Rock Redemption (Rock Kiss, #3)(98)

Kit’s response was quiet. “I’m glad.”

A concrete block fell on his chest. “I should’ve kept my mouth shut, huh?”

“No.” Kit held up a bracing piece so he could lock it into place. “If I’m asking you to be honest, I have to be honest too.” She ran a hand through her hair, her other hand still holding up the piece. “I know those women didn’t mean anything to you, but I don’t like thinking about them.”

Noah thought of how he’d feel if he saw Kit f*cking some other guy; his head pulsed red-hot with rage. “Yeah, I get it.” He wanted to push her on the touch question but couldn’t bring himself to repeat it.

“And I love your touch, Noah.” She went to pick up a small piece, came back. “You and I, we’re starting from scratch, from the moment we decided to be us.” Her eyes held his, beautiful and haunted. “I will walk anywhere with you, but the one thing I ask is fidelity. Don’t cheat on me. That’s my line in the sand.”

Stark and painfully honest, her words sank into his bones, branding him. “I won’t,” he vowed. “I’ve got plenty of other self-destructive behaviors I can indulge in instead.”

It was meant to be a joke. It fell flat.

“Don’t be flip.” Kit scowled. “And you didn’t answer my original question about what touches are always okay.”

He got another piece of the canopy into place. “I don’t know.” Shrugging, he went to elaborate before his brain kicked in and ordered him to keep his mouth shut.

“Just say it. I might not like hearing some of it, but I need to know.”

Fuck, she was killing him. “I didn’t really do much touching,” he admitted. “It was mostly slam my cock in, get off, and that was it.” Even with a blowjob, he’d rarely done more than just unzip his jeans. And the stupid-ass hotel-room stunt he’d engineered? He’d braced himself on his arms so he barely touched the woman anywhere else on her body. “No foreplay, no wasting time.”

“Wow, and women still kept flocking to you?”

“Go figure.” Noah had never called himself the greatest lover on the planet, but some groupies got off on the hard, cold f*ck that was his specialty.

“What about kisses?”

“Romantic bullshit,” he muttered, then paused. “But you know, since you’re my girl and all, I guess I could get into it.”

Kit’s eyes were sparkling when she looked up, and he knew she’d forgiven him for the cruel mockery of their first kiss. “Be still my heart.”

“Smart-ass.” Grabbing her with an arm around her neck, he pulled her close. Her hands landed on his bare chest, and when he lowered his head, her lips were still parted in the beginnings of a laugh.

The kiss was romantic bullshit… and he found he liked it. Liked the way he could feel her smile, the way her fingers curled into his chest, the softness of her. Shifting until he’d backed her up against the house, he braced one arm over her head, put his other hand on her jaw, and kissed her. He knew he was probably not doing it right, but it felt good and Kit didn’t seem to mind his lack of skill.

When their lips parted, his heart was thumping and her pupils were dilated, her breathing shallow. “I vote for more romantic bullshit.”

He grinned at the husky comment. “Meet you on the couch after dinner.”

Pushing playfully at his chest, she said, “Let’s get this bed up first.”

They did finally complete the bed. Turned out Kit had bought some kind of fancy waterproof canopy cover that looked like fabric.

“Mostly we can keep it like this,” she said, tying off the curtains to each of the four poles. “On the rare occasions it rains, we can close the curtains.”

“What about the stars?” What was the point in sleeping outside if you couldn’t see the stars?

“The top peels back.” She showed him how, and suddenly, the bed had a direct view of the sky, that sky bordered by a frame of curlicued metal.

Throwing himself down on the mattress, he put his hands behind his head and nodded. “I dig it.”

Kit came down on the bed beside him, but when she would’ve lain down, he unfolded an arm so she could put her head on it. He curled it back around her, and they lay there in the sunshine for a while until it got too hot.

“It’ll be great at night,” he said after they went inside, having closed the canopy to protect the mattress from the heat.

“Glad you think so. I got it for you.”

He paused in the act of lifting a juice bottle to his lips. “What?”

“You seem to sleep better in the garden.”

It was true, but he’d figured that was a fluke. Not wanting to disappoint her though, he decided to try it out that night.

Six uninterrupted hours after he’d put down his head, he lifted it up. It was the longest stretch of nightmare-free sleep he’d had in years. Even once he shrugged off the grogginess of such a long sleep, he had no particular desire to get out of bed. Yawning, he lay there and listened to the birds that lived in Kit’s garden and wished she was nearby so he could try some of that romantic bullshit again.

When he asked her to sleep with him on the bed in the garden the next night, she agreed, and yeah, there was some messing around. Kisses mostly. It was normal and romantic, and he actually felt like a goddamn man when he made her moan in the back of her throat.