by Amy Gregory
Ruby, of course, was right there beside them all day, every day.
“Okay, I think we’re ready. I’ll get this. You want to grab the blankets?” Dallas winked as he lifted the basket off the counter. “Good God, girl, what all did you sneak in here, Lex?”
“Just a few things.” She grinned proudly. “Ruby, let’s go, baby doll.”
Beside the music, Dallas knew things were better just by reading their dog. Before, Ruby wouldn’t leave Alex’s side. Resting at her feet, or walking just inches from her at all times. Now, she was out the kitchen door, through the garage, and waiting with her tail wagging for someone to open the door to the Jeep. One soft bark told them to get a move on it. She cracked him up. Ruby would ride in his truck, but it was the Jeep she always assumed they were taking. More often than not, she was right.
Taking his sweet time, Dallas rolled over the land. The access road was in, but the little boy in him always got a secret thrill of off-roading over the gentle hills and terraces. Work was done for the weekend, but the early signs of a house were there. The foundation was staked out, the little flags fluttering in the breeze, and the dozer had been brought in and unloaded. Next week, they would have a giant hole in the ground that would become their basement. Pulling close to the tree line, Dallas parked. Hefting the heavy basket from the backseat, he held his hand out for Alex and led her to the spot where their back deck would be at some point in the near future.
They spread out the blanket in the shade of the old trees and made themselves comfortable. Ruby trotted away, heading for the water flowing just inches deep over the creek bed. The last time Dallas planned a picnic, he didn’t think to bring a towel. This time he was ready. When she came back soaking wet from playing in the stream and decided to shake herself off by them, they could dry off too.
Dallas stretched out on the soft quilt his father had given him. Another family heirloom, but it came with very specific instructions. Eli gave them two quilts, both lovingly hand-stitched by the grandmother who belonged to the ring on Alex’s finger. One had always been used for outings and picnics, the other for winter nights by the fire. His father had known enough to spell it out, otherwise neither he, nor Alex would have dared to take a precious hand-me-down outside, let alone spread it out on the ground. But Eli insisted that Dallas’s great-grandmother would have been thrilled.
Alex crawled over and laid her head on his chest.
Smelling her soft perfume, he gathered her close, running his hands over her soft skin that summer clothing bared.
He remained steadfast in his belief she wasn’t ready for more. And the closer it came, Dallas was excited he decided to wait until their wedding night to make her his. Alex had never said anything, but he knew her. She would never want to do anything to tarnish the view her parents held of her, and having sex in their home in her mind would be disrespectful. Even as a grown man, holding a beautiful woman in his arms, he agreed.
But, technically they were in their own home. Granted it had no walls, no floor, or a ceiling for that matter. But, they were still home. Laying Alex back on the blanket, he wiggled his eyebrows. Since they were home, they could fool around a little. “Before Ruby comes back and catches us, give me a kiss my, future Mrs. Hunter.”
Sliding her arms around his neck, Alex smiled and pulled him down on top of her. Working his leg in between hers was a mistake of epic proportions. Her tiny shorts left her leg almost completely bare, and instantly she wrapped it around him. “Oh God, Lex.” He breathed out before taking control of her mouth.
Soft kisses and touches were fine at bedtime in her parent‘s home, but when they were alone, things always turned into a blazing fire at the first touch. Years of waiting and wanting had built-up within them both. He truly did intend to wait until their wedding night, and had plans to make the night special for Alex. That didn’t mean she wasn’t testing each and every thread of his patience. Each soft moan, rapid breath, and pull of her fingertips ignited him.
Running his palm underneath her and down her back, he stopped with his hand on her butt, pressing himself into her. Alex whimpered, and he almost embarrassed himself like a horny teenage boy. Pulling his kiss back, he nipped at her lower lip, the hunger in her heavy-lidded eyes sent another surge of electricity shooting through him.
Kissing his way down her throat, Dallas stopped. Sitting up just enough to ease her tank top over her head, Dallas took a long minute to admire the bikini top, and the body in it. Running a finger along her skin, he watched her squirm, both from being lightly tickled, and from nerves. Trailing lower, he unhooked her shorts. “I think it’s too hot for this many clothes, baby. Don’t you think?” The smirk tipped her lips, but she remained quiet. Dallas pushed up to kneel, crossing his arms over his head, he yanked off his t-shirt, then slid her shorts down her trim legs. The tiny swimsuit she was wearing was insanely hot, and just a step away from being considered lingerie. She had promised it was for his eyes only when she’d shown it to him in the catalog.
Alex bent her knee as Dallas’s eyes raked over her. She knew he was nervous about hurting her and had taken every step painfully slow. The flashbacks had quit coming, and as far as that night went, it was something she defeated. Pages had been filled in her worn leather notebook, her fears written down so they could be released.
Since Dallas had proposed, she had returned to the woman she was before. He gave her strength and acceptance when she hadn’t given it to herself. He’d made her whole again. Upon doing that, little by little, she’d returned to the person who had been in love with him since she was little. Although the levels and layers had changed and deepened, the hunger had matured, and the need had swelled.
She knew Dallas inside and out. She understood where his heart was, and his need to put her above himself. Alex knew he wasn’t denying her because she had been marked by another man—a monster. That wasn’t something Dallas would ever do. He loved her and because he did, he was waiting. She had figured him and his plan out long before, and that was fine. However, that did nothing to stop her from becoming a hot mess every time he looked at her with those penetrating gray eyes.
It was that damn laser-pointed stare he bored straight into her. He could be a happy, carefree guy most of the time, but other moments, she’d catch him looking at her as if he wanted to cross the room and have her at that very moment, circumstances be damned— much like he was at that very minute.
God, she needed more than just hot kisses that left her edgy and needy.
Biting her lip, she weighed her options and quickly formulated her own game plan that reeked of I’m a virgin and I’ve never done this, but hell, she was.
Propping herself up on her elbows, she tried for a sexy bedroom voice. “Um, eh, l-lay down, Dallas.” Okay, that backfired. Starting off by stammering sounded really hot in no one’s book.
He was still kneeling and his abs were bare. She caught herself staring. Dragging her eyes up to meet his, she noticed the raised eyebrow. She pretended he wasn’t already onto her so she didn’t lose her nerve. A smile tugged at his mouth, but he moved and stretched out next to her.
“Come here, baby.”
Trading positions as she got to her knees, Alex shook her head.
It was hard not to get lost staring at him. He still sported the same scruffy hair that was longer than professional, and the sun-bleached tips curled at the tops of his ears and at his neck. His face though had become sculpted with age. The defined lines and his jaw were more rugged and made him look more handsome than the baby face she’d fallen for years ago. But, it was those eyes that were his only downfall. He’d never be a poker player with those grays. He was too easy to read.
Like now. She didn’t have to see he was fisting the blanket to know he was barely hanging onto his control. It made her feel more powerful than she ever had been before. To know a man who was in such control of her, of her safety, the one who saw to it she was happy, was the same man she could break with just one smoldering lo
ok.
Alex narrowed her eyes as she drank him in, appreciating the body he worked so hard to mold. It was the appreciation of one athlete to another, something they had grown used to over the years of dedicating themselves to a mutual sport. She was reaping all the benefits right now as she slowly, and with faked precision, started to straddle him as if she was a true sex-goddess who knew exactly what she was doing.
Leaning over, she grasped his hands, and he laced their fingers together. Then she moved their joined hands to his head. “Stay,” she whispered beginning to kiss him. Slow, lingering kisses that moved lower to his jaw, neck, and then his throat. Moving her way down his chest, she felt him twitch involuntarily, but he’d hit just the right spot and she squeaked, both surprised and wanting more.
“Lex, you need to stop, babe,” he said through clenched teeth.
She shook her head and proceeded downward, moving her whole body as she kissed a path down his. Running her fingers lightly over his lower stomach, she felt the V his muscles had drawn for her, and nuzzled her face against the soft line of dark hair that disappeared underneath the waistband of his swim trunks.
“Alex, I mean it, honey. No more. I can’t take it. I know we’ve teased each other a lot, but this is different.”
She disregarded his plea and shook her head again. Easing further down his body, she tucked her fingers into the band around his waist and started to tug. Not having much luck in being sexy, she realized they were caught on something that only continued to grow and make her plan harder to execute. Rising up a bit, Alex noticed the strained look that washed across Dallas’s face. Smiling to herself, it gave her a hint of encouragement to continue on. Carefully she lifted his waistband up and over him so she could slide his swim trunks down.
“Lex? Honey, what are you doing?” He breathed out while his eyes remained screwed shut.
Instead of answering with words, she filled him in on the details by placing a tentative kiss on it. He twitched instantly, and Alex had to bite her lip hard not to snicker as she watched completely fascinated. Not only had she never touched a man with her mouth, she’d never really gotten more than a glimpse of a man’s body. And that was only recently when she’d try to angle herself just right to catch Dallas’s reflection in the bathroom mirror as he was getting in or out of the shower. Maybe one of these days she’d tell him she damn near fell off the bed once as she was ogling him.
Now though, she was up close and getting personal with it.
She accidently giggled at the thought and wondered what to call it. Maybe she should name it, or was it normally just referred to as him?
Tilting her head, she studied all of Dallas, and even ran a finger across the soft skin. It amazed her. He was soft as silk. A complete contrast to the man she thought of as rugged.
She knew from growing up with men their family jewels were fragile, but right now Dallas was as hard as steel. Growing braver, she slid her hand slowly around the length of him and realized she couldn’t wrap her fingers all the way around his width. Her eyes went wide, knowing where he was going to put that giant monstrosity on their wedding night.
“Don’t be scared, baby.”
Glancing up, Dallas looked like a Cheshire cat. He’d been watching her. “But…he’s, you’re…so big?”
He raised his eyebrow, “Thank you? I’m going to take that as a compliment, even though I’m not sure if that’s how you meant it.”
He snickered and she knew he was teasing her. However, there was no embarrassment with Dallas. Not one feeling of inadequacy. She didn’t even think to be shy as she sat holding him in all his glory while he watched her. As a matter-of-fact, she was long past being ready. A surge went through her, her body clenching as a result, and a quick breath escaped. Suddenly, looking between his thing in her hand, and the hunger his face betrayed, Alex realized she was way in over her head. “I don’t even know what to call it.” She bit her lip.
“It?”
“Shit! I said that out loud? Crap.” She was messing this up in monumental proportions, “I…um.”
“Lex, it’s okay. Call it whatever you want. My penis, my dick…whatever you are comfortable with. Just not Henry. For some reason, that just would be weird.”
He knew she had panicked and frozen—literally. And he’d given her a twinge of humor, freeing her. Warmth flooded her. Dallas knew her inside and out. He knew exactly what she needed and when she needed it, and always gave it to her.
Looking at his, okay, he called it a dick, she could too. Still in her hand, she quickly bent down and kissed him again.
“Baby, let’s wait for that.”
“But?”
“Not yet.”
“But, I wanted to. Guys are supposed to like that.”
“Well, we do, but come here.”
Without giving her time to adjust his trunks back over his family jewels, he had her under her arms and was pulling her back up to blanket his body before she could argue. For the first time, she felt him between her legs with very little between them. The scrap she called a bikini was it. Running his palm across her cheek, Dallas pulled her mouth to his. Her lips were already parted, the tingling that she’d felt before, returned with a vengeance. Fire dusted her skin the instant his tongue touched hers.
Breaking free, she scrambled back down his body and had her lips wrapped around him in less than a breath. She gave him no say in the matter. Using her hand, her tongue, her lips, Alex let go. There was no thinking, no game plan this time. She just did what felt natural, but it was his deep-throated growl that spurred her on.
She kept up her motions, and what she was doing must have felt okay. He gripped one of her shoulders with his fingertips, and hissed through a jaw she could tell was clenched. A string of words alternated between ‘oh my God’, ‘shit’, and ‘you’re killing me’ before he stilled and issued directions one more time. “Alex, move, I’m going to cum. Now.”
But she didn’t listen then either.
He shuddered with a guttural moan. Dallas’s arm fell away, brushing her knee as it landed on the blanket below, but that was it. She continued to swipe her tongue around him and over the tip until she thought he was clean. He’d let out one huge gush of air and now Alex wasn’t sure he was still breathing anymore. Waiting with him still in her hold, she didn’t dare move. Finally his eyebrows went up, even though his eyes didn’t seem to want to follow. “Damn.” One word. After several more breaths, he opened his eyes. “Geez, Alex. Maybe I shouldn’t be treating you with kid gloves.”
With her brow furrowed, she bit her lip. “So?”
“So, it was—amazing!”
“Kid gloves?”
“I don’t want to rush you in anyway, honey.”
“You won’t even undress in front of me, Dallas.” Alex grinned.
With blinding speed, she found herself on her back, lying in his warm spot on the blanket, their positions reversed. Dallas kissed her stomach and sat up to adjust his waistband. “I thought I was being respectful. I still don’t want to do anything while we’re in your parent‘s home, but you’ve made it awfully hard to keep my manners in check when we’re alone.”
“I did make you hard, huh?” Alex smarted back, then shut her mouth quickly, seeing the flare of hunger dash through his eyes again.
“Turnabout is fair play my little blue-eyed angel. I’ll show you exactly what you did to me.”
With his arms bracketing her head, he leaned forward. Her tongue darted out to touch her lips, but he bypassed her mouth and headed for her neck. He sat back up. Alex opened her eyes to see he had the string of her bikini top in his teeth, one tug and the bow was gone. His palm swept under her, his heat searing a path across her skin. A rush of tingles followed as the thoughts and desires bounced around inside her head. Using only his tongue and teeth, he worked to remove her bikini top, then tossed it aside with the most sinful grin pulling at his mouth the entire time. It was then she figured out what the hand at her back had done.
His gray eyes darkened. The palm still at her back pushed against her, forcing her to arch up meet him.
Lowering, he silenced her teasing with his kiss. “Yes. I am,” he whispered against her skin before licking a slow trail over her breasts and finishing by taking one nipple into his mouth.
Pulling in a deep breath through her nose, Alex arched her back even higher, instinctively asking for more.
“I will wait until our wedding night to make you mine,” Dallas said, then kissed her stomach. “But,” he kissed again. “I will.” He began alternating each word with a kiss, each one easing lower on her body than the last. “Show. You. How. I. Feel.” Reaching the line of her barely-there bikini bottoms, he eased up, pulling one string on each side until each scrap fell away. “You opened Pandora’s box, Lex. This is what you do to me.”
He lowered to kiss her before she’d even been able to catch her breath. Alex knew she needed more, and he’d left her feeling frustrated when he held her or kissed her. She walked around so turned on, she couldn’t concentrate on simple mundane tasks. She had a certain amount of sympathy for him, and was fairly positive he felt the same way. Especially since there were times she would brush up against the front of him and feel how hard he was, and it was happening more and more often. However, he’d had sex, she hadn’t. Alex understood his need to protect her with all they’d been through, but her needs were starting to rage out of control. She wasn’t that young anymore, and if anything she was a tad embarrassed to still be a virgin. That she would blame on him for the rest of their lives.