by Amy Andrews
“Oh? Was that how your first time went down?” Ivy was relieved that he hadn’t tried to back out on his earlier statements, but she was sick of him making decisions for her.
“Ivy…you waited this long for a reason.”
Yes. She’d been waiting for him—it was so obvious now. And she was damned if she was going to walk away unfulfilled this time. “I don’t want dates or romance, Dean. I’m a big girl, I know what I want. In fact I’m looking at him.”
“In a few hours we’re going to go our own separate ways.” He crossed his arms. “You’re going back to Canberra to start a new career and I’m going to be here, and apart from a few crazy days in a hotel room, we have no other real relationship. I don’t have a great relationship track record and I’m not looking for a long-distance thing. We’re never going to see each other again. And you’re okay with that? That’s how you want the first guy you sleep with to treat you? Just use your body and walk away. Is that how you imagined it would happen the first time?”
No, it wasn’t. But she wasn’t some teenager in love with being in love—she was an adult who knew the realities of the world better than most. Ivy understood what he was telling her. If they had sex, there’d be no happily ever after for them. But hell, she had plenty of time to find that.
“To be fair, I plan on using your body, too,” she murmured, hoping to lighten the mood.
“Ivy.”
“Damn it, Dean,” she growled back, her frustration growing. “I get what you’re saying. I’m not a child. I know what’s on offer here and I’m good with it. I’m asking you to show me how to make love to a man. Nothing more. I fully understand that this is all we’ll have. Now can we please stop talking about it and just do it?”
He shot her an exasperated look. “We don’t even have any contraception.”
“I have an implant and the hotel”—she turned and strode over to the mini-bar selection and grabbed the packet she’d seen on the first day. She walked back to Dean and threw it on the bed—“has a three pack.”
He looked down as the packet bounced on the quilt, staring at it like it was a grenade about to explode. He glanced up at her. “Ivy…” He pushed his fingers against his closed eyes, then moved lower to rub his palms over his jawline. She noted absently how raspy it sounded.
He was preparing to reject her again. And she couldn’t bear it. The man took that Special Forces honor stuff to a whole new level.
She searched her brain for something to say, anything to convince him. But the only thing that came to mind didn’t involve a whole lot of talk. Before she could check the impulse she’d grabbed the hem of her tank-top and reefed it off her head, her naked breasts swinging free.
“Show me.”
Chapter Eleven
“Oh…Jesus…”
Her nipples responded quickly to the blatant desire in Dean’s eyes as he raised his head.
“Ivy…” he groaned, his throat bobbing as he stared at her, his gaze glued to her breasts. “Don’t.”
Don’t what? Ask for what she wanted? For what he clearly wanted? If he was trying to convince her he didn’t want her then that little husky note in his smooth-as-cream voice was not the way to go about it. Hell, if his voice were alive it would have leapt out of his throat and licked her nipples already.
“Show me,” she repeated.
He shook his head, his hands gripping the edges of the mattress, his knuckles turning white. “You’re killing me.”
Which only made her more determined. Funnily enough the next move was easier. It shouldn’t have been. He hadn’t seen all of her yet and exposing herself completely to him was a big step. But the way he was looking at her breasts, like he wanted to devour them, gave her the confidence to push on.
She’d never particularly been into her body, too busy obsessing over its flaws, but Dean looked into it big time so it was now or never. She hooked her fingers into the sides of her pajama pants collecting the elastic of her underwear and, aided by a quick wriggle of her hips, they were down her legs and off her feet in seconds.
“Fuck.”
He followed the move all the way down and then back up again, his gaze zeroing in on the apex of her thighs for long moments before moving up again to her breasts. It was hard not to squirm under his scrutiny, but Ivy held firm.
“Show me,” she whispered.
His fingers flexed several times. “God, Ivy…your bruise.”
She looked down at it. She’d honestly forgotten about it. It hadn’t given her any trouble since the night of the broken glass and the edges were starting to fade a little now.
“It’s fine,” she assured him quickly. “It doesn’t hurt anymore.”
But he was looking at it like it was a gaping hole in her side and she refused to let it, to let Kade and his actions ruin any more of her life. This wasn’t about that. She moved toward him then boldly stepped between his legs before sinking on to her haunches.
“Show me,” she said, looking up at him.
The thick pound of his pulse pushed at the prickly skin of his throat as a battle raged behind his eyes. She could see he was desperately trying to hold on to his honor and she admired the hell out of him for that. But the drift of his gaze to her mouth and breasts, the rasp of his breathing and the flare of his nostrils told her he was tempted.
Close to the edge.
A good person, an honorable person, would have withdrawn, backed down, let it be. But Ivy wasn’t being good tonight. She’d leave honor to the Special Forces.
She rose on her knees and slid her arms around his neck, inching her face closer. Her mouth stopped a whisker from his and stayed there for a few beats before moving to the right and buzzing his jawline all the way to his ear.
“Show me,” she whispered, brushing her lips against lobe.
He groaned. “Screw it.”
The sudden slide of his hands onto her hips then down to her butt caused a breakout of goose bumps across her flanks. She moaned as he hauled her closer and shivered as her breasts squashed into his chest. His head turned, his mouth hunting hers.
She sighed when he found it, open when he claimed it, whimpered when he owned it.
And he owned it.
His hands kneaded the flesh of her ass as he unleashed a maelstrom of lust on her mouth. Deep, long, wet kisses that took and gave and took and gave and kept coming back for more. His tongue diving in and out—licking, sucking, stroking, his groans a heady tempo filling her head.
When he finally pulled away they were breathing hard.
“Jesus, I could do that forever,” he muttered, his gaze roving all over her face. Ivy could feel the heat in her cheeks as he lifted a hand and pushed a strand of hair off her forehead.
“Are you okay?”
Ivy smiled, she was deliriously okay. “You’re not going to keep checking in on me are you?”
His finger trailed down her face to her mouth and traced along her smile. “No,” he murmured.
She opened her mouth and sucked the tip in. “Good,” she said around it and it was gratifying to see desire dilating his pupils.
“Stand up,” he said.
Ivy didn’t even think of not standing up. Her brain and insides had melted to a great pile of mush so direction was good. But her knees were weak and just about everything trembled as she looked down at him, his hands high on the back of her thighs, her breasts at his eye level.
“You’re beautiful,” he said, looking up at her.
Ivy shook her head, pushing her hands through his hair. “You’re beautiful.”
He shut his eyes and turned his head, his lips brushing her wrist as she continued the caress. He caught her watching him when he opened them again, a soft smile touching his lips.
“I want to look at you,” he whispered, his hands gliding up her thighs to her butt and onto her waist. Then he stood, easing her away slightly and, as if they were waltzing, he turned her around and indicated for her to sit on the edge of the mattress.
/>
“Lie back,” he urged as soon as she sat.
She obeyed, her feet firmly on the floor. “All the way back,” he said, “legs on the bed, too.”
Ivy wriggled back along the mattress until her heels were level with the edge, conscious of her breasts swaying with the movement, conscious of him watching every jiggle. She supposed she should have felt exposed lying here completely naked with Dean fully dressed, his gaze roaming over her body like he wanted to devour it piece by piece. But she didn’t.
She felt strong.
Sexy.
It took all her willpower not to arch her back and spread her legs.
Time seemed to slow and every breath was thick as soup as he took his time looking. Her nipples were hard little berries and everything tingled and burned in anticipation.
His gaze ran over the bruise on her hip and instantly became grimmer. Ivy did not want to give that any traction.
“Dean,” she murmured, a low rasp betraying her sexual impatience.
His gaze drifted up. “What?” There was a very definite smirk on his face like he knew exactly what the anticipation was doing to her. But at least the grim set to his mouth had disappeared.
“Aren’t you going to take your clothes off?” she asked.
He quirked an eyebrow. “You want me to take my clothes off?”
Only for the last three months. “I think that’s the way this goes, right?”
He grinned. “Oh…so much to learn.”
Ivy smiled back. She couldn’t help herself. Playful Dean was super hot. She raised her foot and put it flat and high against his thigh, her knee bent slightly. His eyes widened as she gave him a better view of what was between her legs.
“So show me.”
He peeled her foot off his thigh and took a step back, quickly divesting himself of both his shirt and his jeans. Ivy watched with rapt attention. In less than thirty seconds he was standing before her in nothing but his underwear and every bit of moisture her body owned gathered between her legs.
“Nice,” she whispered, feasting her eyes on his smooth chest, mapping the dips and planes of his bronzed flesh, chasing the shadows created by the warm glow from the lamp. The only hair was a thin trail from his belly button down.
Down, down, down…
“What about those?”
His black underwear complemented his olive complexion, a wide gray band boasting some logo sitting low on his hips. The soft cotton sat high and snug on powerful thighs. The man could have modeled for Calvin freaking Klein. But more important than any of that, was the long, thick erection testing the durability of the fabric.
She supposed she should worry whether or not it would actually fit but it was the last thing on her mind. All she could think was what an effective…tool it looked. Her father always said you needed the right tool for the job and Dean sure knew how to bring it.
God alone knew what she’d think when she actually saw it, but she could see why maidens of old swooned at the sight of a fully erect cock for the first time. Even concealed, Dean’s looked like a lethal weapon.
“Oh no,” he said. “These stay on.”
Ivy bit back her disappointment as she dragged her gaze back to his face. “Your chastity belt?”
He chuckled, his throat bobbing deliciously and Ivy wondered if it was possible to orgasm just from the sound of him laughing.
“This thing”—he grabbed his erection and Ivy inched a little closer to nirvana—“tends to develop a mind of its own in these situations and I want to kiss and lick every inch of you before I let it out to play.”
Kiss and lick every inch. Sweet jaysus. He removed his hand and Ivy pouted. “What if I want to…” She stared at his dick. Just thinking about touching it, putting her mouth around it had her swallowing hard. “…play with it?”
He shook his head. “This area”—he pulled out the band of his underwear and let it snap back—“is off-limits until I say so. It’s primed and it doesn’t need any encouragement, if you get my drift. No playing, okay?”
Ivy cocked an eyebrow. “Is that an order?”
He looked faintly surprised for a moment, then chuckled. “It is. Can I hear a yes, sir?”
His voice dropped to a nice low growl and her nipples tightened. “Yes, sir,” Ivy murmured with absolutely no intention of making good on it. First chance she got she was wrapping her hand around that monster. “Now can we get on with this?”
He chuckled again. “I see I’m going to have to teach you the virtue of patience,” he said as he moved closer to the bed, nudging his bent knee onto the mattress beside her foot.
“I’m getting older by the second.”
“You need to relax,” he murmured, his gaze lazily working its way up her thighs. “This is going to take a while. I want to make sure you’re ready.”
Ivy practically melted beneath his very thorough gaze. She’d been ready for freaking months. “If I was any wetter I’d be lying in a puddle.”
His gaze zeroed in on the juncture of her thighs. “I know,” he murmured. “I can see.”
Ivy blushed at how physically aroused she was but he didn’t look like he was complaining as he lowered himself down beside her. And he certainly didn’t feel like it as his erection pushed into her hip so tantalizingly close to her hand that was now trapped between their bodies.
He propped his head on his hand and looked down at her before stroking his index finger down her nose and over her lips and chin to her throat. When it reached the hollow it continued lower passing through the valley of her breasts, dissected her stomach, and swirled around her belly button.
Ivy’s pulse spiked as it traveled lower and she made a little noise at the back of her throat as it slowed right down, but his gaze held hers captive and she couldn’t look away. She sucked in a breath as his finger furrowed through the hair at the apex of her thighs and came to a stop tantalizingly close to ground zero.
“Has a guy ever made you come?”
Her eyes widened and her vocal chords almost went into paralysis at the frank question. It scandalized and titillated.
So this was how the big boys played.
Her breath scorched her lungs, hot enough to ignite. “No.”
“Do you give yourself orgasms?” he asked, his eyes never leaving hers.
“Sometimes.” Bloody hell. She couldn’t believe she’d just admitted that. But his question emboldened her. “Do you?”
He smiled. “Sometimes.”
She got wetter just thinking about Dean touching himself. Would he think of her, of this, when he did it next? She hoped so. She knew for damn sure she’d be thinking about it—about him—next time she did.
His hand drifted back up again and Ivy couldn’t work out if she was bereft or relieved. He’d been close, so close. But she was happy to let him take the lead. His fingers swirled around her nipples from one to the other in a figure eight and she moaned and arched her back.
“I like watching your eyes when you’re turned on,” he said, holding her gaze. “They go really green.”
Ivy was incapable of saying anything as his fingers kept up the maddening rhythm, circling close, so close to her nipples before skating away again.
“And I’m obsessed with your mouth,” he muttered, his fingers trekking up her throat to her lips, his thumb rubbing back and forth along the bottom one, making her belly clench tight. “I love your mouth.”
Ivy drew in a ragged breath at the surprising choice of words, but didn’t get a chance to respond or even process it properly before his mouth was proving just how much he was obsessed with hers. He nuzzled it lightly, dancing a trail of wispy kisses across it, adding in tiny licks of his tongue along her bottom lip, mimicking the path of his thumb earlier.
They drove her crazy, stoking not satisfying. She chased each one, frustrated at his gentleness, trying to get him to linger, to open, to give her more.
“Dean,” she whispered against his mouth. “Please.”
His
deep groan rumbling around her told her she’d discovered the magic word as his control seemed to snap, a hand planting on her opposite shoulder as his mouth opened hard and hungry over hers.
Ivy was ready, every cell rejoicing at the relentless pressure, her hand furrowing into his hair as she sought to pull his head closer, to invite his tongue in deeper, to grant him all the access he demanded, to stoke the deep well of need inside her into an inferno.
He could have all of her.
Any time.
Always.
She was always going to want this. Want him.
His mouth left hers and Ivy whimpered in protest. “Shh, it’s okay,” he murmured, his lips brushing against hers with every word, “I’ll be back.”
He kissed her hard, then pulled away again, his mouth moving to her neck, then the hollow of her throat, then down farther, kissing and licking a trail to the pale pink tip of one breast. Ivy’s breath stopped in her throat as he nuzzled around and around it like he’d done with his fingers earlier. She moaned and her back arched in silent invitation and just when she thought she was going to die from the want of it, the hot flick of his tongue and the firm suction of his mouth almost pushed her over the edge.
His dark head bent over her pale flesh was erotic on so many levels. It felt like glory.
Like she’d been made for him.
Eyes closed, tossed around in a sea where just his mouth and what it was doing existed and nothing else was real, she was lost in the ecstasy of it.
Nothing else mattered.
As he promised, he returned to her mouth and she almost sobbed when he kissed her again. She slid her hand onto his neck and kissed him back with everything she had, raising her head off the bed, never wanting him to leave, never wanting him to stop.
Everything spun in a delicious haze to the crazy rhythm of her heart. He’d asked her if this was how she’d imagined her first time and Ivy knew without a doubt it was. As long as she lived she’d never forget this night with Dean.
His hand moved lower again. Down, down, down. All the way this time, not stopping until his finger slid into the slick heat between her thighs and found the hard knot of nerves screaming for his touch.