With Every Heartbeat (Forbidden Men #4)(88)

I clutched him, my hands curling instinctively around his back to anchor him against me. When my fingers encountered scar tissue, I faltered. Crap, I’d forgotten about his wounds. Quinn jerked and made a sound in the base of his throat as if he wasn’t quite sure how to react to my discovery.

I wanted to inspect each laceration and love them, kissing every single one of them. But now didn’t seem like the time, so I ventured south until I came to the waistband of his jeans. Needing him to know he hadn’t repulsed me in any way, I kept going, inside his jeans, under the band of his boxers and down until I cupped cool, smooth buttocks. Then I squeezed.

He groaned and bit down a little more enthusiastically onto my breast before he was whipping my shirt over my head.

For a brief moment, I panicked. What if he saw how skinny and puny I was and turned disgusted? What if—

“It’s okay,” he murmured, stroking one side of my hair as he buried his nose into the other. “You’re so beautiful. I just want to see you.” He pulled back. “Just want to worship every inch of you.”

I blew out a shuddered breath and nodded. His smile warmed. Then his gaze lowered. I held perfectly still. When he reached for the strap of my bra and slid it off my shoulder, I closed my eyes and concentrated on breathing. But he stilled.

“Zoey?”

My lashes fluttered open.

He shook his head, almost as if he was confused. “Don’t be scared. I’d never hurt you.”

Tears filled my eyes. I nodded and sent him a huge, watery smile. Then I removed my bra myself. He watched, seemingly spellbound. After I unbuttoned my pants, shimmied them down my legs, and kicked them off, I hooked my fingers into the tops of my panties, but he caught my hand. “Not yet. I just...I-I don’t know if I could trust my own control if I saw all of you right now because...wow.”

He blew out a breath.

Feeling good, feeling bold and uninhibited, I reached for the top button of his jeans. “Can I see all of you?”

Another strained breath escaped him, but he nodded and removed both his jeans and his boxer shorts.

I thought I was ready for my first glimpse of his cock, but I wasn’t at all. My head went dizzy as the long column bobbed proud and free from his body. I knew the mechanics, what was supposed to happened, what went where, and I began to wonder how the heck that huge, long thing could fit anywhere inside me. He’d rip me in half.

Oh, crap. How bad was this going to hurt?

“Trust me,” he said, reading my mind as he smoothed his fingers over my hair. “It’ll work. As long as you’re wet, it’ll work perfectly.”

Well, we didn’t need to worry about that then. I was already wet. Embarrassingly wet. My panties were so damp they’d soaked through.

I blushed hard, but he merely smiled. “After the touching and kissing comes the licking,” he instructed. He lowered his head and licked one of my nipples into his mouth.

My back came off the bed as I shrieked, startled by the intensity of sensation that surged through me. But Quinn didn’t just lick. He commenced to suck as well, lavishing one breast, then the other until I was a panting, aroused mess.

“Quinn,” I begged, needing him to help alleviate all this throbbing pressure he’d created.

His lips were red and swollen when he lifted his face to grin at me, his blue eyes still glazed with alcohol but also, I think, arousal.

“Ready for another biology lesson?”

“What?” I gasped in disbelief, my chest heaving. How could he even think about—

My eyes crossed when he slid his hand down and touched me through my drenched panties.

“I want to teach you about flowers. Flower anatomy.”

What had he just said? Nothing was computing. So I just bobbed my head and slurred, “’Kay.”

“Like humans, flowers can have female reproductive organs, male reproductive organs, or they can have both.” His fingers curled around the band of my underwear, and he began to lower them over my abdomen, then my pubic hair.

I sucked in my stomach, unable to catch a steady breath.

After he peeled the cloth down my legs and tossed them over his shoulder, his gaze focused on me, right where I was wet and aching. I didn’t mean to, but I squirmed until I’d arched my hips an inch off the bed in a silent plea for attention.

His lips spread with a masculine kind of pride. “First, you see the petals that cover the reproductive organs.” His gaze lifted to mine as one of his fingers stroked my petals. “That’s the prettiest part, I think. So pink and delicate, hiding the best things inside it.”

I bit my bottom lip as my thighs quivered with need.

His attention fell to where he was gently thrumming his finger up and down my labia. “Some flowers react to sunlight and open their petals during the day, exposing all their carpels to the world.” He swiped his finger between my lower lips, making me cry out and jerk from the mattress. “Am I your sunlight, Zoey? Is that why you opened your petals?”

I didn’t respond past a needy whimper, but I don’t think I needed to. He already knew the answer. He wasn’t just my sunlight; he was my everything.

“This receptive tip here would be the stigma. It catches all the pollen for germination.” He slipped his finger over my clit and rolled it delicately under the pad of his finger. “It’s definitely caught me.”