“I’m in love with you, and I just thought you should know.”
He didn’t let her respond, because he wasn’t ready to hear it either way. If she loved him, too, he supposed that would ease the tiny voice in his head that kept telling him to ask the question, like why she was heading to L.A. if that was the case. If she didn’t love him, and he knew that was a possibility, he didn’t want her to say anything she didn’t mean just to protect him. Instead he leaned down, flicked his tongue against her nipple, and then sucked. She gasped.
First her hands fisted the bedspread, but then she ran a palm up his thigh. He groaned against her as the tip of her thumb grazed his balls, aching against the denim of his jeans. She palmed his erection, and he hissed in a breath as he kissed a trail from one breast to the other, licking and nipping and sucking the left as he had the right.
Brynn’s hands worked at his button and then the zipper. She pulled the hem of his boxer briefs over his tip, swirling her finger in the wetness.
“Jesus, Brynn.” Something about all of his nicknames for her didn’t fit. Those were the endearments of a friend, but this—this wasn’t friendship. They were in undefined territory.
…
Brynn stared at the beautiful man in front of her, his blue eyes dark with need. She stroked his erection from root to tip, feeling him pulse in her palm, and she knew she loved him. This beautiful, infuriating, stubborn man who could have had her ten days ago—hell, ten years ago—if he hadn’t been so damn careful with his own heart. Didn’t he know she’d never hurt him? Didn’t he know, in one way or another, she’d loved him for more than half her life? He didn’t have to protect his heart anymore, now that he’d trusted it to her.
She was ready to tell him, the words poised to spill from her lips: I love you, too. But then he did that thing with her breast, and her brain went to mush, and she was just happy she could remember her own name. So she followed the direction of her body, letting her actions do the talking for now. There’d be time after to explain, to apologize for not knowing sooner that it was him. It was always him, and she almost let him get away.
She pushed him gently to his back and removed the rest of his clothing.
“Oh my God,” she managed, and he chuckled. “Shouldn’t you have a beer gut or something?”
She didn’t wait for an answer. Instead she sent her jeans to meet his on the floor, leaving her lace bikinis on until they were ready for that final step. She straddled him, slid up his thighs, and rubbed against his shaft until she cried out, the agony exquisite and at the same time almost too much.
Is this what sex was supposed to be like? Hadn’t she been in love before? Or was her love for Jamie what intensified the experience? The thought scared the crap out of her, but his thumb pressed on her swollenness. Her eyes rolled back, and she arched into his touch.
Jamie slipped a finger through the side of Brynn’s panties and plunged inside her. She gasped and slid to her side next to him, giving him a more advantageous angle and sending her very near to the edge.
She faced him, stroked him again, and he crushed his lips to hers. Nothing about their movements now was careful. Every touch and kiss spoke of insatiable need.
Two fingers were in her, pulsing before they slid out and around her clit. She writhed against his hand, her body begging him not to stop and at the same time lamenting that this soon would end.
“Is this really happening?” he asked in a low whisper. He entered her again, and she gasped.
“Yes,” she whimpered. “It’s real,” she added, begging him to understand what she meant, what she had yet to say. “Jamie, I…”
But he stopped her again with his mouth, the kiss deep and slow as she rode his hand until she thought she might burst at the seams.
“I’m on the pill,” she said, knowing he’d seen her swallowing the oral contraceptive last night yet never saying a word about what that meant for her intentions with Spencer. Shit. Spencer. She’d deal with that later. Right now she needed Jamie.
His fingers dove deeper, and she shuddered against him.
“Now, Jamie. For the fucking love of God, get inside me now.”
He smiled against her and slid his hand out of her panties, helping her wriggle free of them. She didn’t wait another second. Instead she straddled him and slid up his length, this time unfettered by the thin lace barrier. She watched his Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed. Then she kissed him and urged him inside, buried him to the hilt, and there it was—fireworks, “I’m a Believer”—and her heart cracked wide open for the man she’d been too stupid to know she loved with every fiber of her being.
He rocked inside her, every thrust solidifying that her journey was over. She didn’t need L.A., and she wouldn’t have to adopt a litter of kittens after all.
The second thought made her laugh quietly.
“What?” he asked, his voice hoarse in her ear.
“You’re perfect,” she said.