New Adult Romance Box Set

by Emme Rollins, Julia Kent, Anna Antonia, Helena Newbury, Aubrey Rose

  Certain they wouldn't mind if I used it, right? I pulled it out, threw the wrapper in the garbage, found a half-squeezed tube of toothpaste and brushed my teeth for the first time in days. It felt like getting high and having a massage at the same time. But nothing would be better than what I was about to do with Darla.

  I stuffed the toothbrush in my back pocket and quietly opened the door. There was no sign of Darla anywhere as I peered down the hallway, past the stacks of newspapers and magazines and what appeared to be an entire box of Christmas themed potholders, new with tags on them. I saw Cathy slumped in her chair, a light snore pouring forth from her mouth.

  Pausing, I let myself take a couple of breaths and really thought about this for a minute. My dick didn't want me to do that but something deeper in me, the part where song lyrics poured out without effort, like paint filling a canvas on its own, told me to stop and think. Think, Trevor. This really wasn't all that different from home. My mom was likely to be asleep in front of our TV right now, her last whiskey sour diluting on the coaster on the end table next to her, the ice cubes melting with the vestiges of alcohol. The house disheveled until the maid service came that week and the quiet, the 2 a.m. preternatural calm. I could link my home to this place and strip away the differences.

  Darla was somebody who wanted more but had decided to—no, had resigned herself to—take what the world laid out for her. And in my own, completely different way, that's exactly what I had done. I slipped past Cathy and outside, off the crooked porch. My footsteps crunched through whatever made up the door yard and thwacked against my soles, the flip flops little better than nothing. My hand shook, just a little, as I reached up to open the door to Darla's carved-out little piece of paradise.

  Darla

  Mama's sugars had been fine, which surprised me, but her issues were an afterthought, my brain so full of candy and fog and Trevor and—oh, dear God, all of it. I wanted to will all of the crazy, all of the neglect, all of the daily grind away and just focus on him. I'd gone into the back bathroom and done as quick a cleanup job as I could, a washcloth, a toothbrush and some dental floss like magic potions in a witch's bag.

  I needed to beat Trevor out to my little shed to prepare and be ready for what was coming. It's funny, when I picked him up on the side of the road and found myself wanting him, that's all it had been. Just wanting a romp, something novel. An experience that just got me out of my head and out of my life and gave me some crazy yarn to spin, sitting at a bar, telling stupid stories to other people as we descended into drunkenness.

  I wasn't so puritanical that I wouldn't have a beer or eight when the time was right. My pot-smoking days were few and far between, and unlike so many people I knew, I didn't get stupid drunk. Unlike two thirds of my graduating class, I had other forms of entertainment besides Netflix and altered states.

  For me, it was the music—and now I had my real life lyrics in physical form before me. The maker of so many of my dreams walking up the steps to my little dream maker home. I'd spun this place into what it was as a haven. It started out because I couldn't stand the smell of stale cigarettes—at least that's what I told myself.

  And now as Trevor walked in, the creak of the door hinge like a prayer being answered. He closed it, slid the bolt into its proper hole and then turned to me, hair damp and perfect, darker, clinging to his scalp. Those blue eyes right on me.

  Then he said, “Come here.”

  I took the deepest breath I could muster as Trevor kissed me, his hands roaming all over my ass and back, taking me in like he was greedy for me. My hands did the same, finding tight muscles and loose clothes and a slightly-stubbled jawline that made me want to scratch myself against it forever, inhaling the sweet scent of Trevor and my own soap and a pureness.

  Lavender and eucalyptus were my favorite scents, sprinkled liberally throughout my little home, wafting through my senses as he explored me with hands and mouth and ragged breaths that spoke a language so different from what we'd said to each other even at the rest area.

  Something had shifted. Something had changed. Showing him my life and making myself naked before him in a completely different way made him more there. Our there was more there and damn it if he didn't use those large man palms to pull my ass up and grind his hard, needy erection into me.

  “Sure thing,” I murmured when we came up for air between kisses, the glow of my Christmas lights making us seem warmer than I ever imagined I could be. Time to take things nice and slow, to let this little cocoon just be. Letting go of my worries about what he thought of my life was my biggest challenge until right now.

  And then it just unfolded and dropped, like an apple that decides to release itself from its ripe little connection to the large tree. His fingertips grazed my face, as if memorizing the lines of my cheekbones, my lips, and I opened my mouth to take his index finger in, sucking and laving it, his groan my victory lap.

  Well, not quite. That would come much, much later.

  He held me and leaned me back, slowly, down to my tiny little bed, his arms and legs strong enough to gently stretch us both with little effort. So strong, so controlled—no man had done that before, a move you would see from a prince resting his princess in a bed of roses. All I had was a down-covered memory foam mattress and that was more than enough as his hands touched every part of me, cupping my breasts and inhaling me, seeming to revel in just my very presence, as if I were enough.

  Without asking, he tugged my shirt up and I helped him, my silent yes an eager response to a question he never had to ask. The confidence was something new to me—Trevor wasn't taking, and he wasn't assuming I owed him something. This was a partnership, two people enjoying each other, and it was his sense of respect for me that was the biggest damn turn-on ever, making me pulse and throb because at the core of my being I'd always wanted this and here he was, handing it out effortlessly, eyes trained on mine, sharing a sense of something bigger than us both.

  I could live like this forever. A sob crawled up my throat and I swallowed it down, the joy of finding this so great I nearly cried. Then a cold wave of air hit my chest as Trevor stripped me, his hands at my waistband, pulling my unbuttoned pants down.

  “What about you?” I murmured, eager to touch his nude body once more.

  “You've seen me naked already,” he whispered, eyes excited and impish. “Time to even things out.”

  Time seemed to move at a snail's pace and all at once with him, and as he peeled off my pants and then glided my panties down my thighs like a man who made it a form of worship, I braced myself for the full unveiling. What would he think? A full body like mine is one thing when it's crammed in a shirt and pants, but under the glow of my lights, on my tiny little Hobbit bed, would he find me beautiful? Was his haze of desire just a blend of polite gratitude and leftover peyote?

  All I needed to do was to look into his eyes and see what I was searching for, as he inhaled sharply and stripped naked to his own words. “Oh, Darla, you are so beautiful.”

  “You don't have to say that,” I blurted out, as if some inner demon was working to sabotage everything good and whole in my life.

  “I know I don't have to. I want to,” he replied, stretching out naked and lovely and manly and just so Trevor. Our bodies were long and parallel now, the heat of skin like a thin line between us, both on our sides and facing each other, my breasts full and dipping a bit, gravity winning where it came to being a bit lusher than most. It seemed to turn him on, his hands filling with me, his mouth coming to taste my neck, my clit beginning to respond and my V welling up with warmth and wetness that craved him. Finally, finally, finally we could cleave and connect and I could ride him blind.

  Seconds passed and he pulled back, one hand deep in my hair, the other making its way to find my soft, red nub and when he did—ah, that alone was almost enough to make me come.

  His mouth was so lush and searching, and then his hands lifted my hips, beckoning me to straddle him. I bent down, first, and
grabbed my purse. This was embarrassing but a necessary step. No babies for me (yet), thank you. I handed him the foil wrapper and he nodded appreciatively, rolling on the condom with a respectful grace that made me want him even more.

  Not that that was possible.

  The slide of his hands against my skin, the sound of his breath along my shoulder, how he just was, all Trevor and strong muscle and warmth and flame, his hands moving me and urging me to climb on top of him, my body feeling free and real once more and forever—it made me close my eyes and just feel. His fingertips tickled my ribs, making me shiver as I became a bit coy, not letting him enter me just yet, wanting to stretch the moment out long enough to kiss that incredible mouth one more time, our lips touching and then hungry.

  My head nearly exploded as his hand slid in my hair and grasped a handful, gently but firmly pulling my head back as his eyes sought mine. Most guys didn't kiss much during sex, much less look at you. It was like all that was there was body parts and hands. This? It was more like all that was there were our souls, and the flesh was an afterthought.

  “Darla,” he murmured, the word suspended in the air between us, as if hung by the moon and stars and some sort of life force that drove the universe. Inhaling felt like a form of supplication and as our eyes remained locked I fought my usual inclination to look away, to be unnerved by the depth of emotion that flowed between me and another person. No expression, no deflection, no defenses.

  It fed my hungry heart. Each breath infused love into my soul, and even if it wasn't the kind of love that lasted, it was here for this second, for this inhale, for this instant, suspended in time. If I couldn't have this forever, I could have it now and be nourished and treasured and enjoyed. How many people could say that?

  “Yes?” I answered, unsure suddenly, a bit muddled in the head by all of this, with a body raring to go and shaking with anticipation. Whoever I'd thought Trevor Connor was, it had been a cardboard shadow compared to the man under me, the man who, as I let my thoughts come back into focus, stole another kiss.

  His hands rested on my hips, face serious. “I've never felt this way before.”

  Oh. Oh! Oh! Oh! Please mean it, please mean it, please mean it, my mind screamed and my heart prayed. Don't forget me! my wetness shouted, lost in the fray.

  We were about to get to that.

  My answer was to shift, just enough, so that the tip of him was right at the gateway to my body, the groan from his sensual mouth all the response I needed. In the light of the moon and the glow of all we'd created here, I slowly lowered my body over him, enveloping his hard offering, and then sunk into the deep pleasure of our bodies joining, the hot, full feeling quenching so many needs in me that I thought I'd gone to heaven.

  Trevor stretched one arm up and under his head, as if relaxing after a hard day of work, the pensive grin on his face so gratifying. His other hand reached down and slid between our bodies, reaching for my—oh!

  “What are you—” I started to ask, and instantly I knew exactly what he was doing, touching and stroking my clit in a way that made my sex walls clamp down, hard, the distance from heightened arousal to OHMYGOD as long as one of his fingers.

  Somehow, he sat up, his ab muscles turning into little bulges of rock-hard yumminess as my hands dug into his chest and ribs, my pelvis rocking to his fingers as they played me like a guitar string. “What am I doing, Darla?” he asked, husky and gravel and sandpaper in his voice—but perfect silk in his touch.

  “You're playing me,” I gasped. No man had done this before—touching my little nub as he was in me, making all the pleasure points cry out at once. Trevor took the lead and, from under me, rocked his hips, pumping his ass up and pulling back, some sort of athletic control I couldn't fathom allowing his body to move with incredibly fluid grace. It was holy. It was surreal.

  And it rocked my world.

  “No,” he whispered, sliding himself in, then out, pulling back and speaking through gritted teeth as his fingers played a lovely imagined melody, “you're playing me. You're like a hot, wet vise.” He pulled the arm behind his head out and stroked my breasts, pinching in time to his thrusts up. I leaned down and pressed my hands against his shoulders, a smattering of hair damply stuck to his forehead, his eyes leaving that intense gaze and going unfocused. We were both so, so close, and then—

  We tipped over together. A wave of cotton and spirit encircled us, making my ears rush with pumping blood and found dreams as wave after wave of climax crashed over me and Trevor, his hips thrusting himself so hard into me I cried out from the pleasure-pain of being delved into so deeply, of being known so thoroughly. A strangled groan of ecstasy made his neck tighten and he was oh, so beautiful in that split second, an image of abandon and release and I was doing that to him. Me.

  And then my own screaming orgasm flushed through my entire body, from the top of my head to my toes, all wracked clenching and unremitting joy, hips shifting and demanding he fill me and move me with more, more, more. I cried out and the hand he'd been using on my sweet spot stroked my face, fingers tracing my lips, giving me a taste of myself, the act of wild eroticism adding to my climax, bursting me to an explosion that went on and on, endless, taking me some place so pure I could only be, living in full communion with some divine kind of love that was a blend of our breath, our sweat, our juices, our touch and moan and—

  Our everything.

  Like everything, though, it couldn't last, my body struck dumb for burst after burst of this sensuality, Trevor's own orgasm pounding into me and making me feel so honored, so needed, bodies in concert and playing a song we hadn't even created yet. As the throbbing receded slowly, I found myself first hearing our breathing, my body panting while Trevor's took slow, deep inhales to steady himself. A slickness connected us at the pelvis, my hips and mons covered with what I realized was my own juices, his safely contained in the condom (thank goodness), my body more primed and responsive than ever.

  My naked soul was so grateful. I leaned down over him, pressing my lips to the soft spot under his stubbled jaw. His hands covered my back, then one came up along my hair line and pulled my messy mop off my face. The grin we shared said all the words that, spoken out loud, would have sounded stupid.

  So we stayed silent, until Trevor said apologetically, “I need to take care of this,” and I slid off him. Having him out of me felt like an immediate emptiness I didn't like but didn't know had been there before. Sore and a little befuddled, I just watched his dimpled ass as he walked away, took care of things at the trash can, and came back to the bed, pulling a cotton blanket we'd thrown off the edge onto us.

  And then we just spent a long time breathing together. It was all we needed.

  Trevor broke the silence first, which was fine with me, because I had no idea what to say. There wasn't any kind of class at my high school or college for what to say after fucking a naked hitchhiker in a potting shed.

  “Can I ask you a strange question?” Trevor asked, stroking my arm from the shoulder down to the elbow in a long, languid, gentle way that made me feel like a little baby having its back rubbed to sleep. It felt divine and he could ask me whatever he wanted at this point.

  “Go ahead,” I said, sleepy and sated.

  “What happened to your mom's foot?”

  That was not the question I was expecting and it shook me out of my trance. “That...that happened when I was four,” I said, my feet and hands going numb at the change of topic.

  Trevor had no idea what he had just asked and if he kept prying I was going to curl inward like a potato bug in too much sunlight. He seemed to sense that he'd encroached on some sort of place where he wasn't wanted but I could tell he wasn't going to back off. A creepy-crawly feeling covered my skin, marching on like soldiers in combat, not in a rush, but steadily progressing to get in place to defend.

  “What kind of accident, Darla?” he whispered in my ear. His hand froze and then the whole of his palm pressed against my shoulder, warm and comforti
ng the way someone treats you when you've lost someone you loved and they don't know what to say.

  “Car.” I was reduced to one syllable answers. Nobody really talked about this. I was only four when it happened and even I didn't really have the words to tell Trevor what I knew he wanted to know. Layer by layer he had penetrated—and no, not just sexually—me. Now he was going in deeper, like a prince with hedge clippers, trimming away the thorns to get to the castle to rescue the sleeping princess which, I supposed, would be me in this analogy.

  Or maybe my pain.

  “The car accident,” he asked, “were you in the car?”

  Oh, how I had wished I had been, at least when I was little. For so many years I'd wondered how different our life would be if I had been in the car with Daddy and Mama, with Aunt Marlene and Uncle Jeff.

  “No,” I said, shaking my head. My heart went still and zoomed up all at once and it became hard to breathe, hard to feel, hard to stay here with Trevor who, for some godforsaken reason, kept asking more. It was almost like he genuinely cared and wanted to know more about me because—well, why? Asking all these questions had to mean something, right?

  He gently pulled my shoulder toward him and I had no choice but to respond, the bed so tiny I couldn't exactly pull away or I'd fall off. He was the only man I'd ever had in here, so this was all new on so many different levels. First of all, this was not a bed made for two people. I rotated my body, my hips sliding against wetness, a proud sort of blooming inside me recognizing that it was a symbol of what we'd just done.

  Face to face, I couldn't hide anymore but I could close my eyes because his right now were searching, and deep, and questioning. That was the problem. Trevor was taking all of this far too far. What I thought was supposed to be some fun, something wacky, something to add to my list of Stupid Things That Darla Did For Stupid Reasons was quickly becoming Something That Darla Had Always Hoped Could Be.