Chasing Shadows (First Wives #3)(45)

He dropped his lips to the top of her breast and tasted the salt on her skin. “So good.” With a quick movement, he unclasped her bra and let it fall from her shoulders.

“You’ve had practice.”

He gathered the firm mounds of her breasts between his fingers and lifted them, one at a time, to his tongue. “I work with my hands,” he told her.

Her head fell back. “And your mouth.”

Yes to the left, and yes to the right. She was perfect. All of her.

The control he’d felt as he turned her into putty fell away when she traced the outside of his cock through his pants. Resting his forehead on her shoulder, he pushed into her touch.

“I want this inside of me, Liam.” Her husky voice drove through the fog in his head. “I want you inside of me.”

He pulled his wallet from his back pocket and tossed it on the counter.

Avery reached beneath the elastic of his pants and wrapped her delicate fingers around him.

“Good God, woman.”

She offered a deep laugh. “Feels like God was good to you.”

He dragged her off the counter long enough for her to peel her spandex off while he kicked his sweats and briefs to the side. The desire to stare and study and taste was overpowered by the need to feel.

“Here?” he questioned one more time.

With a grin, Avery wiggled back up onto the countertop. “Here, there . . . against the window where someone below might see us. I’ve pictured you everywhere, and now I want to make that happen.”

With hands on her thighs, he smiled into their kiss. “You have quite the imagination.”

“It isn’t as good as the real thing.”

From his wallet, he retrieved a condom and tore it free of the wrapper. “Next time we go slower,” he promised.

Avery opened for him and looked between them as he positioned himself.

Her breathing matched the quick staccato of his. “Please, Liam. I’ve waited long enough.”

With a sigh, he pressed into her warm folds and paused.

Avery’s long release of a breath tightened her body around his.

He shook his head, already fighting for control.

“Liam?” she questioned.

“Shhh.” He pulled away and slowly moved back in. “I got you.”

And he did. Standing as he made love to her made it a little easier to hold off while she warmed to the feeling. Her kiss was a barometer of where she was at and how close she was to the edge. Slow and easy at first, then a little faster, until she wasn’t kissing him at all. With her lips hovering over his, he felt her start to go. As she did, he lifted her from the counter and moved deeper until she called his name.

The feel of her insides squeezing took him over the cliff. He set her back down and rode the last waves of his release until his legs felt like blobs of Jell-O.

They breathed hard into each other’s necks while his heart rate returned to normal.

Avery pounded a fist to his back. “Don’t ever make me wait that long again.”

Liam kissed her shoulder. “Yes, ma’am.”





Chapter Nineteen



They made it to the shower, and that was when Avery digested every ounce of him.

The tattoo on his right shoulder was a geometric design he told her didn’t have a meaning. He’d been on spring break his second year of college, drunk with his friends . . . yeah, she could identify with that. She wasn’t sure how much of her college years she’d actually spent sober.

There weren’t many times in Avery’s sexual life that she’d showered with a man. Early on, when she wanted to try everything once. But in her most recent past, she never wanted a man to look at her the way Liam did. Every gentle swipe of his soap-filled hand told her she was beautiful . . . said he was lucky.

The moisture dripping off her hair as she stepped from the shower matched the volume of the ice that had been around her heart. Even as the thought entered her head, she tried to pull it back.

It’s just sex.

Even alone with her thoughts, she couldn’t convince herself that was true.

Liam was different. What that meant she couldn’t name. Refused to name. Men bounced once they slept with her. They always did.

With a towel wrapped around her and another one in her hands as she dried her hair, she watched Liam come up to stand behind her. Their reflection in the mirror brought a smile to her face.

“What has you so quiet?”

“Nothing.”

He rested his chin on her shoulder and stared at her in the mirror.

Before he could call her a liar, she squeezed out the only words she could find. “I really like you.”

He bit his lip as if he was trying not to smile.

“You just figured that out?”

Avery rolled her eyes and dropped her gaze. “Men never stick around. And you’re kinda growing on me.”

“I’m not like any other man in your life.”

“Yeah, I know. It’s scary.”

He laughed.

“Stop. I’m serious.” She shivered, looked at him. “Ever since we met, I’ve felt like there’s a wool coat on my bare skin, but I’m fine with it because feeling the coarse fiber is better than feeling nothing at all.”

His laughter faded. “I want to be the silk against your skin. But I’ll take the wool coat for now.”