The Kingmaker (All the King's Men, #1)(32)

“It’s enough.”

He doesn’t move, so I do, tipping up to press my mouth to his. At first he just watches me kiss him, eyelids lowered, lips closed, like he’s still not sure we should. I lick into the seam of his mouth, and he groans my name, his eyes closing. That sound vibrates through my lips and to my core—to the seat of my need and want and curiosity. I want to understand this physical mystery I’ve eschewed all my life, and I want it with him. If the price is ultimately heartbreak, my eyes are wide open.

I cover his hand with mine and coax it up to my breast, press myself deeper into his palm. He squeezes and slides a thumb under the bra to tease my nipple. My breath stutters and my eyes close. He runs his hand up my shoulder and under the silk bra strap, persuading it down my arm. Under his touch, the bra’s clasp snaps free, baring me to him. I’m proud of my body, not because it’s a certain size or because I’m fit, but because it’s what I have to offer him. I chose this man, chose this time. In a world where so many of us don’t get to choose, I cherish that. It’s my right, but that doesn’t mean I take it for granted. Not when I’ve seen so many stripped of that choice. Not when I’ve seen so many who regretted their first time.

I can already tell that won’t be the case. Not with Maxim.

He bends and takes one nipple into the heat of his mouth. I gasp and shove my fingers into his hair that has half a mind to wave and half a mind to curl. One of his hands cups my butt and with the other, he kneads my breast. He slips open the button and zipper of my pants, coaxing them down and over my legs until I stand only in the panties to match the bra Kimba and Vivienne insisted I wear “just in case.” With his thumbs hooked under the silk bands at my hips, he slides those down until I’m completely naked.

“Damn, you’re beautiful, Nix.” He breathes the husky praise against my neck, inciting a trail of goosebumps along my arms. He sinks to his knees, scattering gentle kisses on my stomach, the underside of my breast, my hip, the tops of my thighs. Finally, he kisses lower, between my legs. His spreads me with gentle fingers and swipes once with his tongue.

“Jesus,” I moan.

He glances up through impossibly, enviably long lashes, his mouth a roguish slash of a smile. With the gentlest of nudges from him, my legs give way, surrendering to gravity and the sensations licking over my body, and I fall back. The bed beneath me is cool and downy. His palms are the perfect kind of rough on the sensitive skin of my inner thighs as he spreads my legs and bends his head again, running his nose along the crevice of my pussy.

“I want this so bad,” he rasps, his breath a caress. He lifts my legs onto his shoulders, the breadth of him widening me, exposing me. I expected to feel embarrassed or self-conscious, but I don’t. Some wild, wanton thing longs to grab him by the hair and force his head down into the wet, throbbing place where his mouth hovers. Anticipation is the match to a line of gasoline, and I’m already on fire. He doesn’t move.

“Dammit, Doc,” I whisper hoarsely. “Do it.”

With a growl, he does. He licks into my secrets and eats away my inhibitions, his mouth and tongue and teeth consuming me like it’s his first time and I’m his last supper.

“God, you’re perfect down here,” he says roughly. “You’ve done this before? Someone’s gone down on you before?”

I can barely breathe, can barely form words through the haze and havoc he’s wreaking on my body. “Yeah.”

His fingers tighten around my thighs, and he pushes his face deeper into me. “I hate everyone who’s ever tasted you.”

The possessive words slide into the hungry places lurking under my defenses. I want to tell him not to say things that contradict our agreement, but his fingers inside me steal all thought. He sets a rhythm of advance and retreat, his middle finger thick and satisfying when he’s in, and denying me when he’s out. He adds another finger, stretching me. My muscles clench. My head thrashes on the bed. I claw his hair while his thumb works the sensitive bud where all my concentration and thoughts have convened. I can’t think beyond his hands and mouth. Guys have touched me there, have kissed me there, but it never felt like this. He’s tearing me up and tossing me in the air like confetti until finally I’m fluttering, floating, falling, little bits of myself swept into a storm.

“Oh, my God,” I mumble through numb lips. I’ve had a few orgasms before, mostly at my own hand, but this one made my lips go numb. My entire body is limp and boneless.

“Good?” he asks.

“Um, yeah,” I say on a startled, laughing breath. “You could say that.”

He licks greedily at the wetness kissing my thighs. “I want to make you come again just to have more of this. I’ll never forget this, Nix. I’ll smell you, taste you, in my dreams.”

Head bent, he worships at the very center, where little aftershocks still roll through me. His mouth is avid, sucking, growling, making the wild wolf noises, all pretense of civility left behind. My hips roll into him in a deep, back-cracking wave. My body is an empty chamber, and my own cries of pleasure echo, hollow and desperate.

“I need you inside me, Maxim. I’m ready.”

“I’m not,” he mumbles against my pussy, still loving and laving it. His hand wanders over my belly and ribs until he reaches my breast to squeeze and plump the nipple even while he keeps eating. The tandem of his hands and mouth sends me spiraling, flying again.