Total pages in book: 151
Estimated words: 145746 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 729(@200wpm)___ 583(@250wpm)___ 486(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 145746 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 729(@200wpm)___ 583(@250wpm)___ 486(@300wpm)
“Yeah. Ray’s a great guy.” I snort. “I would have bet my dad would be the one to get hitched again since he had a girlfriend before the ink was dry, but he never has. He’s the same. A little older. Little fatter. More stubborn than ever.”
“Sounds like someone else I know.”
I crawl over to her, pressing our bodies together, her back to the headboard.
“You calling me old?” I whisper across the kiss-swollen fullness of her lips. “Or fat?”
“I’m calling you stubborn.” She laughs, knocking her fist against my temple. “And hardheaded.”
“If I was stubborn,” I say, lowering my head to brush our lips together, “would we be doing this?”
She opens for me, her mouth and her legs that spread so I can sink deeper into the kiss, into the softness of the mattress. Despite our earlier caution, I’m grinding into her, seeking any friction I can to relieve the hardest hard-on I’ve had in years. She reaches between us, gripping and pulling on me with a sure stroke through my pants, like it hasn’t been more than a decade since she held my dick in her hand. She fumbles at my belt and my fingers shake as I help her get my pants open.
Several sounds—a loud crack of laughter, the muted sound of chatter, and, inexplicably, someone singing “Brown Eyed Girl”—float up and over Dessi and Tilda’s fire escape, freezing us both in place.
“Shit.” I press my forehead to hers. “It’d be just our luck to break this rickety bed with half the crew down there listening.”
She snickers, tipping her head back and baring the silky length of her throat. Dark amber-streaked curls halo around her face, textured and luxuriant and stark against the white sheets.
Fuck, she’s beautiful.
Now even more than then. She looks so much like the girl I knew, the one I loved, that I could almost trick my heart into believing we never left that bed in my tiny apartment off campus. I spent so many hours memorizing that face, though, I detect the fractal changes in this one. For a hot second, I regret not witnessing the evolution from the college student to the self-assured woman beneath me now. A single gray hair swirls at her temple. I could have teased her when it first appeared. There’s the tiniest line at the corner of her lush mouth. Not even a line. A faint echo of a thousand smiles I didn’t get to see. A milli-crease that wasn’t there before.
“What are you looking at?” she asks.
“You.” I push the hair away from her face. “I’ve always loved your curls.”
“We can thank my mama.” Sadness tinges her smile, but it stays in place. “When I was young, she and Aunt Roz argued about me getting a relaxer. Aunt Roz said I should, that it would make managing all this hair easier. Mama wouldn’t, though.”
“And you never have?”
“I never have.” She sighs, shrugs. “When you lose someone that early, before you grow up, it’s kind of like certain things are frozen where you left them. Mama probably would have given in eventually and let me relax my hair, but we never got there. Keeping my hair natural feels like honoring her wishes in a way.”
“Well, I’ve always thought it was beautiful.” I pinch her cheek, hoping to lighten the mood. “Still not too bad.”
“You’re not too bad, either,” she teases, tracing my eyebrow with her thumb.
It’s a tender gesture that makes my heart stutter, whether in confusion or something else I don’t want to analyze. This isn’t supposed to be a tender arrangement. We’re gonna fuck and that’s it. I draw back from her touch and slide off the bed, reining in my emotions and zipping my pants.
“We did say we’d wait and think about it over the break,” I remind us both. “And you’ll miss your flight if you don’t get out of here.”
“Right.” She clears her throat and stands, fluffing Dessi’s pillow and straightening the blanket covering the prop bed.
When she pushes past me and reaches the door, at the last minute, I grab her wrist and pull her back into the room, then press her smaller frame into the wall. I dip my head and take her mouth in another kiss, promising myself it’s the last. I go deep, drinking from her like a well of fresh water. She tastes so damn sweet—everything I remember, but spiked with something tantalizing I’ve never had before. We both moan, our bodies rolling against each other.
I snap my head up, breaking the kiss and dropping my nose to the curve of her neck.
“You should go,” I suggest again, my breath short and panting.
“Yeah. My flight,” she mumbles. “Don’t wanna miss it.”
I step back, giving her space to leave. I adjust myself and count to twenty, waiting for this monster erection to go down. Her eyes zero in on my dick and she licks her lips like she remembers how it feels in her mouth.