by Amelia Wilde
I can’t believe I’ve only known her for a week.
I don’t tell anyone about Andrea—not anyone I’ve met post-college, anyway. Dahlia knows about her, and so does Adam, but Kennedy is the first person to hear about her from my lips since they handed me my diploma.
My chest feels lighter now that it’s out in the open—the fun-loving, reckless idiot Gideon Hawke got played by his last serious girlfriend—but Kennedy doesn’t seem to care. She accepted it as easily as she has every other fact I’ve told her about myself.
And it’s been a long day of watching her pert ass work as she climbs over boulders and crawls through narrow trails, and I need her.
I need her.
I wish I’d thought to do something beforehand, but I don’t know if money would have been enough to sway the National Park Service into shutting down all of Devil’s Bay and the Baths so that I could have the option to bend Kennedy over a boulder and finally, finally, have my way with her.
It takes all of my strength not to push her behind every tree thick enough to hide us on the way back to the docks, and the only thing that keeps me in line on the five-minute water taxi ride is the fact that we’re sitting three feet away from the captain. Kennedy is silent, breathing hard, a pink flush in her cheeks, and I am desperate, absolutely desperate, to get those clothes off of her.
I slam the cottage door closed behind us the moment we step inside, and this time it’s Kennedy who makes the first move, lunging at me like a tigress, her arms closing around my neck, legs wrapping around my waist, those perfect lips crashing into mine so fiercely that it hurts in the best possible way.
“Fuck me, Gideon.” She gets the words out between more kisses, and that’s all it takes for me to move us away from the door, back into the bedroom. We both tumble onto the bed together, the coverings pulled tight by the staff while we were out. Kennedy arches her back, all of her straining toward me, and it’s the prettiest invitation I’ve ever received.
And I accept.
I hook my fingers into the waistband of her bathing suit and pull it off, down toward her knees, over her ankles, and toss it to the floor while she whips her sundress over her head and then undoes the top, her full breasts springing free. I’m out of my clothes in seconds, and during that time she pulls herself up to kneeling on the bed, legs spread wide underneath her.
I wrap my hand around the back of her neck and thread my fingers through her hair, now loose from its tie, and tug her head back, tasting her again, holding her firmly, demanding, commanding, as my other hand strokes her soaking hot slit.
She’s already wet and ready, and her little moans are driving me fucking crazy. I need her to be mine. I need all of her to be mine, and with every breath, Kennedy seems to be submitting a little more, giving herself over to me.
With my hand still firmly entwined in her hair, I pull back and look deeply into her eyes. “I’m going to claim you and make you mine, Kennedy Carlisle.”
We’re frozen in that moment for a heartbeat, and then Kennedy licks her lips. “Please…” Her ragged whisper pushes me over the edge.
One hand on her arm, I help shift her so that she’s turned onto hands and knees, and fuck, she’s a natural, arching her back and spreading her legs, pushing that unbelievable ass into the air. I can’t believe this is the same Kennedy Carlisle that had to think twice, then three times, about dancing with me in the club. Right now, she’s all heat and fire, her pink, perfect pussy exposed to me in the most delicious way, slick and so wet the droplets are collecting on her thighs.
Just when I think it’s not going to get any hotter—can’t get any hotter—she presses her breasts to the bed, turns her head to the side, and looks up at me with desperation in her endlessly blue eyes.
And then she reaches back, crossing her wrists together on the small of her back.
“Please, Gideon,” she begs again, and the realization of what she’s asking for rocks me to the core.
Kennedy doesn’t just want to be mine. She needs to submit to me, even if it’s only behind closed doors, only in the privacy of this cottage, far away from her life and her work and everything else that rules her mind on a regular basis.
I lean down to growl into her ear. “You don’t have to beg me, pretty thing.” Then I lock one hand around both of her wrists, holding her tight. “Not unless I tell you to.” She sucks in a breath, pushing her ass another inch into the air.
With my other hand, I reach between her legs and slide two of my fingers into her wetness. There’s no resistance—she’s that slick—and my cock twitches at the sensation of her trying to press back on those fingers, trying to fuck herself on them, only she’s held in place by my hand over her wrists, pinned down on the bed. She gasps when she realizes it, and her pussy clenches tightly around my fingers.
I can’t wait another second.
I take my fingers out—Kennedy whimpers—and suck them into my mouth. “You taste so sweet. But I want more of you.” Her hips sway from side to side, as much as she can, and I push her back into place with a firm motion that’s answered with another gush of wetness. Kennedy spreads her legs a little farther apart, begging me with her body, and I can’t deny her. I won’t deny her.
I line up my long thickness with her hot, wet slit, steady myself with a hand on her hip, and thrust into her with all of my weight, all of my strength, taking her completely in one motion, burying myself to the hilt. Her muscles clench around me immediately, pulling me in, squeezing me, and Kennedy cries out.
I stay still for only a moment, and then I fuck her hard, fuck her like I’ve wanted to ever since the very first moment I saw her in the club that night, and she writhes underneath me. After a few strokes, I release her hands, and she curls her fingers into the comforter and pushes back against me, meeting every thrust with one of her own.
It’s everything I wanted it to be.
It’s more than I wanted it to be.
Kennedy rocks against me, her hips moving out of rhythm as she climbs toward release and then, in a burst of tightness and wetness and heat, she comes hard on my cock, careening over the edge and pulling me along with her. I come so hard that stars explode at the edges of my vision, and when I’m finally spent, I fall back onto the bed next to her, the aftershocks moving through my muscles in waves.
Kennedy lies next to me, her breathing settling, and then she pushes up on one elbow, her finger tracing a path from my chest down to my abs…and then lower. Her face is all flushed. She flashes me a wicked grin, and then she leans down and kisses me.
“We’re just getting started, right?”
Chapter 23
Kennedy
Gideon is fireworks and heat, the power of the ocean sweeping me under, sheer man coiled into a body so muscular and hard that I’m surprised there’s any softness left in him.
But there is.
There’s so much tenderness, and it’s balanced perfectly with his animal need for me, which keeps me on all fours, spread wide for him, taking him in again and again and still wanting more. I can’t get enough.
He’s not the only one consumed by this lust.
I’m soaking, burning, writhing, all of his energy jolting like lightning through me, a million watts buzzing in my veins.
I lose count of my orgasms.
I lose count of how many times he growls into my ear, hissing things like open up for me, pretty thing and you have no idea what a good girl you’re being and don’t hold back, don’t hold back and come for me one more time, just one more time.
It’s never just one more time.
I’m not always submitting to him.
We shift and battle, and it’s like a power has been released from where it’s been buried deep inside me, too many years spent buried under a cloud of anxiety and guilt. All of it has been a cage that has imprisoned me, forcing me into playing the part at work, during the day—into directing assistants with a firm, confident hand and then sitting alone in the evenings, calling Abby t
o check in once, twice, even three times on a bad day, coming up with excuses to text her for this or that insignificant thing, while the rest of the things I wanted in life faded away into the background.
But I know what I want now.
What I want is Gideon.
I’m insatiable, and he keeps up with me, meeting me at every single turn to give me what I want and then some, to take me past the boundaries I always thought were the limiting factor when it came to sex.
Not that any of the men I was with in college—and there weren’t many, when all was said and done—could even approach his level of dominance and tenderness, passion and strength.
At one point, after the sun has set and the moon has risen over the sea, when we’re still tangled in each other and I’m riding him like a woman who will never be satisfied, a storm breaks over the island and the sudden rush of water on the roof of the cottage fills my ears. Gideon breathes in, like we’re noticing it at the same moment, and he looks up at me, his eyes dark in the moonlight. I thrust down onto his cock and my muscles tense, squeezing, and then lean down toward him, running my fingers through his hair.
He’s still inside me when our lips meet, so whisper-soft that we’re hardly touching. It doesn’t matter. We’ve been fucking for so long, with such abandon, that any touch is like coming in contact with a live wire. My lips are puffy from his kisses. It’s the most delicious bruise, kissing him now.
His cock twitches inside of me. When was the last time he came? Can he even come again? I trace a finger down the side of his neck, through the sheen of sweat there, and his hands tighten on my hips. He’s done this so many times that the skin there is tender, but it’s the kind of pain so mixed up in pleasure that it all begins to feel good, so good.
He takes in another breath, not saying a word, and thrusts up into me as I kiss him again, harder, harder, the rhythm of his thrusts keeping pace with the increasing intensity of my kisses. Every heartbeat is a crack of thunder in my chest as Gideon’s hips rock into me, filling every last inch of space inside me, stretching me, owning me.
I never want to go back. I never want this to end. I never want to leave this moment, with him, right here, right now. I want it to stretch on and on into eternity.
Gideon clenches his teeth, the rest of his body tensing, and he comes hard, cock pulsing inside of me, and I’m so attuned to him that it pulls me along after him. I’ve come so many times that each one is as different from the last one as my first-ever orgasm was from the last time I got myself off in my bedroom.
We’re still breathing hard when the storm reaches a fever pitch, the rain cascading against the roof, coming down in buckets, in a deluge so strong I can’t see the shore, can’t see the beach.
It doesn’t matter.
All I need to see is Gideon.
He lays with his head on the other pillow as we catch our breath, his hand stroking my hair over and over, eyes on mine. There is no color at this time of night, but all I need is the outline of his face, of his body, the smoothness of his skin underneath my palm, the hard hipbone that meets my fingertips.
I want every moment with him. Every moment.
His mouth moves, but his voice is drowned out by the fever pitch of the storm. Gideon’s eyes are bright, deep, bottomless.
“I couldn’t hear you,” I say, my voice thick from the hours of sex. I move closer, an inch closer, every muscle tired and aching and spent.
“I love you, Kennedy Carlisle.”
It’s another wave of warmth, but this time it swells in my chest and follows the path of my sunburn, from my shoulders to my toes, until I’m surprised I’m not literally glowing, lighting up the entire cottage.
“You don’t have to say that.” I say the words through what has to be the world’s biggest smile.
He leans forward, pressing his lips against my forehead. “I do have to say it. You never know what’s going to happen.”
At his words, an icy cold threatens to gather in the pit of my gut, but I’m too full of Gideon’s words to let it bloom into any kind of anxiety, at least in this moment.
When he says it again, his lips so close to my ear that the heat of his breath is against my skin, my heart nearly bursts.
“You can change your mind in the morning.” I don’t know what the hell I’m saying, only that I can’t stop beaming, my brain short-circuited by this moment and every other moment from the time we stepped into the cottage until right now.
“I’m not going to change my mind in the morning.” Gideon runs his hand down my shoulder, down my arm, then slips his palm into the curve above my hips. The storm is lessening, giving up—it was violent but short-lived, like most thunderstorms. “I’m not going to change my mind any morning.”
Those are the last words I hear before drifting off to sleep.
Chapter 24
Gideon
I sleep so deeply that when I open my eyes, I have no idea where I am.
It doesn’t faze me, because I travel so often and throw myself into so much random shit that there have been times when knowing my current location before I fall asleep is not high on my list of priorities.
This isn’t like that.
Kennedy was absolutely ferocious last night. There was nothing she wanted that I couldn’t give her, that I wasn’t damn thrilled to give her, but it’s been a long time since I met anyone with her appetite. I smile at the memories, a haze of sex and domination, the sight of her breasts bouncing as she rode me, driving her hips down with every thrust, her red hair spilling over her shoulders, her head thrown back with all the abandon I never thought I’d see from her that first night in the club.
Not until she started dancing, anyway.
It’s all so vivid that it takes me a minute to realize she’s not in bed with me.
Her side of the bed is cool, but her scent is still clinging to the sheets and pillows.
I stretch.
Every inch of me is tired.
But every inch of me wants more.
Not just today, but every day from here on out.
I told her I loved her.
I had to do it. Something about the storm, the lightning illuminating the sky outside and reflecting through the window into her eyes, the way she felt, so warm and solid and relaxed and present—they were the only words that came close to expressing how much she’s come to mean to me.
It’s only been a week, but it seems like so much longer than that. It seems like we were always waiting to find each other.
I groan out loud at how sappy that thought is. I might have spilled the beans last night, but I don’t have to find her and mention it to her out loud. Not right now.
I do have to shower, though.
One of the towels in the bathroom—they’re thick and white and completely pristine—is hanging at a lopsided angle from the hook. So Kennedy is up and about.
I want to linger under the hot water, but my heart is already beating faster at the thought of seeing her again with her hair all wet, drying in the sun. So I towel off as quickly as I can, throw on a pair of boxers and shorts and a short-sleeved t-shirt that’s first up in the drawer, and go out into the living room to find her.
Halfway through the living area, I see her through the windows of the double doors leading out to the beach. At some point yesterday, the staff set out two chairs, both with their own umbrellas to shade them from the sun, and Kennedy sits in one, her hair piled on top of her head in a loose bun that looks exactly like the best vacation of my life. She’s reaching for something on the table—another strip of bacon. The table is loaded with trays of breakfast foods—perfectly toasted English muffins, cut strawberries dipped in a fine layer of sugar, bacon, eggs.
This isn’t the kind of place where they hold back, which is exactly why I brought Kennedy here.
She turns her head, smiling, at the sound of the door opening and shutting, and then leans into me when I bend down to kiss the hollow of her shoulder. “I thought I’d let you sleep
in.”
“I didn’t really want to miss a minute with you,” I tease.
“You only missed forty. I’ve been sitting here deciding how much of this food to leave you.”
“There’s more where that came from.”
Kennedy sighs, taking a bite of the bacon. “They know how to make bacon.”
“They know how to make everything.”
She’s dressed in a flowing cover-up, white like the sheets of the bed, and it moves softly in the breeze. Her legs are stretched out on the lounge chair she’s sitting in, and the sight of her bare feet makes my heart twist in my chest.
I wasn’t lying when I told her I loved her.
Kennedy watches the waves on the shore for another minute, while I lift the empty plate from the table and stack it with food, starting with several strips of bacon. My stomach growls. I didn’t know how hungry I was until I saw the food. I’ve just settled back into the chair when she speaks again, clearing her throat.
“So, I know it’s not dessert.” I put the plate down on my lap. “I wanted to tell you about Abby.”
Her sister.
“I know it probably seems like I—” She presses her lips together, thinking. “Like I go a little overboard with things that might not be one hundred percent...safe...to do. But it’s because I was in an accident in high school, and it was my fault.”
Kennedy swallows hard.
“She was sixteen, and I was eighteen. It was Derek Smith’s house party over this stupid mid-winter break that we had—some four-day weekend in the middle of February.” Kennedy smiles ruefully. “I used to go to all kinds of parties in high school, and my parents never knew.” The smile disappears from her face. “They trusted me.”