by Melissa West
“Do you draw? Is that why you chose architecture?”
Colt walked around to the kitchen and opened the fridge. “I like the idea of creating something out of a drawing that is as magnificent as a building, which is why my major is technically civil engineering. I’ve taken several classes in Georgia’s landscape architecture program, but I’ve always wanted to create buildings. I’d love to have a hand in both the drawing and the final product at some point. But yeah, I’ve had a passion for drawing since I was little.”
I eyed the drawing pad again, my fingers itching to pick it up. To flip through it to see what sort of things spoke to Colt. Was he a landscape artist? Or did he prefer people?
“Where is your drawing table?”
He motioned to the door on the left and I had a surge of feelings move through me at the realization that we were this close to his bedroom . . . and his bed. “There. Would you like to see?”
I grinned. “May I?”
He nodded forward, and I started for his room, peering over my shoulder to see if he was following, but he hadn’t taken a step. “I’d rather you look on your own, without me over your shoulder. It’s an experience.”
I held his gaze. “You’re surprising. Did you know that? And that’s saying something, because no one surprises me.”
“That’s because most people are predictable twits. I like to think I rise above that.”
I laughed. “Slightly.”
“Are you calling me a moderate twit? Because if so, I’m fairly certain I could convince you otherwise.” He took the step I loved, all purposeful and sexy.
“Is that right?”
And then he was in front of me, his hands gliding slowly down my arms before he reached my hands, and then he tugged me to him. In one swift movement, he pressed his lips to mine. All the ease of before was gone, and I had to fight to keep from moaning into his mouth, lost in how a person could kiss so unbelievably well. His tongue slipped into my mouth and his hands reached for my waist. Before I knew what I was doing, my hands were in his hair and I was flush against him, desperate to taste every last drop of his mouth, desperate to forget the stresses of my day.
He pulled away with a chuckle. “If I knew you would react like that, I’d have kissed you proper months ago.”
“Months?”
“Kara Marcus, I’ve wanted to kiss you since the moment I met you in your apartment. You were all spunky and fiery and ‘no one messes with my friend.’ I’d never been so instantly attracted to anyone in my life.”
I closed my eyes and rose onto my toes, gently kissing him again. “You’ve just earned yourself another.”
“Well then, what else can I say to earn more?”
I coyly peered over at his door. “How about we judge by your drawings?” I pulled away from him with a smile. “If you’re as good as you seem, you’ll earn another kiss for them.”
He laughed. “And if I’m bloody awful?”
I shrugged, still grinning. “We’ll cross that bridge when we get there.”
He laughed again, this time full out. “You Southerners and your sayings. I doubt you can go an entire conversation without using one. Everyone here uses them. White as rice. A penny saved, a penny earned. I suppose there’s a manual somewhere or something. Instructions on how to survive in the South.”
I whacked at his arm, but I was laughing now, too. “Well, you sound insane half the time. So we’re even.”
“Insane?”
“Yes, who calls McDonald’s Macca’s? I mean seriously.”
He grinned. “You’re cute when you’re defensive. Now get to those drawings before I change my mind.” He popped me gently on the bottom and I instantly wanted to abandon his drawings for . . . other things.
“What are you doing to me?” I asked as I reached for the door. “I’m a good girl.”
He winked. “We’ll see about that.”
I pushed through his bedroom door, still laughing from his flirting, and stopped dead. His room was very guy-ish, and I wondered whether it was his décor or Taylor’s roommate’s. A chocolate brown duvet, no curtains, tidy in an overly organized way—but then none of that was what had my heart beating faster, warmth spreading through my chest. Above his bed was a charcoal of the Sydney Opera House that I knew was one-hundred percent Colt. I studied each line in the drawing, careful to notice how meticulous he had been, how everything about the sketch was lifelike yet personal, from Colt’s vantage point. In a way that only he could show it. I walked around his bed for a closer look, sure that I could stare at the drawing for minutes longer, but that wasn’t why I was in his room. My eyes scanned the room, stopping at his drawing table by the window, a small stool in front of it. I edged around the table and sat down at the stool, seeing several sheets of giant paper clipped to the top of the board. I smiled. Colt had left them out for me to look through.
I flipped the top page, which was blank, to the one below it, and gasped at the building layout before me. It was simple, yet futuristic. Strong and clean and absolutely masculine. I flipped to the next drawing, then again to another and another, taking my time with each, studying them as though they were prized art. To me, they were. They were different, sometimes in subtle ways, but other times, it was obvious that he was testing himself, seeing which direction he would go—modern or traditional. I flipped to the final drawing and my hand went instantly to my mouth. All of the drawings were fantastic, perfect, but they were nothing compared to the final. It was more feminine than the others, softer, everything about it emotional where the others had been all structure. Like a strong woman instead of a tough, durable man.
“So . . . what do you think?”
My eyes snapped over to the doorway to find Colt standing there, watching me.
My gaze dropped back to the final drawing. “They’re amazing. Unlike anything I could have expected. You’re an artist, Colt. They’re beautiful.”
He shrugged off the compliment. “Which is your favorite, out of curiosity?”
I smiled up at him. “I think you know. It’s the final drawing. With the angled roof?”
He grinned, clearly pleased with my choice. “Does that mean I earned another?”
I slipped off the stool and stopped in front of him. “You definitely earned another.” I slid my arms around his neck and rose onto my toes. I would have to remember to wear wedges around him. My five-two height made me feel like a tiny kid around his six-foot-plus stature.
“I’m too small for you,” I said.
“Impossible.” He leaned down and gently brushed his lips against mine. “But there is a way to make it easier.”
“Oh yeah?”
He lifted me up and walked me back to his bed, laying me down there. My heart kicked up as the fear that always came crashed into me. Colt started to climb down over me, then stopped, his eyebrows shooting up. “Did I misread you?”
I closed my eyes, humiliated beyond belief. “No . . . I’m just a freak.”
He studied my face. “The abortion?”
My gaze lifted to meet his. How was it possible that he always knew what was wrong? Saw through my careful façade? “It’s just hard. Once you’ve had the scariest thing happen, it’s hard not to think about that scary thing . . . and it’s hard to want to do what caused it.”
Colt lay beside me, propping his elbow up and resting his head in his hand. “Does that mean . . . you and Ethan never . . . ?”
I almost laughed. Ethan was the most over-the-top sexual person I’d ever met in my life. He was a good guy at heart, and he would never have forced me to have sex, but he sure as hell made me feel guilty if I tried to get out of it. “No, we did. I just never . . . fully experienced it.”
At that he sat up and peered down at me. I knew my cheeks were aflame now, but we were already too deep into the conversation to stop. “Kara, are you telling
me you never had an orgasm with Ethan, or never at all?”
I tossed an arm over my face to hide myself, and said in the most pathetic voice imaginable, “Never at all.”
Colt pulled away my arm, forcing me to look at him. “Don’t be embarrassed with me. Nothing you could say to me would ever make me judge you. Don’t you understand that?”
I placed my hands on my stomach and released a calming breath. “I do. I’m just . . . honestly I’m not sure that I can . . . you know, go.” Oh my God. I was going to die, right here. Kara Marcus, death by mortification.
Colt laughed, and I started to get up, when he gently stopped me. “Don’t go. I’m sorry I laughed, it’s just, what you’re telling me has less to do with you and more to do with your . . . partner.”
“Sorry, what?”
He fixed me with those chocolate eyes. “In capable hands, you would do a lot more than simply go.”
Warmth spread through my core at the thought. At his suggestion. “Are you saying your hands are . . . capable?”
“Extremely.”
The warmth spread through me, an undeniable want building in its wake. Why did I have to be so afraid of sex? Every fiber in my body ached to pull Colt to me and take this as far as he was willing to go, but my mind screamed at me to stop. To think.
“Let me ask you something,” he said.
I glanced up.
“Sex makes you nervous due to the risk, right? What if we took away the risk?”
“What? How?”
“There are other things we can do, Kara. Other things to make you feel good.”
The want in me skyrocketed at the words feel good from his deliciously full lips. “So, no sex?”
“For now or forever. That’s your choice, but there are a lot of things between this”—he kissed my lips, igniting the want—“and sex.”
“So . . . other things?”
He licked his lips and nodded, and my heart began to beat noticeably faster in my chest. My eyes met his. “When can we begin?”
His lips crashed onto mine, my words all the permission he needed. He pulled back and looked at me, sweeping my hair from my face. “You control this. You say when, okay?”
I nodded and his mouth fixed over mine, the kiss building. His hand moved to my neck, then trailed down over my breast, causing me to moan into his mouth. It’d been so long since that simple gesture did anything to me that it caught me by surprise. He hadn’t even touched my bare skin and already I felt myself becoming wet. His hand left my breast and his fingertips teased the skin on my stomach, just inside the edge of my tank top.
“Your skin is so soft. It’s like silk,” he said, pressing his lips to my neck, then collarbone, where he sucked gently, turning my insides to liquid.
He pushed the strap of my tank top off my shoulder and kissed from my collarbone around my shoulder. “Okay?”
“Don’t stop.”
He reached down for my shirt and slipped his hand under the hem, tracing the lines of my abdomen, then the outline of my bra. “I want to take this off.”
I sat up, my eyes on his, then slipped off my tank top. “So take it off.”
He smirked. “Good girl, you say?” He flicked the back of my bra, unfastening it with one hand. I dropped it to the floor with my shirt and laid back down, allowing his eyes to take me in, and holy hell, his look alone was so full of desire for me that my already damp panties became even wetter.
His fingertips trailed over the lines of my breast. “So beautiful.” And then his lips were back on mine, and his fingers were toying with my left nipple, gently pinching and tugging and making me want to beg for his lips to take over, but I didn’t have to wait long. He dipped his head to my right breast, his fingers still on my left, and began to work with his tongue, flicking and tasting and sucking. “Oh, God . . .” I said, unable to remain silent.
And then his hand moved down my stomach and inside the waistband of my shorts, all hesitation gone. He slipped a finger inside me, and I cried out in complete and utter satisfaction. His lips returned to mine, kissing me hard as his finger moved within me, swirling, deeper and deeper, in and out, toying with my folds, driving me slowly insane. I arched my back, desperate to be closer to him, but he held me back, forcing me to go slow. His mouth slipped down my neck, his tongue trailing a fiery line to my breast, and I felt sure the entire building would wake up from my screaming.
Colt slipped a second finger inside me, and all thought and control disappeared. “Oh my God. God. I—I—” And then I exploded, every feeling and emotion and thought bursting through me, my breathing unsteady. He continued to move his fingers inside me, taking me through my climax and then bringing me slowly back down. I kept my eyes closed, and smiled once I was safely able to talk without moaning. “Wow. That was . . . wow.”
Colt kissed my lips. “You’re perfect.” Then he leaned into my ear and whispered, “And trust me when I tell you, that was only the beginning.”
Chapter Seventeen
Colt ran his thumb over my hand as we walked down the sidewalk toward his office and Helping Hands. I couldn’t get my mind to focus on anything but last night, the intimacy of being with him—the intensity. I wondered if every orgasm would feel just as amazing or if the first was special, like the first cup of coffee in the morning. All the other cups after the first were just coffee, but the first was like magic. Maybe orgasms were the same way.
Fantastic, Kara, now you’re comparing sex to coffee.
I glanced over at him, praying he couldn’t sense my thoughts or the reaction my body was having at the memory of last night, only to find him grinning at me.
“What?”
“I was just thinking about my plans for you tonight.”
I smiled back. “Oh, really?”
We reached Applegate & Long. “Come by later?” he asked, leaning in to give me a kiss. I closed my eyes, sighing at his earthy scent. “Hm, you’re killing me with those sounds.”
“You’re killing me with those lips,” I said, kissing him once more. I pulled away before I embarrassed myself outside of his job and mine. “So, tonight?”
“Tonight.”
We said our goodbyes, and I continued on to Helping Hands, where I was supposed to meet Maggie for our shopping trip. I had convinced myself that a single present was no big deal, that I would view it as helping someone in need, no attachments, no emotions. I could do that . . . maybe.
“Hey!”
“Hey,” I said as I reached Helping Hands. Maggie was already there, standing outside in her ready-to-pop glory, looking beyond excited. I could almost feel Tori’s judging gaze from inside the center, but I knew she wouldn’t come out to voice her opinion in front of Maggie. Besides, we agreed a gift was okay. I just had to keep it to one gift . . . or a combination that technically equaled one gift. Same thing. “Are you ready?”
“I am. Where are we going?”
I motioned to my car, parked just down the street. “I thought we could go to Babies R Us. Is that okay? You can check out a few things you need.”
“Wow. The only baby store I’ve been in so far is Walmart.”
I smiled. “Well, that changes today. Let’s go.”
It took me a surprisingly long amount of time to find the Babies R Us, even though I’d pulled the address up on maps on my phone. For all my organizational ways, I had zero sense of direction.
We had been driving for about ten minutes, talking about mindless things like the latest movies to hit theaters, when I decided it was time to ask the question I had been dying to ask Maggie for weeks now. I just hoped I could ask her without pushing her away. “So, Maggie,” I asked. “Have you reached out to Addie’s father?”
She stiffened. “I told you, it was a random fling.”
I hesitated, knowing that I was probably about to cross the line, but I couldn’t s
top myself. “But do you know him? Even if the sex was random, I think he deserves to know that he’s having a baby.”
I thought of Preston’s face when I’d told him, how he refused to talk to me for months.
“He wouldn’t care.”
“How do you know?”
She lowered her head. “He’s just not the kind of guy who cares about anything. Forget a baby.”
I pulled into the Babies R Us, and parked my car, then turned to look at her. “Look, I don’t know the guy. He could be a serious ass. I’m just saying, the baby is half his. He deserves to know about her. Just think about it, okay?”
“I know you’re right,” she said reluctantly. “I just don’t . . . I don’t know.”
I let it drop as we grabbed a cart at the store, and I worried that Maggie’s mood would be ruined from the conversation, until she stepped inside the store and her face lit with excitement. I smiled over at her, glad that I could help make her this happy.
“What should we look at first?” I asked.
Maggie’s eyes went wide as she glanced around. “Oh, I have no idea. It all looks amazing . . . and complicated.”
I bit back a laugh as she fiddled with a breast pump. I had next to no clue about much of this stuff myself. But my mom had four sisters, most with kids younger than me, so I’d been to my fair share of baby showers. I felt like I could get us around.
“Why don’t we start with car seats? You’ll need one to be able to take her home from the hospital.”
We made our way down the long aisle, and as we went from car seat to car seat, I realized I knew far less than I originally had thought. There were a thousand brands and colors and options, all seeming equally important. And the more features they had, the higher the cost.