Kong chuckled and bit her arm gently. “As you command, my queen.”
“Mmm,” she said, laying kisses along the tense muscles of his neck. “I like that. You can use that nickname whenever you want.
It was late in the morning, and she couldn’t believe how long she’d slept, but perhaps she’d needed the sleep. Maybe her heart and head had needed a break from thinking and grieving. Even though her chest still felt heavy with Mac’s loss, she felt better this morning than she had since he’d passed.
She bit his ear playfully before he leaned over with her weight still on his back. He turned on the hot tap and shimmied out of his cotton sleep pants that were light blue and thin enough she could always see his morning wood through the material. The kind that hung low on his hips and showed off those two yummy strips of muscle that wrapped around his waist. “Sexy mate,” she murmured, slipping from his back.
“I like that nickname.”
“Mate of many muscles.” She peeled off her shirt and wiggled her boobies at him when she caught him looking.
“Mmm, keep going.”
“Not the Kong anymore. My Kong.”
“That’s the one,” he said through a dazzling smile as his eyes faded to muddy green. “That’s my favorite.”
He lifted her off the bath mat and wrapped her legs around his waist as he stepped into the shower. He pressed her back against the plastic shower wall and slid into her slowly, eyes on her. Always on her. This wasn’t about covering her, or pheromones. It wasn’t about practicing for a family. Something in Kong’s soul was aching, and he needed her. His eyes dimmed to the soft brown she’d fallen in love with over the years. He dipped in to kiss her, only to ease back and watch her face again as he stroked slowly into her. And when they were both close, he rested his forehead against hers and whispered that he loved her. And when he’d met her orgasm with one of his own, he pulled every pulsing aftershock from her, then slid out and washed her body as if she was a goddess. As though she truly was his queen.
He kept her off balance as the morning faded to afternoon. Playful, happy, serious, troubled, playful again. He carried her over his shoulder and gripped her ass through her sundress on the way to his Camaro.
Willa and Gia waved to them as they pulled away, and Layla beamed. “I like it here.”
“Yeah?” he asked, pulling her fingertips to his lips as he drove away from the trailer park.
“I know we have to go back to Saratoga soon, but that place made everything easier. The people there and the woods.”
“Ten-ten.”
“Yeah.”
“Told you it was magic.”
“You. You’ve made everything okay.”
He threw her a questioning glance, and there it was again. The speckles of green, just starting to glow like fireflies in his gaze. He rasped his newly shaved jaw across her knuckles but didn’t say anything as he dragged his gaze back to the road and slid on a pair of sunglasses.
“Would you be mad if I put my feet on the dashboard?” she asked, slipping her feet from her sandals and wiggling her toes right over the finely detailed glove box.
“Maybe.”
“You know, if I make footprints, you’ll always think of me when you get in and see them.”
He ghosted a glance at the dashboard, then nodded his head. “Do it. I like thinking about you.”
“Really?” She was shocked to her bones. Kong loved his car.
“Really.” He pressed her knee so her left foot touched the warm dash. “Leave your mark on here, woman.”
So she did. She rested her feet there the entire drive to Moosey’s Bait and Barbecue. When she took them off in the parking lot, the dash still looked pretty shiny, but if she squinted and looked hard at just the right angle, there were two faint smudges, and that was good enough. “Now, if anything ever happens to me, you’ll still have a part of me with you in the passenger’s seat.” Ugh. Where had that morbid thought come from?
Kong stared at the prints too long after putting the Camaro into park.
“Did you change your mind? I can polish it again.” Layla turned and reached for the detailing wipes he kept in the back seat.
“No,” he rushed out. “I like them. Leave them.” He leaned over and kissed her. Just a sweet sip with a gentle smack at the end, and then he was getting out of the car, leaving her off-balance as he’d done all morning.
Kong was a tall glass of arctic water on a hot day. His legs were long, lean, and powerful against the hole-riddled jeans that clung to his waist just right. The thin V-neck white T-shirt that hung over his defined chest was enough to draw a gulp from her lips. Aviator sunglasses hid his eyes, and scars peeked out from under the neck of his shirt. He was rocking that sexy, clean-shaven jaw that was sharp as glass with thick, dark hair styled longer on top and, holy hotness, she couldn’t believe he was hers.