Have My Baby (Crescent Cove 1)

“You’re insatiable. I never guessed.”

“Did you think about me in bed?” I trailed my finger underneath her jaw and down along the tops of her cleavage. She fought not to shiver and to hold my gaze, but she was on the verge of losing it, I could tell. “I thought of you.”

“Liar. You did not.”

“Only when you went out on dates with assholes,” I admitted. “And it was entirely unwitting. I tried to stop it. To not see you in my mind naked and writhing on their sheets, mainly because no one was ever good enough for you.”

She lifted her chin in challenge. “But you are?”

The question stopped me in my tracks. A tremor went through my hand and she must’ve noticed, because she gripped it and held it against her cheek. “This is where you say yes. That you’re everything I could ever ask for in a guy. More than. And you fuck like a goddamn champ, even though technically, I don’t know the difference. Just roll with it.”

The laugh started in my gut, spilling out of me with a freedom that had never occurred with anyone but her. I buried my face in her hair, pulling in deep breaths of her summery scent. It centered me, just as it always did. She was the embodiment of the lake and the town that had been my home for my entire life.

Memories of the long summer days we’d spent chilling with a picnic basket by the lake—or doing way riskier stuff like joyriding in my dad’s Porsche when he was away—stretched out in my mind, somehow reflected in her eyes.

She was safety, and home, and family in a way no one else had ever been except my brother. And now she was so much more. That fresh-air-in-a-bottle scent of hers was capable of making my dick hard in an instant. The way she’d tied off her sundress so neatly behind her neck, making me imagine the strapless bra she had on underneath.

Or nothing. I was voting for nothing.

Fuck, I had to see. But first…first, I had to make sure.

Sucking in a breath, I turned around and braced my hands flat on my now-bare desk.

“What’s—what’s wrong?” Her tremulous question nearly broke me.

I didn’t want her to ever doubt the effect she had on me for a moment. I’d already fucked up so much with my stupid contract and crazy scheme to have a kid when if I’d just talked to her, explained where my head was at, maybe we could’ve made some decisions together. I’d caused her to think that any attraction I might have in her direction was just based in my wanting to knock her up.

Truth was, I’d been trying my goddamn hardest not to notice her that way for years.

Now I didn’t have to shove those errant thoughts away. We were both single. There was no reason we couldn’t do the family thing our own way. With sex and kids and our own rules.

Love wasn’t a necessary component. At least romantic love. I didn’t see her that way. Of course not. I mean, I loved her, but to love her romantically would be taking a huge fucking risk.

The biggest of them all.

“Hey.” She stepped forward and stroked my back, and even in that single touch, she conveyed her growing confidence. Not in general, but in this particular space with me. “You’re running hot and cold.”

I laughed. “Far from it. I’m so hot right now that I’m amazed I haven’t torn a hole in my pants yet.”

“So why did you pull back?”

For fuck’s sake, I knew she was blushing just from that little breathy catch in her voice. I knew so much about her, and instead of that making this boring, almost routine, it made every moment better. Bigger. I wanted to find out everything I didn’t know. How her eyes hazed over as she came, the tremble of her lips just before she went over. The way she’d soak my dick with her release.

Without a condom between us this time.

I pressed my palms into the desk, searching for clarity. For restraint. “Every time, it feels like I’m pushing you.”

I expected her to argue. That’s what she did—what we did.

Instead she reached around me and stroked my cock through my pants, so slowly that I hissed air between my teeth. “Mmm. You weren’t lying.”

Christ, that little purr in her throat? Gonna be the death of me.

She didn’t wait for my affirmation. Her first task was to undo my belt and toss it on the desk, where it hung half off like a waiting snake. The metallic sound of her undoing my zipper seemed loud in my head, competing with the throb of my heartbeat. She dipped her fingers inside, grabbing my shaft through my boxers. I was so hard that just her light grip had my balls drawing up, full and tight.

I might not plant a baby in her this afternoon, but it wouldn’t be from lack of coming. Holy shit. It was going to happen whether or not I wanted it to if she kept touching me like that.

As if she heard my thoughts, she pushed down my pants and my boxers and turned me around to face her before going to her knees. I didn’t breathe. Didn’t make a sound. Just watched and waited as she stroked my dick from root to tip and flicked her gaze from mine to my length, over and over.