by Lucy Lennox
“Still are, Nico. Still are.” She gathered her hot drink and a cupcake and turned to go. Before opening the door, she turned back to me. “It’s really good to see you doing so well, Nico. I was proud of Adriana, and you seem to be doing just as well. Your mom would have been proud of you. I hope you stick around.”
With that, she was off. I was left with the warm feeling of acceptance I never remembered feeling in my first fifteen years there in Hobie, and I wondered if it was possible that people and places changed for the better.
By the time Rox returned, I’d had a few more friendly conversations with customers, several of whom expressed how sorry they were to lose my sister so young. They shared memories of her with me and I finally got a chance to begin thinking of her as the adult she’d been more recently, rather than the surly teen she’d been when I’d last seen her.
After we returned to the house, I noticed Doc’s vehicle in the driveway next to Griff’s rental. Sure enough, Doc and Grandpa were inside cooing over the baby and sharing a cup of tea with Rebecca. Her eyes seemed to be watery, as if she’d been crying about something, but I quickly realized what must have been the cause of it when I saw several boxes stacked by the front door.
“What… what’s all this?” I asked.
“Oh, honey. We packed up some of Adriana’s things for you. I hope that’s okay,” Rebecca said, getting up. I gestured for her to stay put and nodded at her.
“Okay…,” I said, unsure.
Doc cut in. “Don’t worry, Nico. It was just clothes and shoes and toiletries I thought you might want to donate. Nothing sentimental or important at all.”
I let out a breath. “Thank you. Yeah, I guess that’s good.” I looked around the room to reassure myself that nothing had drastically changed. But I knew there was no point. Before I left for California, I had to go through it all in order to list the house for sale.
My gut twisted at the thought, and I felt my jaw clench. “No, that’s good. Really. Thank you for getting started. I need to figure out what I’m doing with everything, and I guess I just didn’t want to face it before now.”
Griff reached out to squeeze my shoulder. “We can help. As much as you need.”
I gave him a small smile of thanks and wandered to the kitchen to make myself a glass of ice water. I heard the rest of them chatting quietly and took a minute to ground myself with a mental reminder of what really mattered in my life.
Not stuff. People. The people I had back home. My life back home.
But who was that exactly?
Griff. But Griff had Sam and Benji and lived in Napa.
The Marians. But I wasn’t really one of them.
Mike and the others who worked with me at the shop. But they were more employees than friends.
I felt the familiar coil of loneliness snake around me, which was ridiculous since I was standing in a room with four people who seemed to care about me a great deal. I looked over at Doc and Grandpa, Griff and Rebecca.
Hobie and home.
I wanted them all. I needed them all. Even if none of them truly needed me.
I wasn’t so sure anymore about where home was.
It was Pippa’s whimpers that woke me out of my funk. At least for a little while, someone needed me as much as I needed them.
My Pippa.
When it was time to head to West’s place for dinner, I made sure Rebecca and Griff knew where to find the food Goldie had brought over two days before. She’d been dropping off meals for me every few days like clockwork, and I could tell that cooking was her love language. Before closing the fridge, I slid out the bakery box I’d brought home from the shop and carried it to the front door.
Rebecca called out from her spot on the floor next to Pippa on the play mat. “Nico, honey, why don’t you stay over at West’s tonight so you don’t have to sleep on the sofa?”
I gawped at her. “Wh-what?”
She grinned and Griff rolled his eyes. “Nico, c’mon. Seriously? You’re wearing cologne. You really gonna claim this is a dinner meeting and not a date? Or at the very least, a booty call.”
Rebecca chuckled. “Don’t listen to Griffin. Surely West has a nice guest room in his house where you can stay comfortably while we hold down the fort here. We’ll see you in the morning.” She winked at me before turning her attention back to Pippa.
I swallowed and turned to leave without saying another word. Before the door clicked behind me, I heard Griff tell his mom, “Those are his sex pants.”
My face turned hot, and I looked down at what I was wearing.
Sure enough.
Sex pants.
Chapter 32
West
When I answered the doorbell, Nico was standing on the stoop looking very uncomfortable. He was balancing a white bakery box in one hand and a bottle of wine in another. A large document folder was wedged under one arm.
“Hey, let me help you with some of this,” I said, reaching out for the box and the bottle of wine. “You didn’t have to bring anything.”
“I know.”
He followed me upstairs to my place and set the folder on the kitchen table before shucking off his jacket. As he turned to hang it on a hook by the door, I saw his adorable round butt perfectly packaged in a tight pair of black leather pants. Dear god. I wanted to squeeze it. Or bite it. Probably squeeze it first, and then bite—
“What’re you doing?” he asked with a flirty quirk of a brow.
“Huh?”
“You were checking out my ass.”
“Well, to be fair, have you seen your ass in those pants?”
Nico turned around this way and that in an effort to catch sight of his butt. It didn’t look like he was succeeding, but it sure was cute watching him try.
“C’mere,” I said, reaching out for him. He grinned up at me and stepped in close so I could get my hands on him and pull him in tight. My gaze landed on the delicate hoops that always drove me crazy in his lips, and I felt my tongue come out to wet my own lip in response. “Thank you for coming over,” I murmured before running the tip of my tongue along his lip.
His hands came around my waist and held on tight to the fabric of my shirt against my back. I didn’t want him grabbing my shirt. I wanted him grabbing me. All I could think about was getting him naked beneath me again. I could hardly catch my breath from wanting him.
Our kisses turned feverish, and his leg pressed between mine until he used his hip to roll across my cock.
“Fuck,” I gasped. “I hope you’re not hungry.”
“Not in the least bit,” Nico said before nipping at my bottom lip with his teeth. “Unless, of course, you wanted me to answer with something cheesy like ‘My ass is hungry for your cock,’ because that is also accurate.”
There was really no more need for words. I grabbed at his clothes and pulled them up, down, and off until I had a completely naked Nico Salerno panting in my kitchen. I was still fully dressed, and something about the contrast made me even hotter than I thought possible.
I spun him around until he faced my heavy wooden kitchen table, and I tilted him forward until his hands came out to support his weight on the hard surface. His bare ass jutted out, pushing into the front of my pants. I couldn’t help but run my hands from his rounded shoulders down all that ink to his colorful ass cheeks.
“Bend all the way over and put your chest on the table, Nico.”
My cock was leaking in my underwear, and if I didn’t free it soon, it was going to choke itself to death against my fly.
Nico did as I said and laid himself face first on my kitchen table, ass presented to me like Christmas fucking morning and all mine for the taking.
I ran my hands over the rounded muscular cheeks and squeezed. A groan rumbled through me as I reached for my belt and began unbuckling.
While I worked open the front of my pants, I leaned over to run my tongue along his spine, moving wet kisses over the indentations above his ass down to the meaty flesh below. I
bit gently into him with my teeth before soothing the spot with soft kisses.
Once my own cock was blessedly free, I dropped to my knees and used my hands to press him open.
“West,” he breathed.
I sucked my own thumb into my mouth, coating it with spit before pressing it onto Nico’s hole and rubbing firm circles into his crinkled skin.
“So sweet, Nico,” I murmured. I leaned in and ran my tongue over it, taking my time now that I had him exactly where I wanted him. “So fucking good.”
I teased him with my mouth and my fingers, alternating between his hole and the piercings leading to his balls. Every time I pressed my tongue against the rings, he hitched in a breath and moaned some more until his sounds became more irregular and desperate.
“Please, West,” he begged.
I smiled to myself, enjoying the process of peeling away his prickly outer shell and revealing the sensual, vulnerable man inside. The one I secretly hoped he reserved just for me.
“You want to come for me, sweetheart?” I murmured against his skin while sliding a spit-slicked finger inside him again and reaching for his prostate. He cried out when I found it.
“Want you inside me first, West. Please,” he croaked. “Want you with me.”
My throat tightened at his words. I dropped another kiss on his sexy ass cheek before straightening back up again and lowering my pants and underwear. I reached into my pants pocket for my wallet and removed a condom and packet of lube.
Trying to get the damned things open was an exercise in futility. My hands were shaking, and all the blood was pounding in my head and cock.
Nico had begun subtly pushing his ass back into me in invitation. With every pulse toward me, his hole opened slightly, all shiny and flushed from my bites.
“Not helping,” I groaned under my breath. He snickered and pressed back again. I smacked one of his ass cheeks. “Quit that.”
I eventually got the condom on and the lube open, spreading it on myself before reaching for Nico’s sexy-as-shit body. We both made noises of appreciation when my cock finally pressed into him.
“God, Nico.” I sighed. It was tight as fuck and perfect. “Fuck. Oh god.”
His hand flew back to grab for me, catching me on the hip and digging nails into my skin.
“West, wait, wait.”
I froze, biting my lip and smoothing a palm up and down his spine while he adjusted. He blew out a breath and squeezed my hip more gently with his hand to let me know it was okay to move.
My hips began pressing in and pulling out as gently as I could until the clench of his hot channel was too much for me to hold back any longer. I leaned over his back and reached for both his hands, threading our fingers together and stretching them up high on the table above Nico’s head.
My hips jacked into him over and over, the sounds of skin slapping and the table legs moving slightly across the floor echoed in the room. My lips came down on the tender spot behind his ear, and I pressed kisses there before murmuring in his ear how hot he was, how tight his ass felt on my cock, how absolutely stunning he looked spread out like a meal on my goddamned table.
The sex-crazed lunatic fucking Nico on my kitchen table was a stranger to me. It was a side of me that had lain dormant and unknown somewhere in the far reaches of myself, but now that Nico had awakened it, my hunger was insatiable.
I thrust into Nico’s body over and over until we were both crying for release and clutching at each other’s hands. It was feral and aggressive, sweaty and hot. Sex with Nico was unlike anything from even my wildest fantasies.
“Want you to come, Nico,” I ground out between tight teeth.
“Fuck, fuck,” he panted. He tried pulling his hands out of mine so he could grab for his own cock, but I didn’t want to let him go.
I wanted him to come without touching himself.
After transferring both his wrists into one of my hands, I dropped the other hand to where my cock entered him. I slowed our rhythm down just long enough to press my thumb down on the tender skin above his hole as I slid in and out of him.
Nico made a choking sound, and then I felt it—the telltale squeeze of his body around mine that indicated his orgasm cresting.
“That’s it, baby, that’s it.” I breathed. “Let go.”
He gasped my name and threw his head back, shuddering through his release until he was spent and trembling. I wrapped my arms around him and took just a few more thrusts until my own release hit, rolling over me in delicious waves that almost forced a laugh out of me, I was so happy.
We lay there on the kitchen table—Nico buck naked and sprawled out like a sex buffet and me with all my clothes still on, lying across his back coated in sweat and panting like a dog in summer.
After a few minutes of calming down, I began to pull away from him, reaching for the condom to dispose of it before yanking my clothes back up. Nico remained fucked out on the table, and I was tempted to just stand there, taking in the view for as long as he was willing to remain like that.
Instead, I ran a hand down his damp back and leaned in to kiss the side of his face. “Come take a shower with me, okay?”
He peeled himself off the table, and I noticed the wet spots on the floor at his feet from where he’d come. Was it wrong of me to be proud of the evidence of his orgasm?
I reached for his hand and held it until we got into the bathroom. Before I had a chance to strip my clothes off, Nico reached out to do it for me, sneaking shy peeks here and there of my face as if we hadn’t just been as intimate as two people could be.
I reached out a finger to lift his chin. “Thank you.”
He blushed to the tips of his ears. “What for?”
“Well, first of all, the hottest sex I’ve ever had. Hands down,” I said with a grin. “Secondly, for coming over tonight even though I know you wanted to spend time with Griff.”
His tongue twisted in his mouth like he wanted to say something but was holding himself back. Finally he spoke. “I can see Griff back in California. I can’t see you back in California.” He crouched down to strip my pants off me before tossing them out into my bedroom and continuing. “I don’t know… maybe it’s selfish. But I…” More twisting of the tongue.
I brushed my hand across his cheek. “You?”
“I can’t seem to stay away from you,” he admitted, looking up at me with a familiar look of defiance on his face, almost like he was daring me to laugh at him.
“I sure as hell can’t stay away from you, Nico. So the feeling is mutual.”
His face softened. “Yeah? Well… good. I’m not the only one being stupid then.” He laughed softly before rubbing his hands up and down my chest. “But… West, it’s more than just sex for me. This… whatever this is here…”
He blew out a breath and looked everywhere but at my face.
I wrapped my arms around him and pulled him close before murmuring, “Is scary as shit and piss-poor timing?”
Nico just nodded silently against my chest.
“I know,” I said softly. “I don’t want you to go back to California. I feel hopelessly selfish.”
I felt his lips turn up against my skin.
After dropping a kiss into his hair, I reached over to turn on the shower. “Fuck this. Let’s shake it off and get cleaned up so we can get dirty again. What do you say?”
He nodded his agreement, and we enjoyed our shower together, soaping each other’s bodies languidly while catching up on our day. I told him about the patient I’d had who got bitten by a snake in her garden, and he told me about painting cakes with Griff at the bakery.
Nico got squirrelly again a little while later, and I asked him what was going on in that colorful head of his. We were in my bedroom, and I was searching for comfortable lounge pants that might fit his smaller frame so he didn’t have to spray-paint his leather pants back on.
“Would it be okay if I stayed over tonight? It’s either that or sleep on the sofa at home… I mean, at
Adriana’s.”
I couldn’t hold back a laugh. “Are you kidding? Of course it’s okay. You were staying here either way, but this way it’s not considered felony kidnapping,” I said with a wink, handing him my smallest pajama pants.
The minute the word “kidnapping” was out of my mouth, Nico’s smile dropped. “Yeah, ah… we should also probably talk about Pippa.”
My stomach dropped as I realized the connection he was making. Doc had told me about the run-in with Curt Billingham in town.
“I don’t give a shit what the birth certificate says, Nico. You’re her family. You’re her uncle. I’m nothing to her,” I assured him. “You know I would never let anyone accuse you of having her illegally. You know that. Tell me you do.”
He looked up at me, insecurity plain as day in his eyes, and I wanted to scream at the injustice of it all. I’d never wanted to throttle Adriana before in my life the way I did in that moment for putting him in this situation. For fucking this up for him.
“I know you’re not going to have me put in jail, West, but the fact remains that if you’re listed as the father on the birth certificate, you actually have legal custody of her right now.”
“That’s just a paperwork issue. She’s still yours,” I insisted.
“No. She’s not. Because this is a paperwork issue. I’m putting her up for adoption. But I can’t, because she’s not mine to put up. That means you’ll be the one to sign the adoption paperwork.”
“But I can rescind my paternal rights and—”
Nico interrupted. “Then she would become a ward of the state and the adoption process would have to begin again. Only this time she’d be in foster care. You can’t transfer ownership of a baby to me like she’s a vehicle I’m buying from you. I’d have to go through the entire process to qualify to adopt her. That would include home visits and background checks. Instead, you can just be the one to sign the paperwork for the Warners.”
We’d slipped into more comfortable clothes and sat on the edge of my bed. I turned and took his hands in mine.
“Nico, I’ll do what you want me to do. What do you want me to do?”