Ground Rules

“A list.”

I began reading its contents. There were several names on the list, one after another, all females. “What is this?”

Cole sighed and leaned farther on my bed. His jaw was cut to steel, and his lips moved so effortlessly that I began to sweat. “I gathered each girl’s name that I saw Ryan with over the last few months—that I could remember. I don’t often pay attention to him, but dudes talk in the locker room. I’ve also put a little check by the girls that haven’t come back to the house after being with him.” He shrugged. “I’m sure I’m missing a good bit, but it’s the best I could do. I thought that maybe we could talk with them…” He trailed off, and my heart beat harder and harder. Did he really spend time doing this for me? “Well, you should probably be the one to do it. It would be weird if I cornered them.” His light chuckle sparked my blood. “Anyway, talk with them. Maybe see if Ryan did to them what he did to you? It could be a start.”

I just stood there.

I just stood there with my mouth open and stared at him in awe.

“Mazey?” he asked, eyes bouncing back and forth between mine frantically. “Did you not want me to do that? I haven’t said anything to anyone.”

I finally let out a breath of air. “No, no.” My fingers clenched the paper. “I just…thank you. This is…so helpful.”

Cole’s head tilted, and his lip curved just barely. “You don’t have to thank me.”

I could kiss him right now.

Heat slithered up my chest and landed on my cheeks. There was a laptop in between us that held article after article of laws about sexual assault, the limitations, so much shit, and I wanted to throw it across the room and crawl onto Cole’s chest and become wrapped up in him. Because that was what happened last week. That was what happened inside Ryan’s bathroom, too. Cole consumed me. Even more so now because he wasn’t a teenage boy with anger issues who obeyed his parents even though they were callous, close-minded people. He was so much more. He was a man of good worth, and I was really, really proud of who he had become.

“Maze, why are you staring at me like that?”

A tiny hiccup left my chest. “Like what?”

His mouth parted, and I felt like we were on top of the sun. “Just…different.”

Tentatively, I took another tiny step toward him. The muscles along his temples flicked as he watched me. My hand landed on my laptop, and I shut it before shoving it off his lap. Both of our breathing had picked up in speed, and Cole’s hands fell from his lap. I glanced down and had zero thoughts of what I’d said just one week prior—ground rules. There were no rules when it came to Cole Johnson. None at all.

“What are you doing?” His whisper was all the push I needed to climb on top of him and straddle his long legs. His hands instantly went to my waist, his thumbs dipping underneath my loose t-shirt and singeing my skin.

“I don’t know,” I whispered back, leaning forward and hovering my lips above his. He smelled of cologne and mint. The loud gulp that came from his throat made me throb, which was ridiculous, but I couldn’t seem to care.

One of Cole’s hands left my waist, and he gently tugged on my hair tie holding my messy hair in place. The strands fell in luscious waves, cascading down, locking us in a small and crowded space together. “I didn’t come here for this, Mazey. You know that, right?”

My finger traced all around his soft lips as heat flung to every inch of my skin. “I kno—”

Cole suddenly pushed my lips onto his, his fingers tangling with my hair. His tongue dipped inside, and I let out a whimper so soft I wasn’t sure he heard it, but with the feverish way he was kissing me, I thought he did.

One hand clamped on my hip, the other woven into my hair. Faces pressed together and hearts complete. We kissed for what felt like an ever-lasting eternity of sensual peace. It was rough but slow. Possessive, almost. But in the most enticing way.

Cole’s lips stopped moving over mine for a second, and he swung his legs over the side of the bed, still holding me in place. He gently placed my feet back on the ground and stood up, peering down at me. For a second, I thought he may have been leaving, trying to stay true to his word and my request of no distractions and ground rules, but he fingered the edge of my t-shirt and pulled it slowly over my head.

He sucked in a breath as he realized I wasn’t wearing a bra, and I swallowed back the lust in my throat. Next, he dipped his fingers into my sleep shorts and bent slowly as he pulled them down my legs. I throbbed at my center, feeling everything curl and intensify as his breath hovered over me.

He gently lifted each of my feet, his hand caressing my calf as he allowed me to step out of my shorts and panties. When he stood back up, he undressed himself. His black t-shirt was over his head, his jeans unbuckled, and boxers gone. When his hands landed on the small of my back, our bodies collided, and our lips connected. He kissed me deeply, and that was when I knew there was nothing more than us in this moment. I didn’t know what it meant, but I didn’t care.

My back was on my bed next, and Cole hovered over me with eyes full of so many things that were buried beneath his hard exterior. I shook my head and pressed my finger to lips before he slowly bent down and began placing kisses to my neck, my collarbone, my chest, and eventually, every inch of skin.

I was worked up, both emotionally and physically, so when he centered himself at my entrance and stayed locked with my stare, my eyes welled up. He knew. He could see right through me. He could see right through us. His forehead came down on mine as he entered me, and this was so much different than last week.

It wasn't hot and rushed.

It was slow and a desperate attempt at unbreaking what was left of us from two years prior.

“I have never felt this way,” he breathed into my ear, working me slow and deep. My legs fell to the side, and one of his hands gripped onto mine and placed them above my head, burying our joined palms into my pillow. I gasped, grinding along with him. “Nothing has ever compared to what I feel for you. Even now. Two years later.”

A moan escaped me as I clenched my eyes shut. His words, even if they weren’t dirty, did things to me. Things that I had never experienced. The feeling of pleasure went way past the surface. Everything was intensified. We were in the middle of a burning room, lost, and with no need to find our direction.

“Eyes on me.” My eyes fluttered through the building in my core. I took one glance at his intense stare and moved to study his muscles that moved with fluidity and a precision that only he could master. “That’s it, Mazey. Look at me.”