With Love, from Cold World(82)
“Why not? It’s so much fun.” He kissed the sensitive skin at the side of her neck, his lips brushing her earlobe. She felt the flutter of his breath against her cheek as he said, “Am I getting ahead of myself?”
Her own breath was caught in her throat. She was afraid to move, afraid to break whatever spell had wrapped around them at her kitchen table. When she finally spoke, she could only manage a single word.
“No.”
She was conscious of his bare thighs under her, the light dusting of hair, the way his muscles flexed as he drew her back against him. And then she was very conscious of the hard length of him against her ass, the layers of clothing between them doing little to disguise just how turned on he was. It made her feel powerful, knowing that she could do that to him with such little provocation.
“How about now?” he asked, his fingertips skimming the bare skin of her waist under her shirt. She shook her head wordlessly, sucking in a breath as his hands slid up farther, his thumbs rolling her nipples through her bra.
“Now?” he rasped into her ear.
She tilted her head back, her neck exposed as she arched against his touch. “I don’t—” she started, breaking off with a ragged sigh when he reached to cup her breasts fully under her bra, his hands warm and possessive. “I can’t follow what you’re asking me.”
His hands dropped to her rib cage, and immediately she wanted them back where they were, his palms rubbing the tender tips of her nipples. “I’m asking permission to touch you,” he said. “To show you how much I want you. Because, god, Lauren, I want you.”
She turned so she was more sideways on his lap, burying one hand in his hair as she looked down into his gray eyes. She loved his hair, how soft it was under her fingers. She loved the way he looked at her with his full attention, his gaze on her face like he was still cataloging every tiny detail, like he hadn’t yet run out of new things to notice.
“Only if I can show you, too,” she said. “It’s only fair.”
“Tit for tat,” he said solemnly, then immediately closed his eyes.
“Was that a joke? It was terrible.”
He cracked one eye open, biting his lip in an adorably self-deprecating expression that would make her forgive ten more equally cringeworthy puns. “Sorry,” he said. “I’m a little nervous. I joke when I get nervous.”
Nervous was her default state, but weirdly, hearing him admit to feeling the same way made her own nerves fly out the window.
“Maybe I should do something to shut you up.”
She’d never been good at dirty talk, and her every instinct wanted to immediately apologize for saying something so rude, but Asa didn’t seem to mind.
“Please shut me up,” he said. “Please.”
She leaned down to slant her mouth against his, her tongue darting out to lick the place where he’d just bitten down on his lip. He groaned against her mouth, pulling at her shirt until he’d drawn it over her head, almost taking her glasses with it. He took those off next, setting them on the table before pulling her down for another kiss, his hand wrapped in her hair.
She had his shirt off in an instant, and this time there was no fumbling as he reached around to unclasp her bra, letting it slide down her arms to the floor. He’d seen her before, of course, when she’d unbuttoned her shirt in his room, but this felt different. Bright morning sunlight broke through the gauzy curtains over her living room window, and she was half-naked on his lap at her kitchen table. She felt exposed, suddenly shy.
“They’re small,” she blurted. “And I’ve always had this freckle right”—she pointed to the tan smudge near her left nipple—“here.”
Asa pressed his thumb into the freckle. “You’re perfect. And that is officially my favorite freckle. I’m obsessed with it. It’s unseemly how much.” He kissed her there, his lips dragging over her nipple in a way that made a shiver run up her spine. “And now you’ve got me running at the mouth again, when I can think of much more interesting things I want to do with it.”
He ran his tongue lightly over her collarbone, a tease, before finding the hollow at the base of her throat.
“I like the way you talk,” she said, her own voice coming out a little breathless. She realized she couldn’t put into words just how much she liked it, or how he made her feel. It wasn’t just the pulse she got between her legs when he touched her, when he told her how much he wanted to. It was the way it brought her back to herself, reminded her what she was doing and who she was doing it with. The fact that it was Asa, looking at her like that, causing this swirl of emotion and desire, made it that much better. And the fact that she was her . . . well, it made her feel like she was enough.
Her hand went to the hard ridge of his erection through his boxers, tentative at first, then a firm stroke with the heel of her hand along the length of him after she heard his intake of breath. He captured her mouth with his, taking her lower lip gently between his teeth before kissing her more deeply. “I want to see you,” he murmured against her mouth. “All of you.”
“Here?” The word came out as a high-pitched squeak.
He lifted her until she was sitting on the table, careful to move the notebook and her glasses over to one of the chairs. “What if I said please,” he said, his hand wrapped in the waistband of her jeans, the backs of his knuckles brushing against her skin while his thumb ran down the length of the zipper.