The Summer I Saved You (The Summer #2)(50)

Offering to try wouldn’t be good enough, except...I’ve seen him with the twins. He cares about them more than he wants to admit and maybe he just needs to see firsthand that those commitments he doesn’t want to make aren’t so daunting. That he had a very bad break once upon a time, but it doesn’t have to ruin the rest of his life.

And I can’t walk away without discovering what we could become. I can’t.

I raise my chin toward him, and he takes it for the permission it is. His mouth lands on my mine, his five-o-clock shadow rough against my skin.

My hands go to his waistband, and his small intake of breath—eager, masculine—banishes the last whispers of worry. His fear of commitment, his imminent move...those are problems for another day.

He tugs me tight against him, his cock hard and jutting against my stomach, lips pressed to my neck, and I am suddenly burning alive. I need out of this dress; I need him out of the t-shirt and sweats. I’m dying to feel his bare skin on mine. “God, Caleb...can we go upstairs? Like...now?”

In a second flat, he’s got me in the air with my legs wrapped around his waist, carrying me toward the staircase with one hand and grabbing the candle with the other.

He reaches the top of the stairs and turns, heading straight to my room.

“How did you know where to go?” I ask as he kicks my door open.

He sets the candle on the dresser and tosses me on the mattress, climbing on the bed after me.

“You think I don’t know which room is yours?” he asks, leaning down until our noses are a millimeter apart. “My day doesn’t end until I see your bedroom light go out.”

I smile. Caleb’s been watching my house just as carefully as I’ve been watching his.

He kisses me again—soft lower lip, unshaved jaw—and his hands move to the hem of my dress.

“I’m not wearing the garter thing,” I gasp.

“Good,” he says, his palm running up the back of my thigh. “God, that would have pissed me off if you’d worn it for someone else.”

He pulls me firmly to that bulge straining between us, and then he leans back on his knees, his mouth wet and open as he looks me over.

“Jesus Christ, this dress pissed me off when I walked in.” He gives me a sheepish grin. “I actually was going to apologize until I saw the fucking dress.”

I laugh. “Maybe you should remove it then.”

He gives me a half-smile, tugging his t-shirt overhead before he pushes the dress around my hips. “Now that I know you weren’t wearing it for someone else, I sort of want you to keep it on.”

He pulls my panties down and sweeps his tongue between my legs.

“Ah,” I gasp, arching. “You don’t have—”

He laughs against my skin. “Yes, Lucie. I don’t have to. You’re not going to come. I’m not doing any of this for you, I promise.”

I almost believe him, and it’s freeing. Without the pressure to perform, to do this right, all I have to do is experience it. I’ve got little basis for comparison, but I’d be willing to stake my life on the fact that no other man alive has Caleb’s mastery of this—the pressure of his fingers pushing inside me, the tip of his tongue flicking along my swollen clit then breaking to sweep over me in long, lathing strokes.

I might even be able to come this way, if it went on long enough. But if I let him keep going, he’ll get his hopes up about it and then it wouldn’t work and he’d be disappointed. He’s got to be getting tired of it anyway. “Come up here,” I plead.

He takes one last taste and then slides up, thrusting inside me without warning.

“God,” he groans. “I’m—already close. Don’t move.”

“It’s okay,” I urge. “Just...please.”

“Hearing you beg is not helping the situation,” he hisses. But he starts to push in and out, his jaw locked tight as he reins himself in. He tugs the dress and bra down to bare my breasts, looking me over with smug satisfaction on his face, thrusting harder and harder as my eyes fall closed, as I start to arch and gasp and plead. And when I finally go over the edge, he follows, groaning into my neck.

“Lucie,” he whispers, my name slurred with fatigue. “Haven’t slept yet. Too worried.”

I wrap my arms around him, and within seconds his weight settles, his mouth still on my neck. He’s already asleep. And he’s smiling.

The spring breeze blows through the curtains while I marvel at the way this evening worked out, the way my life is working out. I’ve never considered myself especially lucky, but is that true? I think, perhaps, it’s not.

Caleb lands on the pillow beside me and reaches for me without opening his eyes once. I’m lulled to sleep by his even breathing, his warm chest, and my dreams are so vivid that they seem entirely real.

I dream Caleb and I are in his office building that crib I saw, that we’re both in my aunt’s boat when a woman starts swimming alongside us, a woman I somehow know is Kate.

And then I dream about Caleb pushing my legs apart. I dream of his tongue, the tiny, electric flickers of pleasure he elicits with it, his fingers inside me, the wet sounds of my pleasure. I would normally tell him to stop at this point— It’s not going to work, you’re wasting your time—but I’m dreaming, so what does it matter? I can let him go as long as I want. The pressure grows and I want a few more seconds, and a few more after that. I slide my hand into his hair and pull, demanding more.