Miraculously, that shut the dog up.
The other ones fell quiet in quick succession, no longer being instigated by the large animal. The lone holdout was a little yappy dog that continued to yelp for another twenty seconds. I kept expecting Mrs. Grace to dash through the door in her bathrobe and slippers. Kept waiting for Coach to storm in and find me with his daughter. That would go over about as well as telling Annabeth her expensive skincare crap got discontinued—he’d flip.
When tiny Napoleon finally went silent, Peyton parted her lips and I shook my head, trying not to breathe, scared to make a sound, and listened for their approach.
“My parents aren’t coming,” she said after a minute, taking a step closer. She placed her hand over mine, right over my heart. “You’d be surprised how soundproof this house is.”
“But aren’t…” I swallowed again and tried to catch my breath. It felt like it was trying to pound out of my body. “Aren’t they worried about people breaking in?”
Peyton smiled, a small one that said she thought I was adorable. I wasn’t adorable—I was protective. I was strong. I was her freaking hero. I wasn’t adorable.
“We have an alarm and we lock the doors,” she said, telling me like I didn’t already know. I did know; I just, well, I’d forgotten about the alarm. “Plus we have the code at the gate. The likelihood of anyone getting in here is pretty slim. So, Dad insulated the crap out of both houses to keep us from getting woken up every night.”
My ears heard what she said. My thoughts were just too scattered to grasp them right away. When I did, the relief was almost paralyzing. My knees went weak, the fear of the last few minutes fully catching up with me, and I blindly reached back for the mattress, tugging her with me onto the bed.
“Oh, thank God.”
For the next few minutes we just sat there, holding each other, letting my racing heart match its rhythm to hers. I wasn’t cut out for this shit. Fifteen years of living pretty much by myself, only having to look out for myself, messed with my survival instincts. Thankfully, the longer the dogs stayed quiet, the more my breathing relaxed.
Slowly, I became less and less focused on the excitement of the last few minutes… and more and more aware of the girl in my arms.
I inhaled naturally, easily, the tightness of my chest easing, and the floral scent of her skin mixed with coconut shampoo hit my senses.
“Christ, you smell amazing.” I took another drag and locked it in my lungs. She always smelled amazing—like the perfect summer day. Breathing her in, my head clouded and my skin blazed hot. I felt drunk, drunk on the scent, drunk on her, and the craving I had just before she got here—that I’ve had ever since I met her—stirred again. My fingers clenched at the thin cotton of her shirt.
We were alone in the near darkness. Her parents were asleep. And Peyton was in my bed.
I repeated my question from before. “What are you doing here?”
I softened my words by cradling her cheek, but I needed to be sure. My control was hanging by a thread. She shivered in my arms and her neck tilted back, lifting her eyes to mine. They shimmered with want.
Calmly, deliberately, she untangled herself from my arms. She stood from the bed, and I panicked, grabbing for her hand, thinking she was leaving. But she wasn’t. She came closer and nudged my knees apart.
Peyton’s long, smooth, completely bare thighs, exposed by her flimsy tee, slid between my legs, light next to dark, and I looked down, realizing for the first time what I was wearing. A pair of nylon basketball shorts—that did jack to hide my current condition—and that was it.
“I’m here,” she whispered, eyes steady on me, “because I need you to make me feel alive.” As she watched me absorb her words, her hands drifted toward the hem of her shirt.
“Are you…”
My voice disappeared as she whipped the top over her head.
Peyton’s hair fell wildly around her shoulders and moonlight danced across her soft skin. My hungry gaze was the only thing covering her, and it devoured. As shadows chased each other over the planes of her body—and my eyes recorded the curves to memory—every last drop of my blood pooled south.
“You’re beautiful.” My words came out like a prayer. She was perfect. Absolutely perfect. Any image or fantasy my overactive imagination had conjured the last few months paled in comparison. It almost hurt to look.
“Make love to me, Justin.” Peyton’s voice, although shaky, sounded sure. She stood in front of me naked as the day she was born, completely confident in her own skin, and my body responded—
Holy hell, did it respond.