Unlike this afternoon where he’d been very concentrated on her, his attention was driven solely on his own desires. It was in the way he grabbed her and touched. Even his staring was different. Earlier, he seemed to have looked and taken her in. As he stood back now, staring at her breasts beneath the thin silk of her white bra, he all but licked his lips.
Wetness grew between her legs and dampened her panties. He came at her again. Nimble fingers had her aching breasts free and bra lost on the floor with her shirt. She moaned aloud as his hands took their weight. Thumbs rasped over her tips and palms stroked the sore bottom curve from her underwire.
As he touched her breasts, sensation spiraled down. She didn’t want to wait longer. She needed him here and now and not a moment later. If only he would give it to her. Reaching between them, she popped the button loose on his jeans. A heavy relief lifted from her shoulders when he bent and pulled her nipple in his mouth instead of stopping her. She arched against him, feeling his cock grind against her. She lowered the zipper and eased his jeans and boxers off his hips until he sprang free.
She wrapped her fingers around his hard flesh and stroked him tight. Moisture beaded from his slit and she rubbed her thumb across, savoring the hot liquid. Her mouth watered, desiring his taste, wanting him filling her. She pulled in a steadying breath, not wanting to push. By his reaction with the condoms in the drawer, the whole full-out sex she-bang was still off the table.
She took what options she had and pressed a kiss to his chest. Licked over each of his flat nipples. His abs were hard under her lips. Hands stilled on her back as she bent and pulled the head of him in her mouth, licked up his salty essence.
He growled and pulled her up against him. “No.”
Before she could respond, his mouth was on hers. The taste of him on her tongue was soon lost on his. He pulled her skirt up. Cool air washed over her exposed ass. Hands reached between her thighs and spread her legs apart, allowing more air to touch her. Shivers ran down her body. He palmed her, replacing the cold with heat. His fingers slipped inside and stroked. She wrapped her hands back around his length and kept pace on his cock with the speed he set. Release was rolling over her, so close, nearly there, but she was denied.
She didn’t asked, didn’t wait to see what he’d do next, but delved in that top drawer and felt around for the packets she’d already found. She didn’t even have them out of the drawer when he took them from her, ripped the top one off and covered himself.
His eyes met hers, silently asking.
She kissed him in answer and slid her leg up his thigh, opening herself to him. He grabbed her by the hips and spun her around to face the mirror. His hands slid down her back, the weight of his palm bumped over each bone of her spine, bending her over.
She tried pressing back for more, but he stilled her with his hand on her hip.
“You sure you want this?” Even as he asked, he was lifting the back of her skirt, his fingers lazily eased up her thighs.
“Like nothing I’ve ever wanted before.”
He folded the skirt over her lower back. His thumbs brushed under the curves of her ass. He dipped a finger under her thong and ran his hand down, pulling the material free and sending her so close to the edge, just not enough. Keeping her thong aside with one hand, he reached between her legs and inserted his fingers again. She squeezed him and tilted her hips, seeking more. All the while he watched her. Desire coated his eyes and glazed them over until they were hazy.
He stepped forward and held his cock in his hand. It slipped between her thighs and she arched as he took her. Pleasure jolted through her core. She squeezed, but he just wouldn’t give her more. He pressed in inches, then pulled back. Pressed in a little further, pulled back. Deep inside she ached for him to fill her, to just grab her by the hips and take her.
But no. He kept that maddening pace of stretching her little by little. She grasped for more, squeezed him tight. Need for release curled and ached and demanded satisfaction, but he bent over her back and kissed her neck, refusing her.
Reaching around her waist, sliding over her ribs, his strong, rough hands cupped her breasts. Fingers pinched her nipples, lightly twisting the sensitive tips. She pushed against him, turned her head and sought his kiss, only to be denied as his callused fingertips felt down her body. His hands moved to her hips, his mouth nuzzled over her spine.
“Riley, please.” She met his wicked gaze in the mirror. The corners of his lips turned up as his eyes darkened while he slid in, slow. Agonizingly slow. His hard length made a long, continuous stroke against what she wanted him to touch the most until his hips met her ass.
Fully seated, he held her there, his grip tight to prevent her from rocking and took his time kissing her neck, her shoulders.
“Riley!”
He glanced up and met her gaze in the mirror. A devilish smile formed on his lips. He held her stare and finally pulled out and thrust forward. And he took her over and over again. His cock thrust into her in wonderful, maddening pushes.
She clenched around him, feeling the brink coming. She curled her hands around the counter’s ledge and met his thrust. Sweat gathered on her brow.
And she was thrown over the edge. She bit her lip to keep from crying out and alerting the whole house party that Riley had just rocked her socks completely off.
Riley pressed on, continued giving her more through her orgasm until he too finally stiffened and slouched over her, his cheek rested on her shoulder. His breaths were full and heavy and she supported him even as her core was still tingling.
His arms wrapped her in a hug and he kissed her shoulder blade before straightening and pulling free from her body. She looked up in the mirror at her flushed cheeks and mussed hair. All she could do was smile. Riley moved alongside her and cleaned himself. She straightened as well and tugged her skirt down. Using the forgotten rag on the floor, she swiped sauce from her forehead and picked a few bits of chicken from her hair. Best to at least look like they’d been in the bathroom cleaning her as they were supposed to.
She turned for the trash and smacked into Riley. She glanced up, intending to smile, but what she saw on his face stopped her. His jaw was tight. His lips flat and eyes narrowed. She touched his arm and he flinched under her hand. Not much, but she hadn’t missed it.
“Riley?”
He shook his head and stepped around her, leaving the bathroom and leaving her alone. What the hell? She threw on her bra and shirt and hurried after him. She stepped in the living room and several pairs of eyes met hers, but there was no Riley. She started toward the door, but an arm looped through hers, halting her.
Stephanie leaned in close. “We are going to be very good friends.”
Being Shellie only met the girl an hour ago for a brief hello, she doubted that. But she smiled like so anyway, mostly so she could end this conversation and find Riley. “Think so?”
Stephanie smiled herself then. “I know so. Your shirt is on inside out and it wasn’t a moment go. Also, Riley came down the hall just now with his shirt un-tucked. It wasn’t when he got here. I guess there wasn’t any trouble finding the bathroom?”
Chapter Eight
Riley waited by the front door and motioned for Shellie when she would have run past. She stopped and met his gaze. Her eyes were worried and heavy. He thought for a moment she might hug him, but instead she only stared up at him, waiting for answers. He hated that wounded look on her face. He knew it was his fault. He should have done something other than glare at her while she was still obviously glowing and thrilled, but it just hadn’t been in him.
He’d left all this behind and in two days, Shellie had dragged him back into a man who slept without a commitment, fucked in a friend’s bathroom during a party, and had a
helluva
time doing it. Even still, he wanted to drag her back to that bathroom and do it all over again until there wasn’t a condom left. And that just fucking pissed him off more than anything.
“Riley?”
He answered her with a quick shake of his head, waved at Parker, and forced a smile before ushering her out the door. She should be pissed and giving him the cold shoulder and waiting to get to his house so she could get the hell out of there. Instead she looked ready to wrap him in one of those damn hugs again. He opened the passenger door for her and held her hand as she stepped in the truck. Once her feet were in, he pushed the heavy metal closed. The clang of the door closing felt like it shoved all he’d worked for these past few years into his face.
He walked to the driver’s side and stepped in. She didn’t say a word and he for damn sure wasn’t. He put the truck in drive and headed around the corner. Shellie was now tapping her foot hard enough it bounced her knee and he knew the silence wouldn’t last that much longer. There was no way she’d hold off until they got home so he could hop on his four-wheeler for a drive and hide.
She sighed and rested her elbow on her door. The silence was at an end. “You’re going to have to talk to me eventually.”
He was somewhat deflated because he knew she deserved so much better. “I don’t do this shit anymore, Shellie.”
“Have sex with someone you care about is shit to you? It sure as hell wasn’t to me.”
He winced. “No. I don’t have sex with temporary people anymore. You’re leaving in a few days. How long before I see you again this time?”
“Well, I don’t know, Riley, but don’t you dare accuse me of losing touch with you. You’re the one who went through a life change and didn’t bother to even pick up the phone and let me know about it. Nothing changed for me over the years. I was always in the same place, living the same life.”
“I don’t know, Shellie, but nothing changes the fact that you’re still leaving in a few days.”
She stomped her foot. “Says you!”
He bit down until he thought his teeth might shatter and he forced them apart again. “No. Says you. Last I heard you were staying through the weekend and going back home. You just wanted a little breather before going back to your mom. That makes you temporary.”
“Yeah, I said I was planning to leave on Sunday. Days ago before I ever got here and saw you again.” Her hand touched his arm and she squeezed. “You’re the only one that keeps saying temporary, Riley.”
He froze as her words sank in. It was true, he couldn’t deny that. He was the only one saying temporary, hell, ‘cause that’s all he knew. Temporary was the arrangement she made when she came to visit him.
A sigh escaped him and he leaned on his door. Trees flew past his window in sickening, streaking smears and Riley eased off the gas pedal. A grocery store was just ahead and he slowed, pulling into the parking lot and stopped in a deserted corner at the back. He was shaking. Jesus.
He raked his hands through his hair and tugged. “Where do we go from here?”
“Will you let us go from here?”
He glanced over. “Of course.”
“Will you though?” She unbuckled her belt. Before he knew what she was about, she’d eased over the console and straddled his lap. She cupped his face and turned him up to her. “You’ve been different through some of today. You’ve been the Riley I know. Fun and loving. Carefree.”
He glanced away. “That got me into trouble in the past.”
She leaned forward and wrapped her arms around him and hugged him in one of her damn tight hugs. He was starting to like those. “I don’t care how many times I have to do it, I am going to hug that thought out of you. You can still be responsible and still be yourself.”
He swallowed and searched for something to get this off him. He knew what happened in his past, she didn’t. Hell, she was still living in the past. “And you?”
“And me what?”
“When are you going to stop telling lies about yourself? When are you going to admit to your mom that her life’s ambitions are not yours? You’ve been living that lie for as long as I’ve known you and still are.”
She sat back on his lap. Her hands dropped to her thighs, head was down and she was once against silent for a moment. He wanted to say something, anything, but at the same time, he didn’t. He’d never been quite that forward and direct when it came to her mom. But it was damn time she heard it.
Shellie raised her head and looked at him. “Make a deal?”
He arched a brow.
“I’ll tell my mom to kiss off, that I don’t want a rich man, that I want a flower shop—”
“Flower shop?” His brow furrowed.
She flicked her wrist. “I’ll explain that later, but anyway, I’ll call mom right now and tell her that. If...you have sex with me in this truck right here, right now, and you have fun doing it. No
pissy
moods afterward. And then when we get home, you’re going to carry me upstairs. We’ll go to sleep and tomorrow you’ll go tend to your cows or whatever it is that you do. And then when you want me again, you’ll come get me. Even if it’s seven in the morning and then again at ten. And you’ll see that you can still be responsible and be Riley Hamilton, the boy with the quickest hands to have ever come out of Jones High School.”
He leaned his head back and thought over her words.
“You know, Riley, you don’t give yourself much credit.” Her arms were crossed under her chest now. Completely serious. “You were just as responsible in high school as you are now.”
He met her gaze and waited for more ‘cause he’d never heard a bigger lie in his life.
“Every time I went with you somewhere, I knew I’d be okay because you’d take care of me. I still believe that. Back then, you managed to have fun and be yourself, but also be in control of every situation. I’m not that girl you met in college. You can do and say whatever you want, but you’ve got to realize you weren’t the only one responsible for making that baby. Hell, it could have happened to a thirty-year old virgin.”
He breathed in and let her words soak through. He would always blame himself for what happened. Nothing would change that, but she was right. She was not the girl from college. This was Shellie. Shellie, who was wanting more than temporary, even if they were off to a fast start. He leaned forward and kissed her, sealing the deal. Her nails combed through his hair and he could feel her smile in her whole body.
Shit.
He pushed her back. “Condoms. I still don’t have condoms. We’ll have to swing by a drug store and then seal this deal.”
She was smiling. She reached in her waistband and pulled the remaining strip from the bathroom drawer.
His mouth dropped. “I cannot believe you stole their condoms. What if they needed those?”
Her head fell back and she laughed. “Let’s just say I had an interesting conversation with Stephanie when I went looking for you. I like her. She’s going to come with Parker later this week so we can talk while he looks at something or other of yours.” She dangled the packages.
He shook his head and lifted his phone from a cup holder. “You promised something first.”
She snatched the phone from his hands and dialed the numbers without hesitation. He could hear her mom’s voice on the other end of the line and figured why not get this started? He cupped her hips and slipped his hands under her shirt, going for second base while she was on the phone.
She slanted her eyes at him, but he smiled and didn’t stop. She spoke to her mom. Keeping her words quick, explaining that she was staying with him and she was going to open a nursery to sell flowers and trees. He didn’t know what that was about and unless something had changed, Shellie couldn’t grow a weed. But if that’s what she wanted, he’d see that she could do it, one way or another.
“This is about what I want, Mom.” Shellie shook her head. Her lips parted more than once to interject, but he didn’t think her mom ever bothered with a breath. Shellie rolled her eyes, clicked the phone shut, and tossed it aside. “Where were we?”
He pulled her forward. “I was about to make love to you in this too small truck for the hell of it even though home is only fifteen minutes away.”
“Fifteen minutes?”
He shrugged and slipped his fingers under her skirt. “Seems too damn far to me.”
She leaned forward. Her lips met his. Her hands dropped between them and opened the fly of his jeans for the second time tonight. He lifted up, pressing her up, and slipped his pants down enough to free himself. Her skirt had worked up to her hips again. She sat forward and rubbed against him.
“This isn’t going to last if you don’t stop that.”
She shook her head and dropped the condoms in his lap. “I don’t want it to last. I want it now.”
He couldn’t say he disagreed with her. And hey…a second quick blow now and he’d be ready for her again when he got home. The image of Shellie spread out before him on his navy sheets sprang to mind. Of her legs parted and his face between her, tasting her again. Hell yeah.
He covered his cock, lifted her and dropped her down on him. She was so tight again. Gripping him. Sucking. She set a rhythm and he grabbed her hips and helped her keep the quick pace until his balls were drawing in tight and he exploded in release.
She rocked her hips one last time and screamed out like he knew she’d been dying to do in the bathroom. She breathed heavy, but she didn’t relax against him. She pressed her hands on his shoulders, trying to catch her breath. “Well?”
“I’m ready to get you home so I can see you naked on my sheets.”
He kissed her one last time, holding her tight to him before she settled back in her seat. She clipped on her belt and tucked a foot under her ass. “Let’s go, cowboy.”
He shook his head, a smile on his face, and left the parking lot. “I’m not a cowboy.”
“What are you then?
“Just a farmer.”
She lifted his old, torn and ripped ball cap from the floorboard. There used to be a tractor ad on the front, but it was faded off. She dusted the bill and bent the corners down as he’d shown her years ago and tugged it on her head. “Can I call you a redneck? Then when I call Mom later I can tell her I’m moving in with my long-term redneck lover?”
He chuckled, trying to recall the last time he’d felt this happy. This light. It was probably the last time he’d seen Shellie. He tapped on the steering wheel. Sometime over the summer after graduation. He’d taken her to the river, given her a first sip of beer that she had spit out within seconds, and returned to volleyball. A smile tugged deep until he recalled later that day.
When he returned her home. And she left. And he left for college. His stomach did that uncomfortable pinch it’d done those years ago, only it was magnified into a tugging, turning, twisting ulcer thing. He swallowed. “Is that really what you want to tell her?”
Shelli finished adjusting her hair under the cap, flipped the mirror up, and sat back. “I don’t want to talk to her at all, but I’m going to have to call her back and explain more.”
He reached across the console and grabbed Shellie’s hand. “No, I meant, is that what you want to tell her that we are. That we’re long term lovers.”
Her lips flattened. “I don’t want to push you faster than what you’re ready for, Riley. You said you’re ready to try, and I’m open for what you’re willing to give. I just—”
He lifted her hand and kissed it. “Will you be my girlfriend, Shellie?”
She stared at him. He waited for laughter, but it didn’t come. A smiled curved up the corner of her lips. “Yes.”
“Yes?” He parked in front of his house and shut off the truck.
“Yes. Most definitely yes.” She nodded and looked toward his home, but frowned.
“It’s probably not what you always imagined. Hell, this little farm house wasn’t what I imagined either.”
She squinted and leaned over the dash. “Cows. Back in your yard.”
He looked up to see the same two calves there who always managed to escape. “Little devils.”
“Riley.” Shellie turned in the seat, a hand wrapped around on her hip. “I want to stay here. I like this house. I like what you’re doing here. I like everything about this place, so don’t start making excuses, to ‘give me an out’ if you think that’s what you’re doing. But we are going to have to do something about these cows in the yard because the first time I step in a pile of shit, you’re going to be missing one from the herd.”
He put a hand up. “We’ll work something out. Tomorrow.”
She nodded. “Tomorrow.”
He tugged open his door. “Let me get these two put up.”