by Mari Carr
Love him.
Not just desire him. Not just aroused by him, wanting him. But in love him.
She loved him and now she was finally going to make love to him.
Raking her nails up his back, she thrust her hips, hooking one leg around the back of his thigh. The move spread her folds a little and his cock dipped into her heat before nudging her clit again.
She arched her back, driving her heel against his butt. Wanting him inside her.
Wanting…
Dylan tore his lips from her, running a hand down her side, along the length of the leg hugging his hip as he raised his head and gazed down into her face. His dimple creased his cheek. “Want me to take my hat off?”
Monet shook her head. “Don’t you dare.”
“Fair enough.” His fingers journeyed her leg until, with a quick shift of his arm, her knee was draped over the crook of his elbow. “Ready?”
Monet smiled, even as her heart beat faster in her chest. “You better believe it, cowboy.”
He tsked. “Stockman, love. Stockman.”
And he thrust into her.
One long, fierce, deep thrust that stretched Monet to her limit and filled her head with glorious swirls of color.
“You’re so tight, Monnie.” His voice was strained. His eyes burned, his stare holding hers. “So tight.”
Monet wanted to say something back but couldn’t. The pleasure of his cock slowly withdrawing from her gripping pussy wouldn’t let her. Instead, she clung to him, one leg pulled high to her shoulder, the other stretched beside Dylan’s as—just as slowly—he sank back into her sex. Deeper and deeper until the root of his shaft kissed her clit.
“So fucking tight,” he murmured. “And so fucking perfect.”
He withdrew again, until she could feel the distended head of his cock spread her folds before, with a thrust more powerful than its predecessors, he drove back into her heat once more.
And again.
And again.
With every thrust, Dylan’s speed grew. With every penetration, Monet’s pleasure mounted. With every steady withdraw, with every punching stroke, her body grew hotter. Hotter. When his lips captured hers, when the brim of his hat bumped her forehead, it was all she could do to hold on and ride the pleasure swelling inside her. He kissed her, demanding and dominating, and she moaned into his mouth and gave him everything he wanted. Gave him her mouth, her tongue, her cunt.
Kissed him, fucked him. Squeezed her sex around his cock, gripping it with her inner walls as he slammed into her, his speed increasing. Growing faster. Faster. Sending shards of liquid electricity into her soul with every dragging stroke against her clit.
“Christ, Monet,” he moaned into her mouth, “not much longer. Not much…”
He slammed into her again. Harder. Harder.
A fuzzy part of her mind told her he was palming her breast beneath her bra, his fingers pinching her nipple. Another part told her she was scoring the taut flesh on his shoulders with her nails.
And it was the way it was meant to be. It was right. It was exquisite. Except…except…
She broke the kiss, Dylan’s groan of protest feeding the building tension in her sex. “Dylan,” she rasped, fisting a handful of his hair. “I’m going to come. I’m going to come and I want—”
He lifted his head and gazed into her eyes. “To see my face when you do,” he finished, the words a breathless growl. “Come for me, Monnie.” He slammed into her, jaw bunched. “Come for me now. Before I can’t—”
She came. A paroxysm of pleasure so intense, so complete, she barely had time to register the fact Dylan’s hat was still on his head before she was lost to her release, his name bursting from her lips as her name roared past his, her arms wrapped around his shoulders as his rhythm failed him and he pumped into her sex. Filling her. Filling the condom.
And as her climax peaked, it dawned on her he hadn’t even come close to embarrassing himself.
She wondered exactly how many more condoms he had in his luggage.
Chapter Ten
“Why Black Friday?”
Monet lifted her head from where it lay resting on her crossed arms, opening her eyes to look at Dylan. He was sitting on the bed beside her, his back against the headboard as he cast his attention over the open New York Times in his hands.
He looked so perfect there on her bed—finally on her bed, not the sofa—his golden-brown chest calling to be touched, his long, lean legs stretched out before him on top of the sheets. His black boxers—which he’d slipped on to retrieve the morning paper from Monet’s door fifteen minutes ago—highlighted the deep tan the Australian sun had given him, a sight Monet found very appealing indeed. If she wasn’t so damn comfortable stretched out on her belly, his body heat seeping into her side, his distinctly masculine scent threading through every breath she pulled, she’d climb from the bed, find her closest sketchbook and capture his gorgeousness on paper.
But she was comfortable. Damn comfortable. And her closest sketchbook was at least a good fifteen feet away out in her studio.
“We have a Black Friday in Australia,” Dylan went on, “but it’s named after a bush fire that destroyed whole towns.” He cast her a quick sideways look around the edge of the Times. “I’m guessin’ your Black Friday has nothing to do with fire?”
Monet shifted on the bed until she lay on her side, resting her head on her hand as she smiled at him. “No. It was originally called Black Friday because the number of people who went out shopping in Philadelphia after Thanksgiving made the streets and sidewalks hell. Somewhere around the eighties, people started referring to it that way because supposedly the retails stores turned a profit after that day.”
He frowned at the paper in his hands. “And people really get out of bed to go shopping at four in the morning?”
Monet grinned. “They do.”
Dylan shook his head. “Bloody idiots.”
“And what do you do at four in the morning, Mr. Oh-So-Mighty Sullivan?”
He closed the paper, folded it carefully and then tossed it over his shoulder as he rolled onto his side to face her. “Sleep.” He pulled a face. “Or muster a herd if it’s summer or sale day. Or find a snake to put in Hunter’s boots if he’s been out on the town the night before.” His grin returned. “But my favorite thing is sleep. Definitely not going to the bloody shops, I can tell you that.”
“What if the most perfect prize bull was only going to be on sale at four thirty and every other cowboy—I mean stockman,” she corrected when he cocked an eyebrow at her, “was going to be there to try to buy it. Would you get out of bed to go to the ‘bloody shops’ then?”
Dylan laughed, placing his hand on the curve of her bare hip and smoothing his hand over the gentle dip of her waist. “Oh well, that’s different. If it’s something important like Angus.”
Monet rolled her eyes. “You are such a cowboy,” she said, emphasizing the cow. She was doing her damndest to appear indifferent to the wicked sensations his hand was creating simply by brushing over her waist. It was hard. Especially when her heart tripped into a hiccuppy little pace and her pussy contracted the second his thumb traced the curve of her rib cage. And then higher. “You’d get up at four to buy a bull or give your brother trouble but not for anything else?”
His fingers feathered over the pointed tip of her nipple. “I’d be up at four a.m. for you every day of the week.” He skimmed his hand down her arm, wrapped his fingers around her wrist and guided her hand under his boxers to his cock. His very erect, very thick cock. “Just like this.”
Monet couldn’t stop her low moan. Nor could she stop her fingers circling his impressive girth and squeezing. She didn’t want to stop. His flesh was like velvet steel against her palm. It made her pussy throb with urgent want.
“Have I told you how much I love the feel of your hand on my dick?”
Dylan’s hoarse question rasped against her senses. She shivered, the raw hunger in his voice potent.
She slid her fingers down his length until she cupped his scrotum, giving its heavy weight a gentle tug. “What about the feel of my hand on your balls? Do you love that as well?”
His eyes closed, his breath growing ragged. “Oh yeah.”
She kneaded them, watching his nostrils flare. Reveling in the way his jaw bunched and his Adam’s apple jumped up and down in his throat. “So, you’d get up for me every morning at four?”
“Every day,” he answered, although the words were a barely audible groan. Probably because she’d shucked his boxers down over his hips and had returned her hand to his cock, pumping it with slow, firm pressure. “Especially if you’re going to do that.”
Monet smiled. “What if I did this?” She shifted on the bed, pushed him flat onto his back and, without hesitation, straddled his face and took his cock in her mouth.
“Fuck!”
The curse burst from Dylan a second before he gripped her hips and plunged his tongue into her sex.
Monet pushed back toward his penetrations, sucking on his growing cock as she did so. She rode his face, taking pleasure from his lashing tongue in her pussy, mimicking with her mouth the rhythm of her hips.
He groaned and shoved his hips upward, his fingers digging into her ass cheeks, his knees bending. His tongue laved her clit, swiped into her folds and back to her clit again. She hummed her approval around his thrusting cock and he groaned again, his grip intensifying.
Monet didn’t relent, fucking him as hard and fast as she could with her mouth. She’d never get tired of giving him head. His cock filled her mouth so perfectly, slid over her tongue, pressed at the back of her throat. She hummed again, wanting to feel Dylan’s reaction. He gave it to her, nails driving into her flesh, tongue plunging deeper into her sex.
It was exquisite torment. She never wanted it to end. She wanted to live in this moment forever.
He licked his tongue up over her perineum, into her anus, and she let out a cry, concentrated pleasure surging through her.
Dylan assaulted her ass with his tongue, each stabbing thrust driving her closer, faster to release. She stilled above him, allowing herself the sheer indulgence of his worship for a moment, her whimpers slipping from her parted lips, her eyes closed. She hovered there on the brink of orgasm, his tongue in her ass, his hands on her flesh, roaming her butt, hips, inner thighs.
Her pussy.
He rubbed a finger—or it could have been his thumb, she didn’t know, didn’t care—over her clit, laving her ass as he did so. Propelling her closer to the edge. Closer.
She returned her mouth to his cock, the taste of his pre-come like ambrosia. She wanted to come with him. Wanted to feast on his seed as she came on his face.
Sliding her lips up and down his throbbing length, she sucked hard. Plunging deep and then withdrawing to the very tip, over and over and over again, her orgasm like twisting fire building in her core. Threading through her very existence. Scorching its way from her center, through her body, through her soul.
Dylan’s fingers left her clit, sank into her wet sex and she came. Just like that. Her orgasm gushed from her, shuddering waves of pleasure that stole any ability to think. To act. All she could do was let it crash over her as her mouth continued to fuck Dylan’s cock. Take it deeper as his tongue fucked her ass and his fingers fucked her cunt.
And then, as his tongue left, he let out a roar and he came, his hips slamming upward, his come flooding her mouth, the back of her throat.
She took it all, every thick spurt, sucked greedily on his release.
His moans turned to pants, his pants to gasping giggles. It was the most perfect sound. The laughter of absolute pleasure. She loved it. As much as she loved him.
Which was more than she could find words for.
Slowly sliding her mouth from his spent cock, she rolled to the bed, letting her thigh drape over his chest as she rested her cheek on his hip. “Now that’s better than shopping.”
Dylan laughed, lacing his fingers behind his head. “Bloody oath it is.”
Monet smiled, the Australian expletive making her feel warm and fuzzy inside. Who would have thought she’d fall in love with an Australian cowboy?
More importantly, what was she going to do about it?
Tell him how she felt? Ask him to stay? Google Green Card applications?
“Dylan?” She shifted on the bed, pushing herself up to face him and tucking her knees under her chin. Her heart beat fast, thumping its way into her throat. Her lips tingled. “Would you…”
She paused. What was she doing? Was she really going to take the next step? Was she really?
He gave her a cheeky grin. “Would I what? Make breakfast? Sing Waltzing Matilda? Make breakfast while singing Waltzing Matilda?”
Oh God, should she ask him? Ask him to stay with her?
“Would you…would you…like to have a picnic lunch in the park today?”
Chicken.
He looked at her, his expression unreadable, and for a moment she thought he was going to call her out. But then his grin returned and he sat up to place a quick kiss on her lips, the subtle perfume of her juices tickling her senses. “Sounds like a plan, Stan.” He swung his legs to the floor, kicked off the boxers still tangled around his ankles and pushed himself off the bed, crossing to the door. Buck naked and so goddamn sexy Monet wanted to moan. “As long as I don’t have to eat another hotdog from those sidewalk trolleys. Call me unadventurous, but I don’t think my delicate Aussie stomach is cut out for that kind of food.”
She laughed, even as her pulse pounded in her ears. Even as she tried desperately to hide how scared she was.
Watching him walk through the door, she stayed on the bed. Unable to move. It wasn’t until she heard the sounds of the shower running a few moments later that she finally succumbed to the fear gnawing away at her belly.
Fear. God, how could she have gone from rapturous pleasure to gut-churning fear so quickly?
Because you’ve fallen in love with an Australian cowboy, because there’s no guarantee he loves you back and, worst of all, there’s no reason you can possibly think of to ask him to stay in New York even if he did. Isn’t that enough?
She dropped her forehead to her knees and scrunched her eyes tight. “Bloody oath it is,” she muttered. “Bloody oath it is.”
Five minutes later, Dylan stood in her room again, his hair a tousled mess of damp honey-gold strands, his exquisitely muscled legs covered by faded denim jeans, his fingers buttoning up a soft black chambray shirt she hadn’t seen before. It wasn’t one he’d bought here, which meant it must have come from his luggage.
His luggage from Australia.
Because that was where he was from. And unless she said something, that was where he would return. Is that what she wanted?
Ignoring the question, she hurried off the bed. She couldn’t bring herself to think about Dylan being away from her anymore.
Chicken. Again.
“How ’bout a greasy, touristy breakfast at Ellen’s Stardust Diner?” she all but shouted, snatching clean clothes from her bureau. “And then we can brave the Black Friday madness and buy some cold cuts and French rolls from Whole Foods. A hotdog-free meal but still very New York.”
Dylan’s appreciative hum made her turn halfway through yanking her jeans up her legs. He leaned one broad shoulder against the doorframe, the dimple in his right cheek flashing at her. “I’m becoming quite partial to the idea of ‘very New York’.”
The buzz of her apartment’s intercom cut through the room.
Biting back a curse, she tugged her jeans all the way on, zipped her fly and walked to her front door, all too aware Dylan watched her the whole time. There was something going on in his head. She could tell.
Her buzzer sounded again, making her jump. And swear.
“Yes, Tommy?” she asked, pressing the button to activate the speaker to the doorman’s desk.
“There’s a flower arrangement here for you from the Kerrie Ande
rson Gallery, Ms. Carmichael,” the doorman answered. “A rather large vase of what I believe are Australian eucalyptus flowers. Would you like me to have Franklin bring it up?”
Behind her, Dylan laughed.
Monet pressed the button again. “You can keep it for the day, Tommy. Dylan and I are just about to head out.”
“Very good, Ms. Sullivan.”
She turned back to Dylan, her heart still doing its damndest to beat its way out of her chest, and froze when she noticed two very significant things.
One, Dylan’s hat was nowhere to be seen.
And two, he was looking at her with open, undeniable lust.
“Are…are you ready to go?” she stammered.
He shook his head. “Not yet.” His accent played with her senses. “There’s something I need to do first.”
* * * * *
It took them at least an hour to leave the apartment. Dylan blamed it on Monet’s jeans. They were so snug they showed off her sexy arse to perfection. It was all he could do not to strip them from her the second she’d finished talking to her doorman. As it was, he’d pressed her to the door, pinned her wrists beside her head and kissed her until she could barely stand. Then he’d worshipped her breasts, unadorned by bra or shirt, sucking on her dark, hard nipples, refusing to stop until she came, her cries of release as powerful as the aching throb in his cock.
Here he was, four hours later, the chilly autumn wind playing through his hair, the sounds of New York filling the air like a mad cacophony, Central Park a green oasis in a sea of gray around him, and his cock still ached.
He’d gently removed Monet’s hands from his belt buckle when she’d finished climaxing, shaking his head with a small smile on his lips. “Later,” was all he’d said.
She’d given him a curious look, almost a cautious one, but he hadn’t relented. He couldn’t. He knew then, just as he knew now, if he’d let Monet unzip his fly and withdraw his hard-on from his jeans they’d still be in her apartment making love. And while that was the only thing he wanted to do—make love to her, worship her, give her pleasure over and over again as she gave him pleasure in return—he couldn’t let himself.