She cries out, low and long, and she throbs, wet and hot, around my length. I think her orgasm might be fading, but another one seems to follow suit, and I continue to thrust inside of her until my body starts to tense and then let go. My own muscles begin to tense, and I pump deep inside until the tension threatens to take my whole body over. After a drawn out moment that seems like eternity, I thrust in her one final time and come deep inside, shaking and shuddering against her.
Sweeping my hands up under her body, I cup her perfect breasts and run my thumbs over her nipples as I push inside of her one last time, filling her totally with my come. I let my body fall against hers, and she pulls me to the floor in a tangle of arms and legs. The fire crackles on beside us, a soundtrack to the desperate need of our two bodies.
Lying like that, we fell asleep together as the fire crackled and sputtered, finally dying down sometime in the night. I think of the dinner we cobbled together, the tree we put up with its half-assed tangle of lights.
And I wonder if there’s a man alive who had a Christmas Eve as perfect as mine. I’d be willing to bet not, at least not in New Mexico.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
“I’ll see if I can get you scheduled for the 31st if you want to go,” he says.
“There’s no if. I need to go. Everything in me wishes I could stay, wishes I could repeat yesterday over and over again.”
We’re sitting by the fire again, listening to it crackle on, some of the logs wet from the snow popping and hissing as they burn. It’s Christmas morning, and Rowan is drinking whiskey, and we’re eating bread slathered with hand churned butter from down the road.
A girl could get used to this. The peaceful, quiet days. No cars, no subways, no sirens wailing at four in the morning.
I want to open my mouth to say all of this, but I know it’s not right, not right now. Maybe Rowan *will come to New York in February, as he’s said he will. Maybe he’ll show up, and we’ll have the best weekend we’ve ever had. And maybe he’ll ship me back out here and wine and dine me like he’s been doing, make me fall deeper and deeper in love with him. But that’s a lot of maybes. And New York is waiting for me, with its bills and loose ends, with Anna, who’s been texting me and freaking out about the art studio. There’s a whole life there, and the life here doesn’t quite seem real, not yet.
And it’s a lot of maybes, for someone I barely even know.
I watch Rowan as he eats the bread, crumbs falling on his plaid shirt that shows off his sense of cowboy style.
Funny how even billionaires spill crumbs on their shirts. Seems like he should be crumb proof, but underneath the big paychecks and guest houses and companies he owns, he’s a man like any other. A man who can cook, but a man nonetheless. And I’m expecting a lot from a man I barely know.
“I wish for that too.” He looks down into his whiskey and swirls it, then takes a drink.
It’s been so long since either of us has said anything that I’ve almost forgotten what we were talking about, so lost I am in my thoughts. “But this isn’t normally how people get together. You don’t *know me--“
“I know enough to know that I love you.” His gaze turns to me, and he finishes off the last of the whiskey. “I know enough that I want to convince you to stay with me, to see where this goes.” He takes my hand in his and traces his fingers over my palm. “Maybe if the necklace didn’t work—and I see that was silly now--you’re not so much a necklace girl, are you?”
I shake my head, trying to pry the words out of my mind to respond. But instead, I’m silent, my mouth ever so slightly.
“I was thinking of turning the guest house into an art studio. I could get skylights put in, and we can put in a polished concrete floor that could take a lot of paint. The whole front wall, we could knock that thing out and put floor-to-ceiling windows and—”
“Rowan.”
“And, I think we could probably put in an office where the bedroom is, keep the kitchenette. You could work with Star on some of the projects she’s lined up with the art collaborative. And I’ve got some connections in El Paso, and in Austin. We could get you a show with some of those big-canvass paintings you do--“
“Rowan,” I say again, holding his hand in mine so that I can almost feel his excitement. “That’s the nicest thing anyone has ever offered me. Really. But--“
“I know. Maybe I’ll keep the idea on the back burner. That okay?” He smiles and he butters another slice of bread. “I guess I’ll go check on the drive and see if any of the plowing I did yesterday has helped the snow melt. I nod and lie back on the sofa, lost in the thoughts of the art studio and how it might feel to go there every day. I smile and pet Eliza, who stretches out in a blissful sleep on the top of the couch cushions. As soon as I start petting her, Eliza’s head pops up, and she lets out a low growl, looking toward the foyer. I hear the door opening and closing, and then Rowan talking in a low voice.