To hell with worrying about her underwear. Once they were both naked, who cared? She shoved at his shirt, grazing his nipples in the process. She wanted to lick them, lick him.
“Carlie Beth, honey, we’re not in any hurry.”
“Britt said one o’clock.”
“My brothers can wait.”
“What if I can’t? I want you out of your clothes.”
Grif blew out a breath. “How about one thing at a time?” With gentle hands, he reached for the hem of her tank top and slowly eased it up her torso and over her head. She had to fight not to cross her arms over the cotton bra a preteen girl might wear, but she won the battle, pulling back her shoulders as if she was proud of the meager portion she’d been given.
One side of Grif’s mouth swooped up and he bent to press a hot kiss between her breasts. “I like the flower,” he said against the fabric.
She glanced down. Oh, God. She really had worn a little girl’s underwear embellished with a tiny yellow-centered pink daisy. She’d accidentally pulled on one of Aubrey’s bras. Heat burned in Carlie Beth’s cheeks, but she wasn’t about to let embarrassment derail her now. “It’s your turn.”
He crossed his arms and grabbed his own shirt. When he would’ve yanked it up in a violent movement, Carlie Beth slowed him and stretched the neckline so it wouldn’t graze his chin as he pulled it over his head.
And oh, Grif Steele was just as much a golden boy as he’d ever been. The hair on his chest and stomach was shades lighter than on his head, and it glinted like old gold in the muted sunlight. His skin had a healthy California tan. Oh yeah, she wanted her hands all over that landscape.
Suddenly impatient, she kicked off her boots and reached for the button on her jeans. “Ditch the sweats.”
“Uh-uh,” he said, swatting her hands away from her waistband. He toyed with the button, fanning his thumb along the sensitive skin of her belly in the process, making the muscles underneath quiver. Just that light touch had the space between her legs aching.
“Please.”
“Please what?”
“Please stop with the teasing.”
He leaned into her and pressed a kiss to the side of her neck. “Haven’t you ever heard anticipation is more than half the fun?”
“You really think this is better than being naked?”
His hand jerked on her pants, and praise God, the button slipped free. Before he could stop her, she slid her zipper down and pushed the denim over her hips. Because the faster she got out of these things, the faster Grif would shed his own pants.
Grif took over, crouching to ease the fabric down her legs, placing him at eye level with her pink cotton panties. His voice was rough when he said, “Step out.”
She braced a hand on his shoulder and shook off one leg. He didn’t bother with the other, just grabbed her around the ankle and widened her stance.
“Oh, you are most definitely a girl, Carlie Beth Parrish.” The pure male satisfaction in his words sent another wave of arousal through her system, and it came to shore directly between her thighs, lapping at her and making her wet. Grif’s hands remained anchored on her legs, but he leaned in and studied the strip of fabric that covered her.
His breath penetrated the thin barrier, warming her skin, heating her blood until it was all she could hear in her head.
When his tongue darted out and precisely flicked her clitoris, her knees were taken completely by surprise. But she wanted more. He stroked her again through the cotton. The desire for him to rip it aside and plunge his tongue inside her shuddered through her, and her grip tightened reflexively on his shoulder.
“You want more?”
“God, yes.”
To her everlasting disappointment, he didn’t shove down her panties and slide his talented tongue over her. Instead, he stood, so close that the head of his penis nudged against her clit before coming to rest heavily against her stomach.
“Then we’re going to have a lesson.”
“What?”
“Well, you seem to have some strange idea that you’re not very feminine.” He smoothed a thumb across her lips, and she bit down on the tip, making him groan low in his throat. “And even though you’re trying to distract me, we’re going to show you exactly how wrong you are.”
“I didn’t—”
“Didn’t what? Didn’t mean it? You’re the kind of woman who says exactly what she means.” Grif glanced around the room. “Damn, I wish I had a mirror. Hmm, we’ll have to do this a different way.” He took her hand and led her to the middle of the room.
“You have a perfectly good bed.”
“It won’t work for this.” He turned her away from him and released the clasp on her bra. “Take off your panties.”
She reached for them, and his heat shifted away. She looked over her shoulder to see him shove down his sweats and reveal his cock, hard and flushed and pointing directly north. Oh, it had been a little too long since she’d set eyes on one of those bad boys.
Definitely too long since she’d seen Grif’s.
She also wanted to trace the sexy hawk-shaped birthmark on his thigh. With her fingers. Her tongue.
But he paid no attention to his erection, just nodded at her, reminding her she was still wearing clothes. So she shed the scrap of fabric and kicked it away. She started to reach for him, but he caught her hands, twirled her around and pressed his very impressive front against her back. He lifted her hands over her head and led her fingers over her hair.
“You have the most beautiful hair I’ve ever seen,” he said, his voice husky. “Feel it.”
The stands were silky and sensual beneath her fingertips. A totally different experience from when she quickly brushed it out in the morning and pulled it back in a ponytail or corralled it into a braid. Grif pushed the mass over her shoulder so it hung across her right breast.
“Run your fingers through it.”
She did as he asked, raking through the strands and letting them fall against her skin. When he kissed the spot at the top of her spine, her body buzzed with the decadent sensation, sending shocks of awareness to all her already aware spots.
He took control of her hands again, drawing them from her hair to splay across her chest and collarbone. Her skin was pale—dotted with tiny freckles—against his darker hands. If he would just shift his hold down a few inches…
As if he’d heard her needy request, he moved her hands, skimming them over her breasts and teasing her tender nipples. “Grif, I—”
“Touch yourself like you mean it. You don’t appreciate your own body.”
She did. It got her where she needed to go. Was strong and healthy. But she didn’t pamper it, linger over it.
He manipulated her fingers until she held a nipple between each thumb and forefinger, forcing her to squeeze and release until she almost screamed from the pressure it was building between her legs. She rubbed them together, felt her slick response on her inner thighs.
“So pretty and pink,” he said, his voice husky and sincere. “I’m going to suck them while I fuck you.”
She wobbled at his declaration, but he tightened his arms around her and adjusted her hold so she cupped her small breasts in her palms and stroked her nipples with her thumbs. The erotic sensation of touching her own body was both slightly unfamiliar and overwhelmingly sensual.
Too soon, he swept her hands away from her breasts and used them to trace the curve of her waist. “Does that feel like a woman to you?”
God, she was so turned on she was trembling from it.
“Soft skin, perfect curves.” Under his direction, her palm smoothed over her stomach, flirted with the indentation of her belly button. Her pinkie trailed over her hip bone and came to rest in the red hair at the apex of her thighs, making her clitoris throb in anticipation.
Once he’d helped her explore the soft skin of her belly, he drew her hands back to her hips, coaxed them down and back so she covered her own ass cheeks. But he wasn’t satisfi
ed with that. He made sure her fingertips edged between them, teasing and tempting.
Near her ear, he said, “Would you let me bend you over right now? Let me slide into you from behind?”
She was shaking so hard, she wasn’t sure she could stay upright. Her legs would give out, and she’d be on her hands and knees on the floor. He would cover her, push into her… “Yes,” she breathed, using one hand to grab his thigh and steady herself.
But he didn’t bend her at the waist. He led her other hand back to the front of her body, positioning her middle finger directly over her clitoris.
“If you keep holding your breath, you’ll pass out.”
Air burst from her on a laugh.
“Better.” As a reward, she supposed, he pushed her finger into her folds. “Close your eyes.”
She did as he asked and rested her head back on his shoulder, almost able to hear his smile.
“Now, touch yourself and tell me what you feel.” His hands retreated back to her waist, and Carlie Beth was all alone with the most private, most intimate part of her body.
She used her finger to circle her clitoris, absorbing the sensation. “It’s small. And hard. Like a little BB.”
“Packs more punch.”
She varied her motion—side to side, up and down, around and around—until her breath was coming hard and choppy.
Grif’s hands clamped down on her waist. “You’re not finished.”
“Almost,” she gasped.
“Push your finger inside your body.”
“But—”
“Do it.”
She reluctantly abandoned the source of her shaky knees and moved her hand lower. Wet, so wet and hot. How could her body be so hot and not burn up? Slowly torturing herself, she eased her finger inside her body, her muscles clenching.
“How does that feel?”
“Um…”
Grif’s hold shifted from her waist and slid up her arms, and over her shoulders. “Do you know how sexy it is to watch you touch yourself? Explore and enjoy every feminine part of your body?” He grabbed a handful of her hair and bent her neck to the side to kiss it. “Your hair.” With his free hand, he cupped her breast and pinched her nipple. “Your breasts.” Too soon, his hold moved away, but it landed on her rear. “Your ass.” Then he covered her hand with his, pushing her finger deeper. “Your pretty pussy.”
She moaned and ground the heel of her palm against her clit, seeking relief.
“I want you to tell me what you are.”
She shook her head, unsure of what he was asking.
“Say ‘I’m a strong…’”
“This is silly—”
With a quick move, he pulled her hands away from her body, holding them parallel with the floor. “Say ‘I’m a strong…’”
“I’m a strong…”
“Beautiful…”
Although it made her shrink a little, she said, “Beautiful…”
“Sexy…”
“Sexy…”
“Woman.”
“Fine, I’m a strong, beautiful, sexy woman!”
“One who now deserves a reward.” As if she weighed a single pound, he took her by the waist and lifted her to sit on the high window ledge. “Spread your legs.”
“I’m in front of a window.”
“Shade’s down.” He walked across the room and snagged a box from the top of neat pile. He withdrew a condom and placed the rest of the box near her hip.
Carlie Beth couldn’t help herself. When he rolled the latex over his erection, her tongue touched her top lip. Grif glanced up and caught her at it. “Thinking about something?”
“I want that.”
“That’s handy because I plan for you to have it.”
“Between my lips.”
Grif stumbled a little, reached out and caught himself on the window frame, and she laughed in delight. Mr. Seduction wasn’t immune, and that made her a very happy girl. Then his mouth transformed into a wicked smile and he grabbed her by the hips, pulling her to the edge of the window ledge. “Not today, Shortcake.”
Before she could prepare herself, he braced himself on either side of her hips and lowered his head between her legs.
OhGodOhGodOhGod.
It had been so long since she’d had a man’s mouth this close to her happy parts, she couldn’t even remember the last time. Now, Grif’s labored breath was hot against her inner thighs.
She had to fight the need to squeeze her legs together to get him closer. She squirmed on the cool window casing.
His touch, when it came, was a leisurely lick with a brain-blasting tongue curl at the end. And she knew her chances for survival were in the single digits.
But, oh, what a way to go.
Grif repeated that little technique a few more times, and Carlie Beth didn’t realize she’d buried her hands in his hair and was pulling the hell out of it until he paused and said, “Palms on the windowsill.”
“Huh?”
He reached up and untangled her fingers, then moved her hands to a safer position near her hips. She shifted for better balance, and he hummed his approval because her movement had pulled her shoulders back, making her boobs look as if she actually had something.
When Grif returned to his previously scheduled program, he pushed her knees wide, opened her as far as her position would allow. Then his tongue became BFFs with her clitoris, playing with the sensitive nerve endings there until Carlie Beth thought her bones would simply disappear. As delicious as his attention was, it wasn’t quite enough, keeping her right on the edge.
She moaned her frustration.
“Need a little more?”
Crap. She didn’t want him to think she didn’t like what he was doing. “Um…”
“Because I’ll give you anything you want.”
His words arrowed directly into Carlie Beth’s chest. Anything? How could he do that when she didn’t know what the hell she wanted from him?
But before she could form some type of coherent response, he pressed two fingers against the very heart of her. He slid them inside her, what felt like one stingy millimeter at a time. Hooking his fingers, he touched the spot that made her come unglued.
“Oh, yessss.”
Then his thumb teased her clit while his fingers worked some incredible sexual magic. It didn’t take long. Probably less than a minute if Carlie Beth had the brain cells to clock it. A few pushes, strokes, and circles, and her body simply gave over to him. Her orgasm was a pulsing, shaking, whole-body affair as she rode his fingers, her hips pumping against his hand.
She had absolutely no shame, no sense of propriety at that moment. All she wanted was for the feeling to go on. Forever.
Grif didn’t allow her brain and body to become one again. As soon as her orgasm began to wane, he covered her mouth with his and pushed inside her body.
And oh Lord, if his fingers had felt like heaven, this was…was…whatever was above heaven. He braced her ass with one big hand and proceeded to screw her silly.
Long, hard strokes while he took their kiss to a wild tempo. Tongues and teeth and lips in a wild mash of desperation. Her covered her breast and played with her nipple, never breaking stride in either of his other pursuits.
At eighteen, he’d been a sweet and fun lover. Now, he was completely devastating, able to keep her on the edge of sanity from his touch all over her body. Her heart running a hundred-yard dash, she plunged her fingers into his hair, holding him close as she met him kiss for kiss.
When was the last time she’d felt so…so…much?
He gave her breast one last thorough caress, then reached between their bodies to lavish slick attention to her clitoris again. Up and down until she was lightheaded and panting for breath.
Between the slide of his tongue along hers, the slide of him inside her, and the glide of his fingers between her legs, the pressure built. A sweet intensity that seemed to make her pounding heart swell, doubling its size.
Unable to con
trol her response, she took their kiss to the next level, nipping at his lips in desperation. He palmed the back of her head and met her challenge.
Within seconds, another orgasm began to ripple through her, like a tide that could never be stopped, too powerful, too elemental to let a mere woman get in its way.
Grif thrust into her with a wild intensity, his rhythm finally hitching. Then he thrust and held, groaning through his own climax. He leaned his forehead against hers, his chest expanding and releasing rapidly as he worked to catch his breath.
Carlie Beth slid her hands from his hair down to his shoulders, savoring the sheen of sweat glistening on his muscles. Although he’d seduced her, he’d been just as affected by what they’d done.
At least physically.
“That was…”
“Yeah, it was all that and about a hundred times more.” His smile was endearingly crooked. “And Shortcake, if you’re still worried about not being much of a girl after that, I’m not sure I can help you. Because I think you’re one hell of a woman.”
20
Before the sweat even began to dry on their skin, Carlie Beth was fidgeting in Grif’s arms as though she were locked in a carnival ride she no longer wanted to take a spin on. Dammit. He wanted to knock his head against the wood trim. Although it had seemed like a good idea in his lust-inspired fog, he was now having second thoughts about his decision to nail her on a windowsill in an apartment bare not only of furniture but sophistication.
Just because he was living in less-than-optimal conditions didn’t mean she should be subjected to them. How many times could he be a dick to this woman?
“Carlie Beth, I’m—”
“Oh my God. You’re about to say something that’s going to piss me off, aren’t you?” She shoved at his shoulder and swung her knee over, almost neutering him in the process. He tried to grab her by the waist, but his phone rang from the bedside table, distracting him. Carlie Beth swerved left and in her scramble to escape him, she bumped the window shade, somehow triggering the damn thing to pull and release. As she hopped down from the ledge and ran for the bedroom door, the piece of fabric that had been shielding them from Main Street rolled up with a reverberating snap, and quite literally left Grif standing there with his dick out.
Going Hard: Steele Ridge Series Page 16