rubbings?” I walk over to the wall.

  Nearly every square inch is covered in them, along with a mix of black-and-white photos scattered at random. Hawke and I are in several.

  He wraps his arms around my hips then kisses my nape. “Yeah, still. You probably recognize some of these. And those crazy kids.” He chuckles.

  “We really were kids.” I tear up. “And the rubbings, yeah… I recognize lots of them.”

  My gaze flies over the wall as I reminisce about the two of us rambling around in his truck, seeking out abandoned cemeteries in little towns up and down the central coast of California.

  “I need to do this—frame mine. It’s so beautiful. I have a box full of rubbings just waiting to be framed.” I think about the contents in that box as I exhale noisily.

  “Hey, you all right?” he asks, catching me in a momentary knot of unease. “You want me to help you go through them? I used a great local company to frame all of these.”

  I swallow over my disquiet. “Yeah, I would love that. I know exactly where the box is in my library. Maybe next week, once I have myself a little more situated, we could do that. Sound good?”

  “You choose the night, I’m there. I’ll help you hang them as well.”

  “You’re so full-service. I’m feeling spoiled.” I giggle as he kisses my neck.

  “Oh, darlin’, spoiled is how you’re gonna feel tonight and then some.” Hawke spins me around to face him.

  I look up to his eyes as they dance over my face before landing on my lips.

  “Tell me what you want tonight.” His hoarse voice slams into my desire. It’s his spread-your-legs-I’m-about-to-fuck-you voice. The voice I’ve come to recognize when he groans out strings of dirty words as he’s thrusting himself into me.

  His eyebrows shoot up as he waits for my answer. Hell, I want everything. Is there anything I don’t want with him, anything I wouldn’t let him do? No. Nothing.

  “You gonna tell me? Or should I just take?”

  I should know what to ask for, but a big part of me thinks the best thing to say here is simply, “Do what you will.”

  “Then I’ll take it.” He chuckles as he throws me over his shoulder in a motion so fast I’m stunned.

  I’m laughing hysterically because he tickles me into a fit until he puts me down in front of the colossal glass window.

  “Sloan.” His eyes are carnal. “I’ll take what I want, give you what you need.”

  A barely-there kiss meets my lips in a feathering touch. Barely there, but it turns my insides to liquid, my knees to ribbons. His tongue slides into my mouth, dancing with my already undulating tongue as it awaits his arrival, soft, wet, slow, then intense. He moves passionately, taking possession of my mouth—then all of me. Soft moans escape my throat, met with deep groans that make my heart strut around in my rib cage. The taste of him on my mouth takes me back ten years.

  “Give me what I need. Please.”

  His grip on my jaw as he steers my face to his has me wound up and hungry for more. Then, as if on command, his fingers journey to my blouse. One button at a teasing time, he pops them open. My breaths are jagged in anticipation.

  “Sloan… So beautiful.” He slips his fingers inside the lace of my bra. His lips close around my nipple an instant later.

  “Hawke.” The strain in my voice and the way he’s touching my body throw me into overdrive.

  He finishes unbuttoning my shirt then skates his hand down. Deftly, he pulls the drawstring at the band of my pants, loosening them enough for his hand to slide in.

  “For me?” He growls into my neck as his fingers dance over the wet lace between my legs.

  “You.”

  “You feel more than a little excited tonight. You feel… Christ, Sloan, you make me hard,” he says, pushing his erection against me. “Hard and ready to fuck you.”

  His voice is rough with need. I remind myself to breathe as his lips suck the lace of my bra. Falling against the window, I bridge my body into him as his hand rests on my lower back.

  “Love to lick you.” He makes a sucking noise that has me delirious for his tongue to travel lower.

  The friction of the wet lace and his suction makes me utterly orgasmic. I’m half-clothed and ready to blow.

  “Hawke!” I cry out as his fingers continue to con me into believing they’re on my bare skin. My hips thrust against his hand in an aggressive rhythm, trying to find the balance of coming and riding it out as long as I can.

  “Not yet, you won’t.”

  It’s a lulled command. He wants complete control over my pleasure. I hand it over as he keeps one finger on my clit in a slow back-and-forth motion as his gaze finds me.

  “Look at me, Sloan.”

  “Hawke, I need to—”

  “No, you don’t. You want to. Be patient. Open your mouth.”

  I do.

  “Suck me,” he says, crashing his lips onto the edge of mine while two of his fingers ride in and out of my mouth.

  It’s an erotic invasion combined with the way he’s stroking between my legs. It’s as though his body approaches foreplay in a whole new way, one delicious new route to nirvana after another. Little things grab hold of me in the way only big things should.

  “Lick me like it’s your clit,” he says softly.

  I start licking unhurriedly.

  “Show me.” He drops to his knees and yanks my pants and panties down in a tug.

  I step out of them as I keep licking, praying that he’s about to plant his face where I want him most. He spreads my legs then licks his way around my thighs, melting my resolve.

  Please, oh, God, please, I beg inwardly. “Hawke.”

  His mouth lands perfectly in place.

  “Lick,” he says. It’s an indulgent demand.

  I lick, and he mirrors my speed. My whole body turns over in response, every sensation of what I’m doing along with what he’s doing dragging me through a tunnel of lust—until he takes his hand from my mouth and stands in front of me, staring.

  “Now, tell me what you want.”

  “I want you to finish,” I beg him.

  “Finish what, darlin’?”

  “Hawke, please, I need to come. Make me.”

  He chuckles as he looks me up and down. “You’ll have to make yourself come, but I’d love to help you. C’mere.”

  He tangos me—and all of my pent-up desire—over to a lounge chair. I ea
se onto it. Hawke yanks my hips to the rise of the lounge and swings my legs over his shoulders. I smile as I realize Le Corbusier must have been one horny sonuvabitch.

  “Christ, I’m tempted to fuck you right now, but how can I pass you up in this position? You in my house after all these years, legs spread and ready for me. Sloan, this is…”

  He doesn’t finish that sentence with words. But he does finish it—and me. He becomes one with me as his fingers dig into my ass while he plunges his tongue into me then drags it between my swollen lips until his mouth closes around my exquisite throb. I cry out as he assaults me to a merciless degree. He speaks to me through licks and groans. I lift my head, needing to see him there, between my legs, his masculine hands and beautifully muscled forearms stilling my body as I writhe. I try to answer him, but I only release stifled moans and cries.

  “Sloan, so fucking good.” His voice is low and smooth as he says my name over and over while sliding his fingers in and out of me everywhere, breaking me, forcing me over an edge.

  “Like that. Feel it like that… Christ, to watch you come…there you go, my girl.”

  Yep—here I go, bucking like a pony with a burr under her saddle. He pins me down with an open, flat hand on my stomach as he takes me along a road of delirious pleasure and contentment.

  Hawke takes his jeans and his briefs off then kicks them aside. He stands in front of me, stroking himself. His gaze on my eyes.

  “You like to watch?” he says in an all-male tone as he licks his lips.

  “I’d watch you do anything.” I mean every word of it.

  “Need to get inside you. God knows you’re ready for me.”

  I mutter something back. Yes or Please or Put it in me already. I don’t know which of those things—maybe all of them. He pushes my thighs open, forcing them back as he palms their undersides.

  “You okay?” he asks after I gasp.

  “Yeah. I forget. That’s a lot of power you’re punching.”

  “Sorry. Guess I get a little excited around you. Breathe. Just breathe, darlin’. There you go. That better?”

  I nod, unable to speak as I grab the back of his neck, pulling his face to mine. He licks into my mouth. It’s sweet and responsive backed with a dominant urge. His mouth and his hips move in tandem, everything all-consuming and maddening.

  “You okay? God, you feel good.”

  “Hawke… Yeah.”

  A delicious shock of excitement zips through me, the nearness of him intoxicating every pore in my body. Our eyes lock, sending a shiver of ripples through my body and scatters goose bumps across my skin. Don’t stop, I say inwardly. Don’t stop loving me—ever. Don’t stop being the man I hoped would fill a hole in my life for over a decade.

  “Please, Hawke, don’t stop.”

  “I won’t. Not ever. Won’t stop.” He groans as he thrusts into me.

  Did I say all of those things out loud?

  “Sloan…can you… Are you ready?” His head falls back, the veins on his neck bulging as sweat trickles down his face.

  To watch him be overcome with pleasure because of me. If only I could make that last for a lifetime. All of it. And, just maybe, I can.

  “Sloan, are you…”

  His words are my undoing. It’s perfect, all I need. This. Him. It wrecks through me with the strength of a tornado, whirling about then slamming hard into my need, making me come in what feels like triple time. An unending roll of orgasms lift then fall, again and again in a surprising continuous thrill of ecstasy.

  “Sloan.” He speaks in a velvet-edged groan. “Jesus. I’m lost in you. I’ve never, not with any woman, had this.” His breathing is harsh; his tone is raw.

  My eyes prick at the edges. God, I love this man.

  I wonder if there will be a choice for me. A spot with him, I hope, between something or nothing. Would it matter if the choice was less than I’ve hoped for? Less than everything? I’d take something, regardless of the terms. It’s Russian roulette and maybe, just this once, I’ll dodge the bullet.

  I linger in Sloan, our hearts racing in wild beats, our bodies wet with perspiration. “Stay the night. Don’t make me beg or tie you up. Neither of which are beneath me, but I’d rather you want to stay.”

  “So my first night in my new home is in your home?”

  “Well, if you put it like that, yes.” I pull out, then split my legs over the chaise, with her legs over mine. Her wet pussy is on display and already tempting my cock to get hard again. I fist it as I drag a thumb over her clit. She needs to stay. “Come on. Does it really matter where you sleep?”

  “Apparently, it does.” She laughs. “You know I want to. It’s just—”

  “You couldn’t possibly come up with one excuse to convince me that you need to sleep in your own bed. You don’t even have sheets on yours. Mine, on the other hand, is a lush haven just waiting for your naked flesh.”

  “Sounds like you’ve decided for me,” she says, placing her hand over mine.

  “I have. Come here.” I pick Sloan up and carry her toward my bedroom. “To your right is the kitchen, where I’ll make a big breakfast, which I’ll serve you in bed.”

  She chuckles, telling me to slow down so she can see rooms we’re passing by. She asks me to zip through the kitchen for a peek. I do. High-speed.

  “To your left is one of my editing bays. You may find yourself in there sometimes too.”

  “You’re going so fast. This is too fast! Hawke, wait. What was—”

  “That was my soundproof drum room. I’ll fuck you in there soon so you can really let loose.”

  We both laugh. I’m not kidding.

  “Because I’ve really held back?”

  “No, because I have,” I whisper into her neck. “You think you’ve been fucked hard yet? Oh, darlin’, we’re just warming up. I’m easing you in.”

  “You mean you’re easing you in.”

  “Soon to be slamming.”

  “I’ll brace myself.”

  We make our way to the end of the hall where my bedroom is.

  “And this, my beautiful bride—”

  “Put me down.” She sounds strangled.

  And here we are again. She kicks her feet, squirms around, then elbows me in the chest. I set her on the bed then sit next to her, holding her hand.

  “I’m sorry. Shit, come on. I’m just messing around.”

  “Why do you have to? You keep pushing.” Her eyes are glossy as she gazes at me then away. “What’s the hurry? I’m giving you everything I can. I need you to get a hold of it.”

  “Sloan, stop. I think you’re being oversensitive. I said I’m sorry. Can’t you understand? I’m further along than you are in this. Don’t take it as a bad thing, okay?”

  “Give me a little wiggle room. I’m tired…and I need to go.”

  “No, you aren’t going home. Not like this. Get over here. At least lie in my arms, please.” I pull her against my chest.

  She rewards me with a peek through her dark veil of lashes that says she’s willing to consider.

  “Just relax, and please—”

  “Fine. Just cool it on all the…whatever you want to call it. I’m here. I want to be with you. You’ve already moved us in together and married us off.”

  Maybe I am hunting her; maybe I can’t help myself. Maybe I’m afraid that, if I don’t tie her down, she’ll leave me again, but it feels like the more I try to hold her captive, the more she backs away. I can’t help but wonder why she’s so opposed to my hold on her.

  “That scares the crap out of you, doesn’t it?”

  “No, actually.”

  “Okay, I hate to admit that I’m confused, but I am. The idea of us and permanence doesn’t scare you? You could have fooled me. Translation, please?”

  “We just need to talk this week. I realize I sound insane and like I’m talking out of both sides of my mouth. I promise you I’m not.”

  “And I promise you, whatever it is, we’ll be fine. There isn’t a
nything you could say that’ll change how I feel about you. I won’t push you for that conversation or anything until you give me the green light. But could you please make it obvious when you’re ready for us? You know—us. Not in code. I’m thinking flashing lights and loud noises.”

  “I can do obvious. I’m sorry I freaked, I guess I’m still adjusting to being back home and in your arms. I didn’t think it would feel so right.” Sloan stares up at the ceiling, twirling a lock of hair in her fingers. I steer her face back to mine.

  “Because you forgot about me for ten years?”

  “Ouch. Guess I deserved that.” She cringes then scoots her way under the covers.

  I follow her and nestle her body against mine.

  “I didn’t forget. I couldn’t stop remembering. Everything. You aren’t the sort of guy a girl forgets—ever. Even though I was young, our relationship was meaningful—and then some. Please don’t ever think I forgot you. I didn’t have a choice in regards to the way things went.”

  “Okay, let’s leave it at that. Otherwise, I may tickle whatever you’re not telling me straight out of you,” I say as I poke her ribs.

  “Hey, Hawke?”

  “Yeah, Cricket?”

  “Thanks for… Well…you’re the same boy, but in man form. I like that about you.”

  “Thanks. And, for the record, I like too many things about you, things I’m not allowed to say for fear you’ll be streaking buck-naked back to your place. I’ll just say this: You are all woman, and I’m gonna make you all mine no matter how long I have to wait. Now, roll over.”

  Sloan flips onto her stomach as I peel the covers off her body then smooth my hand down her back. I kiss between her shoulder blades.

  “So beautiful.”

  I want her to be mine permanently. Seems like a rush to her—might seem that way to anyone who’s not me. But, to me, she’s always been mine. This isn’t a rush—this is the longest damn relationship without a culmination the world has ever known. Yes, I want her to move in with me. Hell, we could put her house on the market tomorrow. I couldn’t give a rat’s ass. Do I want her to unpack? Hell no. Not unless it’s here. I want to marry Sloan McQueen, and honest to God, had she not left me, I probably would have by now. But, now, we’re on the hurry-up-and-wait train. I’m the hurry, she’s the wait. I just hope to hell that, when we finally park that sucker, it’s at the Slater–McQueen Union Station.