by Avery Flynn
Because he knew that Dahlia would be there, and something inside him wouldn’t let things go with her.
“Because of the bounty,” he said.
Her eyes widened as though she’d forgotten about the stupid money. He liked that. She wasn’t rattled because she could get paid if they let this thing go further than a kiss. Her back was up because of him.
“Don’t get it wrong, Dahlia, I want to taste every inch of your skin. I want to memorize your tattoos with my tongue. If this,” he motioned between them, “happens, I will worship you. But I don’t want it on Deadspin the next day or the next week.”
“I don’t,” she gulped. “I don’t want that either.”
Anders felt his confidence click into place, that feeling he had whenever he was about to score a goal. It was like a sense of inevitability flowed over him when she let him see a touch of vulnerability, when he realized that the two of them was a thing that was actually going to happen.
He was almost glad that he wasn’t like some of the other guys on the team, drowning in pussy, forgetting names, forgetting themselves inside the most convenient woman around. He wanted to remember Dahlia, everything about her.
He leaned close to her ear. “You don’t want me to worship you?”
“I, uh, want that. I don’t want anyone to know.” Her voice was husky, and it was better than having her happy to see him. The sound was needy, and it filled him with something he couldn’t explain to himself. A sense of pride mixed with the need to protect what belonged to him.
“I won’t tell anyone, but if you don’t go back to the kitchen, someone is going to realize how much I want to peel those baggy pants down your legs and make you say my name with that sex voice of yours.”
“Anders.”
“There it is. Now, I’ll have to make you scream it.”
She looked down and couldn’t have missed the way his jeans didn’t fit over his fly in that moment. “You don’t talk like a guy who’s never done this before.”
He gripped his biceps, hard, so he wouldn’t reach out and touch her. “The bounty only covers a certain kind of sex.” He paused, not sure he wanted to tell her the full terms of the deal. “Or, anything that absolutely requires a condom.”
She chuckled softly. “The church girl loophole is closed, you mean?”
“But I know where everything is and how it works.”
“Yeah?” Her voice did that breathy thing again, and she was still looking—just looking. Her fingers danced on the edge of her jacket like she wanted to reach out as much as he did.
“All of it.” Finally, he let himself touch her, to lift her chin so their gazes met. “Go back in the kitchen, Dahlia. But come to my room when you’re done for the night.”
“But—”
“No one is going to know. My place faces the water. No one will hear us.”
She nodded, and turned on a dime back to the kitchen.
5
Anders stood up and sat down on the couch in the living room of the townhouse so many times he would probably break the fucking thing. For the first hour of waiting he looked at the art on the walls, but you could only stare at a landscape photo so many times.
He’d taken a shower before the wedding, but he took another one. Fighting off the urge to take his cock in his hand, to take the edge off, he’d shaved again and messed with his hair. He wanted to look good for Dahlia, smell good. It was almost as important for this to be good for her as it was for him. In fact, he didn’t give a fuck whether this was good for him. What was that saying about sex being like pizza? Dahlia was already Chicago-style, no matter what happened. She could have a third nipple, and he’d still want her.
When he heard a tentative knock on the door, he had it open before she could make the second knock. He pulled her inside and closed the door. Her beauty knocked him on the chest. She rocked back on her feet when he grabbed her shoulders and took her in with his gaze.
Earlier, she’d been all buttoned up and professional. Now, she was soft and rumpled. Where her mouth had been pressed into a thin, severe line when she’d first spotted him at the wedding, her face was open, and her pillowy lips invited his in for a taste. Her hands remained pressed into the corner of her jacket pockets. She had a bag looped around one wrist.
“So.” Her voice was as far off the husky sensuality she’d let him see a glimpse of a few hours before, but it still made him want her.
He wanted to hold her, craved her touch. Now that they were alone, nothing was stopping him. So he pulled her close. When they made contact, they shared a full-body shiver. The overwhelming sensation of her slim figure against him settled through his limbs.
“You took a shower.”
She let out a laugh against his chest, which reverberated through his shirt, into his skin. “I figured it would be no good if your first time happened with me smelling like fish.”
“Going gentle on me?” He ran his hands over her shoulders and down her waist, settling in the dip above her ass. The last thing he wanted her to be was gentle. From the second they’d met, he’d craved more of her sarcasm, more of the fire and flirtation.
“Isn’t that how I’m supposed to do a deflowering?”
He laughed. Today at the Temperance, she’d shown him her softer embers. He wanted that, too. But he didn’t need her to be gentle.
“What’s in the bag?”
She pulled back and finally took her hands out of her pockets. A couple of strands of her hair stuck to his sweater, and he tucked them behind her ear as she moved away from him. Now that he had her alone, he wouldn’t stop touching her. Not unless she asked.
She held the bag open for him. “Food.” He recognized some of the appetizers from the wedding. Those would be good. Later. “And condoms.”
He’d already thought of that, but didn’t want to have them hanging out on the coffee table. He’d never talked booty call protocol with his friends or teammates. They were usually caught up with giving him a hard time. He walked over to the end table where he’d stowed them, opened the drawer, and held up his box.
Dahlia laughed, and some of her apprehension seemed to float away, out of the cottage. “We’re quite a pair, aren’t we?”
She blushed, and he liked how that made him feel. Still, he wasn’t quite sure what to say. At the wedding, when he’d been trying to convince her to come to him, the words had come out easily. He was ready with fantasies of what he would do with her given the chance, but he didn’t have anything now.
“Do you want some food?” He stuffed his hands in the pockets of his jeans.
“I can’t look at any of this anymore.” She walked toward the kitchen and opened the fridge. When she’d stowed the food, she stood up and took off her jacket.
She wore leggings and a dark flannel shirt over boots. Somehow, that was sexier to him than any short skirt.
“Come here.” The hard gravel that came out with his words surprised him. Dahlia grimaced, but came closer. “Sorry.”
“What for?” Her eyes flashed at him, and her mouth curved into a saucy smile. Her voiced lowered, she said, “You might not know it, but you know what you want. And I like that.”
“You do?” He’d always thought that what he liked in his head would be off-putting to most women. He wasn’t about to try to talk her into whips and chains or anything, but controlling Dahlia in bed got him going in a major way.
His skin heated, and she reached out and touched his face. Just that touch sent a spark right through to his dick. When h bent his head and took her lips, she melted into his body like ice.
Her hands went to his hair, stroking and pulling in perfect measure. Her soft curves against his body felt so right, he wanted to roar and beat his chest. Sweet lips urged him on when he ran his hands over her hips and generous ass. Something shifted, when he plumbed inside her mouth with his tongue.
She ground her pelvis against his painfully thick cock, and he put her away from him. “Fuck, Dahlia.”
“Yes, please.” Her mouth curved, wet and swollen from their kiss.
“We should slow down.”
“Why? You’ve been waiting too long as it stands. I hate that your teammates did this to you.” She unbuttoned the first button on his shirt. And then the second. And the third. His skin sizzled wherever her fingers touched him.
“Did what?”
“Put a bounty out on you.” She had his shirt open, and she kissed the center of his chest. His skin lifted and resettled over his body at that point. He pushed her jacket until it hit her shoulders. Then she let him shove it onto the floor.
Anders had to see her. Sure, he’d gotten a glimpse of her that morning at the falls, but he hadn’t gotten to see her all naked. He hadn’t glimpsed all the soft parts, the vulnerable places. He unhooked the top button of her jeans and took the zipper down. She stood in front of him and let him.
When he ran a finger across the downy skin of her lower belly, it was her turn to shiver with pleasure. “Sensitive there?”
“Yes.” Her voice was so ragged that he went to his knees without thinking. He laid his mouth across the skin between the teeth of her undone zipper and pushed her jeans down her legs. They got stuck on her boots, but he didn’t have time to take off her shoes. He had to taste her about five minutes ago.
He groaned into her little black panties, so stark against the pale skin of her belly. He hooked a finger in either side and pushed them down her legs.
Her legs wavered, and he realized she probably couldn’t move. The idea excited him, but he paused to check in with her. Her head rolled to the side, she peered at him when he stopped. “Do you want your shoes off?”
She gave him a lazy smile. “If you’re about to do what I think you’re about to do, I’m not going to want to run away.”
He ran his hands up the backs of her strong calves and over her knees. She gasped and leaned toward him before he put his open mouth over the curve of her inner thigh. Her hands dug into his hair as he spread her thighs apart, gripping her ass cheeks.
When he licked her, he felt her nails dig in. She was all wet and ready for him, and he could barely wait to sink inside her, but he wanted her just as desperate for him. He sucked her clit, and she groaned out his name.
He allowed himself to get lost in her, wanting to beat his chest every time she made a new sound. He lost track of time at the center of her. For maybe the first time in his life, he wasn’t worried about where he had to be and when. He didn’t give a shit about what his coaches and doctors were thinking. Even the dull pain in his knee, his constant companion since his surgery, quieted down while he feasted on Dahlia.
“Anders, please.” He knew what she was asking for, and he would give it to her. He would give her anything. He pulled her cheeks apart and sucked again, precisely where she needed it. She went up on her toes and flooded his mouth with her honey.
He kept at it, needing to ring every bit of pleasure out of her, until the hands in his hair pushed him away. But he didn’t let her go. He held her up by the thighs until she settled, and then took off her boots, socks, pants, and underwear.
“Well, I think it’s pretty safe to say you’ve done that before.”
Something in his chest shifted. He didn’t like the fact that she was making jokes about what had just happened. He’d never felt as close to another person, and he didn’t want her pushing him away, not right now.
She ran a finger over his brow. “That’s not a bad thing.” He looked up at her. She wore a satisfied smile and a sleepy look in her eyes. “You made me happy.”
“If I’d have known it would be that easy, I would have done it last night.”
“If I’d have known you were that good, I would have let you.”
He stood up, and finished up the buttons to her flannel. “Want to see you.”
“Greedy now?”
“Don’t you think I’ve earned the right to be a little bit greedy with you?”
She bit her lip, as though she had to consider it. “I don’t want you to get addicted.”
“Because this is temporary?” Jesus. He felt like such a girl in this situation. The pang of anticipated regret in his chest was completely uncalled for.
“It has to be.”
She stood in front of him naked, and he was worried about getting to do this again. Pathetic. He was lucky to be getting to do this right now.
“Let’s make it count, then.” He leaned in to kiss her again and palmed her breasts. Some people might like big ones, but he liked one kind of boobs—Dahlia’s. He moved away from her mouth so he could taste her neck. “Love your tits.”
“You’d be about the first person ever.” She ran her fingers along the muscles of his shoulders and back, kneading gently. Her touch disappeared everything, like being on his knees for her had. He could get lost in her for hours and days. They hadn’t done the deed yet, and he was already plotting to get her under him again.
He kissed over her collarbone and grazed the ink that wrapped her shoulders with his teeth. While he was getting his mouth all over every inch of her he could reach, he nudged them over to the couch. He should probably get them upstairs to the loft and the bed, but he didn’t have the patience for that.
After a quarter of a good lifetime of waiting, he needed her now.
She sat on the couch and unbuckled his belt. When she pulled down his pants and boxer briefs, his eager cock was so close to her mouth that it only made sense that she ran her tongue over the head.
Before she got too involved in blowing him, he grasped her hair. Maybe it was too much because she looked up at him wide-eyed, pupils dilated. “Too much?”
“You’re a little kinky, Anders Sorenson.” Her words had a raspy sense of laughter to them.
“And you like that?” He wanted to be sure, but he also wanted her to tell him she wanted him, as he was. He needed to know that she didn’t just like the idea of him, that she liked him raw and naked—both literally and figuratively.
In the past, he’d been turned off by women who wanted him too much. They’d only been interested in the bounty or the idea of hooking up with a pro athlete. None of them, not one, had wanted the man he was inside. None of them had wanted the pimply teenager too shy to talk to girls.
He almost didn’t buy the way that Dahlia was looking at him now because she’d made it so clear that she hadn’t wanted any of those things. The bounty insulted her. She hated hockey players. But she wanted him.
“I love that, Anders.”
He kicked off his jeans and sank down on top of her. Her arms and legs came around him, and he groaned into her mouth. They came together perfectly. Although he was only technically a virgin, he realized in that moment what he’d been missing all this time—the tangle of limbs and press of flesh against flesh.
Dahlia’s sweet body wanted to welcome him. His cock dragged through her pussy, and her hips rolled, begging him to sink in deep. His breath was ragged, in and out through his nose to get enough control to slow down enough to protect her.
When he pulled back to get a condom she stopped him. “I have an IUD, and I’ve haven’t been with anyone since I was last tested.”
Her words didn’t sink into his lust-addled brain at first. “So, we can?”
She nodded. “We can. We should. I want to.”
He didn’t waste time after that; he went to his forearms and sank into her a bit.
Heaven.
When he didn’t move or try to get deeper, she thrust herself up on him. “Wait.”
“I can’t wait.” Her voice was strained, and the fact that he’d brought her to that desperate place where she’d do anything for him to be inside her brightened something inside him.
He sank deeper and lost the will to go slow. Thank God she didn’t want slow. They could do slow, before the night was over, they would do slow. But not now.
“Oh, fuck, yes,” he said when she rolled her hips and clenched around him.
He may not ever h
ave done this before, but he knew that this thing between them was good. After a few tentative strokes, they were so in sync that they moved the couch with each stroke. On the end table, the lamp hit the wall every time he got all the way inside this woman, this lake nymph who’d stolen all his good sense.
Sweat slicked their skin, and his hands sought purchase against the leather couch.
The skin on her neck and chest flushed. “So close, Anders.”
“You’re going to come, Dahlia?”
“Yes.”
“What are you waiting for?”
In answer, she dragged her pelvic bone across his. “I need more.”
He slipped his hand around her hip and rubbed her clit. She wrapped her legs around his hips and pulled him closer, trapping his hand between them. He didn’t give a shit about the awkward angle; she moved as though she didn’t care about her skin sticking to the leather. Both of them fucking like the world was ending, like they could burn it all down from a couch in the north woods of bumfuck Minnesota.
His whole body tightened with the impending orgasm, but this feeling of being inside her was so perfect that he didn’t want to give it up quite yet. She was his whole universe in that moment, and he wasn’t sure what he’d do without her.
But, when she tightened around him, her face screwed up in a perfect mask of excruciating pleasure, he let go inside her. His brain emptied until they were the only two people who existed. The sounds she made as she came probably echoed all the over the lake, into Wisconsin.
Right then, if someone had asked him, he would have told them that his life’s purpose had changed. Hockey was no longer his reason for being. Fucking Dahlia Clarno was what he’d been put on this Earth to do.
They didn’t move for long moments. The only sounds in the townhouse were the rush of the lake against the rocky shore and their panting breaths.