by M. K. Hale
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Nate. I’m not trying to do anything. If you find that sexy, then that’s on you.”
His neck strained as he whipped his head around, trying to see if anyone was there who could catch us. “I’d hoped you had forgotten about this skinny dipping idea of yours.” He all but bit his nails.
Nervous Nate was just as cute as stern, professional Nate. I loved how we seemed to take turns at supporting each other. Whenever he was on edge, I was there to tease him. Whenever my sensitivity and fear spiked, he was there to be strong and confident. How had I not been able to see what a perfect fit we made?
However, now that we were officially together, we had been less physical and intimate than before. We shared a few hot kisses, but Nate did not push for more.
I wanted more. Did he not want more?
I had told myself maybe he waited because he did not want to have sex with me in the dorms while everyone was there. Not a solid reason, but it gave me hope of things changing between us, and becoming hot and heavy again once Thanksgiving break began and everyone deserted the campus to go home for the holiday.
We were one day into the break and had the entire dorm to ourselves. We could hook up in the communal showers if we wanted to. So why had he not made a move? Why did he break away after every kiss or caress?
Did he want to go slow? Surprising, considering the attraction between us and how we had masturbated in front of each other before we were even together.
My skinny dipping plan was to take things one step farther between us. Seeing each other naked would help. Hopefully.
“How could I forget? It was just three days ago you told me you had never gone.” I had spent the next few days planning it. The pool closed at ten o’clock so we had snuck in at eleven. I had my skimpy bikini on under my clothes, and Nate wore swim trunks and a T-shirt.
“Biggest regret of my life.”
“Oh, come on.” I grinned at him. “I know you’re loving this.”
He shook his head, adamant. “Incorrect.”
“You’re not excited at all? We’re sneaking into a pool to swim naked.”
“I prefer legal dates, such as going to a movie theater or staying in with a nice hot cup of not-breaking-the-law.”
“Boring.”
“Morally right.”
I gave him a playful tap on his nose. “You’re so cute when you’re scared.”
“I’m not scared, I just don’t enjoy the confinement and solitude of jail time.”
“You’re not going to get in trouble.” I laughed at him and wrapped my arms around him. “Can’t you just trust me?” I leaned in so close, it hurt to maintain eye contact. He had no choice but to look down and focus his eyes on my lips. He was so easy to seduce.
“I—”
I kissed him to distract him from backing out. He needed to go skinny-dipping as much as I needed a distraction. My week had been rough, and this was my official relax-and-have-fun-with-Nate time. His lips captured mine, and my body flooded with heat. Great, what had started as a distraction to calm him became a distraction for me from what we were doing.
I pulled back from the kiss with reluctance. “This will be my date night, where I pick what we do and where we go. You can be in charge next time.”
“Something tells me I’ll never be in charge again,” Nate grumbled under his breath, still staring down at my lips, which were now swollen from such a passionate kiss.
I grabbed his hand and led him to the heated indoor pool. The room was dark except for the lights in the pool, which illuminated it, making it look like a portal. The stillness of the water made the prospect of jumping in all the more alluring.
“See? Isn’t this cool?” I ran to the edge. “It’s all glowy.”
“Like a tank of radioactive waste.”
“But blue instead of green.”
“And less toxic.”
“That’s the spirit!” I ran back over to him and tugged on his shirt. “Now strip.”
His jaw dropped, his expression horrified. “Excuse me?”
“Skinny-dipping means no clothes.” I eyed him up and down and made a gesture. “Whip ‘em off, buddy.”
“Don’t call me buddy while trying to get me naked.” He glanced back at the pool. “And don’t act so nonchalant about it either.”
“Oh, I see. You want me to act all in awe of your nakedness. Will do.”
He sighed. “You’re making fun of me.”
I kissed his cheek. “No, I get it. You don’t want me to make light of this moment.” I kissed him again, but this time on his neck, and whispered in his ear, “I want to see you, Nate. All of you.”
He swallowed, and a pulse settled between my legs. I wanted to see him naked. I tried to downplay it with my teasing, but the truth was I was ready to drool.
He whipped off his shirt, and I whistled on impulse. He glared at me, but he smiled on the inside. He loved it whenever I told him how sexy he was. He was smug that way.
“I shouldn’t be the only one taking off my clothes,” Nate remarked, and my eyes widened. Oh, so now nervous Nate was transforming back into confident and bossy Nate. Good; I had missed him.
I flashed a wicked smile at him while pulling down the straps of my loose top. It fell to the ground. As I slipped out of my short shorts, I bent down and flashed him a decent amount of cleavage in the process. I stood, left in nothing but my white bikini. The sound of Nate sucking in a breath as his eyes devoured my body made all the trouble of shaving everywhere the day before worth it.
His gaze roamed, heating and heating until it blazed and burned me.
“Shall we?” I asked before I dove into the lit-up pool. When I surfaced back up for air, he still stood on the edge of the pool in front of me.
“What happened to the skinny part of the dipping?”
I giggled at his disappointed expression. “We can play a game.” I swam a bit away from him, making room so he could jump in when he wanted. “We can try to take the rest off of each other in the water. The first person who is stripped naked loses…or maybe wins?”
Now Nate wore the wicked smile. “You think you can strip me before I can strip you?”
I loved challenging him. It was so easy, and he always rose to the occasion. For someone who desired control, he sure lacked it when something needed to be proven.
“Why don’t you jump in and we’ll find out?” I giggled again when he dove into the water toward me. Because of the lighting, I could see him through the electric blue water, and the sight of him swimming up to me under it was somehow erotic. Or maybe it was just because it was Nate and everything about him was erotic. When he popped up for air, he was right in front of me. Mere inches separated our almost naked bodies. “Well, hello there.”
Nate leaned his forehead onto mine, and it took me a minute to realize he had a perfect view down my bikini top. “Hi.”
“Like the view?” I poked his chest, which ended up hurting my finger because the muscles were solid. Was he flexing on purpose?
He shifted his head against mine until his lips were at the ultra-sensitive side of my neck, just below my ear. He kissed my pulse point, and I bit back a moan. “I have a feeling I’ll like it even more…” When his lips left my neck, his pesky fingers raced up to undo my bikini. I pushed him away from me, cackling with laughter, and started to swim away.
“Seducing is against the rules.” I wagged my finger at him. No way would he beat me. I would dive under and get those swim trunks off him before he could ask, “where did you go?”
“So I’m supposed to just rip your clothes off at random in order to win?”
“You’d have to catch me first.” I sank down in the water and swam to the other side of the pool. His hands caught my foot, but I twisted it away from him and swam faster.
We dog-paddled around the pool, avoiding each other for a while before I risked it all and went for his trunks. I dove under, my hands slipping under his waistband,
and jerked the trunks down. That’s when the game became dangerous. It was the first time I had seen him naked and, damn; he fulfilled my wildest dreams. I gasped underwater at the sight of his hard cock reaching up towards me. The gasp led to me choking on water so I resurfaced, which allowed Nate the opportunity to catch me and hold me to him so I could not escape again.
“I win,” I said through my coughs as my lungs cleared themselves of chlorine.
“Do you?” he whispered in my ear.
My bikini top loosened and fell into the water with a wet splat. His hands drifted down to my waist and played with the strings on either side, which held the piece together.
“I believe I do.” I pinched his bare ass, and he grinned down at me. Nate was either playful or dominating when aroused, and I had no idea which one I preferred.
“Well, then,” He kissed my collarbone and trailed his mouth down between my breasts. “I guess I can—”
He sank under the water and bent down to pull off my bikini bottoms. He slipped the piece down my legs and it floated up next to me. However, he stayed underwater and wrapped my legs around his shoulders. I moaned at the sight of his head nuzzling between my legs and yelped when he closed the distance and delivered a kiss right above my clit.
He lifted me as he resurfaced for air. Both his hands were holding me up, gripping the swell of my ass, as his head secured itself between my legs. My nipples pebbled between us from the sheer chill and thrill of Nate’s touch as he held me in the air, out of the water. My hips undulated into his embrace.
“Nate,” I shouted when his tongue became my new best friend.
His hot, wet tongue drew torturous circles over my throbbing bud, and I grabbed at his hair, frenzied. Desire ran through me, hard and wild like a freight train. This was not how it was supposed to have gone. I was supposed to be the seducer. My plan to skinny dip and convince him to do more than just kiss me unraveled because now he became the one pulling all the strings.
This was one case, however, where I did not mind Nate being in control. Damn, with his ability to move his tongue like that, I would give him control over everything.
He pulled back from between my legs and chuckled when my fingers tugged at his hair for him to go back to what he had been doing.
“You like that?” He delivered another sensual lick.
I groaned at his evident intent to tease me. “Yes, I like that. Who wouldn’t like that?” I pulled on his hair again, making my desire known. “Now please resume.”
He stared at me, appearing hungry, starving, and I wanted to hit him for pausing. “My good girl is so wet,” he rasped.
“Yes, well, we are in a pool.” Now I was the agitated and impatient one. If he was not going to continue where he left off, I would have to show him how much I did not appreciate being teased.
I widened my legs so the firm grip over his shoulders faded, and I slipped down his body. He raised one eyebrow, but let me change our position. I re-secured myself by tightening my legs around his waist, rubbing over his erection. The bulbous tip made direct contact with my slit, hot and begging for more. My hips rocked against him.
The tortured look on Nate’s face brought a smile to mine. All is fair in love and war.
I arched my hips against him, aligning us until his hardness grazed my swollen bud. Shivers wracked me. Sensation took over. He moaned and moved in to kiss me, but I dodged it. I slid a hand down his chest to his arousal, curling my fingers around him and squeezing.
“Jesus, Allie,” he choked.
“You like that?” I repeated his words to him. Time to show him how much I disliked teasing.
“Yes.” His eyes crossed, unfocused on anything but pleasure, when I moved my hand up and down over him. My grip was firm, the water working as extra lubrication.
I leaned in and licked up his neck to the bottom of his earlobe. A bead of moisture rose on the tip of him and slickened my palm with each stroke. “Mm, my good boy is so wet.” I used his words against him again, though it seemed he was no longer listening to me.
“Allie.” He grunted. “Harder.”
I tightened my hold on him without any hesitation. Damn it, I was finally in control again and he still called the shots?
“That’s it, baby. Hard and firm.” He bit back a curse, grating, “Your soft little hand is going to kill me.”
A hard swallow worked down my throat as wetness leaked from my core, and I continued jerking him under the water. My fingers ran from the base to the tip of his throbbing erection.
“Ah.” Nate tore my hand off of him and pulled me to the edge of the pool. He pushed himself up and turned to sit on the edge, half of his legs still in the water. He slapped on the tops of his thighs and ordered, “Up.”
I shook my head and swam between his legs. “So bossy.” I kissed his inner thigh, so close to the body part he wanted me to kiss, he jumped.
“Up. Now.” The heavy desire in his voice resulted in an aching in my core.
I lifted my arms, and he grabbed me and pulled me up onto him. I now straddled him, and the moment I lowered myself into his lap, we both let out a loud moan at the contact. His lips crashed against mine like waves, calmly lapping and passionately crushing at the same time.
“Allie,” he murmured through the kisses. “I like you so fucking much.”
“I like you too.”
“You went skinny-dipping and you two still did not have sex?” Eliza, my friend from France, laughed, astonished, on the phone.
“I thought it might happen, or at least that more might happen, but it just ended in romantic making out the way the other nights have.” I should not have been complaining. We had only been dating for several days. Still, when we weren’t together, he’d had a hard time keeping his hands off of me. Were the forming emotions stalling it from happening again?
“Maybe he wants to wait?”
I kicked at my rug. “I’ve heard about his sex life from multiple people, even when I really didn’t want to, and they all say he’s a very sexual person,” I commented. Why the hell could he have tons of sex with other girls but not with me? Skinny-dipping was supposed to be the night. We had both been so ready to lose control. “Do you think it’s me?”
People had told me he was a dom. Was he truly kinky? Did he need to be dominating in order to have sex? Was that why he waited? Because he thought his dom traits might scare me away? He was dominating enough in normal life with all his bossiness; there was not much he could do to surprise me.
“Stop,” Eliza warned. “If he makes you think he does not want you, then turn the tables on him. Seduce him.”
“Me seduce him?” I repeated her plan. “Well, why didn’t you say so?”
Chapter 23
Nate:
* * *
“Mmm, pancakes,” Blue muttered as she stuffed the breakfast food into her mouth and chewed through her words. “This is better than cereal.”
“Anything is better than cereal.” I tugged the blankets over my bed, which my sister had been using since she moved in on the first day of Thanksgiving break. Just as I had thought, the dorm and campus were empty from everyone going home for the holiday. Except for Allie. Allie did not have a home to go back to and, I suppose, neither did I anymore.
I wanted to be Allie’s home.
I had spent as much time with Allie as I could to not raise her suspicion, but I always had to come back and spend the majority of my time with Blue. Aka, Allie and Blue did not know about each other. Blue thought I was out doing official RA business when Allie and I had gone skinny-dipping.
God, that night had been eye-opening.
The sound of Allie laughing and splashing me played in my ears as I pictured her pressed against me, both of us bare. The deep need to thrust inside her and achieve what both of us needed. A release. But I was not about to make our first time together at a pool after hours. She deserved a bed. Or a wall. Whichever was closer in the moment. She deserved more than simple rutting.
<
br /> She deserved romance.
I was terrible at romance. And even if I was not terrible—which I was—Blue sleeping in my room prevented me from doing anything. The walls were too thin if I dared to sleep over in Allie’s bed. Thus, we could not go farther than a few kisses until Thanksgiving break ended and Blue went to stay at my aunt’s house.
Allie would be fine waiting until then, and I would make it up to her. I just could not let her find out about Blue staying with me. I had opened up enough to say my family had money issues as of late, but I did not want her to know just how messed up everything was. According to Allie, I had already told my supervisor we were in a relationship and gotten it approved.
I had lied to her.
Two things remained true: 1. I could not tell my supervisor about Allie until everything was sorted out with Blue and my parents, or until I graduated. 2. I could not sleep with Allie until the end of Thanksgiving break, four days away.
Four days.
My cock was ready to fall off inside my pants.
Even though I slept on the uncomfortable floor while Blue took my bed, my blood flow must have been strong since it caused some thick morning wood. I had tried to wane it away with dark thoughts, but gave in and ran to the men’s bathroom to take care of my problem. A few strokes to memories of skinny-dipping with Allie and I had come within minutes.
Bathroom breaks were a whole endeavor while having Blue in the dorm as well. She did not want to pee in a place with urinals, so I always had to distract Allie in her room long enough for Blue to go to the women’s bathroom, do her business, and return to the sanctity of my room.
Distracting Allie for a few minutes was not an easy feat because there was no hey-let-us-have-a-quick-conversation when it came to Allie. We either discussed life, laughed for half an hour, or made out like her lips were an addictive substance.
So, when Blue told me she had to go to the bathroom, I let out a deep sigh and brainstormed a short conversation starter, lasting around three minutes.
I watched Blue sneak into the bathroom before I knocked on Allie’s door with a tight smile.