Price of a Kiss

by Linda Kage

  “What?” I asked innocently, honestly confused.

  “Just touch it already,” he pleaded from between clenched teeth.

  Jeez, okay. He didn’t have to be an impatient crabby pants about it. I reached out and petted the length of it with two fingers as if timidly greeting a live, rabid animal.

  Sweat beaded on Mason’s brow. He looked tortured, but he appeared to love every second of his suffering. “You are such a comedian. You know that’s not what I meant by touch it. It’s not a freaking dog.”

  “Um, no. I’d say this thing is more the size of a bull.”

  He gave a choked laugh. As much as he wanted me to get with the program, he was still having fun. I loved it. I’d never had fun while that other guy who-shall-not-be-named had been naked in front of me. I liked having fun with Mason.

  “Now, why am I doing all the touching here?” Faking a pout, I sat back on my haunches and slapped my hands to my hips. “You haven’t inspected one inch of me yet. Don’t you like what you see?”

  “I love everything I see.” His eyes glazed with instability as he frantically clutched the sheets under him. I was worried I might’ve pushed him a little too far. A little dirty teasing was fine; driving a man to hormonal homicide was not.

  His brow glistened as if he had a fever. “But if I touch you right now, that’s it. I won’t be able to stop. I wanted to make sure you have all your playtime in before I get started.”

  “Aww.” I patted his belly, a bare three inches from the head of his oozing penis. “Thinking of me first. That’s so sweet. Thank you.”

  “Yeah, I’m a frigging saint. Now will you please touch my dick like you mean it before the damn thing explodes?”

  “Oh, all right.” I let out a resigned sigh as if giving in to his demands was such a bother. Then I leaned over and touched his dick—with my tongue—stroking it all the way from base to tip with a hot, wet stroke.

  He shouted out my name and bucked us both a couple of inches off the bed.

  “What did I do wrong this time?” I demanded, sitting up again to pierce him with a pointed look.

  Panting, he stared up at me through a wild glaze. “N…nothing. That was…that was…perfect.”

  The dazed expression on his face made me pause. “Haven’t you ever been licked there before?”

  “No,” he said in a strained voice.

  “Really?” I arched an eyebrow. “What is wrong with the women of Waterford?”

  He shook his head, still looking completely bowled over. “F…fellatio is more about my pleasure, and none of them really cared about my pleasure so…oh!…God.”

  His back bowed off the bed again as I took as much of him into my mouth as I could fit. Wrapping my fingers around the rest of the base, I sucked hard, being careful not to bite. Then I let my tongue roam, investigating every bump and vein. Next came a little deep throating.

  “Reese!” His voice was high and strangled. “Oh, my God. Oh…” I think I actually heard his eyes roll into the back of his head. “…shit.”

  Yes, I give a damn fine B.J. if I do say so myself.

  I knew he was right on the edge when he let go of the two handfuls of sheets he’d fisted his fingers around and sat upright. “I can’t wait any longer. I need…I need to touch you. Now.”

  He pulled me off him, flipped me onto my back, and was on top of me so fast it knocked the wind out of me.

  The kiss that followed was so hot, it melted my panties away. Literally. Well, okay, I think he ripped my panties away. But either way, after we were done giving each other mouth to mouth, I was completely naked, he had a condom on, and things had gotten real hot up in this loft apartment. My entire body throbbed with heat and moist, aching need.

  Mason grasped my hip and manually draped my leg around his waist. I followed his lead and wrapped the other around him, hooking my feet together at the base of his back.

  Sliding his palm up my thighs, he cupped my ass and lifted me enough to align our bodies. My core pulsed in anticipation, tightening my nipples into hard sensitive buds and tugging on the nerves in my thighs.

  When he dipped in a finger to find me wet, we both moaned. Another digit followed. He stroked me until I arched and panted under him. His mouth did sinful things to my breasts. I never wanted him to stop.

  After he pulled his fingers free, he replaced them with something much larger that nudged my entrance and made my vision gray. Oh, God. We were doing this. We were doing it right now. I held my body taut in eager excitement as his blunt tip pressed a little deeper.

  The only other person I’d ever had sex with had been Jeremy, and he’d been so controlling and domineering, I wasn’t absolutely positive what the normal procedure was. What if Mason wanted me to be more involved, or less involved, or…?

  As if sensing my sudden insecurity, Mason looked up, his face flushed. “Reese? Are you sure?”

  That was it. His concern for me broke through all my fears about proper procedure. I needed this man now, in every way possible.

  I nodded like a bobble-headed doll. “Yes. Yes. Please.”

  He set his forehead against mine and thrust forward, impaling me fully.

  Oh.

  God.

  I sucked in a sharp, startled breath, not expecting so much, so soon. Oh, God. So very, very much. He hadn’t hesitated once. My body couldn’t adjust and I slapped his back in uncontrollable panic. “Stop! Wait, wait, wait.”

  He immediately fell still and pulled his shoulders back to look into my eyes. “What’s wrong? Did I hurt you? Are you okay? I thought you said—”

  He began to pull out, but I locked my legs tighter around him to stop any movement whatsoever.

  I shushed him, needing silence so I could clear my head. “I’m fine. I’m fine.” My mind was scrambled. I felt so stretched and full. He seemed everywhere. My thoughts were a scattered, disorganized mess.

  It was too freaking overwhelming.

  “I just…I need a moment. I wasn’t expecting it to be so…You’re so big. Bigger than…” I looked into the worried, frantic face above me, and once again, that was all I needed. I grew famished. “Mmm.”

  My body warmed, adjusted, and accepted him. It actually relished the snug fit. In fact, it craved more and wanted to feel that delicious inner stretching again, wanted to feel him rubbing against the bundle of nerves inside me, and it wanted it right freaking now.

  I arched up under him, burning for more. “Move, move, move,” I panted.

  Mason looked conflicted and a little panicked. “But you told just told me to stop.”

  I grabbed two handfuls of thick, wavy hair and clutched them hard. “Well, now I need you to move. Oh, God. Please, hurry. I feel so…I’m so…Jesus, what are you doing to me?”

  Keeping a suspicious eye on me as his cheeks grew ruddy and his pupils dilated, he pulled out only to immediately rock back in. And oh my stars, the fit was just as snug and mind-blowing as his first plunge. I arched under him, moaning out my ecstasy in a low keen. “More.”

  Mason set a hand on the pillow by my face, watching me as he steadily pumped my body. “You confuse the hell out of me, Teresa Nolan, Reese Randall, or whoever the hell you are.” His voice was raw and winded. “But I still can’t get enough of you.”

  I was so happy he knew all my names and every part of me. There were no secrets between us. Just him and me, and this.

  He plunged into me harder, shifting us just enough to slide deeper. Then he rearranged my legs, telling me it would make him feel bigger in me, and holy crap, he wasn't lying. Next he flexed his penis just so, hitting a spot that almost had me crossing my eyes. Damn, he sure knew what to do.

  I thrashed my head from side to side, fighting the tightening in my loins as much as I embraced it.

  “You feel so good, so good,” I chanted from between chattering teeth. “So good.”

  Why were my teeth chattering? Why the hell was my entire body chattering? It seemed like the firmer my muscles pulled
around him, the more my organs low in my abdomen swelled. And the more they expanded, the harder I shook.

  “Christ,” Mason bit out. His teeth clenched and neck tendons strained. “Don’t say shit like that to me when I’m already on the edge. You feel good too, Reese. So…goddamn…good. But I don’t want it to end yet.”

  I didn’t either. Except the faster he moved, the better it felt. And the better it felt, the sooner it was going to end.

  “Oh, screw it.” I dug my fingers into his firm ass and moved with him, urging him to quicken the pace. “We can have long, drawn-out slow sex later.”

  He groaned again, though this was more like a whimper. “Promise?”

  I nodded. “Yes. Yes. Right now, just light me up. Please.”

  “On it.” His hips slapped against mine. And…damn.

  It was the first time I actually savored the carnal delight of this act. I cherished every wicked sensation vibrating through me. Hugging his hips tight between my thighs as he repeatedly entered and withdrew, I threw my head back and arched with him.

  And yet, despite how hot and sweaty and primal it was, I felt a connection that ran so much deeper than the physical. The electrical current that had tethered us together the first moment I’d ever seen him across the college campus ignited inside me.

  Mason’s gaze was awed and amazed as he watched us come together. But he must’ve sensed the bond too, because he looked up and caught my eye. With a dazed kind of grin, he sank his fingers into my hair and held my face as if bracing himself for the big plunge off the summit.

  “I love this,” he said. “I love you. You are so beautiful.”

  I gripped him tight. “I love you, too.”

  And that was it. For a split second, he appeared overcome. Then he crushed our mouths together, buried himself deep, and sent me spiraling over the cliff. My entire system felt like a lightning rod, absorbing the shock of our union. Mason groaned and followed me into oblivion.

  Until that moment, I hadn’t realized I’d never had an honest-to-God orgasm before, because what happened to my body possessed every nerve inside me and shocked me from the inside out. The intensity kind of scared me. I cried out and clutched him hard, gouging out half moons into his back with my fingernails.

  “Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, God.”

  “Jesus, Reese.” He arched and crushed us together as his cock pulsed.

  I dug my heels into the base of his back until the earthquake, tornado, hurricane, and tsunami of sensations passed. And still, I felt rattled to the core. “Oh…my…God,” I said one last time, my voice faint and exhausted.

  Slumped heavily on top of me—which I loved—Mason chuckled against my cheek and kissed my jaw, then my throat, my collarbone. “Thank you,” he said. “I’ve always wondered what it felt like to make love.”

  I turned my face to the side and saw his heart reflecting through the stained-glass windows of his gorgeous gray eyes. Realizing this was the first time I’d made love too, my lashes grew a little damp. Cupping his cheek where his five o’clock shadow prickled my palm, I murmured, “It is a million times better than that icky ol’ straight sex with no feelings involved, isn’t it?”

  He teased my ear with his nose. “Fifty million times better.”

  Not one to be bested, I had to retort, “A trillion times.”

  “Infinity,” he countered.

  Wrapping my arms and legs around him, I burrowed my face into his neck. “Infinity times two.”

  With that, I pretty much just passed out underneath him, falling into a deep, peaceful stupor.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  We woke some time later to my phone announcing an incoming text. Mason swung out an arm and grabbed it off the nightstand to pass to me.

  It was from Eva. His Jeep is in the driveway again. That gigolo better treat you right.

  This EX gigolo is treating me better than all right, I returned and gave the phone back to him to replace on the nightstand.

  “What was that about?” he asked with his sleepy, sexy voice.

  “Nothing.” I curled into his warm side and ran my fingernails lightly over his chest. “I was just bragging a little to Eva.”

  My phone chimed again. I began to lean over him to retrieve it, but Mason caught my waist, halting me. “Don’t you dare stop touching me like that. I’ll get it.”

  Sighing contentedly, I caressed him a little lower. He groaned out his approval as he opened my text. “She said you’re a lucky bitch.”

  I smiled, and a little something-something under my stroking fingers grew into a rather large something-something. “Why, yes. Yes I am.”

  He cursed and hooked an arm around my waist to tug me on top of him. This time around, I straddled his lap and did a little cardio exercise. Mason was even kind enough to show me how the backward cowgirl position worked. Bless his soul.

  After round two, we took another nap. When we woke again, food became a little more important. I knew I didn’t have much in my cabinets, but we went to investigate the kitchen anyway.

  As I commanded him to stay seated at the table, I scurried around to collect all the breakfast friendly food I had.

  From his seat, he took a drink of the OJ I’d gotten him and sighed, refreshed, as his gaze followed every move I made. “I finally know why a guy likes it so much when his girl wears nothing but his shirt around.”

  “Why?” I asked and wiggled in his shirt so the hem would ride higher up my thigh. “Easy access?”

  “Well, that too.” Eyes glittering with sensual awareness, Mason watched me open the fridge and pull out a couple of jars. “But I think it’s like marking his territory. He knows just how much she’s his when she’s wearing his property.”

  I paused and lifted a non-impressed eyebrow. “Marking his territory?” God, he really was a guy, wasn’t he? “So…I’m like a car tire you feel the need to pee on?”

  His grin grew wolfish. “Peeing on you isn’t quite what I had in mind.”

  I wrinkled my nose and stuck out my tongue.

  He laughed and crooked his finger, beckoning me closer.

  Unable to deny him, I drifted within his reach. “So, here are your choices for breakfast.” I set a jar of strawberry preserves on the table next to the loaf of bread and box of cereal I’d already gotten out.

  He didn’t look at the food. His gaze wandered to the bare skin on my thighs where his T-shirt ended. “I know exactly what I want for breakfast.”

  I snorted. “My God. Let a guy rock your world two times and he turns into a horny perv.”

  “Hey, I was a horny perv before.” Snaking out his hands to grasp my hips, he swung me into his lap where I landed on his arousal pressing against his boxer briefs. “And you have no idea how hard it was for me to hide all the horny, perverted thoughts I had every time I was around you.”

  Licking my lips, I tilted my head back, letting my hair tumble down my back as I rocked against his erection. “Oh, trust me. I’m getting a pretty good idea just how hard it was.”

  He chuckled and kissed my throat. With a sigh, I sifted my hands through his hair and drifted languidly under the stroke of his expert mouth. He worked his way down until he met the collar of my shirt. With an irritated mutter, he gathered it up in his hands and ripped it over my head, tossing it aside.

  “Oh, home girl,” he chastised when he saw my bra. “This thing got to go.” With three deft moves, he’d unclasped my bra and flung it across the room too. His gaze lit with approval. “Now that’s more like it.”

  I laughed. “You are so—Damn.”

  His mouth latched onto a nipple and I forgot what I was going to call him.

  Mason Lowe was one incredible lover. He touched me with such reverence, his fingertips light and curious as they cruised up my spine while his mouth was bold and knowing, his tongue lavishing taut, puckered skin with deadly precision.

  Without warning, he grasped my waist with both hands and lifted me off his lap to set me on the edge of the ta
ble. He stood up as he urged me to lie back. Then he leaned over me to give a little attention to my other breast.

  Closing my eyes because this was so wild and crazy and amazing, I reached out and grasped the edge of the table for support.

  Keeping my legs draped over the side, Mason fitted himself between my thighs and rubbed against me as he began to kiss his way back up to my throat.

  “You taste so good,” he rumbled against my flesh. “Feel so good. Smell so good.”

  I sighed. His touch kind of fried my awesome communication skills, so all I managed to reply was, “Y-you too.”

  Grinning, he lifted his face to press a tender kiss on the end of my nose. Then he gazed into my eyes and straight into me. “I love being with you, Reese.” He looked down at my mostly naked body and let out a breath. “I love doing this with you. I love…I love you, period.”

  I swallowed, choked with emotion, and not at all used to hearing him say that. Wiping his dark hair across his brow and out of his eyes, I frowned softly. “You say that like it’s the last chance you have to speak to me, like you’re afraid I’m going to disappear any second.”

  His grin trembled. “Aren’t you?”

  “No.” I shook my head. “I’m not going anywhere. This is real, Mason. I’m real, you’re real, and this is really happening.”

  Leaning down, he hugged me and buried his face in my neck. “It feels like a dream, like I’m going to wake up any second and you’ll be gone. I don’t want to wake up from this.”

  “You won’t. I promise.” I wasn’t sure what else I could say to reassure him, so I simply stroked his hair and let him rest on top of me. When I wound my legs around his waist and hooked my feet at the base of his spine, he hummed in approval.

  Out of the blue, he said, “Hey, I thought you didn’t eat fruit for breakfast.” He lifted up off me just enough to snag my strawberry marmalade and eye me with arched, care-to-explain-this eyebrows.

  “But that’s jam,” I argued. “Anything full of sugar doesn’t count.”

  Mason unscrewed the lid. “Is that so?” He dipped out a pinkie full and popped the jelly-soaked digit into his mouth. Closing his eyes, he sighed deeply. “Yeah, that is pretty sweet. But I think it’d taste even sweeter…on you.”