“Tell me you brought a condom,” I plead into his mouth, his thumb plucking at my nipple. He shakes his head with a muffled sound of frustration, pushing up on his arms to meet my gaze. He strains there for a second, distracted, before he dips back down to brush a kiss against my lips. He lingers and groans, another stolen kiss when I squeeze his hips tighter.
“No,” he says, regret etched into every line of his face. I let my hands map the strong line of his shoulders, his broad chest, the muscle stacked down his abdomen. His body is formed by work, colored by the sun and the earth. I’ve already seen every piece of him, but I find new things to discover. The cluster of freckles at the top of his ribs. The thin line of contrast where tanned skin meets pale, creamy white. The trail of hair that leads down his stomach, under the hem of the jeans riding low on his hips.
“Okay, that’s okay,” I babble. We don’t need a condom. There are plenty of other things we can do. My mind unrolls a list a mile long, and the ache within me pulls deeper. Sharper.
I scratch my nails against his hips and reach for the button of his jeans, sliding my hand beneath when it gives. My knuckles brush against warm skin and I wrap my hand around the hard length of him. He closes his eyes, teeth clenched. “I didn’t think—” He looks down at me, bewildered and enraptured. Disheveled and delighted. All of my favorite things. “I wasn’t expecting this.”
“You literally just told me you had a plan.” I pump my hand once and he makes a bitten-off groaning sound. I immediately want to hear it again. “You weren’t expecting me naked on this blanket?”
He shakes his head and rolls his hips into my touch.
“Do you remember the night we met?”
I stroke him again and he thrusts into my grip harder, fucking into my hand with another pained, desperate sound from between his teeth. I like that sound so much I do it again. And then again, my thumb swiping at what I can reach.
“You almost fucked me in the back hall of the bar, Beckett.” I had wanted him to. Practically begged him for exactly that, if I remember correctly.
His hand catches my wrist and he holds me still, eyes blazing. “You first,” he says. His fingers graze the curve of my hip, slide under the waistband of my underwear and squeeze at the bare skin of my ass.
I shake my head and smile at him, my hand still trapped in his pants. I need him so badly I almost hurt with it. All of my ideas scatter and I know what I want. I want us, together. “I’m tested regularly,” I tell him. “On birth control. If you wanted—”
His mouth drops to mine in a kiss, softer than it should be with my body bare beneath him and an invitation on the table. He grips my chin and licks into my mouth with a gentle caress, his thumb tracing my jaw to the tender skin below my ear. He rubs there once, a slow swipe.
“I was tested last month,” he manages when he pulls away, his palm flat against my neck. He slips it down slightly until it’s pressed right in the center of my chest. I loop my hand around his wrist and squeeze. “There hasn’t been anyone since you.”
My heart thumps an uneven beat beneath the palm of his hand. “Same for me,” I confess. I offer him a little bit more. “I haven’t wanted anyone else.”
Not even close. Not even tempted. Just the memory of Beckett had been more than enough. The ghost of his hands on my skin.
“Is this okay?” I ask, my fingertips tracing back and forth across his skin.
He nods, eyes bright, and his hand slips down my body to join the other, toying with the sides of my underwear. He slips his thumbs beneath and snaps the fabric once, enough to have my hips jump beneath him. He grits out a laugh, and I squeeze with my hand still in his pants.
He stops laughing real quick.
Hands grab and pull, a rush to get the relief we’re both craving. He fumbles with his jeans while I try to help, an attempt to kick them off without moving from overtop me.
“If you just—” I pull hard at the material.
“If I what?” He shimmies his hips and it presses his cock right against me. I gasp and edge my legs wider. “You’re not helping. You’re making it harder.”
I snicker. “I’m making something harder.”
“Evie,” he grunts, still trying to pull his jeans over his hips, distracted as I roll mine beneath him. He pins me down to the blanket with his hand at my hip, palm squeezing tight. “Be good.”
I release a slow breath, a smile still on my lips. I’m having trouble keeping still. I press my fingertips over his jaw and rub my palm down his neck. His skin is warm beneath my touch, flushed pink in the low light. “I feel like I've been waiting for you forever,” I confess.
His face softens.
“I know, honey.”
Ignoring the jeans still trapped around his thighs, his hand slips lower, two fingers gliding right where I need him the most. After all the teasing, his firm touch has me halfway there already. He circles them once and I choke out his name. He shifts his hand, presses again, and my nails dig half-moons into his back.
“Fuck, you feel good,” he grinds out. I forgot how deep his voice gets when we’re doing this. How desperate he sounds.
I nod and grab at his arms, palms smacking lightly at the ink on his skin, trying to urge him closer. His thumb slips beneath cotton and we both groan when he feels how wet I am.
“Now,” I demand. “Right now, please.”
He doesn’t bother slipping my underwear from my hips, just twists his thumb in the material and pulls it to the side, lining himself up with his other hand and pushing deep. One heavy thrust, all the way in. My legs scramble at his hips and he drops his forehead to my neck, a groan slipping from his chest to mine. I feel deliciously full, overwhelmed in the best possible way.
My memory is nothing compared to the reality of him. Hands flexing at my thighs, forehead rocking against my neck, stubble scraping at my skin. He pulls back, rolls his hips, and pushes inside. A smooth, easy rhythm that I match. He urges his body against me, again and again, pushing me up the blanket with every thrust until my shoulder blades brush cold grass.
“Evelyn,” he says into my neck. “Evie. Fuck.”
“S’good,” I slur on a laugh, champagne bubbles in my chest. He leans up on his knees and tucks a palm to the small of my back, guiding my hips tighter against him. Everything grinds just right and I’m right at the very edge already, teetering.
“I’ve thought about this,” he says, a breathless confession. His hands curl around my hips and hold tight, lifting me up another inch against him. He looks beautiful like this. A little bit wild, a bead of sweat working its way down his neck. His gaze brushes all the places we’re touching and some of the places we’re not—my thighs, my hips, the bounce of my bare breasts and the curve of my cheek. “Every single day, I’ve thought about this. You.”
My heart flutters and I feel like I’ve got starlight slipping under my skin, hearing he’s thought about me just as much as I’ve thought about him.
“Come on,” he says, eyes locking on mine. I watch his face as he drags his hand over the swell of my hip and spreads his fingers wide. His thumb traces down my belly and then he presses it between my legs. He holds it there—a simple, heavy pressure. Everything in me pulls tighter. A hiccuping breath slips out of me and a cocky grin hitches up the side of his mouth. “Give it to me.”