by Meghan March
Eager doesn’t begin to cover how I’m feeling, and by the grin on Crey’s face, he has no problem with my eagerness. Quite the opposite, judging by the bulge in his jeans. His eyes make a valiant attempt to stay on my face, but my heaving lungs have my boobs bouncing in my bra.
“Jesus Christ, Holly. You’re fucking incredible.”
I lean back on the table, my hands sliding across the weathered wood. Crey’s hands find the button of my jeans and unsnap it, tugging the zipper down in one smooth motion before peeling them off my legs.
“Woman, I’m going to fuck you so hard we break this goddamn table.”
“Thank God,” I whisper.
Seeing Holly spread out on the table, eyes shining, tits heaving, and legs spread, almost stops my heart. Every fucking time. You’d think I’d be used to it by now. But there’s something about her that grabs hold of me and won’t let go.
I think it might be the universe telling me that I need to appreciate every fucking minute I have with her, because if I don’t, a sorry bastard like me might have her snatched away before I know what happened. I’ve already learned what it’s like to lose her—twice now—and that gut-wrenching emptiness isn’t something I ever want to feel again. My heart is on the line here, which is completely new territory for me.
I drop to my knees between her legs, a hand on each knee. Sliding my palms up her thighs, I say, “It’s been too fucking long since I’ve had my mouth on your cunt.”
Holly nods. “Yes. Yes, it has. I totally agree.”
I’m going to fuck the sass right out of my sassy little wife. Well, maybe only most of it. I happen to like her sass. I reach up and grab the front of her lacy thong and rip it off.
“Hey!”
“Unless you’re moaning or saying ‘more’ or ‘harder’ or ‘yes’ or ‘like that’ or ‘Creighton, you’re a fucking pussy-eating god,’ I don’t want to hear it, Holly.”
I look up and catch her saucy grin.
This woman.
I wrap my hands around her thighs and yank her ass to the edge of the table. I don’t wait any longer before lowering my mouth to her cunt.
I could eat Holly’s pussy for every goddamn meal of the day. Using everything I’ve got—tongue, lips, teeth—I devour her until she’s writhing on the table. I slide two fingers inside her just as she begins to clench and the orgasm rips through her.
The muscles of my jaw tense in anticipation. I want to feel that on my dick. I pull back, grab her hand, and put it on her pussy.
“Keep touching yourself. I want you coming again by the time I’m splitting you wide open with my cock.”
Her eyes, already hazy, widen. But she complies, her hand landing on her clit and teasing and circling it in a way that prolongs her pleasure and has her hips bucking toward me.
I didn’t think my dick could get any harder than it already was, but watching her play and keep herself on the edge holds a top spot on the list of the sexiest fucking things I’ve seen Holly do.
I rip open my jeans, grip my shaft, and line the head up with her entrance. “Hard and fast, yeah?”
She nods, her head jerking.
“Then let’s get to breaking this fucking table.”
I slam home, balls deep in one thrust, and Holly’s scream of pleasure echoes in the small kitchen. Her pussy grips my cock and flutters, signaling the orgasm rippling through her.
“Jesus, woman.”
I slide out and thrust again. Over and over and over again, almost mindlessly. With one hand braced on the shaking table and the other wrapped around her hip, I use my thumb to help her stroke her clit, adding more pressure and sending her into spirals of pleasure as orgasm after orgasm streak through her.
I’ve lost count when she finally grabs my hand with hers and stills it. Which is probably a good thing, because my balls are so high and tight, they’re going to blow whether I want them to or not.
When I pump one last time, her inner muscles clench me so hard I can barely move. Then I let go, emptying myself inside her before twining her legs around me and lifting her up to my chest. Her head slumps against my shoulder, and we’ve taken two steps toward the stairs when the table groans.
And collapses.
Holly’s soft giggle is one of the sweetest sounds I’ve ever heard in my life, and one I’ll never get enough of.
Against her temple, I say, “No more running, Holly.”
She pulls back and presses a kiss to my lips. “I promise.”
Other than my mother and my sister, I’ve never told a woman that I loved her. Yes, I know I’ve been married twice before Holly, and that makes me one cold bastard. But I don’t say things I don’t mean, and now that I’ve said the words to Holly, it means a hell of a lot more than if I said them before. Because before, they would have been a lie. I’ve never felt like this in my life. It’s all her.
Now I just have to get her to believe that I mean it. Instinctively, I know my only choice is to show her.
Spending the day in bed may not seem like the most romantic way to get a woman to believe you’re in love with her, but Holly and I haven’t had time to just be. We’ve constantly been on the move since day one, and I want some time to just be. So that’s exactly what we’re going to do.
She looks at me like I’ve lost my mind when I tell her and settle us into her bed.
“We’re going to what?”
“We’re going to leave our cell phones downstairs, we’re not answering the door, and unless the house is burning down around us, we’re not leaving this room except to get food. And I might just feed you by hand.”
She raises an eyebrow. “Are you serious? What about your empire?”
“It’ll keep running without me.”
Holly doesn’t need to know that there are matters that undoubtedly require my attention, but right now, I don’t care. I hire competent people for this very reason, and Cannon practically inhabits the business side of my brain. He knows what to do.
Even knowing that, before I wouldn’t have dreamed of letting a day go by without at least checking in. But looking back now, it makes me realize all the more that I never had anything else in my life that was important enough to take me away from it all.
With Holly, I’ve dropped everything—more than once—to chase after her, and I’ll do it again if I have to. My hope is that she’ll never run again, however. Before we leave this town, she will understand that what I told her is true: she is the most important thing in my life. For no one else would I pull my focus this far from the business that I’ve built from nothing. But if I can’t take time to enjoy what matters most to me, how successful am I, really?
I need to tell her about my acquisition of Homegrown, but I’d rather wait for another time. Although if anything will show her just how serious I am about her happiness, that might be it. Now she’ll have the freedom to take the reins of her own career, and not be subject to the whims of the jackass record execs who don’t have her best interests anywhere near the top of their priority lists.
But there’s time to have that discussion later. Right now, I want to learn about the side of Holly I’ve never been privy to before. I want to know everything about her. Not one detail is too small.
“Tell me about what it was like to grow up here.”
I’ve got her tucked against me with her head resting on my chest, and she freezes as soon as I ask my question.
I look down, my chin brushing her forehead. “Holly, I’ve seen the town; it’s not a bad place. There’s no reason to be ashamed.”
Her hand, whether she’s aware of it or not, curls into my side and pulls me closer. She says nothing.
“Holly?”
She mumbles something I can’t make out.
“What was that?”
“You haven’t seen where I really grew up, though.”
“Is it far from here?”
She starts to pull away, but I tighten my grip around her, not willing to let her separate from me.
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“No. I want to hold you.”
I’m pretty sure it’s the first time I’ve ever said those words to a woman, but it’s also totally fucking true. I suspect that whatever Holly’s about to say is something I don’t really want to hear, because it’s something that bothers her a lot. And if it bothers her, then it’s going to bother me.
“I told you about my mama. We bounced from trailer to trailer in Rusty Meadows, which is a couple miles from here, across the river. It’s called Happy Meadows, but no one actually calls it that.”
“Was it an okay place?”
She shrugs against me. “The people were generally pretty nice, with the exception of the times the guy she’d shacked us up with would toss us out. Sometimes I’d come home from school and find my clothes in the dirt because Mama did something to piss the guy off. Usually messing around with someone else and getting ready to jump ship. She called it lining up her next opportunity. Everyone else called it being a cheating whore. The thing that sucks worst about living in a small town is that everyone assumed I was just like her.”
I recall an offhand comment she made a couple of weeks ago about some boy offering her money for a blow job.
“But you set them straight.”
“I just became an introvert. I didn’t talk to anyone. Didn’t date boys; didn’t talk to boys. I didn’t want to be like my mama. Didn’t even have a boyfriend until I was a senior in high school. But she was gone for years by then. People started to forget about her, at least a little.”
“Where’d she go?”
“She hitched her wagon to a man who could afford to keep her in style. He bought her a Cadillac Eldorado and they took off. I didn’t see her again until Country Dreams happened, and now she just shows up when she needs money, which I don’t really have.”
“Until you married me and I sent her off on a fully paid vacation, and made myself into an easy target.”
Holly sighs. “But you made her go away, and that’s all I wanted.”
I press a kiss to her forehead. “Are you going to take me to Rusty Meadows while we’re here?” I’m not even really sure why I ask the question.
Holly shifts, and I think she’s shaking her head. “No. It’s not something I like to remember. This house,” she jerks her chin toward the ceiling, “is the only home in this town I want to remember.”
“Fair enough. And you were how old when you moved in?”
“Fourteen. Best thing that ever happened to me. Gran was friends with Ben and he gave me a job, which led to me singing karaoke and falling in love with being onstage, and the rest is history and would make a great country song.” She pauses. “Speaking of which, I should totally write that one. I need a few more for the big-box exclusive tracks before I get back to Nashville.”
She settles down on my chest again, and I can feel the tension drain out of her. Which is somewhat surprising, because now the subject of geography has come up. It’s something that’s been weighing on my mind, but it’s not impossible. It’ll just take some finesse.
I lean up on my elbow so I can see her face. “When do you need to be back in Nashville this time?”
“I need to be in the studio two weeks from tomorrow to cut the tracks, and I need to hammer the last few songs out with Vale once I’ve got ideas and practice them with the band. So probably . . . five or six days? Maybe sooner?” She glances up at me. “Is that going to be a problem?”
“No. We’ll figure it out. You know there are recording studios in Manhattan, right?”
Her expression falls. “I . . . I just don’t feel comfortable there. It’s intimidating. Everyone’s so focused and intense, and I feel like I’m just wandering around, hoping to hell I don’t get lost. I don’t mind feeling small in the grand scheme of things, but something about New York just makes me feel . . . inadequate. I know it’s your place, and I’m not saying I won’t go back and try to learn to like it, but I don’t think I’m ever going to like it enough to want to live there permanently.”
I can’t say that her words don’t disappoint me, because they do. I hate that she doesn’t feel comfortable in the city that I love, but the fact that she’s willing to try is a good sign. I’m not going to force her into something that clearly makes her so uneasy, but still, I think there’s hope.
I press another kiss to her temple. “Next time, I’ll show you a New Yorker’s New York. The city has enough to offer that I think even you’ll find something to enjoy. And I know it doesn’t help to tell you that you belong there just as much as anyone else, but you do. Maybe more than anyone else, because you’re mine. So if you’re willing to give it another chance, I promise I’ll give the entire city to you on a platter.”
“Okay,” she whispers.
I pull her against me tighter. “Thank you.”
She snuggles against me, and I can’t help but realize that this is the first time I’ve ever actually cuddled with a woman. It’s nice. But I have a feeling it’s only nice because it’s Holly. She’s turned my entire fucking world upside down, and it’s the best goddamn thing that has ever happened to me.
My self-congratulatory thoughts falter when she asks, “Will you tell me about what it was like for you growing up? Since we’re doing the sharing thing?”
My heart stutters as pangs of loss and grief stab through it. I swallow against the pain of old wounds never fully healed. Because do you ever fully recover from the loss of your parents? Especially when they’re ripped from your life without warning?
I pause for the length of a few breaths before finally speaking. “Up until the age of ten, my childhood was simple. My parents were dedicated to serving others. They were missionaries. When I was six, we moved to Papua New Guinea. We lived there for four years. I don’t remember a lot before that, to be honest. Everything there was so vivid and alive. Simple. Amazing. I ran wild with the other missionaries’ kids, and the mothers took turns homeschooling us. It was basically the best childhood a kid could ask for. My sister was born there, about a year before . . . everything changed.”
Holly’s palm begins stroking up and down my chest, and I wonder if she knows she’s soothing me. It’s a very wifely gesture, and it gives me a shot of steadiness to continue. I haven’t told this story in years, not since I told Cannon. Like I did then, I just have to recite the facts or I’ll never get through it.
“Sometimes I feel bad that Greer was too young to remember any of those good days, but then again, she also doesn’t remember any of the bad. Including the day trip I took with another missionary family, because my best friend James and I were dead set on seeing the tree kangaroos. His dad promised us that he’d find them for us, and he did. We came back late in the evening to the village, and found that fifteen people were slaughtered by a vigilante mob, including my parents, who tried to stop them. The mob was hunting down people accused of witchcraft. It seems insane in this day and age, like something out of the Salem witch trials, but it still happens there, even today.”
“Oh my God,” Holly said softly. “How did I not know about this? The press—how do they not—?” She left her question hanging, but I knew what she was asking.
“My uncle paid a lot of money early on to cover it up. It wasn’t hard. News doesn’t travel very quickly or efficiently from Papua New Guinea. I certainly don’t tell people, and my aunt and uncle didn’t want the notoriety. They were put out enough having to become responsible for two children they never wanted. They were the guardians my parents named in their will. I overheard James’s father telling his mother that my uncle asked if the church could find someone else to take us.”
“Oh my God.”
My face twists into a grimace. “It’s always good to know that you’re not wanted.”
Something wet hits my chest, and I glance down. Tears have gathered at the corners of Holly’s eyes, and a few more splash onto my skin. I catch them on my thumbs.
“Sweetheart, don’t cry. It’s not worth it. Not at all.”
“But you were only ten. And—”
“And you were only fourteen. If you think about it, we’re not all that different. You got dropped off on your gran’s front porch, and I got shipped off to boarding school. I’m just happy as hell that you had a grandmother who loved you, and my aunt fell in love with my little sister. Greer became the daughter she never knew she wanted.”
Holly’s smile is wobbly and utterly adorable, so I pull her up my chest so I can reach her lips with mine.
“I don’t want you to cry for me. Neither of us can change our pasts, but somehow, all of these things happened in a way that made it possible for our paths to cross. No tears are necessary; I’ve got you in my arms, and I’ve never been happier in my life than I am right now.”
She blinks, her eyes glassy with unshed tears. “Damn it, Crey. You can’t say things like that if you don’t want me to cry.”
I frown. “Why?”
“Because it’s not fair. And if you’re trying to make sure I have no chance of holding on to any piece of my heart where you’re concerned, you’re doing a damn good job of that too.”
My frown smooths into a small smile. “Under any other circumstances, I’d say I don’t fight fair to get what I want. But when it comes to this, I want you to give it to me of your own free will. I’m not taking it by strategy, power play, or seduction. I want it because you want me to have it. Freely given. Earned. And that will be the most valuable thing I’ve ever received.”
Her tears fall freely, dotting my face as she leans to kiss me. “Shut up and kiss me before I drown you with happy tears.”
So I do. And then we do something else I’ve never done before.
We make love.
Dress warm, he said. We’re going to be outside for a while. That was it; no other explanation. And then he left the room.
The last two days have been surreal. So surreal that I’m going to give myself a legit bruise if I pinch myself one more time to make sure I’m not dreaming.