The Mistletoe Motive(51)

I shatter, gasping again and again as he chases my tremoring hips with his tongue, stretching out my orgasm until I gently push him away, begging for no more.

“Gabriella,” he says, leaning over me.

“Jonathan,” I tell him breathlessly, drawing his hips close to mine. “No STIs. We covered that. I take the pill every morning.”

His thick length, dark and wet at the tip rubs against me. “No condoms?” he grits out.

“I don’t like the feel of them. I understand their importance, and I can use them if needed, but if you’re okay with not—”

“I’m very okay with not.” He cups my breast and moves against me, working me up to another orgasm with sure, slow strokes of his cock over my clit.

I’m so close, rubbing against him, begging nonsensically, until I finally manage to say, “Inside me. I want you inside me.”

Jonathan kisses me hungrily and starts to ease himself in, but it’s tight and I start to panic. His hand slips into my hair, massaging my scalp. He kisses my cheek, my nose, my cupid’s bow. “Relax for me, Gabriella.”

I moan at the command in his voice, feeling my body loosen responsively. Gently, he rocks in a little deeper.

“Breathe, beautiful,” he says against my ear, before pressing a long, hot kiss to my neck. He’s big, and it’s tight, but I’m wet, so wet, and he kisses me, praises me, until I feel him seated fully inside.

I grip his shoulders, arching up into him. “I need you.”

“I’m here.” He groans as he pumps into me, his grip hard and possessive on my hip. “I’m right here, and you are goddamn exquisite. Fuck, you feel so good. So tight and warm.”

Jonathan holds me close, stroking a place deep inside me that makes my breath catch, makes my hips buck into his frantically.

He wraps his arms tighter around me, his weight pushing me into the mattress, making me feel every nudge of his hips, the steady rub of his pelvis against my clit. He kisses my neck, my mouth, my breasts. It’s fast and desperate, and I start to shake beneath him, to buck and cry, and then I’m coming in such powerful waves, only his body can hold me down.

“Gabby,” he whispers. “Oh, God, I feel you.”

He pulls back and strokes into me, faster, harder, air rushing out of him. “I’m gonna come, Gabby.”

I hold him close as he drops down again and slips his arms around me, between my back and the bed. He drives into me, sending me higher up the mattress with each deep, pained grunt. I feel him let go, feel him surrender his body to mine as I hold him tight.

“Oh God, Gabby. Oh fuck—”

“I want it all,” I tell him through a hard kiss, sinking my hands into his ass, urging him on. “Give me everything.”

On a shout, he thrusts into me and spills, long and hot, frantic punches of his hips as he calls my name, until he’s spent. After a quiet moment and a dozen tender, breathless kisses, Jonathan eases off my body and tugs me into his arms. Content and dazed, we search each other’s eyes.

“Wow,” I whisper.

“‘Wow’ is right,” he says on a soft smile, his hand wrapping around my waist. He stares at me so intently, that soft smile deepening.

“What is it?”

He sighs happily. “You’re here.”

Now my smile mirrors his. “I’m here. We just had amazing sex. What did I do to deserve that? Have I been naughty? Or nice?”

He laughs deep and rich, drawing me closer in his arms, kissing me slowly. “Both.”

Pulling back, I slide my hands through his hair and examine him. “Do you know how lucky we are? That we found each other not once but twice?”

He searches my eyes, his expression serious. “The luckiest.”

“Why do you look like that makes you sad?”

He tugs me closer and kisses me again. “I’m too familiar with probability and statistics.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means one wrong move,” he says quietly, his forehead against mine, “one single misstep, and I’d have missed you. And I don’t want that world. I never want a world without you.”

“Jonathan.” I cup his face, searching his eyes. They’re wet. “Hey. It’s all right. I’m here.”

He crushes me in his arms and buries his face in my neck, breathing me in. “Sugar plums,” he whispers. “You smell like tart plums and cinnamon sugar, and it’s the best fucking smell in the world.”

I smile, sliding my fingers through his hair in a way that I hope soothes him. “You’ve been a little stressed, haven’t you? You’ve had all this knowledge and worry bottled up beneath that tough-guy surface.”

He nuzzles me and hides in the crook of my neck, kissing me there softly. “That last night at work, when you told me where you were meeting him—me—I wanted to tell you so badly. And so many times in those three days we were apart, I almost texted you, almost called, almost went on Telegram and told you everything, but…” He pulls away, holding my eyes. “but I just couldn’t do it. I kept freaking out, that I’d tell you and you’d truly despise me for what I’d done with the store, and then I’d lose you—”

“Never,” I tell him.

“I know that now,” he says quietly, almost to himself, playing with a lock of my hair. “That’s why I met Mrs. Bailey, for advice about how to finally get the courage to tell you.”