Chapter 19

[Pear]

We doze.

What else is there to do after such satisfying sex on a blizzardy afternoon? The wind whirls. The windows occasionally rattle. But in our blanket igloo, Brock and I nuzzle together, and nap.

Admittedly, if I had been here alone, I would have been frightened. The house is old and creaks, and while the fireplace was keeping us cozy, I don’t think I ever would have had enough chopped wood without Brock’s presence.

As I slowly stir, I watch him sleep. His sturdy nose flares as he breathes softly. With his eyelids closed, the length of his lashes is more apparent against his cheeks. The silver in his beard is solid white in patches. He’s strikingly handsome and I hesitantly hover my fingertip over his lips, mentally tracing them to store in my memory.

Tomorrow is day twelve and he’ll be anxious to go home. He’s told me how his kids are waiting, as much as college age-kids want to hang with their parents. Nick sounds like a firecracker like his father but kind and loving toward his sister. No less than it sounds like Brock is toward his own sister, Marnie, and her wife, Lisa. When Brock mentions Ellie, his face lights up, nearly blushing with love for his daughter. According to him she’s perfect, but I remember being eighteen. She has her flaws somewhere her father will never see them.

I’m reminded of myself. All the things I tried to protect my father from knowing. When I was younger, my sister was there to lean on when I made mistakes.

The boy I gave my virginity to in my senior year of high school.

The kid in my psychology class who broke my heart, ghosting me after two months.

The guy I’d hoped to marry before I met Reggie.

Precious never met Reggie. If she had, she might have instantly discerned he wasn’t good enough for me. No one ever had been .

But Brock . . . she would have adored him. The quiet things he did, like pulling out my chair or holding open a door. The handmade wooden snowflake he’d taken the time to carve himself. The way he stuck out his restorative sentence, embracing these twelve days in order to prove himself to my dad.

“I can feel you watching me,” he mumbles, groggy and grouchy, but without any bite. Slowly, his mouth curls before his lids open. “Hi.”

“Hi.” I swallow around a sudden lump in my throat. One chalky and jagged like a lump of coal. “I need to tell you something.”

It was time to fess up. He needed to know that Dad—

“Me too,” he grumbles before scooting closer to me and kissing me without further warning. His fingers tighten on my hip, tugging me to him despite blankets falling between us.

“Brock,” I mutter against his lips, internally chastising myself after taking eager sips of him. “I—”

“I had a dream about you.”

He cuts me off once more, returning his mouth to mine, kissing me senseless before I finally ask, “What was the dream?”

“Let me show you.”

Brock shoves back the blankets wrapped over our bodies. The sudden rush sends a shiver over my skin as the cool air hits us. The fire has lost its blaze, settling into embers that sizzle and hiss. We’ll need to stoke it again, but Brock has other plans.

He reaches for my wrists and tugs me upright. “Let’s play a game.”

I chuckle softly as I’d suggested the same thing during the college football game, wagering sexual favors for winning quarters. I wasn’t a gambler, but I loved a good competition and a competitive gleam fills Brock’s eyes. He retrieves a deck of cards that I hadn’t noticed from beneath the pillows.

“Pick a card.” He holds out two.

I’m curious while hesitant to play along, wavering between the two cards, one pushed forward a few millimeters compared to the other. Whether on purpose or not, I exaggerate my decision making .

“Do I want this one?” I pause before what looks like the shorter of the two. “Or this one?” Hovering my eager fingers in front of the longer one.

I glance up at Brock but he’s no help, his face stoic and firm. When I pull forward the shorter one, certain he wants me to take the longer of the two, I watch his face once more. He’d be great at poker. Considering we are already naked, though, this definitely isn’t a game that involves stripping off our clothes.

“Perfect,” Brock states, taking my wrist and turning my hand so my card faces him.

The queen of diamonds.

“Did you know that the fifty-two cards in a deck represent the weeks of the year?”

No. At forty-one years old, I had no idea and I stare at him, uncertain where this is going.

“Four suits for four seasons. Winter, spring, summer, fall. Thirteen cards each representing the number of weeks within them.”

“Phew.” I whistle. “Maybe you are more country than city after all,” I tease, as the seasons are agricultural in nature.

“And you’ve drawn the queen of diamonds, which represents summer. She’s feminine.” Brock circles my wrist and rubs his thumb up my inner forearm. “The diamond is actually a vulva.”

My head pops up. “You’re making this up.”

He shrugs. “I’m not.” The corner of his mouth ticks upward and I don’t know if he’s serious or teasing, but stroking my inner arm suggests where this game is leading.

“She’s strength and wealth, and lots of orgasms in your future.”

I laugh, lifting my chin. “And what’s your card?”

With a flick of his fingers, he presents his card to me. “King of Clubs.”

“Which means?”

“Winter. The club symbolizes the three-in-one spirit. But also represents strength and determination.”

“And lots of orgasms in your future,” I tease .

Brock’s expression remains serious while his eyes are playful.

“What kind of game are we playing here? And how does this relate to your dream?”

Brock reaches around me, patting the seat of the dining chair that faces inward. “You sit on this throne, and I worship you.”

I glance from the seat to Brock’s face, wondering once more what he’s playing at but as he gently nudges me to the chair, I follow his lead, giving into his game.

All desire to talk has left my brain. Especially when Brock spreads my knees, forcing my center to be exposed to him in a way I’ve never been, and I pulse in all the places.

Brock pins my legs open, my thighs over the front corners of the high-back chair. The woven cane seat beneath my bare bottom takes a second to adjust to. The blanket overhead brushes against my hair, but the second Brock’s hot breath hits that tender spot, naked and visible to him on his knees before me, all thoughts are forgotten.

He worships me as he promised, like the alpha king he is, making me feel like his queen. His tongue is sin. His lips redemption. And those teeth . . . good God, I don’t know how he does it, but his teeth have skill as he teases my flesh. Then it’s tongue and lips again, and my legs shake.

At first, I’m combing my fingers through his hair, but eventually I need to steady myself as my knees bounce. I reach behind me, gripping the sides of the seat for stability as my backside balances on the edge.

Brock hums as he feasts. His eager moans and happy groans fill our little tent. Our bubble of paradise. The blanket den of amorous congress.

“Fireman,” I groan, gritting my teeth as I near the brink.

“Don’t come,” Brock pulls back, growling his demand before dipping his tongue into me once more.

“What?” I choke. I can’t hold back. I’m too close. My toes are tipped on the floor. My legs violently quake. I’m a bundle of nerves and then—

Brock moves away.

“No,” I moan, tipping back my head before peering at Brock, glaring daggers at him .

However, Brock has risen on his knees, bringing his magnificent length to meet that sensitive nub, the tip manually guided to slide up and down in the slippery mess his mouth has made of me.

“I want you to let me in.”

“Brock,” I whimper.

“With nothing between us.”

This would only be our second time. What’s the rush? Still, I meet his eyes, reading more in them. He doesn’t just mean physically. He wants me to let him into my heart. My secrets and my soul.

When I take too long to answer, Brock pulls back, lowering to his haunches, reaching his free hand for his pants somewhere in the pile of clothes and blankets.

I catch his forearm to stop him. “I trust you.”

His eyes shift. No longer black as coal. No longer liquid ink. Something softer, like dark silk.

Rising back up on his knees, he cups my jaw with one hand. “I promise I’m not dangerous.” He made that declaration once before to me. When I opened the door to him and decided to let him into the house. When I allowed him to stay for my own reasons.

I’d replied then that I doubted him. Because something deep inside warned me right then that if I let Brock Scroggs stay, he’d be dangerous for my heart.

However, my body is in control at the moment, and when the tip of his cock slips through slick folds, I watch as he disappears into me. As my body draws him into my depths and we become one.

Brock watches as well, hissing at the warmth of me surrounding him. Once he’s to the hilt, he reaches around me, covering my hands clutching at the chair’s edge. He pulls back and rocks forth, observing where our bodies join. His expression is full of wonder.

Completely vulnerable to Brock in this position, I’m unable to surge forward to meet his thrusts for fear the chair will topple. He keeps a steady pace, slowly rebuilding the lost orgasm, but I’m still afraid I won’t tip over in this position.

“I don’t think . . .” I’m hesitant to meet his eyes .

Without questioning me, Brock places a hand on my lower belly and stretches his thumb for the place I need him. With the thick pad of his thumb, he rubs in delicious circles on that tender spot, and I tremble once more. My feet catch on the rung of the chair, lifting my knees and opening me wider. I can’t be any more exposed than I am. It’s both freeing and frightening what this man is doing to me.

I’m a sexual goddess. The queen of diamonds. And Brock worships me in a ritual as old as true loves giving gifts for twelve days after Christmas.

“Brock,” I whisper, uncertain what to say to him. Knowing I haven’t told him a truth he needs to hear.

Selfish .

But when he flicks that delicate nub and thrusts forward in a way that causes my breath to hitch, I’m only in the moment. No past. No future. Just these moments in time, making a memory.

“I want you to come around me,” Brock whispers, reverent, awed. Like he can’t believe this is happening.

I’m not certain I can believe it either.

Still, I reach the tipping point, like the precarious edge of a diamond, and tumble over. I release the chair and clutch at Brock, holding onto him as my body fully takes over and I melt into the seat. The rush through my body is like the blizzard outdoors, only full of heat and jittery feelings swirling around me.

Lust. Love. Completion .

How can this man be three things at once?

The king of clubs.

This is quite the card game, and one of us needs to fold before we collapse. Before hearts are bruised.

“Paradise,” Brock hisses, finding his own release, surging inward and jetting off inside me. He clamps his hands on my backside and tightens his hold, pinning me to him. His face buries in my neck. His breath is ragged and deep, and then he’s peppering me with kisses. A trail along the column of my throat and down to my shoulder, then across my collarbone and finally up to my lips .

When he pulls back those dark eyes sparkle and gleam, like the diamond hidden beneath coal, ready to burst forth and show its worth.

He kisses me once more, before slowly releasing from me.

A quick reach for his shirt catches any mess before I excuse myself for the bathroom. The tiled space is freezing with the heat’s absence, but the cool air feels momentarily refreshing.

Our blanket igloo grew a little intense. The intimacy almost too much for me. Words I shouldn’t be saying eleven days after meeting a man tickle the back of my throat.

I’m in love with Brock.

I know it. Recognize it. Acknowledge it. Because this is a feeling I’ve never felt before, and that’s why Brock Scroggs is dangerous.

+ + +

When I return to our huddle, restored from the blanket collapsing over our heads sometime during our sexual adventure on the chair, Brock has a plate of cheeses and meats, plus crackers and fruit beside him.

“I’m starving and I guess we should empty the fridge of what we can.”

I fold down beside him, wearing a flannel shirt that he’d left in my room since he’s been sleeping in there with me.

“Sounds like a plan.” I try to keep my voice steady, although I don’t know why it’s shaking.

Brock doesn’t catch the tremor. “You said you had something to tell me.” His voice lowers while he reaches for a piece of cheese, setting a slice of sausage on top of it and placing both on a cracker.

“It can wait.” I have one more day, I guess.

Twenty-four more hours to play my devious hand.