Second Chance Summer(57)

He raised a brow, a silent You positive?

And because he was being so patient, she suddenly found herself very, very positive. “I just needed a minute. I’m okay now,” she said. His bare torso was rippled with strength and very lightly dusted with chest hair including a treasure trail that left her without a coherent thought in her brain.

“Be more than okay. Be sure,” he said in a voice that made her go damp.

“I am.” Or at least she was ninety-five percent sure. Maybe seventy-five … Because the real problem was that the light was on and she was going to have to lose her clothes too and she didn’t look as good as he did. “So …” Mental knuckle cracking … “How are we going to do this?” she asked. Please say in the dark …

He just smiled. The kind of smile the Big Bad Wolf might have given Little Red Riding Hood. This caused a chain reaction of tremors inside her, the really good kind. “I mean where,” she clarified. “Because the light’s on and I’m having a fat week, so—”

He picked her up. Just scooped her into his arms like she didn’t weigh a thing—even though she’d singlehandedly wiped out her entire junk food collection the night before.

“I love your body,” he said, carrying her across the room.

Her heart squished in her chest, but her wits weren’t ready to give up the fight. “The light,” she said, pointing to it as they passed by. “Let’s turn off the—”

He set her very carefully on the bed and didn’t turn off the light. “You still with me?”

“Yes, but—”

But nothing because he straightened and stripped the rest of the way.

Every inch of him visible.

While she stared in shock and admiration, trying to take in everything at once, from his broad shoulders to the ridged muscles of his abs—which, by the way, she wanted to lick—she forgot herself.

Until, that is, he sprawled out on his back on the bed and pulled her over to straddle him. “Watch yourself,” he said. “Don’t do anything to pull on your cuts.”

What cuts? she thought, dazed. Aroused.

Pressing openmouthed kisses along her throat, he unzipped her dress.

“Uh-oh,” she whispered, holding her dress to her as she remembered.

“What?”

She felt herself flush. “I’m not wearing panties. They weren’t in my closet where I got dressed so—”

He grinned. “You’re commando.”

“Yes.”

“I love commando,” he said, and then tugged the dress over her head with a gentleness that she knew was in reverence of her injuries even as he somehow also moved with absolute steely unwavering determination.

“Um.” She started to cover herself. “The light—”

“God,” he murmured huskily, holding her hands out, away from her body. “You’re so beautiful, Lily.”

She looked into his warm, soft brown eyes, saw he absolutely meant it, and … melted. Or maybe that was his hands making her melt as they cupped her breasts, then headed south as he slid one between her spread legs.

“Oh,” she breathed, and then her hands were busy, too, trying to touch every part of him she could reach, and with him beneath her, sprawled out for her touching pleasure, she didn’t hold back, wanting all of him. Every single inch.

And he had a lot of really great inches.

He said her name again, his voice low and rough, and then he very carefully rolled her beneath him and slid her hands above her head, pinning them lightly to the mattress.

He looked down at her as she squirmed. “Right where I want you,” he said.

She squirmed some more, but not in nerves now. More like she couldn’t not move. She needed him to touch, needed the feel of his mouth and hands on her. “Aidan—”

Lowering his head, he let his mouth brush over hers, hovering just enough to tease. She tried tugging her hands free, but he resisted with one of those wicked badass smiles tugging at the corner of his lips, nibbling her lower lip, sucking on it, running the tip of his tongue over it lightly.

Which had her ache intensifying. “Aidan.”

Letting go of her hands, he slid down her body. His eyes were darkened and focused on her. “I want to taste you.”

“I—”

He started with her breasts, teasing her nipples before sliding down farther, kissing her sore ribs, then low on her quivering belly.

She opened her mouth to say God knew what, but he pressed his mouth to her hipbone and sucked in a breath.

He looked up at her, eyes hooded, before dropping his attention back to her body spread out beneath him. “Perfect,” he murmured, brushing a knuckle over the skin just beneath her belly button. And then lower, over the core of her.

She bucked against his hand and he did it again, the motion too light so she thrust harder.

He resisted the pressure and eased back.

“That’s just mean,” she gasped.

With a smile that promised all sorts of naughty pleasures, he lowered his head and brushed the stubble of his jaw over her inner thighs.

“Oh,” she breathed softly, going utterly still. “Oh, please.”

“Patience,” he murmured against her, the rumble of his voice sending another wave of pleasure through her as, with a featherlight touch, he rubbed the pad of his thumb right over ground zero.