The Boy Next Door: A Standalone Off-Limits Romance (Off-Limits Romance #2)

“Whose cunt is this?”


“Yours!” What he’s doing feels so good, I can barely track what else he says as he brings me to fever pitch, then carries me into his bedroom.

Dimly I’m aware of my clothes being peeled off, but what I’m really watching is Dash as he pulls his shirt over his head, exposing his beautiful chest and shoulders to me.

I groan as I stroke his six-pack. “Oh my God…”

Then he’s leaning over me, kissing my neck as I arch up against him. He’s still got his pants on, and I want them off. I want to touch him.

“Take your pants off.”

He gives me a wicked grin. “You do it.”

Dash without a stitch of clothing is a gorgeous sight. I’m stunned into silence: that the boy next door grew up so good.

“You could be a model…” I stroke his muscled thighs, straddling me.

He chuckles. “You would know.” His lips touch down on my neck. “Perfect.” The word is purred, and then he’s kissing me again, driving me crazy as he teases in between my legs. Until I’m begging.

“Please… I need you.”

“I’m right here.”

“I need…this.” My fingers brush his hip, reaching.

“What do you mean? Say it, Am.”

“I want you inside me,” I say in a sultry rush.

He takes himself in hand and rubs his head against me. I buck against him. “Ahhh!”

Dash teases me, pushing slightly in and pulling out… putting pressure at my entrance as I gasp and groan. I claw his arms and squeeze his biceps. “Please!”

And then he thrusts once, hard and fast, and I scream. I grasp for his ass as he pumps in and out, wanting to possess him as he’s possessing me—but I can’t get my hands to work. Can’t do anything but lie there, moaning and screaming, bucking my hips to take him deeper. Dash has got an arm around my shoulders, pulling me up toward him, like he’s hugging me as he fucks me so hard I think I’ll die of pleasure.

We come fast and hard, within seconds of each other. He’s sagging against me when he bolts up. “Fuck!”

“What?”

“No condom!”

I laugh. “We have a bit of a history with the no condom. But it’s okay.” I wrap a hand around his damp nape, guiding his head back to the crook of my arm. “I’m on birth control, and I figured if you thought you might not be clean, you wouldn’t do it.”

“I am—clean,” he murmurs. “I’ve…actually never done this with anyone but you.”

“No?”

He shakes his head.

We lie in a tangled heap. His arms wrap around me, so he’s holding me against him, shifting so my cheek’s against his chest. I look up at the ceiling.

“You’re so fucking perfect,” he whispers.

“You are.”

“No,” he murmurs, heavy-lidded. He pulls blankets over me, then slides out of the covers and rubs them over my hips and my legs. “Wait right here.”

Dash is low on food, but he has two nice, ripe bananas, so we eat those in his bed and then we fuck again, this time so slowly I think I’m going to cry.





Twenty





Dash





I wake up in the wee hours of Monday morning, having dreamed about a masquerade ball. Am was a torero and I was a bull. Somehow, she wound up bleeding. I wake up fully, and she’s in my bed, her lashes soft on her cheeks, her hair everywhere, her breaths soft on my throat. I can’t comprehend it, so I go into the bathroom, wash my face.

When I was younger, I was, for a while, obsessed with karma. I read the Upanishads and spent a lot of time thinking about reincarnation—wanting, I guess, for what happened to me to make some sort of sense. Of course, it didn’t. Not without the context of some past life which would have seen me doing terrible things worthy of punishment.

I tried to tell myself I didn’t deserve it. That I was innocent and clean: merely a victim of my circumstances.

I look into the mirror and try to believe that now. My scruffy face, my tired eyes. Do I look like a blameless man? Do I look like a bull?



Amelia





Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday blur together—in the best way. Dove has gotten all the pre-production green lights, so at work we fall into a frenzied pace, our little studio alive with chatter, art, and energy. We all pull late nights, eager to present our best, and Dash and I find time to slip into a closet here and there. We ride home every night together and he walks me into my apartment, where we throw our clothes off and dive into my covers. Afterward, we shower, Dash tries to help me eat curry with chopsticks, we watch HGTV, I make slice and bake cookies.

He never stays the night, but that’s okay. Before he goes, he kisses me just right and rubs his brow against my brow and smooths my hair back off my face. And I feel dear. Like someone treasured.

Weeks slip by, and we grow bolder, worshipping each other’s bodies, brushing up on each other’s tastes, cooking new things, and sometimes even just falling asleep together after a long day.

My best friend Lucy finds out that she’s pregnant—she had a one night stand with that hottie Prince Liam in Southampton—and I can tell she’s panicking, so I fly out to Colorado. When I get home, I find Dash sitting in front of my door with a bag of Chinese food and two Dr. Peppers.

He kisses me so long and hard, my legs feel weak—and then we go inside, and he spends half the night between my knees.

“I want to take you out,” he tells me quietly when we’re lying in the dark. I’ve got the curtains open in my room, so we can see the city glitter.

“Yeah?” I trace a circle on his upper arm, and Dash sighs, his head leaned against me.

“Yeah.”

“Okay, mister. I could be persuaded.”

“Friday?” he asks.

“Yeah.” I stroke his hair. “Where do you want to go?”

“I know a taco place.”

“Taco ’bout awesome.” I giggle.

“Don’t worry, Am. I guac this.”

He’s quiet for a long moment. I can feel his body still. “You want it to be a date?” he says at last.

“I do.” I know him well enough—I think I do—to detect worry underneath his words. Instead of being insecure that he would even ask, I try to reassure him. Mostly with my mouth and hands.

That night, he stays over and sleeps behind me, his big, thick arms wrapped around me like a cloak. How easy, I think the next day. How easy all this is.

The week is long and challenging and fun, so Friday after work when we ride home together, I’m excited. We kiss in the car and then he walks me to my door and says he needs to go.

“Aww,” I whine. I tug on his striped t-shirt.

“I’ve got something to pick up.” He winks.

He kisses me, and as I watch him walk away, I think how surreal this still sort of is. Dash and me: an item after all.

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