21. Boston

CHAPTER 21

BOSTON

No one had ever put as much thought into a date as Ford put into ours. I wasn't sure what to make of him at first, from the unexpected and unrestrained smile that flashed across his face when he realized I'd gotten him flowers to the casual way he buried his face in the back of my neck while we waited for the elevator. Everything about how he was acting seemed contrary to how he acted before. It was almost like a switch had flipped after our last conversation and he went from treading water in the shallow end to diving in head first.

Not that I was going to complain.

I was learning to love everything about what it meant to be with a man…to be with him.

Everything about the sprawling farm he'd picked for dinner was perfect. The furnishings, the wine, the service and, most of all, the company. Making conversation with Ford was easier than ever, the confident and sure way he rattled off question after question on his quest to get to know me, all of it fairly interspersed with my own questions as ideas popped into my head .

I learned that Ford had no siblings and had only left New York for college before returning immediately after graduation. He told me his parents had died when he was twenty-five, which had served to quadruple the number of zeroes in his bank account. Ford didn't need to work, but it was obvious to me he was a restless kind of man who would get bored without something to keep him busy. He worked because he enjoyed it and I knew if he ever got tired of his job, he would walk away from it entirely.

Over our main course, I told him more about my memories of growing up on the farm and he was eager to ask me all about what Kale had been like as a pre-teen. I didn't want to give him too much ammunition, lest it become clear he had an inside source, but sharing stories from back home had me feeling a whole new kind of warmth in the stomach. Between that and the butterflies every time Ford touched my hand or brushed the toe of his shoe against my ankle, it was like spring had taken bloom in the center of my chest.

By the time we finished off a pumpkin soufflé with some kind of apple and cream sauce, I was bursting out of my skin with anticipation. Hours of thoughtful and discerning touches had put the physicality of our relationship on the back burner, but it was still doing much more than simmering. Close to boiling over, I was beyond ready to get out of the restaurant and back into the city.

The hour-long ride back to Manhattan was agony, and Ford held my hand in his like we had all the time in the world to waste. I admired the way he was able to act like our relationship wasn't a ticking time bomb, but when he leaned close and brushed his mouth across the shell of my ear, I almost forgot .

When the car pulled up along the curb in front of my building, my legs flopped around like I was some kind of awkward baby deer who'd never walked a day in its life. Ford stepped out of the car after me and stayed close behind, one arm wrapped around my waist and his face inches from my neck.

"Did you have a good night, Boston?"

The question was a whisper, but so loud at the same time.

"Very much." Again I found myself wanting to call him Sir for no other reason than it felt right for the honorific to roll of my tongue, much in the same way he called me sweetheart.

"I've never had a date like this before," he went on, "not as a proper adult and not with someone I truly cared about."

That butterfly garden that had exploded in my chest was out of control, his words as much of an aphrodisiac as the rest of him.

"Did you enjoy it?"

"So much," he murmured, swiveling so our faces were aligned and his nose wasn't more than two inches from mine.

"Come upstairs," I whispered.

"I'm trying to be a gentleman." Ford brushed his lips against mine, sending sparks flying into the crisp night air.

"Don't try to tell me gentlemen don't fuck, Ford."

He groaned into my mouth, snaking a hand around the bank of my neck and changing the angle of my head to get a better press of his mouth on mine. I parted my lips for his tongue, my cock thickening hot and hard as he deepened the kiss.

"I don't want to rush you," he said.

"You're not," I assured him, taking his hand and moving it down to cover my erection. "You never have and I don't think you ever will. If anything, I'm the one being too demanding."

"There's no harm in asking for the things you need, sweetheart."

"Then come upstairs with me."

Both our hands were still between my legs and I tangled our fingers together so I could lead him inside. There was a brief moment where Ford dug his heels in, stare shifting unsteadily between the door to my building and the still open door to the town car.

"You're thinking too hard," I said to him, nodding toward the building.

A thousand emotions flashed across his face, none of them sticking long enough for me to make sense of, but I saw enough doubt to let go of his hand and put a foot of space between us.

"I don't want to rush you ," I repeated his statement back to him.

Ford licked his lips at that, pulling the bottom one in between his teeth. He chewed on it, his jaw working the entire time. "I'm just wondering the odds," he finally said.

"Of?"

"Of this ending horribly for everyone." Ford scrubbed a hand down his face and took a step away from me, not toward the car, but not toward the building either. "It was one thing when this was just sex, but now…"

He didn't need to say the rest, because I knew exactly what he was thinking. But now, it was more than our bodies involved. Whether we had planned it or not, there were feelings developing, interest, dedication, and those were things that could only stay hidden for so long. That was why he'd said "horribly for everyone" and not just us. His best friend was my brother; the balance of their friend group and my relationship with Kale were all on the line.

"We don't have to do this if you don't want to."

"Are you out of your mind?" Indignation flashed in his eyes and he closed the space between us with one long and sure step. He had one hand around the back of my neck and the other around my waist before I even realized he'd moved, and he was back in space, back breathing my air. "I've never wanted anything more than I want you, Boston."

Slowly, I reached up and curled my fingers around his wrist, holding on to his arm while he held on to me. His eyes were dark and frenzied, searching my face for an answer I wasn't sure I knew how to give him.

"Then who cares about the rest?" I asked.

"You're making it hard to hold back."

"Then don't." I kissed the corner of his mouth, the underside of his jaw. "Stop treating me like a kid who doesn't know better."

"You don't know better." He scoffed. "That's what got us in this situation in the first place."

"I don't know how ," I corrected, "and I've spent my whole life making my own decisions. I'm fairly certain that the way you kiss me hasn't erased a lifetime of competence."

The corner of his mouth quirked up into a smug smile and I kissed him there next.

"How do I kiss?" he asked.

"Like you want to take me apart with your teeth."

I nipped his jaw with mine to demonstrate exactly what I meant. His fingers flexed against the back of my neck, his other hand splaying out against the small of my back and pulling me closer.

"I do, sweetheart," he rasped, finally tearing himself away from me long enough to slam the car door closed.

We practically ran into the lobby, excitement for the unknown surging up my spine like a tidal wave. In the elevator, Ford backed me into the corner as soon as the doors closed, shoving one of his legs between mine. His thigh pressed hard against my cock and balls, like kindling on an already out-of-control fire. He shoved his face into the crook of my neck and sucked at the skin behind my ear, one hand pressed against the mirrored back wall of the elevator, the other already busying itself with my belt.

We stumbled out of the elevator and down the hall, and then Ford had his front pressed against my back while I struggled to get the door unlocked. His erection throbbed hot and hard against the small of my back, and the deadbolt finally disengaged. Without the door in front of me, we fell into my apartment, and Ford kicked the door closed, not bothering to lock it.

Both of us busied our hands with belts and zippers and buttons, and by the time we made it into my bedroom, we were both naked, save for our underwear. My dick pressed so persistently at the already soaked material, I didn't even see the point in keeping them on. Ford must have agreed because he gave me a rough shove toward the bed, gripping the waistband of my briefs and yanking them down my legs and off.

He didn't bother with his, crawling onto the bed between my spread thighs and peppering kisses up my stomach toward my chest. He paused there long enough to suck each nipple into his mouth, one at a time, and then his lips were at the hollow of my throat, my Adam's apple, the underside of my chin. I tilted my head back, giving him more room to explore.

I was a disaster beneath him, half arousal and half anxiety over having another man on top of me the way he was. When he pressed his mouth against mine, the hot line of his cock seared itself against my hip, and I hooked my ankles around the backs of his thighs.

Ford groaned, pumping his hips against me, holding the top of my head with one hand and my hip with the other. Like he was trying to pin me down and stretch me out, Ford explored my mouth like a man who was meant to make maps from touch and taste alone.

"I want you more than I've ever wanted anyone in my life," he whispered against my lips, sucking the bottom one into his mouth until I arched off the bed and pressed all the hot contact points of my body against him.

"I know I said this before, but I really do bet you say that to all the boys."

At my comment, he went still, lifting up enough for me to blink him into focus. I still had my glasses on, even though they'd been knocked about from the rough kisses. He searched my face with those impossibly breathtaking eyes of his, then slowly shook his head.

"Not a single one, Boston," he said, every word enunciated and punctuated clearly as to deliver the seriousness of his intent.

I swallowed, the intensity of his declaration stirring more feelings in me than the first time Colette had said she loved me. What had I been doing my entire life? Settling for lackluster and less than, when what I should have been doing was chasing after a love like this with every ounce of focus I possessed.

Wait, no.

Not a love…

This was infatuation, this was passion, but there was no way it was anything more than new lust. Even as I tried to convince myself of that, the warmth in my chest blossomed further, spreading to my stomach, down my legs, into my throat making it hard to speak.

I don't know what Ford saw in my face, but he leaned back in and left a soft, chaste kiss against the corner of my mouth. My legs, which had been hooked around his, relaxed and fell against the sheets. I wrapped my arms around his back, testing the way the broad expanse of his shoulders felt beneath my hands, and Ford licked into my mouth, taking the kiss back toward the tumultuous pools of desire we'd just stopped ourselves from drowning in.