Chapter 14

14

MADDIE

Sunday, March 9

I t’s still dark when I wake up, but there’s the slightest hint of the approaching dawn coming in the window.

I’m not in my bed.

I’m not alone.

I’m in Patrick’s arms on the couch, my back pressed against his chest, his warmth touching me from my head to my toes. His knees are tucked in to the back of mine, his arm heavy around my waist.

It takes a few seconds for everything to come crashing back to me.

Keys in the door after I’d passed out, then Patrick standing in front of me, looking like he wanted to eat me alive.

But he stopped himself.

I turn my head and he’s wearing his t-shirt and boxers. He must have stripped out of his jeans after I passed out.

He didn’t want to sleep with me? No, that’s not right; he did. It was because we were drunk. And other reasons.

Patrick told me on the bike ride that he doesn’t do relationships. He doesn’t date. But why? Is he like me, with an ex who messed him up so much he doesn’t want to let another person in?

He deserves to have someone close, someone who really knows and appreciates him.

I want to be that person. I want to be close to him, in any way possible.

My pulse quickens and I’m aware of every spot where his body is touching mine. The hair on his legs tickling me from behind. Sturdy chest pressed to my back. His pelvis lightly against my ass.

I snuggle back into him, and he stirs.

“Maddie.” His breath is hot on my neck and his voice is filled with sleep.

“Yeah.” God, he feels good against me. I shift my hips again and he inhales sharply, pressing his groin against me, sliding his hand along my side. There’s proof he wants me in the form of a hardening cock.

“What are you doing?” he whispers.

I twist my body around so I’m facing him, our knees knocking together.

“I had a thought.”

“That sounds dangerous.” His hand drifts from my hip to the valley of my waist, then stops, so I move it up to my breast, which spills out of my tank top, my nipple barely covered. I wonder if he’s going to say no again, but he moves his hand, squeezing and pressing and rubbing his thumb on the hardening peak of my nipple.

Fuck, that feels good, and the ache between my legs intensifies. I rub my thighs together, but that doesn’t help at all. I look down and I can see his need for me, his cock fully hard and pushing up against his boxers.

“Madison, we can’t.” In one movement, he removes his hand from my chest and sits, pulling me to an upright position next to him and reaching for his phone. “It’s five o’clock in the morning. I should get home.”

I almost chicken out. But even though he’s trying to push me away and staring at a spot on the floor, I know he wants me. He needs me.

“Maybe we should be friends who kiss sometimes.”

He turns to me, and desire radiates off him like steam from a hot spring.

I press my lips to his and pull the phone from his hand, tossing it on the couch. Pulling back for a second, I meet his eyes, my pounding heart like a drumbeat.

Patrick lets out a shaky breath, and I can see the strength of his objections weakening as I press our foreheads together.

“Or more than kiss?”

I slide a leg over his lap and straddle him, hovering above his pelvis.

“Feck, Madison.” He practically growls at me.

And so I drop down onto his waist, letting the weight of me settle slowly on his hard cock, separated only by my thin underwear and his boxers. “You said you don’t want to.”

“First of all, I didn’t say that.”

“Do you want me to stop? Because if you say so, I will.” I shift my body against his and press down on the source of my ache. An involuntary moan escapes my mouth.

“I think I said I shouldn’t. I definitely didn’t say I don’t want to.” He looks into my eyes as he gently thrusts up. I whimper. As a response, Patrick slides his hands on my ass, pulling down my underwear until it’s bunched at the top of my thighs and his hands are massaging bare skin, pressing me down against him, rocking me back and forth. I throw my head back and he buries his face in my chest, removing one hand from my ass to push down my tank so he can get his lips on my nipple, sucking and licking while his rock-hard cock pushes up against my soaking wet underwear.

I moan. “What’s the second of all?”

“Huh?” He lets go of my nipple.

“You said first of all. What’s second?”

“Feck if I know.”

“Here’s what I think.” I sit up straight and try to stop moving for a second.

His eyes are closed.

“Look at me,” I demand, and Patrick’s eyes spring open.

“I’m looking. I’m listening.”

“Why don’t we do this just once. To get it out of our system.”

“Sounds like an awful idea.” But he continues to gently move under me, making it hard for me to form cohesive thoughts.

“But if we don’t, all I’m going to do is think about it. I won’t be able to concentrate. It’ll be so distracting. I need to plan the road trip. You need to focus on the brewery.”

“You can be quite convincing.” Patrick leans forward and plants a series of small kisses on my neck.

“Great. So we’re doing this.” Before I can lose my nerve, I lift my hands and yank off my tank top.

Patrick’s mouth gapes open, and he looks up at me.

“Christ, Maddie. You are perfect.” He stares at my breasts and cups them with his hands, leaning forward to wrap his lips around a nipple again.

I tug at the hem of his shirt. “Sure, now take this off.”

He pulls off his shirt and I shamelessly ogle him. His chest is incredible. He was a professional athlete. He doesn’t sit around on a couch all day. But still, the man should pose shirtless for February of some calendar. His hands roam my sides and my breasts, and I can barely focus on what’s in front of me. I touch his chest, at the artwork carved there, hidden completely when he wears a shirt.

There’s an intricate dragon with outstretched wings, ending right under each pectoral muscle. It’s fierce and angry. I look up at him questioningly.

“Ah, yeah, it was about me being a beast in goal. I got it fifteen years ago.”

“It’s huge. Did it hurt?” I trace the outline of the dragon and his flesh twitches under my touch.

“I hardly remember. I was young and stupid.”

“It’s beautiful.”

“No.” His voice is quiet. “You are.”

His words wash over me. We’re not drunk anymore, and the night’s almost over. We’ve only got a couple of hours before the sun rises.

“Let’s go to the bedroom,” he says. “I’m not doing this on a couch.”

“So romantic.”

He chuckles before standing and pulling me up, shoving my underwear the rest of the way off my body. He then lifts me, and I instinctively wrap my legs around his body, my bare pussy pressed against his groin. I moan and we almost end up back on the couch.

“Stop that,” he breathes out.

I still my body and let him walk us to my room.

“Just one time, Madison, right?” But his eyes are hungry for me. If I disagreed, would he still do it?

I nod. “One time.”

“To get it out of our system.”

“Yup.”

“Promise?”

“You want me to promise to sleep with you just once?”

He nods, his eyes as serious as I’ve ever seen them.

“I guess I promise.” I produce a huge eye roll. “Now take me to bed.”

He drops my legs right inside the doorway and slides me down his body like it’s a fireman’s pole.

“Wait here.” He disappears back down the hall and reappears holding a condom, swooping me back up before walking us backward into the bedroom.

Patrick gently tosses me on the soft bed. A second later he’s naked, and he sinks between my legs, nudging them apart, only giving me the quickest view of his cock.

“What do you want, love?” he murmurs, his tongue flitting out to play with one of my nipples, his hand sliding down between my thighs, stroking gently until I see stars.

What do I want? I want to play a part. I want to not be who I usually am—who is someone who likes to please, someone who is easily left behind, looked over. Someone who falls too hard and too fast.

I’m not doing that with Patrick. I’m not falling for him, I’m not dating him, and if I don’t do any of those things, then I can’t get hurt.

“I don’t want you to make this some big romantic thing.”

He stops sucking my nipple and looks up.

“I want you to lick my pussy, make me almost come, and then fuck me hard and fast until I can’t see straight.” I bite my lip. I have definitely never spoken that directly about what I want during sex.

It feels damn good.

His eyes burn and I watch his throat move as he swallows.

“We’re not dating.” I prop myself up on my elbows. “I just need someone to want me. To make me feel hot and desired. And no more questions.”

“Feck, Maddie. If that’s what you want, I’m down, but...”

“Just do it.”

He snorts and follows directions, lowering himself between my legs and pulling me to his face by my ass.

I gasp as he licks me again and again, sucking on my clit at the end of each swipe of his tongue. I roll my hips into his face, and he buries himself in me. I’m almost there. There’s an incredible building of pressure inside me.

Two seconds later, he stops and rips open the condom package, then his face is level with mine, his dick pressing into my entrance.

“And call me a good girl. I’ve always wanted to hear a man say that to me.”

“Good fucking girl,” Patrick says with a wicked smile before pushing himself inside me.

I giggle and pant as he completely fills me. It almost feels like too much. My eyes roll back in my head and I moan, wrapping my legs tightly around his waist. I can feel his eyes on my face, watching me, making sure I’m okay.

“More,” I demand, thrusting up to meet him. “Tell me more.”

“Take my cock like a good girl, Maddie.” Patrick’s words make my walls clench, and I almost come right away. He pushes one of my legs up against my body, hitting a spot that pushes me to the edge.

“Patrick,” I gasp.

“Yes.”

“Do it harder.”

He doesn’t need to be told again, and he pushes harder and faster until the whole world blurs around me.

I don’t need love. I don’t need a boyfriend. In this interlude of my life, I only need this. For once, I feel in control. I’m getting exactly what I want.

But he kisses me in between thrusts, and it’s soft and sweet and gentle. There’s a confusing contradiction to what’s going on with the bottom half of our bodies and what’s happening with our mouths.

“Maddie, I...” he whispers, but one second later, my muscles contract and I’m coming, wave after wave, and my own moans make it impossible for me to ask him to repeat himself.

I think he finishes it with like you or maybe it’s need you .

I pretend I didn’t hear it.

This is just the one time, anyway.