Hawke (Carolina Cold Fury Hockey #5)(52)

Sadly, I don’t feel it now, not the way I did before. I feel a fluttering, or perhaps it’s a reawakening, and it makes me wonder where we go from here. At least for the long term.

For the immediate future—as in right now—I know exactly where we’re going.

Releasing her from my embrace, I stoop to grab her hand and turn to lead her toward the bathroom. “Come on. Let’s take a hot bath together. I don’t know about you, but I feel like I’ve been run over by a Mack truck.”

Vale halts, pulls her hand against mine. Not enough to dislodge it, but enough to make me turn toward her. “I can’t. I have to get back home to my dad.”

“Yeah, not going to happen,” I say, and turn toward the bathroom again.

This time she jerks her hand from mine. I round on her, expecting a furious tirade over my high-handed ways, but damn…I was always like that with Vale. She should remember that, and as much as she likes to bitch about it, I also know she loved it.

Instead, she chews on her lower lip, absolute indecision causing her brow to furrow deep. “I think it’s best if I just get home. I’m worried about Dad—”

“Cut the shit, Vale,” I tell her with a censuring look but an affable smile. “No more secrets. No more lies. It’s all out on the table now, which means now we deal with it.”

“Deal with it how?” she asks with frustration. “You’ve had seven years of bitterness toward me. Now you’ve got grief and sadness. I’ve got a shit ton of guilt on my shoulders and we haven’t even—”

She stops cold, eyes dropping to the floor.

“Haven’t even what?” I ask her softly as I step up to her. The knuckle on my index finger goes under her chin, lifting her face. She looks at me with a swift smile and shakes her head.

“Nothing,” she says in an accommodating smile. “It’s all out on the table. I’m just…not sure how we process this. What we do.”

“What we do?” I ask her with mock sarcasm, and so she knows I’m teasing I give her an impish smile. “I’ll tell you what we do. We go get in the bathtub and we relax a bit. But because you’ll be naked, and in my arms, I’m going to get horny again, and so we’ll f*ck in the tub. Preferably with you riding me.”

Vale cocks a gorgeously arched eyebrow at me and folds her arms over her chest. “So sex will solve all our problems?”

“It damn well won’t make them worse,” I say with a grin.

She rolls her eyes at me, and to my dismay, turns around to grab her jeans off the floor. I’m lunging at her before she can even think to put one foot in them. I grab them from her, toss them across the room, and spin her in my arms. I let my hands frame her face and I bend down to brush my nose against hers. “Listen, I understand now why you did what you did. I hate we lost those years. Hate you’ve been under this guilt. I don’t know exactly where we go from here, but I do know where we don’t go. And that’s backward. We don’t go back to the anger. We don’t go back to the grief. And we sure as shit don’t go back to just being friends.”

Her eyes are filled with indecision, and I see an intense worry lurking deep within. I can almost imagine cogs and wheels rotating in that brain of hers, trying to figure out some way to accept what I’m saying, but perhaps too mired in the thickness of her wounded conscience to see what’s standing just a few feet in front of her.

“Vale,” I say softly to get her attention. To make sure there is no doubt about what I’m getting ready to say. “I understand why you did that to me…cutting me loose. For not letting me be there for you. I get it…I really do. It’s done and we can stop playing the blame game, okay?”

“So we just start over?” she asks hesitantly.

My mouth splits wide into a smile of dazzling magnitude. I step back from her, dropping my hands from her face. Coughing slightly to clear my throat, I extend my arm, palm sideways, and say, “Hi. My name is Hawke. Nice to meet you.”

Vale purses her lips, letting me know she thinks I’m a dork, but I can see the humor in her gaze. She takes my hand, gives me a firm handshake. “I’m Vale. It’s nice to meet you too.”

We release our grip on each other, but rather than do without touching her, my hand comes up to slide my fingers into the hair at her temple. In deep, curving around the back of her head. I bend down, put my lips in a low hover over hers. “I know we just met and all, but is there any way I can talk you into taking a bath with me?”

She giggles, a sound I haven’t heard in years. It brings elation to my heart that I’m not sure I ever recall feeling. Slapping a playful hand on my chest, she says, “That’s kind of forward, don’t you think?”

“I thought ‘forward’ was the point,” I say, just before touching my mouth to hers. I give her the softest of kisses, more of a reclaiming.

“Okay,” she says softly, her warm lips still resting against mine. “Forward.”

—

“Lean forward a little,” I groan as my hands grip Vale by the hips. I’m lying in the tub, she’s straddling me.

Riding me, actually. Cock deep inside and it feels f*cking fantastic.

Vale obeys me, hands on my shoulders, and she leans forward.

Perfect. My mouth closes around one sweet nipple and I suck on it as she presses her knees into the bottom of the porcelain tub so she can stroke up and down on my cock. I’m so f*cking close to blowing, but I want her to come again. I got her off once with my hands, and that came on the heels of the water starting to cool and relaxation time being over. After she came spectacularly, back arching away from me as she sat between my legs and pressing harder against my hand, she immediately turned and climbed on top of my aching dick and has been bouncing up and down ever since. Her movements alone have caused more than half the water to slosh out onto the floor.