Waking Up to You Overexposed

5



OVER THE NEXT WEEK, Nick went out of his way to change Izzie’s mind about going out with him. He stopped by the bakery, phoned in orders for stuff he didn’t really want and made sure he was the one to sign for any deliveries at the restaurant, just in case she happened to be the delivery person.

She never was.

But he wasn’t giving up. While at first she’d been a sexy stranger who’d caught his eye, she’d now become something of a challenge to him. He wanted to work his way around her protective wall and see if the smiling, funny girl was still there behind that to-die-for woman exterior.

Maybe it was just as well that Izzie consumed his thoughts by day. Because it made it easier to resist temptation by night. It definitely had on Saturday and Sunday night.

He’d worked at Leather and Lace for a second weekend. This time, knowing what he was in for, he’d been careful to avoid being alone with Rose, the club’s sultry star performer, and hadn’t even exchanged a word with her. Even still, it had been impossible to keep his eyes off her.

Especially when she danced.

Especially when she watched him while she danced.

If she’d made another move on him, he honestly didn’t know that he’d have been able to refuse. So ensuring he was never alone with her was probably a good thing.

Hell, he honestly wasn’t sure why he was resisting. As long as he kept the woman safe, he didn’t see Harry Black being the kind of man who’d have a problem with it. After all, he was married to one of his own former star performers.

And letting off a little sexual steam didn’t have to have anything to do with Nick’s normal, daytime life. In fact, nobody in his family ever needed to know about it. There was no law that said an unattached man couldn’t have sex with a willing woman, just because he was interested in another woman.

One who wasn’t interested in him.

Damn. That’s why he hadn’t done it. Because it was driving him crazy that Izzie wasn’t interested in him.

Frankly, he’d never worked so hard to get a woman’s attention in his life. The fact that Izzie was the woman in question made the whole situation that much more challenging.

She’d been crazy about him once. He’d get her to see him that way again if it was the last thing he did. Even if it meant doing stupid, sappy shit like showing up at her bakery with a handful of flowers.

Like he was right now.

God, how the guys in his unit would laugh to see him, standing on a street corner on a hot August day, holding a brightly colored bouquet he’d bought off a guy on the corner.

“What are you doing?” she mouthed through the glass late Thursday afternoon when he knocked on the locked front door.

“I’m bringing you flowers,” he yelled back. “Open up.”

“Don’t bring me flowers.”

Shrugging, he flashed her a grin. “Too late.”

“I mean it.”

“Like I said, too late. Come on, let me in. They’re thirsty.”

She glared at him. Seeing pedestrians stopping to watch the show, she went a step further and bared her teeth.

Man the woman was hot when she was hot.

“Go away!”

Tsking, he shook his head. Then he looked at the closest woman who’d paused midstep to see what was going on. “Can you believe she doesn’t want my flowers?”

A teenager and her girlfriend, who’d also stopped nearby, piped in together, “We’ll take them!”

The older woman, an iron-gray haired grandmother, frowned. “What did you do?”

Good question. He wasn’t entirely sure. “I didn’t recognize her after not having seen her for ten years.”

The grandmother’s eyebrow shot up. Pushing Nick out of the way, she marched up to the glass, stuck her index finger out and pointed at Izzie. “Take the flowers you foolish girl.” Rolling her eyes and huffing about youth being wasted on the young, she stalked down the street.

Izzie, still practically growling, unlocked the door, yanked it open and grabbed his arm. “Get in here and stop making a fool of yourself.”

“I wasn’t making a fool of myself,” he pointed out. “You were making a fool of me.”

“You don’t require much help.”

Shaking his head and smiling, he murmured, “What happened to the sweet, friendly, eager-to-please Izzie?”

“She grew up.”

She yanked the bouquet out of his hand, stalking behind the counter and grabbing a glass to put it in. Watching her, he noticed the surreptitious sniff she gave the blooms, and the way she squared her shoulders, as if annoyed at her own weakness.

Nick didn’t follow her, tempted as he was. Instead, he leaned across the glass counter, dropping his elbows onto it. “The flowers are a peace offering.”

“Are we at war?”

“It’s felt that way to me ever since I was stupid enough to not recognize you that night at Santori’s.”

Ignoring him, she finished filling the glass with water, turned off the tap and plopped the flowers in.

“I still can’t believe you’re punishing me over that.”

“Don’t flatter yourself. I’m not punishing you over anything. I’m just not interested in you, Nick.”

“Yeah, I got it.” Only he didn’t. He was in no way ready to concede that. Something had caused Izzie to put a wall up between them...and he was going to find out what it was. “But there’s no reason we can’t go back to being friends, is there? We were once.”

“No. We weren’t. You were the stud of the known universe and I was the puppy dog with the big humiliating crush. You can’t seriously think I’d go back to that.”

“I tell ya, Izzie,” he said, hearing the frustration in his voice, “I don’t know for sure what I want from you. I just know I can’t stand that you won’t even look at me.”

She finally did just that. Looked at him, met his direct stare. In those dark brown eyes he saw stormy confusion. It was matched by the quiver of her lush lips and the wild beating of the pulse in her throat.

“You liked me once,” he said softly. “And we did pretty well helping each other out at the neighborhood-prying-session disguised as lunch last Sunday. Can we at least try being friends?”

She opened her mouth to reply. Closed it. Then, sighing as she pushed the vase of flowers to the center of the counter, slowly nodded. “I guess.”

It was a start. Maybe not the start he wanted to make with her...but at least the start of something.

“Do you want some coffee?” She didn’t sound particularly enthusiastic about the invitation.

He glanced at the industrial coffeemaker, scrubbed clean for the night, and shook his head, not wanting to put her to the trouble.

“I have a small coffeemaker in the back.”

“Sounds good.”

Nick followed her down a short hallway between the café and the kitchen, trying to remember that it wasn’t very polite to stare long and hard at the ass of someone who was just a friend. It didn’t work. Because though she wore loose-fitting khakis and an oversize apron, the woman had a figure to die for. Every step pulled the fabric a little tighter across her curves, and the natural sway in her hips made him dizzy.

Friends. That’s it. And not friends with benefits.

“How do you like being back in Chicago?” he asked as he sat at a tall stool beside a butcher-block work counter.

Izzie ground fresh beans. At last—a woman who knew how to make coffee. One more thing to like about her, aside from the cute way her ponytail wagged when she moved and the way she smelled of sugar and butter and everything nice. “About as much as I like getting a root canal.”

“That bad? You don’t like being back in the family business?”

She glanced around the kitchen, immaculately clean and stocked with every baking supply ever invented. “My prison smells like anisette.”

“Mine smells like marinara,” he muttered, meaning it.

She nodded, not asking him to elaborate. She obviously knew exactly what he meant. “Not easy to come home, is it?”

He shook his head. “Not easy at all. My parents still haven’t forgiven me for moving into an apartment, not back into my old room. It still has my high-school posters on the walls.”

She snickered. “Mine, too. Though I don’t suppose yours were of ballerinas and Ricky Martin.”

“Uh...definitely not.” A grin tickling his lips, he admitted, “Demi Moore and Lethal Weapon 3.”

Izzie laughed softly. There was a twinkle in those dark brown eyes of hers and a flash of a dimple he remembered in one cheek. At last.

“Are you...”

“What?” he asked.

“I’m sorry,” she said, “it’s none of my business.”

“What’s none of your business?”

“I guess I was just wondering if you felt...a little...out of place with your family.”

“I feel like I belong with the Santoris about as much as that kid in The Jungle Book belonged with the dancing bear.”

She nodded, as if in complete agreement. “But if I recall correctly, I think he wanted to belong with the dancing bear and couldn’t understand why he didn’t quite fit in.”

Nick said nothing. She’d made his point for him.

Izzie seemed to realize it. “Yeah. Me, too.”

“Something else we have in common,” he said.

“Don’t get too excited about it,” she muttered, “I’m still not giving you my phone number.”

“You must know I already have it.”

She rolled her eyes but didn’t frown. “Gloria. Dead sister walking.” The coffee had finished brewing, so she poured two big cups. “Cream or sugar?”

“Neither.” Taking the cup from her, he inhaled the steam. “My mother makes lousy coffee. So does your sister, who seems to have decided even the smell of caffeine can make our hooligan nephews bounce off the walls.”

“Decaf’s for quitters,” she muttered.

Startled, Nick barked a laugh. This was no sweet little Izzie, the girl he remembered.

“I lived on coffee in Manhattan,” she admitted. “It was the only way I could maintain my schedule.”

He sniffed appreciatively, allowing the rich aroma to fill his head. When combined with all the other scents permeating this room, it was making him weak with physical hunger.

Or she was. He honestly wasn’t sure which.

“I think I would have killed for something this good even when it was one-hundred-twenty degrees in the desert.”

Izzie sat on one of the other stools across from him, her cup on the counter between them. Watching him intently, with a bit of trepidation, she forecast her curiosity before the words left her mouth. “How did you make it through every day?”

What a good question—and one nobody had asked him yet. Oh, he’d been asked about the action and the things he’d seen. Asked if he’d shot anyone, killed anyone, saved anyone. Asked what he’d done to relieve the boredom, to accomplish his mission.

But nobody had asked him what it was that had held him together every single day. Not until now.

“I’m sorry, that’s probably none of my business.”

“It’s okay. If you want to know the truth, it was this that held me together.” He gestured around the room.

She frowned skeptically.

“I don’t mean the bakery. I mean this lifestyle. Home, family, all the safe, secure stuff I grew up with that I thought would be exactly the same when I got back. Only, it wasn’t.”

Staring at him, Izzie revealed her thoughts in her expressive brown eyes. She understood what he meant—got it, exactly. Nick didn’t look away, liking the connection even though they were separated by several feet of sweet-smelling air. Mentally, though, they were touching. Bonding. Sharing the unique brand of estrangement they had each been feeling from the world they’d grown up in.

She finally shook her head. “Well, obviously you have some things to figure out, man-cub.”

He grinned, remembering what he’d said about The Jungle Book. “Yeah, well, so do you, right? You didn’t get what you bargained for when you came home, did you?”

She shook her head.

“What’d you do in New York, anyway?” he asked, never having gotten the whole story. He knew she’d had a good job but had given it up to come home and help her family.

“I was...in the arts,” she murmured, lifting her cup to her mouth. She blew across the surface of the coffee, sending steam curling up into the air. It colored her cheeks, already flushed a delicate pink from the heat of the yeasty kitchen. “On the stage.”

An actress. The idea stunned him for a second, though it made sense. Izzie had looks and personality and a lot of self-confidence. He suspected she was amazing onstage.

“But I got hurt last winter and haven’t worked since.”

He lowered his cup, waiting.

A tiny frown line appeared between her eyes as she explained. “I tore my ACL in my left knee and had to have surgery. It required a lot of rehab.”

“And you’re on your feet working in a kitchen all day?” he asked, appalled at the idea of how much pain she had to have experienced. He knew guys who’d had those injuries during his high-school sports days. They were not fun.

“I’m better.” She pointed down to the stool on which she sat. “And I work sitting down a lot.”

Nick wanted to know more. Lots of things. Like what kind of life she’d led in New York and whether anyone had shared it. And what her neck tasted like. And what she planned to do once her father was well enough to come back to the bakery. And what she’d eaten today that had left her lips so ruby red. And why she was resisting something happening between them.

And when she was going to be in his bed.

But the phone interrupted before he could ask, much less get any answers. Excusing herself to answer it, she revealed her frustration with the caller with every word exchanged. Nick heard enough to understand what was going on—her part-time delivery person was calling in sick.

“I can’t believe this,” she muttered after she hung up the phone. “All these orders and he bails on me.” Almost growling, she added, “Are the Cubs playing today? It sounded like the little bastard was at the ball park.”

Fierce. He liked it.

“Don’t sweat it, Iz. I’ll help you out.”

Blinking, she replied, “Huh?”

“I’ll help you make the deliveries.” Hopping off the bench, he walked over to a tall cart, laden with cardboard boxes labeled with the names of several local restaurants. “After all,” he said, offering her a boyish smile over his shoulder, “what are friends for?”

* * *

FRIENDS WERE FOR going to the movies with. Sharing bad date stories with. Getting through boring reunions with. Crying over breakups with. Dieting with. Drinking with. Clubbing with.

Friends were not for having sex with. Or lusting over. Or inspiring lust simply by the way they handled a few heavy boxes and filled out their soft, broken-in jeans.

Nick Santori was no friend of hers. Because oh, God, she had already broken every “friend” rule in the book and she’d only agreed to his terms a few hours ago.

When they’d talked in the kitchen, he’d been friendly and warm. That boyish smile he’d flashed her when he’d offered to help her with the deliveries had made him seem so charming and endearing. Completely the opposite of the brooding, simmering hunk of male heat she’d watched through covetous eyes at the club last weekend. It was like he was two people in one body.

And she wanted both of them desperately.

She couldn’t believe she’d thought she could handle being merely his friend. Now, having been closed up in a delivery van with him for the past couple of hours, she was definitely having second thoughts.

He was being so damned wonderful. Not just offering to help her, he had refused to let her lift a single box. They’d gone to a dozen shops and restaurants, delivering cakes, pies and pastries to some places for their dinner customers tonight, and muffins and coffee cake to others for their breakfast crowds tomorrow. He’d charmed her customers, and her. He’d even driven, since Izzie hated dealing with the traffic. She’d sat in the passenger seat of the bakery van, reading off the list of stops, trying not to notice how big he was and how small the van felt with him in it.

She also tried not to notice how wonderful he smelled. How the sound of his low laughter rolled over her, more warm and sultry than a summer breeze. How his short hair curled a little behind his ear. How strong his lightly stubbled jaw was and how thick his body was beneath his tight T-shirt. How he warmed her from two feet away.

And how very, very much she wanted him.

Especially after the cannoli. It was the damn cannoli that put the nail in her coffin...and the wetness in her panties.

They had an extra box. Izzie had been so wiped out from working so many hours, both at the bakery Tuesday through Saturday, and at the club Saturday and Sunday nights, that she’d miscounted. She’d boxed up an extra two dozen of the decadent ricotta-and-cream filled treats. Once they’d finished all the deliveries, thanks mostly to Nick’s strong back—oh, heavens, that strong back—she’d noticed the extra box and realized her mistake.

So, when they’d gotten back to the bakery and parked in the small private lot behind it, she’d offered him one. He’d immediately taken her up on it, not even getting out of the van before digging in. And seeing him eat it with such visceral, sensual appreciation, was making her a quivering, shaking mess.

“God, these are amazing. No wonder they sell out every day at Santori’s,” he said as he licked at the creamy center of the tube-shaped pastry.

Izzie shifted in the seat. Licking. It was not a good thing to watch a man do if you wanted to have sex with him but couldn’t.

He nibbled some of the flaky crust.

Nibbling. Also bad. She added it to her mental list of no-nos to watch.

Then he bit in and closed his eyes in rapturous delight. Oh, Lord. Biting—anything that put that look of intense pleasure on his face—was absolutely out of the question.

Thankfully, he finished the thing so quickly—devouring it in three bites—that she didn’t have time to do something foolish, like, say, offering him her tongue to lick and her breast to nibble and her inner thigh to bite.

“You are going to let me have another one, aren’t you?” he asked. Not waiting for an answer, he got out of the driver’s seat and bent over to step into the back of the van. Metal racks were attached to each side of it, with an aisle down the middle. Opening the lone box remaining on one shelf, he held it toward her. “Come on, have one.”

She hadn’t voluntarily eaten a cannoli since tenth grade, the day after she’d split her pants while trying to do a sit-up in gym class. They’d torn with a resounding flatulent sound and she’d almost dropped out of school then and there. “Uh-uh.”

He smiled, his eyes glittering in the near darkness. Dusk had fallen while they were out making the rounds, and it was now after eight o’clock. The book shop next door was also closed, their private parking spots empty, and the small lot was entirely quiet and deserted. Very private.

She really should hop out of the vehicle and go inside. Being out here, in the near-dark, alone with Nick, was not a very good idea. Of course, being inside the closed shop, in the light, alone with Nick, probably wouldn’t be much safer.

“One little taste. How can you tell how good you are at doing it if you never give it a try?”

Nearly choking, she repeated, “How good I am at doing it?”

“You know. Making them.”

Yeah. Sure. That’s what she’d thought he meant.

A small smile continued to play on those incredible lips of his as he watched her, as if he knew what she’d been thinking. And had intentionally put those thoughts into her head.

Get out. Now.

But she didn’t reach for the door handle. Instead, like a kid lured by the ice-cream man, she ducked into the back of the van with him. There wasn’t room to stand, but Nick had already sat down on the carpeted floor. One leg was sprawled out in front of him, the other bent and upraised. He was carefully picking his way through the open box of pastries, as if searching for just the right one to satisfy his craving.

Izzie sat down across from him, cross-legged, wondering whether the temperature in the van had just gone up forty degrees or if it was her imagination. Considering it was a breezy summer evening and the front windows were open, she somehow doubted the air had gotten hotter...only she had. In fact, being this close to Nick was setting her on fire.

“You going to let me tempt you with one?” he asked, still looking down at the box, not at her.

They did look good. So good. “I really shouldn’t.”

“Just a taste,” he whispered. Not waiting for her to answer, he lifted one out, then put the box back on the shelf. He scooted forward...close, so close she felt his heat wash over her and his warm, masculine scent fill her lungs. He lifted one of his legs over her crossed ones, until her right knee brushed his hot, jean-covered butt.

She didn’t move. Not one inch.

“Won’t you have one little lick?” he murmured, lifting the cannoli to her lips.

Staring at it in his hands—the flesh-colored cookie, the pale creamy cheese oozing from the end—she suddenly realized just how phallic the thing looked. Her mouth flooded with hunger—she wanted to lick, to taste, to devour.

Not the pastry. Him.

Almost whimpering, she lowered her mouth to it, scraping her tongue along the flaky crust, brushing his finger as she did. He shifted a little in response, as if no longer comfortable sitting the way he had been. The way they were sitting, she quickly realized why.

He was rock hard, his erection thick and long against her leg. She almost drew her legs together, the pressure in her sex demanding relief.

Izzie could hardly think or breathe. Unable to resist, she moved her leg a little, rubbing it against him, and got a low groan in response.

“Taste, Izzie.”

She tasted. Imagining it was him she was sampling, she nibbled at the filling, brushing her lips against it.

She didn’t need to invite Nick to share it. He was already there, kissing the corner of her mouth, his tongue flicking out to clean some of the sweetness off her lips. “Good,” he whispered.

Oh, very good.

She licked again, dipping her tongue inside the cookie shell for a deeper taste. Nick tasted deeper, too. He covered her lips with his, stealing some of the cream right out of her mouth, their tongues tangling over it for a long, delicious moment.

“Get your own,” she whispered with a soft laugh when he pulled away to offer her another lick.

“I’d rather have yours,” he murmured, moving his mouth to her cheek, then lower. He nibbled her jaw, scraping his lips along it until he could nuzzle the sensitive spot just below her ear. “Actually, I’d rather have you.”

His words washed over her, echoing in her head. With his warm breath on her neck, his mouth on her skin, his hard body radiating heat just inches from her own, she couldn’t remember a single reason why she shouldn’t have him.

“I noticed.” She shifted back far enough to uncross her legs. Without thinking or considering, she draped them over his thighs, scooting close—so close—that that thick ridge in his jeans pressed against the damp seam of hers.

He arched forward reflexively, grinding against her, and Izzie gasped. Moisture flooded her and her sex swelled almost painfully against her clothes. Her * felt as if it had doubled in size and she bucked into him, needing to come so badly she could almost taste it.

“More?” he asked.

She arched harder. She definitely wanted more.

He lifted the cannoli. She shook her head, then let it fall back. She wanted to be the dessert now. Right or wrong, stupid or not, she wanted Nick Santori too much to resist him again.

When they stepped out of the van, the real world would return. He’d still be the great neighborhood guy she couldn’t publicly date. But for now—oh, for now—she wanted him desperately, with a longing that had built in her for more than a decade. “Have me, Nick,” she whispered, saying yes to the question he hadn’t quite asked.

He made a low sound that might have been unrestrained—want or might have been triumph. Honestly, Izzie didn’t care. Especially when he nibbled her earlobe, then worked his way down her neck. “Mmm, you taste like sugar and almonds.” He kissed his way down to her collarbone, lightly biting her nape, and she shivered.

Never taking his mouth off her, he reached up and pulled her ponytail holder off. Her thick hair fell around his hand and he twined it through his fingers. Cupping her head and supporting her, he pushed her back a little so he could have better access to her neck.

When she felt the cool wetness touch the hollow of her throat, she gasped. The ricotta filling felt good against her heated skin. When Nick licked it off, it felt amazing.

Dropping back to support herself on her elbows, she watched through heavy-lidded eyes as Nick began slipping open the buttons of her sleeveless blouse. After every button was freed and another bit of skin revealed, he dabbed filling on her. Soon there was a trail of dots from her throat, down her chest, in the middle of her cleavage and all the way down to her belly.

He wasn’t tasting them. Not yet. She twisted and arched up, desperate for him to, but he ignored her silent plea.

Once he tugged the top free of her jeans, it gaped open. Shrugging, she let it fall off her shoulders, then watched him devour her with his eyes. His breath grew audibly choppy as he saw the way her breasts overflowed her skimpy bra. Bent back as she was, she could barely keep the thing in place, and one nipple was actually peeping freely above the lace.

“Beautiful,” he muttered hoarsely. He lifted the pastry and dabbed some of the filling on her nipple.

This time he didn’t move on. He stopped for a taste.

“Oh, God,” she groaned as Nick bent over and covered her nipple with his mouth, licking and sucking at the cheesy filling. He lapped up every bit, pushing her bra all the way down so he’d have complete access to her breast.

“You are glorious,” he said as he lifted a hand to cup her. His fingers were dark and strong against her pale skin, and she literally overflowed his hand. “You hide a lot behind that apron you usually wear.”

She hid a lot more behind the mask she sometimes wore. The thought flashed through her head, but she thrust it aside. This was not the time to be thinking about her alter-ego...or what Nick might do if he ever found out they were one and the same.

Now was for savoring. Indulging.

Reaching for the clasp of her bra, he unfastened it and pulled it off, catching her other breast as it spilled free. Scooping out a large fingerful of filling, complete with tiny chocolate chips, he smeared it all over the taut tip, then devoured it as completely as he had the other side.

Her legs clenched, heat shooting from her wet nipples down her body, straight between her legs. She jerked up, dying to be freed of her jeans. “I need...”

“I know,” he whispered. He dropped his mouth to hers for a deep kiss that shut her up and zapped her brain. He tasted sweet and hot and decadent.

Izzie worked at Nick’s shirt as they kissed, pulling away so she could tug it up and off him. Then she sagged back, staring in disbelief at the perfection that was his body.

In his clothes, he was an incredibly well-built man.

Out of them he almost defied description.

He was rock hard, not an ounce of excess on him, with a massive chest and thickly muscled shoulders. His huge arms rippled as he moved, highlighting a sizable tattoo—a Marine Corps logo. Just the perfect amount of dark curly hair emphasized the breadth of him before narrowing down to his waist and hips, where he was incredibly lean.

“I’m not finished my dessert yet,” he muttered when she reached for his waistband.

He tossed the tiny bit of cannoli away and grabbed another one out of the box. Taking her hand, he pushed her arm over her head until she had to lie flat on the floor. Then he worked his way down her body, kissing, nibbling and licking off all those spots of cream he’d deposited on her earlier.

“It tastes sweeter now,” he said when he dipped his tongue into her belly button and swirled it there. “It just needed one more ingredient to make it absolutely addictive.”

Her. It needed her.

And she needed him.

His hands. His mouth—oh, heavens, his mouth. His amazing body. And that big hard erection she could feel pressing against her leg as he slid farther down her body.

He didn’t even move his mouth off her as he undid her pants and pushed them down her hips. Izzie lifted up to help him...and unintentionally offered herself to him much more intimately.

He was on her immediately.

“Nick!” She gasped and panted when he covered the front of her tiny panties with his mouth, breathing through the fabric, sending warm tendrils of pleasure right where she needed them most. “Please.”

“I bet this will taste even sweeter,” he whispered as he tugged the satin away.

Izzie barely breathed as he pushed her clothes down and off, until she lay naked beneath him. And she absolutely flew out of her skin when he took the new tube-shaped pastry and smeared one creamy end of it through her curls and across her sex.

“Oh,” she groaned.

He pushed at her inner thighs and Izzie parted her legs, giving him the access he’d silently demanded. When he took a first, slow lick at the filling, thick and heavy in her curls, she came up off the floor.

“Oh, definitely sweeter,” he said. He moved farther down, sliding his tongue over every inch of her, eating every drop of sticky cream as if it was the best thing he’d ever tasted.

Izzie was a quivering mess, shaking, panting, bucking. Desperate for more, she didn’t know whether to beg or remain still for fear he’d get distracted from what he was doing.

He didn’t get distracted. And before she knew what he was up to, she felt the flaky shell of the cookie scraping across her *. She cried out again, feeling the climax build inside her. When he licked at her again, working her * with his tongue and his lips—lathing, then sucking—she finally got what she’d been waiting for. Pleasure erupted through her, rocking her hips, sending a pulse of heat through her.

Nick didn’t even pause, beyond muttering a soft “Yes,” in acknowledgment of her orgasm. He just kept going, sliding the cannoli farther...following it with his tongue. Until finally he began working the delicacy between her drenched lips.

“You’re not...you can’t...” she gasped.

But he did and he was. He slid the tip of it into her wet crevice—sending a cacophony of sensations rushing through her. The roughness of the delicate shell, the smoothness of the filling, she’d never felt anything like it. It was wicked—erotic. A little outrageous.

And she loved it. “Nick...”

“I’m not quite finished with dessert. Though I’m just about full,” he murmured.

She only wished she were.

She didn’t get too impatient, however, because she was too anxious to see what this supposedly “nice neighborhood guy” would dare next.

He wanted to keep playing, obviously. He slowly sunk the treat deeper, as far as he could, then gently tugged it out. He did it again, leaving Izzie to wonder how long it would take before the shell broke and the oozy cream filled her.

Finally, when she thought she’d die of the wild wantonness of it, he started working it out with his teeth, rather than his fingers. He nibbled off little pieces as it came out of her, whispering sweet words about how good it tasted...how good she tasted. How juicy and creamy she was.

His words were almost as arousing as his touch.

“Gotta make sure I got every drop,” he whispered once the last of the cookie was gone. And he did, plunging his tongue into her and stroking—in and out—until she lost her mind and came again.

She threw her head back, closing her eyes, giving herself over to the rocking of her body, which seemed to go on forever. When it had finally eased up, and she opened her eyes again, it was to find Nick over her.

She lifted her legs, realizing his were bare. His lean hips brushed her inner thighs, and his thick cock lay heavy on her pelvis.

Whimpering, she looked down. “Let me see you.”

“Feel me,” he whispered, burying his face in her neck. He slid up and down, his cock separating the slick lips of her sex, hitting her * at the perfect angle.

“See and feel,” she insisted, sliding her arm between their bodies to reach for him.

She caught his erection in her hand, shocked at how big and hot it was. He’d already sheathed himself with a condom, but she could feel his pounding pulse through the rubber.

“You’re bigger than that cookie,” she said, nibbling on her lip as she acknowledged just how much Nick Santori had been hiding beneath his clothes.

He groaned and dipped closer, sliding into her a little at a time. “You’re sweeter than that cookie.” He pushed a bit more, easing into her with incredible restraint. “And you are definitely creamy enough to handle me.”

She didn’t doubt it. He’d aroused her half out of her mind and right now, she wanted him plunging to the hilt inside her. Grabbing his hips, she dug her nails into his butt and arched up for him. “Take me, Nick. Fill me up.”

He seemed to forget about restraint because he did exactly what she asked, plunging hard and deep until Izzie howled at how good it felt.

He stretched her, embedded himself in her, then drew out and plunged again. “Oh, my God,” she groaned. “This is amazing.”

Better than amazing. It was absolute perfection. Worth every one of the years she’d waited for it.

Thrusting up, Izzie took what he gave and demanded even more. When she became too frenzied, he slowed the pace, showing so much control she wanted to sob in frustration. But he wouldn’t relent, taunting her with slow, deep strokes and teasing half ones. He kissed her so often and so deeply she wasn’t sure she’d remember how to breathe when she wasn’t sharing the breath from his lungs.

Finally, though, she heard the tiny groans he couldn’t contain. His hips thrust harder, more frantically, and she wrung as much as she could out of every stroke.

“I can’t...oh, Izzie...”

“Do it,” she ordered, feeling another climax building in her from the friction of their locked bodies. “I’ll come with you.”

That seemed to satisfy him—that he had her permission—and he finally lost his head and gave her the deep, pounding thrusts they both needed. Again. And again. Until he threw his head back and shouted as he reached his climax.

She found hers a second later and wrapped her legs tightly around him to ride it out.

As if knowing the floor was hard against her back, Nick scooped her in his arms and lay down, dragging her on top of him. They were both panting, gasping for air, and he kissed her temple, smoothing her hair away from her sweaty face.

“Izzie? I have to tell you something.” His words were rushed. Choppy.

“Yes?”

Closing his eyes, he dropped his head back onto the floor.

“I’m going to call you Cookie until the day I die.”