A Is for Alpha Male (29 page)

His lips immediately returned to their place, lightly resting on mine, and he murmured, “You’re perfect, Haley. Never met a woman more perfect than you.”

I knew we were in a moment, I knew this was serious, and sweet, and one of those moments I shouldn’t let myself ruin. But I couldn’t help it, my scoff bursting forth and vibrating directly against his lips.

His answering chuckle was rough, and I felt it cover every inch of my skin and even inside. It was the very best laugh I had ever heard.

“Exactly the way you are, Haley. You’re perfect for me.”

Realizing all that Danny gave me, all that he accepted as normal and garnered amusement from rather than annoyance, it became beyond obvious that he was right. Except he had it backward.

He was the one who fit. The one who gave the word “perfect” new meaning.

He was perfect for me. And this was the perfect way for us to experience our first time.

Intimate, present, aware.

Perfect.

AS I CAME down from my star demolishing, Earth and Mars shattering, fire breathing, sword swallowing orgasm, lying cradled sweetly against the heat of Danny’s comfortable chest, it hit me.

What? It was a
really
good orgasm. That description seemed appropriate. Breathing fire and swallowing swords required talent, as did producing a truly mind blowing orgasm for your female partner.

Danny could swallow my sword anytime.

Wait
.

That didn’t sound right.

Right. Getting back on track.

All of the flirty touches, the lingering looks, and the sudden changes in the direction of a conversation.

Oh my God.

Didn’t know when my resolve and self-control were going to crumble, but I knew it would happen at some point.

Oh. My. God. Pulling back so that I could look him directly in the eye and slapping him on his previously cozy chest with the weakness of a little girl, I snapped, “You liked me the whole time, didn’t you?! You were messing with me on purpose!”

“I most definitely wasn’t messing with you, Hales,” Danny said on a vexed exhale. “I have had feelings for you from the very beginning, but there’s a lot more to this than you think,” he explained softly, his fingertips gliding over my sexually sensitized skin lazily, his eyes pensive.

Only half listening to him, I continued on my diatribe. “You jedi-mind-tricked me!...No, it’s worse than that. You jedi-
alpha
-mind-tricked me!”

And he had. He’d been controlling the situation the whole time, planting negative views about all the guys I came across inside of my head. Meanwhile, he made sure to keep in contact with me constantly, working his way into my heart and head secretly, planting himself in there nice and deep while I didn’t even realize it.

I mean I realized he was getting to me, but not that it was all part of some invisible jedi-mind-trick plan.

And to think I had waffled about his Alpha-ness. He was so Alpha that he did it in secret. I was following his effing orders without even knowing it!

At first he seemed surprised by my outburst, though for the life of me I couldn’t figure out why. This was me.

Crazy.

Finally, he settled in, a huge smile taking over his rugged face. I figured part of the reason for his amusement was my rant, and the other part centered around the fact that I was doing it while we were both still naked, entwined, and straddling his motorcycle.

“You’re like a Secret Alpha. Controlling the situation by using ass backward Jedi mind tricks,” I continued.

“Is that anything like Secret Santa? Because I didn’t get you a present,” Danny interjected, his tone light and joking.

“Danny!” I shouted, wanting more of an explanation than I had gotten.

In fact, so far, he had been extremely vague.

There was only one word for that.

Unacceptable.

“There’s more to this than you understand, Hales,” he said cautiously.

“Well, effing make me understand, Jerkface,” I snapped and then watched as his eyes flickered minutely with some unknown emotion.

He seemed to take a minute to think before he gave me his answer. “I knew you were right for me, Hales. Knew I was right for you, too. From almost the minute you opened that dirty, little, perfect mouth of yours.”

As he continued with his explanation, it felt decidedly less genuine, but I couldn’t put my finger on why. Or maybe it was genuine, but not in its totality.

Whatever. I didn’t know. But something wasn’t right about it.

“But you’re too much of a stubborn mule not to have to find that out on your own. You had that list and a picture in your mind of what you were looking for. But I know you, I know that list was only half of the reason for the trip.”

He knew me
. Yeah, he did. Scary how well he did after so little time.

“I knew you wanted to have an awesome time with your mom and that finding a guy that was right for you would be a bonus. You needed to go on the rest of your trip, but I knew you wouldn’t go if you thought something was really starting with me.”

He swept a thumb across my cheek, his eyes sliding from one feature of my face to another until he memorized all of them. “However, I didn’t want you to meet someone else in the process. You’re a catch, Hales.”

Being true to myself I said, “I know. I’m awesome.”

Thankfully, he just ignored me, though his voice did hold a tremor of a chuckle when he said, “So yeah, I jedi-alpha-mind-whatever-ed you. I twisted the qualities of the list in order to keep the guys away. You had your fun, but I kept you to myself all the same.”

He reached forward, separated a small section of my hair from the rest, wrapped it around his finger, and gave it a gentle tug.

“And come on, none of those guys were good enough for you anyway. Think about your books. Really think about them. I know what you like. It’s not some specific quality the guy has. It’s that he wants to be all of those things for that specific woman. He wants to be whatever she needs him to be, and he’ll challenge, take on, and defeat any obstacle that gets in his way in order to do it.”

Despite the weird feeling that some piece of the explanation was missing, everything he said made sense. I knew he was right about me and my mom, and I knew he was right about me and my books.

I didn’t bother to tell him that those were all things I already knew.

I mean, come on, I wasn’t an idiot.

“You drove me crazy,” I told him instead, dropping my face into his chest and snuggling it, the barely there smattering of hair tickling my face faintly.

“Baby doll, it must have been a really short trip,” he responded, his lips moving my hair on the top of my head.

“Ha fucking Ha,” I said mockingly into his chest, my face scrunching up with the sarcasm.

His rich laughter was the only segue I got into his next question.

“Do you remember that first conversation we had on the phone?” he asked into the top of my head.

“I know you do,” I responded dryly.

He took the time to chuckle briefly at my humor and then said, “You told me one of your deepest darkest secrets. That you’re afraid one day your family is going to realize—”

“I know what I told you,” I snapped, cutting him off. I wasn’t really sure where he was going with this, but I thought one of the rules of sharing secrets with someone was that they were never allowed to bring them up again.

“Well, do you know what I was going to say to you after that, when you wouldn’t let me say anything because you were so scared you wouldn’t like what I had to say?” he semi-teased.

“No, Danny. I have many skills, but mind reading is not one of them,” I snapped softly.

“Hales, the way you feel is normal. It shouldn’t be some deep dark secret. You love your mom and Hunter, and that’s what love is.”

“What do you mean, ‘that’s what love is’?” I asked in a tone ridden with attitude.

Danny didn’t let my phony surliness bother him. He never did. “If love were a location, it would be a paradoxical mixture of the safest place on earth
and
the most vulnerable. Like an airplane. It’s not quite the safest place on earth, but it’s pretty damn safe. But people are seriously scared of it. And when you fall, it’s a hell of a long way and the landing is really, really shitty. Same as love.”

“That’s got to be one of the stupidest things I’ve ever heard. And yet, it also sounds true.”

“Stick with me, babe. I’m an absolute fucking geyser of knowledge,” he joked, his fingers running carelessly through my hair while his old hand continued drawing mindless patterns on my hip.

“You know, Danny, I think I will,” I agreed easily. “At least long enough to have you breathe fire one more time.”

He cocked his head in confusion, but smiled at the same time. He knew it made sense in my head.

“Though, I have to request a bed this time.”

He moved before I even had the entire sentence out of my mouth, swinging me around to his back like the spider monkey I was, and taking off for the house, both of us seriously lacking in the clothing department.

Carrying me swiftly into the house, down the hall, and tossing me gently onto the bed, he stripped the rest of the way out of his pants and set about showing me the true meaning of E, K, V, and X, using his mouth, both hands, and a deluxe model police baton to do it.

And when he did it, he did it slow.

“Lean forward, Hales. Tilt that beautiful ass for me,” Danny instructed.

It was a good thing we had spent all that time getting to know each other on the phone because we certainly weren’t using our time for gabbing now.

The rest of last night, a night that I spent with Danny in its entirety thanks to Allison packing not just some of my stuff, but all of it, centered around two very important body parts. But the activities weren’t singular in nature.

No, we sucked on lollipops and ate out too.

Um. Cough. Metaphorically.

I was fairly certain I wanted to have go out to dinner with Danny every night of my life.

And morning.

And afternoon.

Truthfully, I wasn’t sure the man didn’t have magical powers.

Thankfully, if that was the case, at least he used them for good instead of evil. And when he pulled a rabbit out of his hat I was hoping it had batteries rather than ears.

Now, Danny was being a sweetheart and showering with me just so that he could get that spot I couldn’t quite reach.

Spreading my legs with his foot, he grabbed my hips with his callused palms and slid slowly inside, all the way to said delicious spot. Thankfully, using Boy Scout rules, he had come into the shower prepared, remembering to bring the all important sheath for his sword.

I might not have acted it, but I was a responsible adult. Rule numero uno was “No glove, no love”. And yes, I had more than one rule number one.

As he moved in and out of me, the hot water ran down and around the peaks and valleys of our bodies, turning our skin red with the heat of its touch.

When Danny’s hands moved up my sides, around my ribs, and up to palm my heavy breasts, they did it how they always did. Gently, deliberately, and with reverence.

Dan Smith effing worshiped my body and made no secret of it.

It was indisputably obvious in every touch, caress, and kiss he blessed me with.

His thumbs swiped my nipples, hardening them instantly, as his palms supported their weight.

Some women liked it hard and rough all the time. Especially with all the Dominant/Submissive books floating around out there these days. I got it, I really did.

I was all about a good fucking every once in a while. But most of the time, I wanted it slow, intimate, and meaningful. Maybe that was boring, but Danny certainly seemed to be in tune with me.

Danny’s hands started their journey back to my ass and then dug in when they got there.

He was close.

Luckily, so was I.

My awareness was already on hyper alert, memorizing every like, dislike, movement, and motion of Danny during sex, but I still wished that I had the ability to notice more. I wanted to know every nook and cranny, every flex and release.