Give Me You (30 page)

“And yet, my money says you haven’t been over here pining for me like a Priest.”

I swallow hard and try to figure out the best way to be honest without ruining whatever the hell this is.

“No, I haven’t. When I left, it seemed like whatever we were moving towards was done. So yeah, I went out. I lived my life—pretty much the same way I lived it before I met you. But honestly, work takes up a lot of my time. And I mean a lot. As in, most of my free time is spent sleeping, eating, or taking a quick shower. Alone.”

Corin is silent. I touch her knee gently.

“If there’s something you want to ask me, you should just ask. I won’t lie to you.”

There is only one thing I won’t tell her voluntarily. But if she asks, I will be honest. It will kill me and it will probably ruin any chance I have of ever having something real with my guarded girl, but I won’t lie to her if I can help it.

“Did you miss me?” she asks softly into the darkness.

There is so much vulnerability evident in her tone I want to pull the car over and show her just how much I missed her.

“Like crazy. But I know my career is demanding and you wanted to focus on school. You weren’t wrong—the things you said when I left. I don’t want to be a distraction. I don’t want to hurt you in any way, Corin.”

God, I mean that to the depths of my soul.

“I was wrong. About a few things,” she tells me. “Important things.”

Corin admitting she was wrong is such a novel occurrence; I’m practically speechless until we arrive at the group of condos where most of the guys on the team live.

“Can you repeat that once more? A little louder, so I can be sure I heard you correctly.”

“Shut up,” she admonishes me teasingly. “I never said I was perfect. I make mistakes too, you know.”

A small voice in the back of my mind alerts me that this might be a good time to tell her about some mistakes I’ve made. But the mood between us is bordering on magical and combustible. It feels like the wrong move, the wrong words, a wrong breath, might destroy it.

“Home sweet home,” I say, changing the subject as we enter the modern yet modestly decorated condo. “I’m not here a lot but it came furnished so it’s comfortable enough.”

“I like it,” Corin states matter-of-factly. “Cozy but not cramped. It’s bigger than it looks from outside.”

A white leather sectional sits in the middle of the room across from the giant flat screen. I set Corin’s bag down beside it and offer her something to drink before grabbing a beer.

“Water is fine.”

I wish I had something stronger, something to take the edge off from this unexpected blessing that still feels like a figment of my imagination.

“So you were saying…something about you being wrong?”

Corin smirks at me. “You really love that, don’t you?”

I nod. “I do. I really do.”

“There’s a first time for everything you know,” she says while opening her water. She leans on the counter, watching me from a distance. I lower myself onto the edge of the couch and wait.

“I haven’t had a ton of sleep in the past few days so this might not be the most articulate conversation. It’s been a long few days but I needed to see you because…”

I lower my beer and place it on the glass end table. “Because…”

Corin seems to consider her next move carefully. She places her water on the counter and takes a few steps closer. “Because I was stupid before. When you left. I was stupid and hurt about the Fallon thing the night of the auction and I put my walls back up. I didn’t want you to go but I understand now why you had to. This is huge—what you have here, your career. Your future.”

I don’t know which part to address first. “First of all, you aren’t now nor have you ever been stupid.”

She sighs. “Trust me, I have been. I thought intimacy was what put me in the position to get hurt. But even without us sleeping together, being without you, leaving things the way we did, it hurts.”

The admission takes a lot out of her and she sits, remaining several feet from me on the couch, which is probably a good thing because I’m aching to touch her.

“I never wanted to hurt you.”

She nods. “I know. But when you love someone, that’s the tradeoff. They get the power to hurt you.”

She loves me?

I feel like someone just smacked me in the face with a sack full of bricks.

Corin loves me? Is that why she’s here?

I swallow the words threatening to erupt out of my throat. “I guess I didn’t realize that you felt that—”

“It’s fine,” Corin cuts me off and puts her hands up. “I know you don’t feel like that about me and honestly, I didn’t realize how I actually felt until the moment you walked away from me at the airport.”

“Lower the walls, Red. Put your armor away for five fucking seconds. I never said I didn’t feel that way.”

Corin sinks her teeth into her lush lower lip before speaking again. “That’s not how our goodbye should’ve gone. Not the night before and not that morning.”

“Oh yeah?” I move closer to her on the couch. “And how should it have gone, sweetheart?”

I have a feeling she didn’t come all this way for a goodbye re-do. At least I sure as hell hope she didn’t. Corin’s tongue sneaks out to moisten her lips briefly. I want to taste her so bad I can hardly keep still.

“For starters, I should’ve been honest with you about how I felt. I should’ve accepted the damn card and told you that I’d come see you every chance I got.” I open my mouth to respond, but she isn’t finished. “I should’ve told you that I was afraid of getting hurt, of getting distracted and veering off course, but that I’ve decided I’d rather risk it than live the rest of my life regretting not going for what I wanted.”

I haven’t been breathing the entire time she’s been talking. I rectify that and move a few inches closer to her. “And what is it that you want? Just so I’m clear.”

“You, Skylar. I want you.”

M
y heart is pounding so loud I can barely hear Skylar’s response to my declaration.

“I want you too, Red. Always have,” he mumbles before his mouth crashes into mine.

It’s like we’re two caged animals who’ve been waiting for a chance to pounce on the other and we’ve finally been set free. His grip on my waist is firm enough to dent my flesh but not enough to hurt. His attack on my mouth is launched so suddenly it startles a gasp from my throat.

There’s a deliberate gentleness at first, as if he’s familiarizing himself with my tongue and my lips, but once I wrap my arms around him, digging my fingers into his hair and deepening the kiss, there’s nothing exploratory about it anymore. Just want and need and insatiable hunger.

His tongue thrusts into my mouth in a deep, languid stroke and I recognize it from the way he licked my pussy on my kitchen table in New York. I want him like that again, worshipping my body the way he did and I tell him so. It’s what’s fueled my fantasies all summer long.

“Tell me everything you want, sweetheart. It’s yours.”

“You, Skylar. All of you. Every way I can have you.” I was exhausted before but now my heart is pounding like a runaway hummingbird in my chest pulsing adrenaline through my veins at warp speed. I climb on top, straddling him in our never-ending battle for control. His erection grinds into me.

“Feel that hard cock,” he growls against my ear. “He wants me to rush this, but I won’t. I’m going to savor every fucking inch of you, sweetheart.”

He thrusts upward against my most sensitive part, pressing the seam of my jeans against my clit and making me moan.

A lightning bolt of pleasure electrifies my entire spine.

“I need…” I can’t even speak due to my animalistic panting. “Skin,” I finally get out.

“Yes ma’am. Skin I can do.” He complies by removing my shirt then his.

“These are so goddamn perfect I fucking dream about them.” He lifts my breasts from my black bra cup and palms them before sucking each nipple into his mouth. I moan, arching my back and leaning back to give him better access.

I can’t get close enough, can’t get enough contact to relieve the pulsating need between my thighs. I unhook my bra and fling it across the room.

I thought sleeping with him would feel like giving in, like I’d succumbed to being a foregone conclusion. But it doesn’t feel like that at all. I’d been with so many before. None of it mattered. None of it felt like this, like him. Like home

He buries his face in my neck and devours it with open-mouthed kisses that send shivers tingling over my entire body.

I pull my hips back, then slide down over his still sheathed erection slowly.

“Are you teasing me, sexy girl?”

I bite his bottom lip gently. “Not teasing,” I breathe against his mouth. “Needing.”

Skylar stands abruptly, lifting me and carrying me down a hallway to his bedroom without breaking contact between our mouths. We’re almost to the bed when he presses my back to the wall and lowers my feet gently to the ground.

“Pants,” he mumbles against my lips. “Off. Now.”

I obey his command, leaving myself completely exposed with the exception of black lace panties I wore for him. I can see our reflection in a full-length mirror behind him. His back muscles battle for position while he removes his own pants.

Skylar drops to his knees and I’m torn between watching him and watching the reflection of him going down on me in the mirror.

“You like to watch, dirty girl?”

I glance down and smile sheepishly. He caught me. “I like to watch you.”

His hand snakes up curls around the cotton center of my panties before he pulls them down my legs. His masculine fingers wrench my legs further apart and he kisses me gently at the apex of my thighs.

Us together, the reflection of it is unlike anything I’ve ever seen. Not dirty or demeaning like the sex I’ve known before.

It’s beautiful. He’s beautiful and he makes me feel clean again, cleansed of the soul-staining bruises from my past, because he knows about each and every one of them and yet he only sees me, the me I feel like I’ve finally become.

His tongue strokes my clit and my head falls back until it thumps the wall. I’m trembling above his expert mouth as he works me into a frenzy with each touch. I bite my lip to keep from screaming out, but when he thrusts two fingers inside of me, I can’t hold it in anymore.

“Let go, baby. Let go and give it to me.”

I’m writhing on his face, something I would’ve never imagined I could handle. His teeth scrape my sensitive flesh and suddenly he stands and lifts me once more. A few steps and I’m lowered on to his bed.

“Get in the middle. Spread your legs for me, Corin. I want to see every inch.”

I scramble quickly to the middle.

“This,” he says, nodding at me while removing his pants and boxer briefs, “this is what I’ve dreamt of pretty much every moment since we met.” His eyes are glinting with desire while he strokes himself. I can’t tear my gaze away from the erotic Adonis before me. “If at any time you want to stop, promise you’ll tell me.”

I nod. “I don’t want to stop. I want you. I want this.”

“You’re shaking, sweetheart.” Skylar clasps my hands with his as he lowers himself on top of me. He places gentle kisses on every centimeter of my skin within his reach. “I promise I won’t hurt you.”