“What?”
His answer was a kiss, sweet and slow. I wanted this very badly. But even so, my heart beat wildly, and I wondered what it all meant. I pulled just far enough away that I could see his eyes. “Hartley? I…I can’t just be a hookup. Maybe some girls can pull that off, but…”
He put two fingers over my lips. “You have me, Callahan.” His hand slid to cup my cheek, and I leaned into its warmth. “You’re the first person I want to talk to in the morning, and the last thing I want to see at night.”
My gasp of happiness was cut off by his lips against mine. Gently, he sat me down on his bed, pushing the hair back from my face with his thumb. He deepened the kiss. As our mouths melded, Hartley groaned from the back of his throat, the sound reverberating down my spine.
When his tongue stroked mine, I felt it everywhere.
Hartley dropped his mouth to my ear, whispering, “I’m sorry it took me so long.” And then his lips brushed my cheek, while his hands reached around my body, pulling me tight against his bare chest. And then we were kissing, and rolling around on his bed like two starving people discovering an unexpected feast. I let my hands skate all over him. There was no longer any reason not to touch him, and suddenly I couldn’t touch him in enough places at once. While my fingers explored the hard muscles of his chest, Hartley kissed his way down my neck. He grazed down my body, lifting the base of my camisole to nose across my stomach. When his lips dipped into the waistband of my yoga pants, my breath hitched.
He raised his chin. “Maybe we should go and get our friend Digby.”
“No,” I shook my head.
Hartley’s muscles popped as he crawled back up to me, his face hovering over mine. “You need to tell me what you want,” he whispered, tucking a strand of my hair behind my ear. “I don’t know what you’re ready for.”
I thought I already knew all the ways his brown eyes could look back at me. But I’d been wrong. Now they flared with such heat and desire that I could barely believe that I was really in his bed, and that it wasn’t just some misunderstanding. “I want you to…” I broke off, because it was so hard to say. “I want everything. I want you to be the same with me that you were with other girls.”
His gaze had the intensity of a laser. “But it’s not the same with you.”
My heart faltered. “Why?”
“Because, Callahan.” The brown eyes came closer. “I never loved anyone the way I love you.” The next kiss was long and slow, and full of promise.
When we came up for air, I made a move, reaching for his fly. Watching me, Hartley’s face flushed. I unzipped his jeans. And when I reached into his boxers to wrap my hand around him, he groaned.
Fingering my camisole, he slipped it over my head. Then he put his hands on the waistband of my yoga pants. “Is this okay?” he asked, his voice husky. He looked at me the way a man looks at a woman he’s undressing — with gravity and longing.
I nodded.
He removed my pants and then shucked off his own. When he lay down on top of me, we were finally skin to skin. The mood was nothing at all like our Weirdest Night Ever. Our kisses were deep and urgent, and our bodies moved against one another with such sweetness and heat that I felt a prickle behind my eyes. “Hartley,” I breathed. “Make love to me.”
“You sure?” he panted. “You waited for me. I’d wait for you.” He hovered just over me, his nose an inch from mine.
But I was finished waiting. I’d never told Hartley straight out that I was a virgin. There was no way I wanted to stop and have that conversation now. I put two fingers over his lips. “Don’t baby me, Hartley.”
His shoulder muscles flexed as he shook my fingers off his mouth. Then pressed his hips against mine in a way that made both of us gasp. “I’d never baby you, Callahan. You’re the toughest person I know.” He opened the drawer of his bedside table, emerging with a little foil packet. He tore it with his teeth, and then reached a hand down between our bodies to roll the condom on.
My heart began to pound with nervous anticipation. But Hartley slowed down, propping himself up on one elbow. He cradled my cheek with his free hand, studying me with such ferocity that it burned me up inside. “I have always wanted you, Callahan.” His fingers whispered down my neck and along my shoulder, tracing a shivery line all the way down my arm. He brought my hand to his lips and kissed my palm. “I was just too stupid to say so.”
Inconvenient as it was, I felt prickles in my eyes. “I can’t believe…” I started, drawing in a breath through my nose, to try to stop my tears.
“What?”