More Than Anything (Broken Pieces #1)(36)

He was grateful for the small light because it helped him find his bearings very quickly. Tina was on her back and tangled up in her bedsheets, moving restlessly, her face drenched in tears as she cried in her sleep.

Harris made a rough sound in the back of his throat and sat down on the edge of her bed and tentatively stroked his hand up and down her arm.

“Hush now, sweetheart,” he murmured. “You’re safe. I’m here.”

She was trembling violently, and he was tempted to curl up next to her and wrap his arms around her shaking body, but he wasn’t sure how she’d respond to that once she woke up. It was bad enough he’d broken into her house and made his way into her bedroom. The best he could do was waken her as gently as he could and try to keep her calm and comforted.

“Tina, wake up, sweetheart. Come on. It’s just a dream.”

She sighed, the sound filled with so much sadness it just about killed Harris. Her beautiful face was swollen and blotchy with tears.

“Tina . . . ,” he tried again, and this time her forehead scrunched slightly before, with another long, sad sigh, she opened her eyes and looked straight at him.

“Harris?”

“You had a nightmare,” he whispered, and her face crumpled as she burst into tears. Horrified and not sure what to do, he intensified his stroking of her arm. “It’s okay, sweetheart. It’s fine.”

“No, it’s not,” she denied in a thick voice. “It can never be fine. Oh Harris.” She sat up and launched herself against his chest. For one shocked moment, Harris just stared down at her bright-red head before closing his arms around her wildly trembling body.

“It’s okay, it’s okay . . .” He kept repeating the inane phrase and dropped kisses to the top of her head, stroking a comforting hand up and down her back, while another—less good—part of himself loved the feel of her soft body pressed up against his.

“It’s not okay,” she said again, lifting her head to look at him, and Harris sucked in his breath at the expression on her face. “Please. Please, Harris. Make it okay. Make me forget.”

She lifted her hand to his face, cupping his jaw, while her thumb brushed over his lower lip in an unmistakably seductive motion. There was no doubting what she meant . . . what she wanted . . . and Harris, immediately and painfully erect though he was, wasn’t at all sure he should take her up on the offer he saw shining in her beautiful, tear-drenched green gaze.

“Tina . . . I can’t do that. You’re not . . .” The rest of what he’d been about to say was muffled when she moved her hand round to the back of his head, entangled her fingers in his hair, and pulled his head down until he was close enough for her to place her lips on his.

The kiss was soft and chaste at first. Innocent and inexperienced, but then her mouth moved against his, her tongue licked at the seam of his lips, and absolutely all bets were off.

He groaned, and one of his hands swept up her back and palmed her nape beneath her fiery mane of hair. His own tongue took over, showing her exactly what she should do and how she should do it. She proved to be an apt pupil, and soon they were dueling back and forth, tongues parrying and thrusting in an endless game of one-upmanship.

His other hand tunneled beneath her cotton pajama top until it found skin, and they both shuddered at the contact. His hand stroked up her front until it reached one of her breasts. He groaned when he cupped her. She was bigger than he was used to, and he loved the weight and feel of her in his palm. Her nipple was burning into the flesh of his palm, hard and hot. His thumb found the coal-hot nub and strummed it expertly. She arched into his touch, and he bit back a groan at her ardent response. God, he loved this . . . she was so responsive.

He shoved the top up, wanting to see and then taste her for himself. He reluctantly lifted his lips from hers and gently moved her until she was flat on her back and he was kneeling between her soft, pale thighs. That was when he made the welcome discovery that she wasn’t wearing any pajama bottoms, just a pair of skimpy cotton bikini panties.

He said a reverent little prayer at the sight of her near nudity.

“Oh my God, you’re so beautiful.”

Their new position allowed him better access to her chest, and once they were both comfortable, he tasted and explored her beautiful breasts at his leisure. Licking, suckling, plucking, stroking, he fucking loved it.

Tina was making gorgeous little mewling sounds, and it made him harder than steel to hear her soft gasps and squeals. She was so sexy it was killing him. He wasn’t wearing much, just his boxer briefs, and he could feel the scalding heat of her through the thin fabric of his briefs and her skimpy cotton panties. He needed more intimate contact and lowered his hips until his straining hardness was grinding up against her damp furrow. She was incredibly wet, and soon her slickness, combined with his own, soaked through the flimsy material of their underwear.

But it wasn’t enough. He wanted more, she needed more, and they pushed and ground against each other, a disturbing—almost violent—urgency in their movements.

He had unbuttoned her top and was feasting on her full, soft breasts while pushing against her core. She had her hands buried in his hair, pulling almost painfully as she urged him to do more, to suck and bite and grind.

He reached down between their bodies, his aching cock feeling constricted within the confines of his briefs. He was too hard and too swollen, and he needed release in more than one way. He shoved his underwear down past his hips, all the way down, until he had kicked them off. He heaved a shuddering sigh of relief after he had freed himself and got straight back to business.