Chapter 14

Fourteen

D ahlia

Blake’s words, his strong body blanketed over me, and his warm breath on my neck make me feel so safe that I let everything I’ve been holding on to ever since I moved back home spill out.

“I shouldn’t have been so angry. I should have believed you when you said you thought it was for the best that we broke up,” I say. “I thought you were scared of commitment and I called you a coward. That wasn’t true.”

He breathes a small laugh against my skin. “You called me a lot more than that. Things I’d never heard come out of those perfect lips of yours.”

On the street at noon on a Sunday, just as people were leaving church, as I recall. I squeeze my eyes shut at the uncomfortable memory. “And I’m sorry that I scared you away when I said I loved you. I should have waited for you to say it first.”

The sudden roughness in his voice almost scares me. “Stop it. Don’t ever apologize for loving someone. Be proud you had the guts to say it. I wish I had.”

There he goes, squeezing my heart and making it impossible for me not to fall for him again. His fingers roaming through my hair send pleasing tingles through my body.

“Let’s never do that again,” he says.

I laugh softly. “You mean never again have a fight on a public street and call each other names and hurt each other and then stop speaking? Yeah, I promise to hold up my end of that deal.”

Blake exhales a sexy sigh and gently hoists himself off me, while keeping his arms and knees on the mattress, caging me in. My body immediately misses the pressure of him. “No. I mean let’s never break up again.”

He waits patiently for the words to land in my brain. When they do, I flip myself over on the bed to face him. I open my mouth to speak but the words won’t come out. I fit my hands along his stubbled jawline. His wide, questioning grin seems to light up the space around us.

“I love you, D. I never stopped loving you.”

With those words, he’s just wrung out the last drop of my resolve to protect myself. For maybe the first time in my life I’m at a complete loss for words. So it’s a good thing no more words are necessary for kissing.

Blake’s lips ease against mine in a familiar slide that’s so tender and full of promise I couldn’t resist even if I had a good reason to. I slip my fingers around to the back of his neck and pull him closer. My lips know his lips and his know mine. They’ve missed each other. I know he’s thinking the same thing as his suction intensifies and his tongue tastes my lips, first the bottom then the top. Our tongues tease each other until our mutual need to claim the other takes over.

Hands gripping each other’s hair, tongues tangling, teeth scraping, legs entwining. This moment feels like we’ve just unlocked the door to a once-sad, empty room full of memories and thrown open the curtains to let the light flood in.

I can’t control the moans that tumble from my mouth into his.

Blake pauses to breathe against my neck. “Never again,” he mutters. “Never letting you slip away again.” His pause to breathe is familiar, too. He’s restraining himself; I can feel him fighting back against his instinct to take me hard and fast.

He growls when I rake my nails over his chest. His mouth paints kisses down my neck to the valley between my breasts. I weave my fingers into his golden locks and pull him closer to urge him on. He gently scrapes his teeth over one of my hard nipples, then the other, before sucking each of them through the material of my bra, ramping up my excitement.

“Tell me what you want, Dahlia.” I let go of his hair and slide my hand down his chest and lower, following the deep V-lines of his lower abdomen until his hard length presses into my palm.

An unintelligible noise of pleasure erupts from the back of his throat. The tip has already breached his waistband, so I help it along by tugging his underwear down his thighs.

He grunts in relief when his cock springs free. I feel it twitch in my hand as I pet it. “D, it’s been so long I might not last if you keep rubbing me like that. I want a taste of what I’ve been missing first.”

I gasp when I gather his meaning. His mouth covers mine hungrily once more before flicking open the clasp of my bra. His warm mouth worships my breasts, suckling each of my tight peaks until I’m nearly mad with need. My thighs clamp around him, and my hips grind against his hard cock.

He chuckles softly. “Now I told you to stop rubbing. Guess I’m going to have to get my face between your thighs right this instant.”

A giggle bursts out of me when I realize something. “Technically it is November 1, so you have my permission to commence with pie season.”

His forehead drops heavily to my stomach as he groans and I laugh harder. “Oh my god, D, you did not.”

“I couldn’t help myself,” I say. One moment I’m trying to control the impulse to crack myself up, the next moment my arousal skyrockets as my big, golden god takes back what belongs to him.

Before I can object—not that I want to—he disappears my undies in under three seconds, and spreads me wide for him. He’s done restraining himself. Good.

The sensation of Blake’s strong lips at my core, tasting me deeply, forcefully, does not simply make me forget all the stress of the previous day, but might also make me forget my own name. The strange dread that surprised me earlier tonight is ancient history.

He alternates between slow, savoring kisses and teasing licks. Every inch of my pussy is drenched with my arousal and his kisses. By the time he sucks my clit into his mouth, I’m so on fire that a volcanic orgasm destroys me almost instantly.

“Oh god! Blake!” I cry as the waves crash over me. The vibrations of his moans against my sensitive skin draw out the most intense aftershocks I’ve ever felt in my life. I shiver again, but this time not out of fear.

“I need to kiss you,” I whimper.

Blake shares my taste with me, and I confess to him I haven’t been with anyone else since we were together last. “I guess I’m out of practice, or I would have lasted longer for you.”

He rumbles against my mouth. “I couldn’t even look at another woman after you left, because I know no other woman would look at me the way you do.”