31. Tammy

CHAPTER 31

TAMMY

The fire crackles as Baxter adds another log to it. I watch the flames jump and dance around the wood, mesmerized by the orange glow, until my eyes track across to the sexiest back in the history of man.

I perch up on my elbow and reach forward, tracing the lines of Baxter's tattooed angel wings. He must have gotten them after high school, and I want to know the story. I want to soak in every detail and reinvent our friendship. I want to make up for all that time we lost.

Will he let me do that?

He glances over his shoulder as if he can sense my perusal.

His smile is gentle and sweet, and my chest seems to expand, like my heart is beating just for him.

"C'mere." I lift the blanket covering me, and his smile grows as he lies down on the floor beside me.

After our tryst in the kitchen, he led me into the parlor, creating a bed out of cushions and starting up a fire. It's romantic and beautiful, and I'm not sure a bed will ever be better than this.

Sure, the pillows move, and my hip will no doubt end up on the floor by the morning, but I don't care. I'm naked. Baxter's naked. And we're snuggled together under this blanket like we're the only two people in the world.

Baxter lies on his stomach, resting his head beside mine and draping his arm across my waist. I continue drawing lines on his back, my finger tracing the intricate details of each feather.

"When did you get this?"

His nose twitches, and he mumbles against the pillow, "Dad and I both got tattoos on our road trip, after Mom…" His voice trails off.

"My heart broke that day," I whisper.

His eyes dart to mine.

"I wanted so badly to come and see you. I just wanted to sit beside you and hold your hand."

"You were married," he mutters.

I shake my head. "You were my friend. I would have done anything for you."

He sniffs, his lips dipping. "You were married."

Tears sting my eyes, and I have to nod, because he's right. I'd been married a week when it happened. The whole town was rocked. Everyone attended the funeral, and I stood next to Hudson but couldn't take my eyes off Baxter.

I'd never seen his face so ashen. He looked like a lost boy, not even crying while he stood beside his father, who looked just as wrecked. It was impossible to know what to say because there were no words good enough to bring comfort. They just had to grieve.

I rested my hand on my belly. My baby bump wasn't really showing yet, but my pants were tight, and it was only a matter of weeks before I'd be wearing new clothes and accepting the fact that town gossip would be rife. It already was. Who the hell gets married in high school? The people who didn't want to acknowledge the truth thought we were soulmates who couldn't live without each other. They thought it was romantic that Hudson had proposed in front of the entire school. They thought it was sweet that we couldn't wait and tied the knot before graduation. Then there were the people who liked to judge. They whispered around every corner and made me feel like Hester Prynne every time I walked past them. Once I started to show, it would only get worse, but I couldn't think about that.

All I could do was stare at Baxter's ashen face and weep for the wonderful woman who was lost to us all.

"She was an angel," I whisper.

His lips curl up in a smile. "She was."

"Do you remember those cookies she used to make?" I laugh. "Who needs chocolate chips when you can use dried apricots and raisins."

He snorts. "Or kiwifruit. Do you remember that disastrous batch?"

"Your dad was so stoic, trying to make out that they were delicious." My stomach shakes with a giggle. "I mean, I guess they weren't all bad, but…"

"They weren't great, TT." He perches up on his elbow so our noses are basically touching. "But nothing can be worse than that cheese-less vegan pizza thing she tried that one time. You don't put pumpkin and eggplant on a pizza. That's just wrong."

I tip my head back as a loud laugh pops out of me.

Baxter lightly slaps his hand over my mouth. "Shhhh. You don't want to wake Kai. The poor kid will be traumatized if he walks in to find us both naked."

My boobs jiggle, and I keep on laughing.

They draw his eye, and he stares at them with a mix of affection and desire. His hand drops from my mouth, and I let him look, finding his gaze a turn-on. He makes me feel sexy in a way that no one ever has before.

"I want you inside me again," I whisper.

His fingers graze my breast, trailing down the curve before twirling around my nipple. His eyebrows flicker with a frown. "What if it's as quick as last time?"

"Then I'll enjoy it just as much." I lean forward and start nibbling his neck.

His throat vibrates with a groan, and my knuckles whistle down his torso until my fingers are wrapping around his iron cock. He's hard as granite, and my insides immediately melt to liquid.

I'm ready for him with zero foreplay and roll him onto his back.

"Wait, what about protection?" He holds me at arm's length when I try to climb on top of him.

"I'm on the pill." I smirk down at him. "And that didn't seem to bother you last time?"

"Last time my brain was functioning on zero blood flow."

I laugh and stare down at his cock, which is standing to attention, the head beading with anticipation. "It looks like you might be suffering from the same problem now."

He closes his eyes and swallows. "Yeah, I'm feeling pretty incoherent, but…"

"But nothing, Bax." I wait until he opens his eyes before smiling down at him.

Taking his hands, I place them on my boobs. He immediately starts to massage them and tries to sit up so he can kiss them, but I push him back down. My hands look small on his broad shoulders, and I know he's letting me boss him around without any kind of fight. He's strong and more than capable of being in charge, but he just lies there while I straddle him, lining up his cock with my weeping folds and sinking onto him.

He grabs my hips, his fingers digging into my soft flesh as he lets out a guttural moan.

I keep pushing, stretching myself to the point of pain, but the good kind. He's big and all-consuming. He fills me, and I'm not even sure if I can take him all the way in, but I can't stop myself either.

A soft cry punches out of me, my fingers digging into his pecs as I lower myself all the way to the hilt.

"You okay?" He gives me a worried frown.

I snap my eyes shut and nod, biting my bottom lip, unable to speak.

Am I okay?

My body's buzzing with an electrical current that's overpowering. My insides are going nuts, and all I can feel is his large cock taking me to the edge.

"You're big," I whisper.

"Too big? I'm not hurting you, am I?" He goes to move, like the thought is too much.

"Stay," I order him.

"But…"

"It's good, Bax." I rise, then slowly slide back down on him.

He groans as if this is sweet torture. I know exactly what he means.

His thumbs graze my nipples, and he squeezes my breasts again when I start to ride him. It's slow at first, long, languid pumps that soon pick up speed.

His chest starts to heave. "Fuck, Tammy, you feel amazing."

"So do you." I grin, triumph soaring through me as I lean back, changing the angle and loving the new moan that fires out of him.

His hands move back to my hips, then slide down my legs, squeezing my knees before trailing back up to my breasts. I lean forward so he can squeeze them again.

"C'mere." He beckons me forward, catching my rocking boobs and sucking my left nipple into his mouth.

"Ahhhh," I cry out on a sigh and stop moving for a second, lost in how good he feels until my pussy demands friction once more. I break away from him and start to move again, finding a heady speed that makes us both groan.

The sound of our sex fills the room, our gyrating body making a symphony that's only us.

Me and Bax.

Baxter and me.

Our coupling is long overdue and feels so right, I can't even wrap my head around it. I don't want to think anyway. I just want to feel.

Scraping my fingers through the hair on his chest, I can't help releasing a series of soft squeaks as the energy inside me builds to explosive.

"Oh shit." Baxter's eyes pop open, his breath coming out in quick pants as he grips my hips to almost painful and starts to jerk inside me. "Ah! Of fuck! Ah!"

I can feel him come, my insides rejoicing as he thrusts deep and uncontrolled. My smile is so wide it hurts, but then my mouth drops open as his thumb finds my clit and quickly sends me over the edge as well.

It takes all of about two seconds with him still deep inside me, and I feel the orgasm from both inside and out. Between my clit and my G-spot, I am done. The cries punching out of me are recklessly loud.

"Shhhh." Baxter covers my mouth again, and I moan into his palm, my body vibrating as I continue to orgasm on him.

His head tips back with a grunt, like he's feeling my internal spasms and barely able to control his own groans of pleasure.

"Fuck, Tammy," he whispers. "Fuck, you feel so good."

The words stretch out of his mouth—long, lean sounds that I can barely decipher.

But I know what he's saying.

I feel what he's saying.

And he couldn't be more right. Being together this way is so fucking good.