by Tee, Marian
"No words?"
She shook her head.
His voice lowered into a purr. "That's fine, baby."
Oh my gosh, he had called her baby.
"Words aren't needed with what we're going to do next."
She didn't even have the time to understand what he was saying, wasn't even given the time to draw another breath. His mouth was just suddenly there. Hard. Warm. Soft. Rough. It was everything and more. Passionate. Tender. Dangerous. Beautiful.
Her first kiss.
And it just felt so right that Thornton Blackwood was the one to give it to her.
The sheer, exquisite loveliness of it, and the joy of knowing that this first of hers would forever be his, had a sob catching in her throat, and all she could do was wrap her arms around his neck and submit completely to his dominion.
His lips nudged hers apart, and his tongue slid in, mating gently with hers, stroking patiently until she found the courage to mimic his moves. Their tongues tangled, and their breathing turned into heavy pants that echoed and bounced against the walls.
She felt him starting to move, but she couldn't even find the strength to open her eyes. Because this kiss. This first kiss. It was just too, too lovely to wake from, and she wanted it to go on and on and on.
She felt him bending, and it was only when her knees sank into soft leather that she dimly realized he had taken them to the couch. The realization made her whimper, which then made Thornton growl, and everything changed.
From sweet and sensual, the kiss became torrid and erotic. With so much of him to feel, she just couldn't help taking advantage of it, couldn't help rubbing her breasts against his chest and grinding her pussy over his erection.
His hands moved down, fingers digging into the flesh of her ass. Dry humping had never appealed to him in the past, but it was different with Blake, and it was driving him out of his mind---
Thornton managed to tear his mouth off hers before all sanity fled and her first kiss wouldn't be the only first he'd end up taking.
Her eyes drifted open, blank and still hazy with desire. "T-Thornton?"
"I want our first to be in my bed," he said roughly, "where I can take as much time as I want and you can scream as loud as you need."
Blake's body ached hard at his words, but because she also wanted the same thing, she tried her very best to get a hold of herself as well. She drew a deep, shaky breath as the room slowly came into focus. She looked down and bit her lip hard at seeing her on her knees and straddling his lap at the same time.
Almost as if he was a stallion she could ride, she couldn't help thinking, and the thought was both a major turn-on and mortifying.
Her gaze moved up, and she realized her gorgeous beloved had been watching her all this time. The hunger in his dark eyes was still there. But it was fiercer now. Instead of the kiss alleviating his hunger, it only seemed to achieve the opposite, and his hunger was now more rampant. Almost to the point of starvation.
It amazed her, that someone like him could want her this much, and even more amazing was his ability to hold himself in check. She knew this for a fact because she had one hand pressed against his chest, and she could feel the taut hammering of his heart through it.
"Thornton..."
"I like the way you say my name," he rasped.
Her heart squeezed hard, and out of nowhere, words threatened to burst past her lips.
I love you.
But somehow she managed to swallow them down. She knew what she was feeling. Knew it was true even if the whole world told her it was unreal and illogical. She knew. But even so, she couldn't say them. Not just yet. Not when the pain of rejection from the past two weeks was still too fresh to ignore and fight past.
Thornton caught sight of the momentary pain that haunted her gaze. "What is it?"
It was the gentlest voice she had ever heard him use, and her eyes stung. "I'm just...scared." She could accept that he might not love her yet. But even so, she wanted more assurance. He wanted her to be his, he had said, and she believed that was true. But what about him? Did he want to be hers, too?
Thornton cupped her chin. "Tell me of your fears, and I'll take care of them."
"I want us..." She worked hard to find the right words. "I want us...to last."
"So do I, baby." That much was true. But whether it would come true...
In the back of his mind, that other man still existed, and Thornton just had no fucking idea.
If there ever came a time that she'd be made to choose...
He had no fucking idea if she'd choose him.
Chapter Twelve
It was usually a brisk thirty-minute walk back home, but since the shop was closed for the day and he already had the car with him, Thornton suddenly heard himself asking Blake if she had already eaten breakfast.
"Not yet," she admitted. "I was in such a hurry to catch up with you, and then when I was at the cafe, I forgot about it again, and at the library...well, obviously, I got distracted there, too."
"I haven't had breakfast either, so..." He opened the car door for her. "Want to head down and grab brunch in the city?"
"Are you asking me out on a date, Mr. Blackwood?" Blake couldn't help asking teasingly.
"If you're not inside the car in five seconds..."
Blake was still giggling when he joined her inside the car and pulled his door shut.
"Do you realize," she couldn't help sharing eagerly, "this is the first time you're giving me a ride?"
"No. I didn't."
She couldn't help smiling at his matter-of-fact tone. They both knew that had been a rhetorical question, but she loved how it never mattered to him either way. He always took the time to listen to her. Always.
Thornton couldn't help wincing at the way Blake was staring at him again. "Blake..."
"Call me the other thing," she teased.
"Baby."
Blake jumped in her seat with a squeak.
Thornton was torn between amusement and exasperation. "Why are you acting all shocked when you were the one who said---"
"I didn't know you'd give in so easily," she said sheepishly. "But I should have known."
Ah, fuck. There it was again: her expression turning dreamy, and after that, inevitably...
"You're so perfect," Blake sighed.
Thornton also sighed. "I'm not."
"You so are."
"If I were," he said evenly, "then I wouldn't have let you wake up alone this morning."
Blake's smile faded, but when she started to look away, he didn't let her.
"Don't."
She shifted in her seat. "I don't know if I want to hear this---"
"I bailed on you this morning," he interrupted flatly, "because I needed space to think about what I did and said---"
"Are you saying you didn't mean any of them?" Blake automatically braced herself for the worst as soon as the words were out. If Thornton said yes, she'd take it. She was a big girl. She could take it. She would take it. Right?
The play of expressions on Blake's pretty face was painfully easy to read, and he didn't like it, knowing how insecure he had made her. The old Blake he knew had been ridiculously but adorably confident that she could get him to fall in love with her...and he wanted that old Blake back.
"Blake."
"Mm?" Don't let him know what you're thinking. Don't show you're hurt once he tells you last night's drunken confession meant-
"Everything I said last night was true."
What...was...that...he...had...just...said?
"I just didn't like that you had to see me drunk while saying them."
"Really?" she whispered.
"Really."
More seconds passed.
And then---
"You're really perfect."
Thornton groaned.
"I mean it. You really are perfect---"
"No."
"Yes."
"I'm not."
"You are."
But by
this time, she was laughing, and even Thornton couldn't keep his lips from twitching.
I love you.
The words were begging to be said again. But she couldn't. She just couldn't. So instead, she ended up doing the next best thing.
Thornton was just about to start the car when he felt her fingers tap his arm, and he glanced at her---
Mmph!
A cheeky smile on her face was his only glimpse before she had his face between her hands and her mouth had covered his.
Aaaaah.
Even as his desire surged, and his body instantly responded to the sweet, seductive brush of her lips over hers, even as her tongue shyly slipped into his, he just couldn't fucking stop his lips from slowly curving into a smile.
Blake felt this, too, and a rare wave of embarrassment swept over her at the thought that he was laughing at her possibly clumsy attempt to kiss him. She started to pull away, feeling self-conscious, but then she felt his hands suddenly holding her back---
Thornton sucked on her tongue, and her insides clenched.
A moment later, and he was the one to pull back, his head lifting so he could gaze down at her. "It wasn't what you thought."
"Wasn't it?"
"Your sweetness makes me smile."
Oh.
"Only you," he said simply. "Only you can make me smile."
And then he was kissing her, again, but it was Thornton with the reins this time, and she had no problem with this at all. She could only whimper as he dragged her past the gear stick, but this quickly turned into a gasp of laughter as he used the lever to have his seat fall back, and she ended up straddling him.
Again.
"Thornton." His voice came out in a breathless moan, but then his tongue dove into her mouth, and she was once more unable to speak. All she could do was kiss him back, and oh God, it was just as good, maybe better, she didn't really know...it was just so, so, so---
Over?
Blake blinked when she suddenly found herself back in her seat. "Uh..."
"Getting you out of the library lounge would've been for nothing," Thornton said roughly as he fastened her seatbelt, "if I ended up taking your virginity in my car."
"Oh."
He felt her gaze on him as he started the engine. "What?"
"You're perfect," she told him in a rush, and because she knew he'd only argue about it, she didn't bother giving him a chance to speak. "I'm not being biased, I swear. And even though you have this beautiful thug look going on---"
Although Thornton kept his gaze on the road, he was almost tempted to smile at this. Only Blake could say such words to him, and in a gushing tone to boot.
It was only when they made it to Laramie that Blake remembered to pause for breath and realized with horror she had talked the entire ride. Cheeks flushed with embarrassment, she could only wait until he helped her out of the car before quickly apologizing. "I'm so sorry for talking you to death."
Thornton glanced at him oddly. "You didn't."
"I did. We both know I did. I talked way, way too much---"
"Did you?" Thornton was genuinely curious.
"Well..." Blake was temporarily distracted at the way Thornton easily took hold of her hand after locking the car.
"It didn't seem like you talked any more than you usually do at home."
"Oh?" Blake had a hard time remembering what they were talking about. She just couldn't stop staring at their hands. They were holding hands. While walking! Who could've imagined that Hartland's John Wick would be willing to do this?
And that was just the start.
When he asked her where she wanted to eat, she asked him to take her to his favorite restaurant, which turned out to be a cozy Italian restaurant right in the middle of the city. The manager knew Thornton by name, and Blake almost had to pinch herself when Thornton introduced her as his girlfriend.
The food they had served was delicious as she had expected, but what she found particularly unforgettable was how when the waiter asked if they wanted dessert. She had opted for dessert while Thornton had simply said he would just sample hers. When the ice cream arrived and it had only come with a single spoon, she had been about to ask for another when Thornton had raised a brow at her, asking, "Aren't you going to feed me?"
Just remembering this made her feel giddy inside. Who knew? Just...who knew Thornton could so easily take all these romantic things in stride or instigate them even?
The drive back to Hartland was comfortably silent but no less eventful, with Thornton reduced to shaking his head when he caught her trying to take candid shots of him on her phone. He also noticed the way she seemed to open and close her mouth as if dying to say something, and in the end, he finally took pity and asked, "Do you have something to say?"
"Oodles," she confessed, "but I don't want you to think you have a magpie for a girlfriend."
"I don't."
"Um, actually---" She gave him a shamefaced look. "You kinda do."
"Really."
Blake couldn't help smiling at the genuine skepticism in his tone. "I can't believe you never realized what a chatterbox I am. I mean, even Curt sometimes wishes I'd shut up, and---" She stopped speaking.
Thornton's expression remained bland even as he caught sight of the flash of panic in her eyes. "Is that his name?"
"Um. Yeah."
The evasiveness in her voice didn't sit well with him. Blake was usually an open book in every way, and yet it seemed she had at least one secret to hide, and it just had to fucking do with another man.
Chapter Thirteen
A childhood friend, that was what how Blake had described the other man. But based on the data Aidan's security team was able to retrieve, Curt Teller had grown up in Queens, New York and not Laramie, Wyoming, like Frankie and Blake did.
Moreover, Teller's first documented visit to Laramie had been six years ago. That would make Blake about eighteen, Thornton considered pensively. Was that enough for the man to qualify as a childhood friend?
He skimmed the rest of the report, which included a list of Teller's flights to Laramie. It averaged about two or three times a year, and this presented another puzzle. He could still (unfortunately) recall everything he had seen from the CCTVs. Those two had been inordinately close, and if he hadn't instinctively known that Blake was still a virgin, their familiarity with each other would've made him think they were lovers.
But they could still be, Thornton reluctantly acknowledged to himself, if Teller found out about Thornton's relationship with Blake. The man could force Blake to choose---
"It's done!"
Thornton immediately closed the PDF app and dropped his phone back into his pocket before joining Blake in the kitchen. It was already four in the afternoon when they had gotten back, but she had still insisted on doing something for dinner. She always acted like personally preparing for his meals was some kind of honor, and this was something no other woman had done for him before.
After a quick thanksgiving prayer, Blake stood up to cut Thornton a large slice of pie before placing a smaller one on her plate. She had just sat down and taken a bite when she saw Thornton already reaching for the serving knife.
"But---" And then she saw his already-empty plate and burst into laughter. "Are you that hungry?"
"Not really." Thornton's tone was matter-of-fact. "But I like how it tastes."
"That's because your girlfriend made it," she teased him. "If you try any other pie, you'll see. It will never taste as good."
Thornton simply nodded. "I believe you."
This, too, was spoken in a matter-of-fact tone, and she couldn't help but laugh again. He was such an easygoing person really, but because he also had all that facial hair making Thornton resemble a certain unkempt assassin, most people couldn't get past his appearance to realize this about him.
Blake worked hard to anticipate Thornton's needs throughout dinner, a part of her subconsciously wanting to make up for her earlier gaffe. She had seen the way Thornton mo
mentarily stilled when she accidentally let slip about Curt having no choice but to like her. And of course, of course she knew what that meant. But until her brother gave her the green light to share his secret, Blake hadn't any choice. She had to stick to their usual cover-up about being childhood friends.
"Blake..."
She looked up, her lips automatically forming an expectant smile. "Yes?"
He nodded towards his wineglass. "Are you planning to get me drunk?"
"What? No---" She paused, realizing all of a sudden that in her anxious desire to please him, she had ended up refilling his glass nonstop throughout dinner. In fact, this was probably her fifth refill for Thornton...in the past half hour, and spontaneous laughter spilled past her lips. "It does look that way, doesn't it?"
"It does." Thornton might not be smiling, but his deep voice was made just a little tender by amusement, and for that one moment, all thoughts and worries about a certain New Yorker were forgotten.
Blake could feel her entire body burning and melting all at the same time as Thornton captured her gaze and she saw the heat that smoldered into an erotic swirl of promises. She watched him reach for the wineglass, watched him slowly take a sip, and with his eyes still on her, it felt like having him drink all of her in.
Oh God.
"Thorn." His name was a shaky, involuntary cry full of plea and yearning.
He put the glass down, and she could only gulp as he rose to his feet with lazy grace. It was like watching the most dangerously beautiful beast come into life, and her heart once again jumped a thousand beats per second as she watched him move towards---
"Oh!" She could only let out a breathless laugh at suddenly finding herself swept up in her beloved's arms.
And then he began walking.
Towards his bedroom.
Oh.
He saw the flare of understanding in her eyes. "Scared?"
The slender arms around his neck slowly tightened. "Of you?" She shook her head. "Never."
And he could see that she meant it.
Blake's eyes widened when she saw the way Thornton's lips curved ever so faintly. "An almost-there smile," she blurted out, but even as his eyes gleamed with amusement, his lips didn't yield any further, and it was like having him silently tell her, Don't push it.