Tease (Cloverleigh Farms #8)(38)

“Need help?”

“No. I’m good.” My heart was hammering as I went down the steps, because I had no idea which room she would choose. I figured by going downstairs, I was giving her a chance to decide what she wanted without pressure from me.

I knew what I wanted.

When I came back upstairs, all the lights were off. I locked the front door and headed for the back hall. Then my heart sank—the door to the guest room where she’d slept last night was closed, and the light was on.

Fuck.

Disappointed, I got ready for bed, noticing that she’d taken her cosmetics bags out of my bathroom as well. So maybe I’d been wrong about her feelings. Maybe putting her clothes in my room had only been for show. Maybe she really just needed help getting that dress unzipped. Maybe the whole kiss practice idea was more about believability than desire.

With my door closed and the lights off, I tossed the covers back and got into bed. I lay there for a few minutes, wondering if asking her to move in had been a huge mistake—was I going to survive a month with her under my roof? Under my nose? Under my skin?

I thought about her in bed just across the hall. The way she smelled. The curve of her shoulders. The pink in her cheeks when she was nervous. Those huge brown eyes, and the way they might look up at me if she was on her knees. The plush rosy lips parting, the tip of my cock easing into her sweet round mouth.

My hand slipped into my pants. Grimacing, I tightened my fist around my erection and wondered if this was my punishment for inviting her to live here, or maybe for this whole batshit scheme—doomed to jerk off every night while I thought about fucking her or going down on her or shoving my dick in her mouth. I stifled a groan, knowing it would serve me right.

That’s when I heard the soft knocking at the door.

I yanked my hand from my pants and lifted myself up on one elbow, my heart a jackhammer in my chest. I stared at the door in the shadowy dark, wondering if I’d imagined it, if shame had me hearing things.

But a moment later, the door opened soundlessly and Felicity slipped inside like a ghost before closing it again. I blinked, vaguely making out the white T-shirt she wore—was it mine?—the dark hair swinging around her shoulders.

“Hi,” she whispered.

“Hey.”

“I was wondering if you wanted to practice now.”

My cock, already standing at full attention, twitched with excitement. “Yeah. I do.”

“Should I get in your bed?”

“Definitely.”

She walked tentatively to the empty side and stood there for a moment, like she wasn’t sure I meant this bed right here.

But I wanted her too much and I’d been waiting far too long to let my nerves keep this from happening. Now that I was sure she wanted this too, I reached out and grabbed her by the forearm. “Come here.”

She laughed as I pulled her into bed with me and easily slipped her body beneath mine, stretching out on top of her, pinning her wrists above her shoulders. The laughter faded as she felt my erection thick and hard between us. “Oh,” she whispered.

“Is this okay?”

She spread her legs and slid her heels up my calves. “It’s more than okay.”

My body ignited as I crushed my mouth to hers like I’d dreamed of doing so many times. I wasn’t sure if practice kissing was something you were supposed to ease into, perhaps with a few romantic lines first, but I couldn’t hold back. I kissed her deeply and hungrily, teasing her lips open and stroking her tongue with mine. Between us, my cock grew harder and my hips moved instinctively, slowly rubbing my solid length along the sweet spot between her legs.

I moved my mouth down her neck as she tilted her head to one side and made soft, sweet little sounds of assent. I inhaled the scent of her skin, caressed it with my tongue, rubbed my lips against the hollow of her throat. Letting go of her wrists, I braced myself on one arm and slipped a hand beneath the cotton shirt, pausing with my palm on her waist to wonder exactly how much activity was allowable at this first practice session.

“Maybe we should discuss a few things,” I said, sliding my hand up her ribcage.

“Like what?”

“Like what other things we should practice. For example.” Shifting my weight to my side, I eased my hand over her breast, brushing one hard nipple with my thumb. “I could practice touching you like this.”

She gasped, then sighed softly as I nuzzled her lips while teasing the stiff peak until she arched and moaned beneath my hand. I switched my attention to the second one, desperately hoping she’d let my tongue do what my fingers were doing.

She slipped a hand down between us, sliding her palm over my erection through my thin summer pajama pants. “And I could practice touching you like this.”

A groan emerged from deep in my throat. I kissed her again, more savagely this time, pinching her nipple with my fingertips, twisting and tugging gently. My dick ached beneath her hand, and I yearned to feel her fist wrapped around it.

I grabbed the bottom of her shirt. “I could practice undressing you.”

“I definitely think you should,” she panted.

I whipped the shirt over her head and tossed it. I hadn’t pulled the drapes all the way, and just enough moonlight seeped into the room to render her skin luminous against my dark gray sheets. I could see the gentle curves of her breasts and hips and thighs—secret, unfamiliar parts of her I’d only imagined.