CHAPTER SIXTEEN
EVELYN
I shake my head and urge him back until he falls with a grunt, my knees clambering up and over to hug his hips. I cup his jaw in my hands as he gazes up at me and trace once over the rough of his stubble.
“I want you to see the stars,” I tell him. Something behind his eyes flares and burns bright. Brighter than anything in the sky. My own private supernova.
He guides me further into him with his hand at the small of my back and trails small, biting kisses up the line of my neck. He sucks hard at a spot just beneath my jaw and then leans back, lingering there with his lips barely brushing mine.
“I’ll only be looking at you.”
His mouth on mine sends shivers cascading down my arms, both twined tight around his neck as our lips meet and press. We lean back in the same breath and readjust. Something deeper, hotter. He kisses me like he’s telling me a thousand secrets, each one something different. I missed you, his first kiss says—soft and lingering against my bottom lip. You’re so pretty, says the next—a sweet, teasing brush. I want you, says the last one—a hungry, grasping thing as he licks into my mouth and holds my face against his. So fucking bad—his fingertips sinking into my hair.
His hand fists and pulls, a slight hint of roughness that earns a desperate sound low in my throat. I don’t think I’ve ever wanted someone so much. Not even at the bar that first time. I roll my hips down onto his and he pulls his mouth away to suck in a lungful of air. I like that he hasn’t stopped me—that he hasn’t asked if this is something I want. He can feel it vibrating through me, same as him. Perfectly in tune. I circle my hips again and he exhales a shaky laugh.
“You feel better than I remember,” he says.
I grin. “You haven’t even seen the best part yet.”
He smiles up at me, his grin a little wild. I take back what I thought about his half-smiles. This is the one I want to keep. “I’ve already seen your tits, Evie.”
A laugh bursts out of me, muffled by a rough kiss against my lips. It’s clumsy, the both of us smiling into it. I want him to ask me here, like this. That same question he asks every evening while we sit on his back porch, the sun dipping low in front of us.
Did you find your happy today?
Yes, I would tell him. I found it right here. With you. Like this.
I reach for the hem of my shirt and I pull it over my head. His hands immediately slip up my belly, thumbs rubbing in a firm sweep below my breasts. I let my head drop, my hair tickling at the small of my back. It feels so good everywhere he touches. I only want more.
“You cold?”
I shake my head and reach for the clasp of my bra. “Not with your hands on me.”
His eyes flare. He likes that answer. The material of my bra falls away and I’m bare skin in the moonlight. I feel Beckett’s deep exhale brush the valley of my breasts, the tip of his nose following after. Big hands bracket my hips and slide up my back—a delicious pressure on both sides of my spine. He curls his hands around my ribs and tugs me closer.
“What about my mouth?”
I card my fingers through his hair and twist, urging him forward. He chuckles at my wordless response and nuzzles into me, pressing deep, sucking kisses below my collarbone and at the top of my ribs. His hands squeeze and he urges me further back, holding me suspended at exactly the right angle for his kisses. He barely grazes my chest and instead skips to my shoulder, the line of my neck. Everywhere but where I want them most. I arch my back, tugging at his hair impatiently.
“Beckett,” I say on a gasp, his stubble perfectly rough against my chest. He drags his jaw against me and I grind my hips down. One hand leaves my back to cup my breast, fingers pinching roughly at my nipple. I make an incoherent sound and pull at his hair again, demanding relief.
“Just wanted you to get bossy again,” he teases, mouth busy at my throat. He dips his tongue there as his fingers pinch again and my whole body shivers.
“You could have just asked.”
“This is better.”
He finally puts his mouth to my breast and I sigh his name, my hands held tight to the back of his head. He feels so good. Warm and wet and just the right amount of rough. He nips with his teeth and the stars shake in the sky.
I hate that I decided to wear jeans tonight. I can feel him thick and hard against me, but the friction is dulled by our layers, every roll of our bodies against each other urging my frustration higher. I want to feel his bare skin beneath me, satisfy the ache low in my belly. I feel itchy with need, thrumming with it.
He smooths his palm down my bare back. “Relax,” he whispers under my ear. “I’m gonna take care of you.”
“You relax,” I grumble back, frustrated by his half-touches. I’m too keyed up for a drawn out tease. I feel like it’s been weeks of foreplay between us. I feel every lingering glance, every restrained touch. I want him hard and fast and filling up every inch of me until I can barely breathe with the pressure of it. He gently lays me back against the blanket and my hair spreads around me, my knees still hugging his hips as I fall flat. I tug on his belt loops with a frown. He thumbs at the edge of my lips with a smile.
“What’s this face for?”
“You’re teasing me.”
“I’m not,” he shakes his head and rolls his hips against me, a deep, dirty grind that has his eyelashes fluttering against his cheeks. A lock of hair falls over his forehead and I press it back with the palm of my hand. A man losing his grip, finally. “I’m trying to go slow,” he grits out.
“Also defined as teasing.”
He huffs a laugh and leans down until he can lick a hot stripe between my breasts. He moves his head to the left and catches the tip between his teeth, follows it with a deep sucking pull that has me arching up off the blanket.
“I’m just trying to hold myself together,” he says into my skin, his hands batting mine away from his jeans. He quickly finds the button of mine instead, slipping it free and tugging at the zipper, his movements quick and agitated. He jerks the stubborn material down my legs with a grunt—only halfway down before he gives up completely, distracted by the sight of plain white cotton. He groans and tightens his grip on my thighs.
“I had a plan,” he says, eyes still fixed on the line of unimpressive cotton at my hips. I wiggle under his stare.
“Oh? Feel free to share it.”
“I was going to make you come and then take you home,” he says in a low voice, his eyes blazing a path up my body. He fixes me with a hungry look and flexes his hands again. “But I don’t think I can.”
“You can’t make me come?”
He releases my thigh to smack lightly at my ass. Goosebumps erupt on every square inch of my body.
“You know I can, honey.”
I feel a sharp pull low in my belly—a string between his words and the desire running hot through my blood. “Did you come up with a new plan?”
He considers, gaze lingering on the two inches of soft, smooth skin between my belly button and the edge of my underwear. I’ve had his mouth there before, while I was propped up against the edge of a dresser with my hands in his hair. I want that again. I want a million other things, too.
“Up,” he commands, tapping once at my bare hip. When I lever my body up, he curls his hands in my jeans and tugs, pulling them off with three rough jerks. I’m in nothing but a sensible pair of white cotton briefs while he’s still fully dressed, out in the middle of a grove of trees in the dark of night. It has me shivering beneath him, hands clenching in his shirt.
I clutch at it. “Off.”
He reaches between his shoulder blades with one hand and pulls it over his head, biceps flexing as he throws it to the blanket. He collapses back on top of me, his mouth on mine, his body a delicious, warm pressure tucking me down, down, down into the ground. I curl my legs around his hips and lock my ankles at the small of his back, denim rough against the inside of my thighs. His zipper bites into my skin and I flex my legs higher, his chest pressed tight to my breasts and his inked arms holding me tight. I focus entirely on him—the heat of his body and the hollow ache between my legs.
“Tell me you brought a condom,” I plead into his mouth, his thumb plucking at my nipple. He shakes his head with a muffled sound of frustration, pushing up on his arms to meet my gaze. He strains there for a second, distracted, before he dips back down to brush a kiss against my lips. He lingers and groans, another stolen kiss when I squeeze his hips tighter.
“No,” he says, regret etched into every line of his face. I let my hands map the strong line of his shoulders, his broad chest, the muscle stacked down his abdomen. His body is formed by work, colored by the sun and the earth. I’ve already seen every piece of him, but I find new things to discover. The cluster of freckles at the top of his ribs. The thin line of contrast where tanned skin meets pale, creamy white. The trail of hair that leads down his stomach, under the hem of the jeans riding low on his hips.
“Okay, that’s okay,” I babble. We don’t need a condom. There are plenty of other things we can do. My mind unrolls a list a mile long, and the ache within me pulls deeper. Sharper.
I scratch my nails against his hips and reach for the button of his jeans, sliding my hand beneath when it gives. My knuckles brush against warm skin and I wrap my hand around the hard length of him. He closes his eyes, teeth clenched. “I didn’t think—” He looks down at me, bewildered and enraptured. Disheveled and delighted. All of my favorite things. “I wasn’t expecting this.”
“You literally just told me you had a plan.” I pump my hand once and he makes a bitten-off groaning sound. I immediately want to hear it again. “You weren’t expecting me naked on this blanket?”
He shakes his head and rolls his hips into my touch.
“Do you remember the night we met?”
I stroke him again and he thrusts into my grip harder, fucking into my hand with another pained, desperate sound from between his teeth. I like that sound so much I do it again. And then again, my thumb swiping at what I can reach.
“You almost fucked me in the back hall of the bar, Beckett.” I had wanted him to. Practically begged him for exactly that, if I remember correctly.
His hand catches my wrist and he holds me still, eyes blazing. “You first,” he says. His fingers graze the curve of my hip, slide under the waistband of my underwear and squeeze at the bare skin of my ass.
I shake my head and smile at him, my hand still trapped in his pants. I need him so badly I almost hurt with it. All of my ideas scatter and I know what I want. I want us, together. “I’m tested regularly,” I tell him. “On birth control. If you wanted—”
His mouth drops to mine in a kiss, softer than it should be with my body bare beneath him and an invitation on the table. He grips my chin and licks into my mouth with a gentle caress, his thumb tracing my jaw to the tender skin below my ear. He rubs there once, a slow swipe.
“I was tested last month,” he manages when he pulls away, his palm flat against my neck. He slips it down slightly until it’s pressed right in the center of my chest. I loop my hand around his wrist and squeeze. “There hasn’t been anyone since you.”
My heart thumps an uneven beat beneath the palm of his hand. “Same for me,” I confess. I offer him a little bit more. “I haven’t wanted anyone else.”
Not even close. Not even tempted. Just the memory of Beckett had been more than enough. The ghost of his hands on my skin.
“Is this okay?” I ask, my fingertips tracing back and forth across his skin.
He nods, eyes bright, and his hand slips down my body to join the other, toying with the sides of my underwear. He slips his thumbs beneath and snaps the fabric once, enough to have my hips jump beneath him. He grits out a laugh, and I squeeze with my hand still in his pants.
He stops laughing real quick.
Hands grab and pull, a rush to get the relief we’re both craving. He fumbles with his jeans while I try to help, an attempt to kick them off without moving from overtop me.
“If you just—” I pull hard at the material.
“If I what?” He shimmies his hips and it presses his cock right against me. I gasp and edge my legs wider. “You’re not helping. You’re making it harder.”
I snicker. “I’m making something harder.”
“Evie,” he grunts, still trying to pull his jeans over his hips, distracted as I roll mine beneath him. He pins me down to the blanket with his hand at my hip, palm squeezing tight. “Be good.”
I release a slow breath, a smile still on my lips. I’m having trouble keeping still. I press my fingertips over his jaw and rub my palm down his neck. His skin is warm beneath my touch, flushed pink in the low light. “I feel like I've been waiting for you forever,” I confess.
His face softens.
“I know, honey.”
Ignoring the jeans still trapped around his thighs, his hand slips lower, two fingers gliding right where I need him the most. After all the teasing, his firm touch has me halfway there already. He circles them once and I choke out his name. He shifts his hand, presses again, and my nails dig half-moons into his back.
“Fuck, you feel good,” he grinds out. I forgot how deep his voice gets when we’re doing this. How desperate he sounds.
I nod and grab at his arms, palms smacking lightly at the ink on his skin, trying to urge him closer. His thumb slips beneath cotton and we both groan when he feels how wet I am.
“Now,” I demand. “Right now, please.”
He doesn’t bother slipping my underwear from my hips, just twists his thumb in the material and pulls it to the side, lining himself up with his other hand and pushing deep. One heavy thrust, all the way in. My legs scramble at his hips and he drops his forehead to my neck, a groan slipping from his chest to mine. I feel deliciously full, overwhelmed in the best possible way.
My memory is nothing compared to the reality of him. Hands flexing at my thighs, forehead rocking against my neck, stubble scraping at my skin. He pulls back, rolls his hips, and pushes inside. A smooth, easy rhythm that I match. He urges his body against me, again and again, pushing me up the blanket with every thrust until my shoulder blades brush cold grass.
“Evelyn,” he says into my neck. “Evie. Fuck.”
“S’good,” I slur on a laugh, champagne bubbles in my chest. He leans up on his knees and tucks a palm to the small of my back, guiding my hips tighter against him. Everything grinds just right and I’m right at the very edge already, teetering.
“I’ve thought about this,” he says, a breathless confession. His hands curl around my hips and hold tight, lifting me up another inch against him. He looks beautiful like this. A little bit wild, a bead of sweat working its way down his neck. His gaze brushes all the places we’re touching and some of the places we’re not—my thighs, my hips, the bounce of my bare breasts and the curve of my cheek. “Every single day, I’ve thought about this. You.”
My heart flutters and I feel like I’ve got starlight slipping under my skin, hearing he’s thought about me just as much as I’ve thought about him.
“Come on,” he says, eyes locking on mine. I watch his face as he drags his hand over the swell of my hip and spreads his fingers wide. His thumb traces down my belly and then he presses it between my legs. He holds it there—a simple, heavy pressure. Everything in me pulls tighter. A hiccuping breath slips out of me and a cocky grin hitches up the side of his mouth. “Give it to me.”
I grin back at him and chase his touch, placing my hand over his to move him just the way I like. “Earn it.”
His laugh is a rough thing, breathless with the way he’s still moving against me. He collapses on one arm and tangles his free hand in my hair. He rolls his hips harder, staying deep.
“I’ll take whatever you’ve got,” he tells me. His fingers curl into a fist in my hair and he kisses me like he doesn’t want to do anything else, ever again.
Just this.
Me and him.
It sneaks up on me, the bright burst of rolling pleasure. It licks up my spine and I arch beneath him, a laugh caught in the back of my throat. I’ve never felt like this. Not ever. Stardust, it feels like, right in the center of my chest.
He keeps moving through it—frantic and without his smooth control—and I’m too occupied with the fuzzy lightness in my limbs to do anything but hold on as he chases his pleasure. He shudders and freezes against me, hands grasping, mouth working soundlessly against my neck. Everything settles in soft waves of pulsing warmth, my body perfectly, deliciously worn out.
I blink up at the sky above me, the tree branches dancing in the light breeze. I smooth my palm down his back. Beckett drops his forehead against mine and breathes out my name.
“I hope your plan includes carrying me back to the house,” I yawn, the back of my hand pressed against my mouth. Every bit of me feels stretched and sated. Lazy. “Because I don't plan on moving.”
He presses up on his elbows. His eyes are soft, his touch even softer. He brushes a kiss to the tip of my nose.
“I’m not carrying anything.” He collapses at my side, eyes heavy and smile loose. “Let’s just lay here. One more minute.”
“Alright,” I yawn again, a shiver racing down my arms. He chases it away with his palm against my skin, urging me closer. “One more minute.”
We lay there much longer than a minute.
Eventually, Beckett bundles me up in my sweatshirt and carries me on his back on our trek back to the house, his hands hooked under my knees and his palms rubbing at my thighs. With my arms looped over his shoulders, he makes quick work of it, pointing out different constellations as we go. Andromeda and her chains. Taurus and his mighty horns. A million stars and a million stories. I bury my nose in his neck and drift to the sound of his rumbling voice.
I startle out of my lull with his boots against the steps of the porch, his hands adjusting his grip to dig in his pocket for his keys. I begin to slip sideways and he lets out a muffled curse, placing me carefully on my feet. I yawn and dig my fists into my eyes as he unlocks the door, dragging my fingers through my hair. I snort when several twigs and some blades of grass fall to the porch, remnants from our time in the field.
Maybe this is what happy is supposed to be. A person, a place. A single moment in time. Beckett in the hallway helping me untangle the sweatshirts from around my shoulders. A family of cats jostling for our attention as we trip into the kitchen. Tea in the kettle on the stovetop and two mugs sitting side by side right next to it.
I collapse onto one of the stools lined up against the countertop and watch him move around the kitchen, settling into the warmth expanding in my chest.
“What’re you thinking about?” he asks, hands busy with a tin of tea. He hands me the honey before I can ask and there it is again, that flutter right beneath my ribs.
I shake my head and reach for a spoon. “Nothing,” I say. “Just watching you.”
He hums like he doesn’t believe me, a smile hidden behind the lip of his mug. We sit there at the counter and drink in the calm quiet of the house. We watch the cats bat around a ball of string and I rest my forehead against his shoulder, his hand finding my thigh, fingers drumming.
A yawn creaks my jaw and Beckett noses at my hair, curling his fingers around my mug before I can drop it. He places it in the sink and comes back to me, bracing himself with his arms on the countertop. I find the galaxy on the inside of his bicep and trace the color.
“Come to bed with me,” he says, his voice a rough whisper. I lean into him until my chin is on his shoulder and the whole top half of my body is resting on his. I could fall asleep, just like this. It would probably be the best sleep of my life.
“I don’t think I have another round in me.”
Beckett shakes his head and guides me off the stool, directing me towards his room with a gentle pat on my ass.
“Neither do I,” he agrees. He drops a kiss to the back of my head and walks us forward, knees bumping against the back of mine. “I want to feel you next to me. Just sleep.”
I’m too tired to pretend that’s not exactly what I want, too. I twist my fingers through his and nod. “Just sleep sounds really nice.”