The Decoy Girlfriend(85)
For all that she was exhausted a few moments ago, when he continues thrusting, Freya starts grinding down on him, trying to take him deeper. At one point, he thinks he’s hit her cervix, but she doesn’t stop or slow, intent on chasing her pleasure. Her breathless, honeyed moans are all the encouragement he needs.
“I love the sounds you make,” he pants, nibbling along her jawline.
Taft sees the exact moment it happens, when she finds her power and grabs it with both hands. There’s no hint of her earlier uncertainty and inexperience in the way she guides his hands to her breasts, encourages him to squeeze and knead and roll her nipples until she’s whimpering his name and god’s interchangeably.
As their pace quickens, her eyes open. If she’s surprised to find him looking straight at her, her face doesn’t show it. Her upper chest is flushed and her mouth open, which he takes as an invitation to lean forward to capture her chin. The angle of penetration changes, and she gasps into his mouth as he kisses her, soft and sweet, cradling the back of her head to keep them doubly joined a few seconds longer.
“You feel so good, Freya,” he says in soft pants. “So hot and tight. So wet for me.”
Even their bodies seem to agree, the wet slap of their joining loud and just a little lewd.
She answers by kissing him again, both hands winding into his hair and scratching his scalp. The sting of her nails coupled with every other sensation makes him growl into her mouth.
As they kiss, he lets his hand slip back to her clit. All it takes is a touch to wrack her body with tremors of pleasure. When she starts to flutter around him, his stomach tightens and begins to reverberate like a just-plucked guitar string. His balls tingle and tighten. His own climax is building, but he refuses to come until she does.
With firm, insistent pressure, he strokes her clit in hard circles, snapping his hips into hers one last time. She comes apart with a cry, the sound swallowed by his mouth. In the aftershocks of her orgasm, her muscles milk his release, and with a low shout that could either be her name or a random string of unintelligible syllables, he comes, filling the condom.
They lay together until their bodies start to cool and their breathing evens out.
“You’re perfect,” Freya declares, pulling away from his neck to look him in the eyes.
He grins. “Aren’t I supposed to tell you that?”
She playfully rolls her eyes and leans in, her kiss electrifying him. “Tell me after I pee and shower?”
Regretfully, Taft slips out of her and watches as she throws on his shirt on her walk to the bathroom. The hem barely covers her ass, and, impossibly, his groin tightens with yearning at the sight of the plump globes just barely peeping out. He swallows—hard.
The imprint of her is still on his skin, and letting her out of his arms makes him feel bereft. Alone. And the idea of being alone in his bed now that he knows what it is to hug her against him doesn’t settle well.
He could follow her. He doesn’t think she’d mind. But he should give her some space. The last thing he wants is to look needy. Even though, he admits, he is.
Freya hesitates in the bathroom doorway. “Or,” she says. “You could join me and tell me now?”
He’s out of bed before she even finishes the sentence.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Maybe it’s the post-sex high, but that morning Freya’s in the mood to do all the things she’s dragged her heels on before, and what’s more, she initiates them.
Look, she’s never going to be tea’s number one fan, but she can admit that the rooibos tea Taft brews for their breakfast isn’t totally terrible. In fact, by the third sip, she even finds it tolerable. Although—and she can’t overstate this enough—she remains deeply suspicious of hot beverages that contain no caffeine whatsoever. Taft whips together some delicious banana-nut muffins while wearing nothing but boxers and a kiss the cook apron that she chooses to take literally even though she doesn’t really need to reach for a reason to kiss him any longer.
While the muffins bake, she makes her mom’s anda bhurji, a favorite from her childhood and something she’s never made for any guy the morning after. Or any guy at all. The soft, spicy Indian scrambled eggs are extra aromatic with finely chopped red chili, onion, and cilantro; a pinch of turmeric and cumin; and lovely soft chunks of tomato, all of it smothered in plenty of butter.
“The onions made me cry,” she informs him while he tries—unsuccessfully—not to laugh. “I hope you love it.”
He does.
Freya even finds herself scratching Hen behind the ears and suggesting a walk around the neighborhood, which has both man and dog lighting up and leaping for the leash.
“We’re lucky no one noticed that I’ve been mostly the one walking him,” Taft says as they step out the door.
“Erm, sorry about that.” She bumps her hip against his and tightens her hold on the leash. “But I guess after tomorrow it doesn’t matter anymore?”
The premiere has creeped up on them in what feels like a blink, even though they both know they’ve each been steadily eyeing the calendar.
Maybe he reads something in Freya’s voice, because he asks, “This is going to work, right? You and me?”
“If we made it through the last four weeks, figuring out what comes next will be a piece of cake.”