“You want me to fuck you with my fingers? You want to ride my hand?”
“Jesus Christ, Spencer, just get me off,” she said with a strangled gasp.
He bent down and latched his mouth onto her earlobe as he plunged two fingers inside her wet heat.
She cried out and rolled her hips, gripping his knees harder now, digging her fingernails into his jeans. “Oh, God,” she muttered. “Oh, fuck.”
He went slowly at first, pulling out to run his fingers all around her entrance. Then he was back inside her, his thumb at her clit, working her, turning her into a moaning mess between his legs.
She rolled her head back and forth on his shoulder, all inhibitions lost now as she thrust her hips and sought the orgasm he could feel beginning in her quivering body.
She was beautiful like this, her red lips parted, her cheeks flushed, hair askew. Her breasts shook through her thin T-shirt, and he reached up with his free hand to flick a nipple through the fabric. That forced a scream from her lips and then she was coming, her inner muscles squeezing his fingers. Her hand gripped his wrist, keeping his hand where it was, against her, inside her, and he didn’t want to be anywhere else.
When the tremors in her body lessened, she heaved in gulping breaths and, with a shaky hand, brushed the hair off her face. “Holy shit, Posh.”
His fingers were still inside her and neither of them seemed to want that to change. Her hips were still moving, slightly, jerking. He ran his tongue down her neck and gently nipped her shoulder. “You don’t even know what you do to me, Alex.”
She huffed out a laugh. “I think I do. Because you do the same to me.”
He pulled his hand away slowly, taking care that she was sensitive, and she shuddered a little as he zipped up her jeans.
He was still hard, beyond hard, but he wasn’t in a hurry to do anything about it. Basking in Alex’s afterglow was good enough.
Except Alex had other ideas.
She turned around, shifted him so that he lay on the ground flat on his back, then she began to kiss and lick his jaw and his neck.
“Alex.” He sighed, running a hand through his hair. “I—”
“Shhhh,” she murmured, her tongue dipping below his shirt to taste his collarbone. “Let me.”
So he stopped talking as she rucked up his shirt and licked his abs and navel. He was silent while she undid his pants and tugged them down until his hard cock slapped against his belly.
But he wasn’t silent when she took his cock in her fist and then took him in her mouth.
“Oh, fuck,” he said, his eyes rolling back in his head as she licked and sucked his shaft. She moaned and the vibration went down to his balls. Which she didn’t neglect, not at all. She let go of his cock and rolled his balls in her palm, lapping at the sensitive skin. No other woman had done that to him, and he realized he’d really been missing out.
Alex pulled back and blew on the head of his wet cock. He jerked at the sensation and she grinned before taking him back to her throat.
Her hair was down now, falling out of her ponytail long ago, so he gathered it up and held it loosely in a fist at the back of her head. He didn’t pull or push, but he wanted a view of those gorgeous eyes watching him, those full red lips wrapped around him.
He wanted to remember this moment back when he was in his sterile apartment all alone in the city. He’d remember this moment. Under the stars. With Alex Dawn.
And that’s what put him over the edge. Alex didn’t pull back, swallowing everything he had until he was a wrung-out mess lying on dried leaves and twigs.
He was now about 50 percent sure he was never getting up and they’d find his skeleton and remnants of his belt, proving he’d wasted away here with his pants down.
But Alex—God, she was perfect—saved him from that fate as she pulled his pants back to rights then crawled up his body and lay on his chest.
He closed his eyes and ran his fingers up and down her back. He was so tired. Of everything. The rush and the next big thing and always, always searching for what made him happy.
This moment. This moment made him happy. For once in his life, he wasn’t glancing at his watch, at his calendar, looking to see what was next, always what was next.
Because he didn’t want what was next.
He wanted now. With Alex.
But it wasn’t going to last forever. Eventually he noticed a stick digging into his ribs and with a grumble he righted them so he was leaning against the tree trunk again, Alex between his legs.
He pressed a kiss to her temple and she sighed.
“I leave this week,” he said, breaking the spell. He hated to do it but it had to be done. She needed a warning.
Her body stiffened slightly and then relaxed. “Okay.”
He didn’t know what to say now. “Should we call? Or—”
“Let’s not do that,” she said softly.
He nodded, unable to speak around this odd lump in his throat. How this little sprite of a woman—the last kind of woman he ever thought he’d fall for—had gotten under his skin, he didn’t know. It was going to hurt to leave; he knew that now more than anything. “I’ll have to break this cone of silence and tell you that I will miss you. So very much, Sprite. I can’t explain to you, despite everything, just how much joy you’ve given me.”
Her body tensed again. Then she slipped out of his arms, and he made a grab for her, but she wasn’t leaving him. She turned around in her spot between his legs and faced him on her knees. Her eyes were a little wet, glittering in the light of the stars above. “I’m only going to say this once. Here. While I feel warm and safe and somewhat protected in the dark. But Posh, I . . . ” She leaned closer, so he could smell her hair, so he could see every freckle on her pale skin. “I promised myself I wouldn’t get my heart involved with another man. That I was done. Bachelorette for life. And as much as I don’t want to admit this—Out loud, to myself, to you—my heart got involved with you. And it’ll suck when you leave, but at least I know there are men like you. Who could care about someone like me.”
“I care more than you know, Alex.” He brushed her hair off her face as she blinked rapidly. “I—”
She kissed him. Which was probably a good thing, because he was about to say words that he couldn’t take back. Words that would stick with them, that would change this even more than how it had already changed tonight.
So it was better this way. He said the words with his lips and his tongue and his roaming hands. They made out like teenagers, knowing it wouldn’t go further than kisses and some mild groping. They didn’t need more, not after what they’d done and the words they’d said. The words they hadn’t said.
THEY WALKED BACK to his car holding hands, and as Spencer drove her to her apartment, Alex stared out the window. “So, what’s next for you. I mean, in New York?”
“Well, as long as everything goes well here, I should get my promotion.”
“What would the promotion mean?”
“Well, it’d be more responsibility.”
“Would you still travel a lot?”
“I’d still travel, but not as much. I used to be a hotel manager. That’s what I did right out of college for Royalty Suites. And I liked it, but I was plucked out of that by my boss now—Penny’s dad—and I’ve been doing this ever since.”
“So you want this promotion?”
“I . . . ” Did he? “It’s the next step in my career. It’s more money.” That he didn’t need. “A more important title.”
Alex was staring blankly at him. “But is it what you want?”
“I . . . ”
“Yes or no, Posh. I don’t need a fucking thesis on it.”
He looked at her sharply. “That was a little uncalled for, wasn’t it?”
She gritted her teeth and looked away. “Sorry.”
“I wish things were different—”
“No. I don’t. This is good. We’ll leave each other before it turns sour, because long distance will never work.” She turned to him. “I’d love to have one relationship in my life that I didn’t have to steal out of in the middle of the night, okay?”
What the hell was that prickle in his eyes? Shit. He swallowed, but his throat felt tight, his mouth dry. “Yeah, Sprite.”
While looking out the window, she said quietly, “Good luck.” But he wasn’t sure how much she meant it.
He wasn’t sure so much anymore either.
Chapter Fourteen
SPENCER STARED AT his hotel room phone, biting his lip and jiggling his leg. He’d last spoken to his dad almost a year ago at Christmas.
And even then the conversation had been short and filled with awkward silences.
He didn’t know what it was, that today he wanted to hear his father’s voice. Rubbing his chest where the fox tattoo lay beneath his shirt, he remembered as a kid when he’d wanted to do nothing but impress his father. He’d learned his father wasn’t someone who was impressed easily, not even by his only kid.
Spencer didn’t know if he was a painful reminder of the wife his father lost or what, but he’d never been what his father wanted. At least, that’s how he’d been made to feel.
So he’d run away. From everything that had been home to him, and hadn’t he really been running ever since? He’d never found home again.