She nudges the door open, but instead of turning on the overhead light, she moves toward the bedside lamp. She flicks it on, and the amber glow shines up on her, bathing half her face in light. I stay by the door. One last-ditch effort to control myself in case this isn’t what I think it is.
She doesn’t say anything. And the seconds of waiting, the anticipation, only make me harder. I watch her struggle to decide on what to say, and when she sighs, I think maybe she’s changed her mind. That she can’t bring herself to ask for what I think we both want.
But I should know by now that Nell will always find a way to shock me. She reaches for the bottom of her sweater, and in one quick move pulls it up and over her head. My gorgeous shy girl has done more than bloom. She’s fucking brilliant. Brighter than the sun, strong enough to pull me right out of orbit. She’s wearing the same black lacy bra that she’d flashed me the last time I saw her. But this time I get more than a glimpse—oh no, I look my fill. Her long neck gives way to dainty shoulders. The bra has her tits pushed up and together, and praise Jesus for Victoria and her secrets. My eyes drop to the narrowing of her torso, the flare of her hips, the soft indentation of her belly button. Her skin looks smooth there and paler than her arms and her face, and I have the strongest urge to leave my mark there, to tease that uncharted skin with my tongue and teeth. Her jeans rest at her hips, stopping my further exploration, but I can remember the vague outline of her legs in the dark of my truck. I certainly remember the feel of them, squeezing at my hips as she came.
That memory snaps me back into action, and I step fully inside the room and close the door. I hear her exhale, and look back to her gaze.
“I thought maybe you . . .” She trails off.
“Would say no?”
She nods. I cross to her and use one finger to tip her chin up so that she faces me. “I told you before . . . nothing you could do can make me not want you.” I take her hand and draw it to my cock, straining at the confines of my jeans. She smoothes her hand over it once, and then again, no hesitation.
“You’re already . . .”
“Hard? Yeah, sweetheart. I pretty much always am with you.”
“But we haven’t even kissed.”
“I’ve been thinking about kissing you again since the moment our last kiss stopped.”
I’m trying to think of a less crude way to tell her that her tits always do the trick, too, when she unfastens the button at the top of my jeans. I suck in a breath at the slight ease in pressure and hold it as she slides my zipper down. Her knuckles accidentally bump against my erection, and I groan. She pauses and looks up at me, and her eyes are calculating. This time her touch is not accidental. She drags a finger over the bulge in my boxer briefs, and the jolt of need I feel is so similar to hunger that I barely resist the urge to pin her to the bed and taste her.
She moves her fingers to the waistband of my jeans and pushes them down. While she does that, I reach back to grab my shirt and pull it over my head. I kick off my shoes and step out my jeans, and it’s my turn to stand still while her eyes study me. Slowly, as her gaze moves over my chest, she lets her fingers trail in its wake. Tentatively, she circles her finger over my nipple in the way that I’ve done to her, and I fight a groan.
She smiles. “None of that, now. If I’m not allowed to hold back, you aren’t either.”
I can’t wait another second to kiss that smart mouth. I wrap my hand around her neck and drag her closer. Her lips instinctively part under mine, her tongue eager and seeking, and there’s such a fucking change in her from the other night. She throws everything into the kiss, running her hands up my abdomen and over my chest and down my arms. I have no doubt that she’s absolutely in this moment. She’s not thinking about anything else, and my cock pulses in response. She breaks away with a gasp, and looks down between us.
There’s such wonder in her voice when she says, “It moved,” that I can’t stop my laugh.
“It does that.”
She reaches out to touch me again, but it’s not enough to feel her fingers over the fabric. I want her warm skin, those small fingers. But first, I want us on an even playing field.
“Take off your jeans,” I tell her.
While she’s shimmying them off her hips, I lose my underwear, gripping the base of my dick tight when her legs come into view. She bends to push her jeans off the rest of the way, and her chest nearly spills out of her bra.
I shift my eyes toward the ceiling because now I’m picturing her on all fours, the way her breasts would fall, waiting for my hands to cup them as I slide into her from behind. Damn.
I have to fight not to let my thoughts run ahead of my actions. But it’s hard. There are too many things I want to do to her, too many ways I want to have her.
But she’s a virgin. And I’ve never been someone’s first before. Not even with Lina. And the thought of it now feels too big to comprehend.
While I’m still looking up, her hand wraps around my cock, pulling me back to the present, and I shudder out a breath. Her eyes are trained on her hand where it touches just above mine, and I release my hold to give her control. I flex, and I move in her hand this time, and she makes this small noise of satisfaction.
“If I wanted to use my mouth on you,” she says, “would you teach me?”
Holy fuck, I’ll never get tired of how direct and honest she is.
“I will teach you absolutely anything you want to know.” She starts to drop to her knees, but I catch her around the waist, pulling her in tight against me. “But not right now. Tonight is about you. I’m the one who gets to learn now.”
She looks disappointed at first, but when I caress her thigh, sliding up the curve of her ass, she doesn’t complain. I shift her backward until her knees hit the bed, and then I guide her to sit. Her bed is low enough that she’s in the perfect position to take me into her mouth, and even though I want it—God, I want it so bad—I force myself to step back.
I kneel in front of her and pull her in for a kiss. Some of my need bleeds through, and our movements are fast and hard instead of the slow seduction I’d been aiming for. But as much as I long for control, it’s not something I know how to keep around her. I want her too badly.
When we both need air, I break away from the kiss and push her backward until she lies flat on the bed. Her arms fly out to her sides, and the rise and fall of her chest makes my mouth water, and as much as I love her in that bra, I want her out of it. Leaning over her, I slide my hands beneath her back to the clasp. She parts her legs around me, hooking her ankles behind my back.
The hooks of her bra come undone at the same time that she lifts her hips, arching her body up so that her center rubs against the muscles of my abdomen. She wants the friction she found that night in my truck, and it would be so easy to shift a little higher, lay myself on top of her, and align our hips. But there’s something beyond sexy about the needy way she writhes against me. I can feel her damp underwear against my skin, and I want to just stay where I am and glory in her uncontrolled actions. Before, I had to work to get her loosened up, to get her to give herself over to the pleasure, but not anymore.
I had intended to taste her, to bring her to the edge that way so that the rest might be easier for her, but now I have a different idea. If I can survive it.
I tell her to move back on the bed, up toward the pillows, and then I crawl onto the mattress beside her. I pull her onto her side to kiss her, and I feel her naked chest crushed against mine for the first time since our night in the pool. It had been good then. Incredible really, but it’s nothing compared to this. Reaching down, I trail my fingers down her thigh until I get to her knee, then with one swift pull, I drag her leg up and over my hip. She gasps and digs her fingernails into my bicep, but I’m not done. Not by a long shot. Slowly, I roll to my back, gripping her hips to bring her with me until she’s astride my hips.
“Sit up,” I say.
She looks nervous, but she complies. And fuck, she looks
good on top of me. Her hair is wild, and her tits are flushed a pretty pink.
“Put your hands on my chest.”
She does, laying her palms flat against my pecs. Holding her hips, I shift her until my cock is trapped between her and my stomach, the length pressed against her pussy. The only thing between us is a pair of black silky underwear, slick with her arousal.
Guiding her hips like I did in the truck, I whisper, “Move.”
Tentative at first, she flexes forward, sliding along my length.
“I want to watch you,” I tell her. “I want to see you take what you want. Don’t think. Just react. Listen to what your body tells you. Move any way that feels good.”
This time she’s bolder, leaning her weight into her hands so that she can grind her hips down into mine. The pressure on my cock hurts so fucking good, and I have to struggle to keep my breaths steady. She arches her back, pushing herself down the length of me before rocking back up. Faster, she does it again. And again.
Her breasts swing with her movements, and I reach up to cup them in my hands. She cries out, increasing her pace, until the friction of her dragging against me is almost more than I can bear.
But she’s too gorgeous like this. I can’t stop her. I won’t. Not when she’s so completely lost to her desires. I roll her nipples between my fingers, and her movements become erratic, her thighs flexing on both sides of me, and she whimpers something too low for me to hear.
“What, beautiful? What is it?”
“Please,” she whines, her dilated eyes meeting mine. “It’s not enough. Please.”
I drag her down for a kiss, and she clings to me, her hands wrapping around my shoulders and squeezing tight. Then, while her mouth is against mine, I reach down and rip the seam on the hip of her underwear. I throw it away, and then the head of my cock brushes against her slick center.
She breaks away from the kiss with a gasp, resting her forehead against mine as she pants against my mouth.
“It’s going to hurt,” I tell her. “But you’re in control. You want to stop. You stop. You want to move. You move.”
She nods, and I guide myself to her opening.
“Wait!” she cries. “Condom.”
Fuck. Fuck. I have never in my entire life forgotten a condom. It’s always at the forefront of my mind. Something about her throws me completely off my game.
“Sorry,” I say, at a loss. “I didn’t mean to . . . I just . . . Jesus, Nell, you’re so fucking glorious to watch, I lost my head.”
I start to shift her off to the side, but she stops me. “There’s some in the drawer of my nightstand.”
I lift an eyebrow, and she shrugs. “I like being prepared.”
And it’s a good thing she is. Because the last thing I want to do is climb off this bed to rummage through my jeans. She leans over to open the drawer, and then pulls out an entire box.
“I wasn’t sure what kind to get, so I did some research on the Internet.”
I groan. I can only imagine the kind of research she’s done, knowing how thorough she likes to be.
“They’re perfect,” I say, impatiently tearing open the box and removing a packet. She shifts back onto my thighs, and her eyes watch, fascinated, as I roll the rubber down my length.
I never could have predicted how good this would feel with her. I knew I liked her, I knew my attraction to her was off the charts. But it’s the little things, the way each moment holds interest for her. Each new touch, each new experience . . . she soaks it all up, and it turns my head around. I can’t help but feel like I need to imprint every moment of this evening on my memory, too, to make sure I remember how perfect she was, how much joy there is in her. I don’t want to forget one second of what it’s like to be her first.
I drag her back into place and up to my mouth and whisper against those plump lips, “You’re beautiful, Nell. Thank you. Thank you for this.”
And then for the second time, I guide myself to her wet heat and begin the slow, torturous slide inside her.
She’s tighter than I could have imagined, and even though she’s practically melting around me, it’s not easy to push forward. I dip my head to pull her nipple into my mouth, and she rocks back a little, drawing me a little farther inside.
“That’s it. Push back while I push forward.”
I suck at her breast again, before trapping it between my teeth. Her hips bear down against mine, and she cries out. I push my hips up, driving forward a little harder, and our combined movements push me almost all the way inside.
I collapse back on the bed, stunned into stillness for a moment at the mind-numbing pleasure of being clasped inside her. She sits back, and the last inch of me slides inside, until I can feel our bodies press together.
I force myself to look for her reaction, even though my instinct is to thrust, to pull her down against me and drag myself back through that exquisite tightness.
Her eyes are closed, and her hands are back to resting on my chest. Her expression is pulled tight, and I know she’s in pain.
“Talk to me,” I tell her. “Tell me what to do.”
She shakes her head, her expression tensing even more, and I can feel my stomach drop right through the mattress. She’s shutting me out again. I should have known the pain would be enough to undo all the easiness in her. It’s hard enough for her to let go when all she’s feeling is pleasure.
I sit up, intending to hold her and talk her through it, but she gasps at the movement.
“That felt good.” She sounds surprised.
I wrap my arms around her middle and kiss the corner of her mouth. “It will all feel good. Just give yourself some time to adjust.”
But as usual, Nell doesn’t know how to take things slow. She only knows how to move forward, and I’m grateful for that particular attribute when she rises up on her knees a few inches before sinking back down against me.
Somehow, in the time between that first thrust and now, my memory of how tight she was dimmed, but now it’s back in full force as her body squeezes around me.
“Fuck. You feel so good.”
“I do?”
“Yeah, girl genius. Better than anything I’ve ever felt in my life.”
And it’s true, not just an in-the-moment utterance. This . . . this right here . . . is the best I’ve ever felt in my life.
She does it again, lifting a little higher this time, dropping a little faster, and I groan. “How do you feel?” I ask.
“Strange.”
“Good strange?”
“I think so.”
I run my hand up her spine to thread my fingers through her hair. I tilt her face down to mine so I can see her expression. Our gazes meet, and she swirls her hips experimentally, and fuck, I lied.
This is the best I’ve felt in my entire life.
Looking into her eyes, seeing the way they glaze over as she rubs her clit against me, feeling her chest brush against mine, all while being held so perfectly inside her.
I must think that phrase a dozen times, two dozen, as she loosens up, and we begin a slow and steady rhythm. Each moment sends pleasure tearing through my limbs, eclipsing the moment that came before.
Eventually, the position is too restricting for our mutual need to go faster, harder, so I roll, pressing her back against her pillows, and brace my arms on either side of her body. Then I’m slamming into her while her nails score my back and she throws her head back in pleasure. I can feel her getting tighter around me, and I speed up my movement, watching the way her body absorbs my hard thrusts.
She says my name, and that alone nearly drags me over the edge, but I manage to hold on, pausing while I’m buried deep inside her.
I reach between us, rubbing at the sensitive spot between her legs, and am rewarded with the bucking of her hips. I drag myself out, slow and steady, rubbing harder against her. I know she’s close when her legs start to move at my sides. Her hips twist and lift, like she’s reaching for something.
&nbs
p; “Mateo,” she says again, and I press my thumb down hard as I slam back into her.
Then her body clutches impossibly tight around me, pulsing and rippling, and I’m gone with her. The pleasure jerks at the base of my spine, and then roars through the rest of me. It burns through my blood, swallowing me up whole, and my last thought as I collapse against Nell’s soft form and take her mouth in a kiss is that I’ve told my final lie.
This.
This is the moment.
Chapter 21
Nell’s To-Do List
• Normal College Thing #5: Lose my virginity.
I wake up hot. And sweaty. And sticky. Exhausted, I start kicking at my covers, but the muscles in my legs are sore and heavy.
Hold on.
Hot, sweaty, sticky, and sore are definitely not part of my normal morning routine. I don’t do anything that can make me sore on a normal basis. (Work out? Please.) And I sleep with the air-conditioning set low because I hate waking up hot and sweaty. I continue trying to wiggle out from under the covers, pondering these four oddities, and I become aware of a fifth.
I can’t kick the covers off properly because there’s a heavy weight over my legs—and over my waist, too, now that I think about it. I try to lean up onto my elbow, but when I move, the weight around my waist squeezes so tight that I’m abruptly awake. Very awake. And there’s a bare chest inches away from my nose.
“Stop moving,” a deep voice growls above my head.
I do stop. I stop so fast that my sore muscles spasm momentarily when I freeze up.
Torres. In my bed.
“And she freaks out in three . . . two . . .”
I push the arm off my waist and sit up straight. That’s about the time I process my nakedness, when I feel the cool air of the bedroom fan over my sweaty skin. It feels good, but I’m more concerned with just how very bright the morning light has made my room. Scrambling, I pluck at the sheet and pull it up to cover my breasts.
Torres groans behind me. (Torres? Mateo? God, why are names so stupid?)