Dark Sexy Knight (A Modern Fairytale) (16 page)

He flicked his glance at the TV. “What’s your favorite TV show?”

“Hmm. Well,
Vikings
is one of my favorites.”

“Right,” he said. “That’s how you knew that Vikings and knights were two different things.”

“Uh-huh,” she said, sipping the last of her wine. “I like
Outlander
too. And I loved
Downton Abbey
when it was on.”

“So, historical drama? That’s your favorite?”

She nodded. “I guess so. Yeah.”

“How about your favorite type of movie?” he asked.

She winced, giving him a sheepish little smile. “Romcoms?”

“What’s with the look?”

“Don’t guys hate girls who love romcoms?”

“I think it’s universally acknowledged that most girls like romcoms.” He lifted the wine bottle from the flowerpot and refilled their glasses. “We put up with it.”

“But
you
don’t like them.”

Honestly? He didn’t mind romantic movies, and he especially didn’t think he’d mind watching one with her. “They’re okay.”

“But what do you
really
like?”

“Adventure.”

“Like
Indiana Jones
?” she asked.

“Exactly. And sci-fi. Some fantasy.”

“Fantasy?”

“You know. Like
The Lord of the Rings
.”

“Never seen it,” she said, over the rim of her glass. Her cheeks were pink, and she seemed much more relaxed than she’d been fifteen minutes ago. Plus, she was still sitting next to him, which made him ridiculously happy.

“Travesty,” he whispered, shaking his head with a mix of mock disgust and horror.

She laughed. “Is that what we’re watching tonight?”

“No. We’ll save
The Lord of the Rings
for a long, quiet, rainy day.”

“Then . . .?”

“You like romance and comedy, right?”

“Right.”

“And I like adventure, sci-fi, and a little fantasy.”

“Your TV. Your rules. Adventure, sci-fi, and fantasy it is.”

“Now, wait a second . . . what fun would that be for you?”

“You know what? I don’t really care what we watch. I’m just happy . . .” A deeper blush stained her cheeks and she smiled but dropped his eyes.

“What?”

“To be here.” She raised her eyes. “To be with you.”

His heart reacted to the simple sweetness of her words, and he reached out with his free hand to cup her cheek. “Where have you been all my life?”

“In Camilla, Georgia,” she said, leaning into his hand. Her voice was low when she asked, “What are we watching?”

“
The Princess Bride
,” he said gruffly, every cell in his body fighting against the instinct to grab her, kiss her, touch her. He’d promised it was her call, but fuck, it took everything he had to keep himself in check.

She gasped, her face bursting into a stunning smile as she leaned away from his hand in excitement. “I know that movie! I
love
that movie!”

He chuckled at her expression, then watched her eyes soften as she cocked her head to the side. “You just laughed,” she said.

“I did,” he said, grinning at her.

“I’ve never heard you laugh before.”

“I’m a little out of practice.”

Suddenly she leaned forward, her breasts brushing his lap as she reached over to set her wineglass on the nightstand. When she drew back, she placed her palms on his face and looked into his eyes with such heartbreaking trust and tenderness, his heart swelled. It swelled with something so big and so awesome that he wanted so desperately, he didn’t know how his rib cage could hold it all inside. His breath caught, and he froze. He was utterly helpless as she stared into his eyes.

“Where have you been all of
my
life?”

“Waiting,” he said softly, closing his eyes as her lips touched down on his.

***

Unlike their kiss on Thursday night, this one didn’t begin in a passionate frenzy of need. Just like Verity, it was gentle . . . and achingly tender.

She brushed her lips against his, nibbling his upper lip between hers before letting it go to love the lower lip in the same way. Her fingers cradled his face, the pads of her palms anchored on his jaw as she nipped, brushed, and nibbled, taking her time to learn the dry, warm texture of his lips, which tasted lightly of wine, and the way the bristles of his five o’clock shadow scraped her tongue just a little when she ran it along the two-point flume that crowned his top lip. These were small movements, light and soft, her way of showing this man—this big, brawny, unpretty man, who could lift all those absurdly large weights on the shelves behind her—that he was precious to her, that he was cherished. That,
to
her, he was beautiful. That,
for
her, he was perfect.

As though slowly waking up to her ministrations, he finally reached for her, his hands landing on her waist. She shifted her body and threw one knee over his lap so that she knelt on the bed, straddling his hips, and suddenly the fingers on her waist tightened, yanking her closer, until her breasts were crushed against his chest and her thighs hugged his hips. Intimately pressed against him, she could feel the twitch and swell of his cock as it lengthened and hardened beneath her, pressing up against her body as she swept her tongue into his mouth and swallowed a gravelly groan of satisfaction. His hands on her ass curled, pushing her pelvis flush against his, and she arched her back as she sucked on his tongue, whimpering as he flexed his hips, grinding up into her.

His hands slipped beneath her tank top, the rough pads of his fingers gently scraping the soft skin of her back until he reached her bra. He didn’t ask permission to unclasp it—just flicked it open and flattened his palms flush on her back while he sucked on her tongue as she’d just sucked on his. Her breasts were tight and aching for his touch, so she reached for the hem of her tank top and slid it up her body, hooking her fingers into her bra and dragging both over her head. Pausing mid-kiss, he reached around to the back of his neck and yanked his T-shirt over his head, then fused his lips to hers again. Verity whimpered softly into his mouth as the taut points of her breasts touched the warm, hard expanse of Colton’s chest. Finally skin to skin, it didn’t assuage her longing, but intensified it. She was hungry for the touch of his fingers, the suck of his lips, the teasing swirl of his tongue.

As though he’d read her mind, his hands on her back slid around her sides, and she broke off their kiss gently, leaning away from him just a little to take one of his wrists and lay his palm gently over her breast. Staring into her eyes, panting from the intensity of their kiss, he flinched as he registered what she’d done, what she was clearly inviting him to do.

“I stop when you say stop,” he growled softly, then dipped his head and took her uncovered nipple between his lips as his hand squeezed her other breast lightly.

Verity’s hands shot to his head, burying themselves in his hair as a bolt of white-hot desire sluiced through her. She moaned, little sounds of desire, of pleasure, of heightened lust, filling the silence of his room as he sucked and licked, swirling his tongue around the tight bud, then laving it gently. Her hands fashioned his hair into a ponytail, and she hung on tightly as he skimmed his lips from one breast to the other, sucking her other nipple into his mouth and flicking his tongue across it until she yanked hard and cried out.

“Too much?” he asked, pausing to look up at her.

“More,” she sighed greedily, flexing her fingers through the silken strands of his hair as he lowered his mouth again.

Her panties flooded with wetness, and she surged against his hardened cock, panting as he rolled her other damp nipple between his thumb and forefinger. He thrust up against her, and she rolled her hips, throwing her head back as his tongue circled her peaked, swollen flesh. The next time she gyrated against him, he met her movement with perfect anticipation, his body colliding with hers, which pressed the zipper of her shorts into her clit.

She gasped from the sensation, clasping his face and demanding his lips as she rocked against him again and again, her shorts massaging the crevice of her sex with every thrust as his abs scraped against her sensitive breasts. He kissed her fiercely, lowering his hands to her hips so he could control their movements, so that the pressure on her clit stayed constant and strong.

“Colton,” she rasped, her breathing jagged, his name uneven on her lips, “I’m going to . . . to . . .”

“I want you to,” he said. “Hold on to me.”

She looped her arms around his neck as he kissed her again. She hung on as he’d instructed her to, but her head fell back when he abandoned her lips and sucked her nipple between into his mouth again. As he thrust up against her in a slow, rhythmic motion, she closed her eyes, about to lose her mind. Over and over again, slowly rubbing her to the point of madness, until she couldn’t bear the swirling swell of pressure inside, and she cried out his name, a strangled sound of profound pleasure as her muscles flexed and contracted in a small frenzy of bliss.

When her brain started working again, a few minutes later, she found she was still straddling his lap, her cheek resting on his shoulder as he gently stroked her naked back with rough fingers.

“Colton,” she whispered. “Oh my God.”

“You okay?” he asked, his voice rough and gravelly.

She felt like purring. “Mm-hm. Are you?” It felt polite to ask, though it suddenly occurred to her that he’d had none of the mind-blowing satisfaction she’d just enjoyed. “Do you need—”

“I felt all of it, sunshine,” he said, his arms around her tightening just a little. “I felt
you
.”

She smiled, leaning forward so that she could press her lips against his neck. “It was . . . amazing.”

“What now?” he asked tentatively.

She kissed his neck again, then drew back to look at his face, into his eyes. Did she want more? Of course she did. But they were new to each other. They were more and more important to each other every day. She worried that rushing things could hurt the newness, devalue the importance of this brand-new beautiful thing they were building. And she wouldn’t be able to bear that. So she forced herself not to ask for more. Not now. Not yet.

“Didn’t you invite me to watch a movie?” she asked, hoping he wouldn’t take her words as a rejection of what had just happened between them, hoping he wouldn’t be upset that she wanted their epic make-out session to be enough for tonight, hoping he would somehow know how much it meant to her, how much
he
meant to her.

He nodded, his dark eyes connecting with hers, a tiny bit of surprise in their depths. “Want to?”

“Yep,” she said, grinning at him. “I want to lie down next to you, all curled up against you like a spoon, with your arm around me and your breath on the back of my neck . . . and I want to watch a movie.”

He smiled back at her, his face so happy and so handsome, it damn near broke her heart because his expression was a mirror of the happiness in her heart.

“Then that’s exactly what we’ll do.”

***

A week turned into two, and before Colt knew it, a whole month had slipped away since the day he’d first seen Verity and Ryan Gwynn in the Marriott ballroom doorway looking like lost sheep.

There had been no talk of them moving from his house. If anything, they’d settled in like they’d always been there, and that’s exactly how Colt wanted it. Verity made them breakfast almost every morning, and he gave her the keys to his car so that, if he had to go in for a matinee show, she could drive him, and he’d pick her up when her dinner show shift was finished.

On the nights they got off work at the same time, he went through the drive-through at McDonald’s to get Ryan something to eat on the way home, and he and Verity had dinner together after Ryan had gone to bed. Those nights ended with her curled up beside him in his bed, fast asleep after making out, watching a movie or talking until almost dawn.

Some nights he went to visit Melody, and though he always enjoyed seeing his cousin, he missed Verity on those nights, wishing he could slip into bed beside her soft warmth when he got home.

But they had yet to spend an entire night together.

On this point, Verity had proved to be unyielding. Until they told Ryan that they were together, she would wake up in her own bed every morning.

There were some nights, after midnight, when he had to force himself to wake her so she could go back upstairs, and others when he’d simply gather her in his arms and carry her up to her bed, pulling the covers up to her chin and then forcing himself to stop staring at her beautiful sleeping face and go back downstairs to his cold, lonely bed.

Lonely because her warm, soft body was much too far away when he went back downstairs. He’d explored every inch of her with his hands and some of her with his tongue too, sucking her pert nipples into his mouth as he slipped his fingers inside her body, listening to her moans and whimpers of pleasure like they were his own personal symphony. When she lay back on his pillow, her blue eyes indigo, her lips soft and swollen, he swore he’d do anything for her, just to have her in his life forever. And fuck if she didn’t give as good as she got, her fingers curling around his cock and stroking him to the brink of madness before plunging her tongue into his mouth to kiss him senseless until he came in her hand.