Christmas at the Riverview Inn

She grabbed handfuls of his shirt, lifting it up until they had to stop kissing so she could pull it off, and the second’s separation was too much and they fell back onto each other like they were starving. And all the tenderness he’d thought he’d feel when he imagined finally getting his hands on her was lost and it was just need between them. Need—and every year they’d spent away from each other.

“Yes,” she moaned. “Hurry.”

They got tangled up trying to take off each other’s pants, and quickly gave up and worked on their own. Belts clanked and jeans were shoved out of the way and her hands, oh sweet god, her hands slipped over the gray fabric of his boxers. Her palm rubbed against the painfully hard length of his dick and he saw stars against the backs of his eyelids. He lost his own rhythm for a second and pressed his head against hers, standing there, letting her touch him the way he’d barely been able to dream of when they were young.

She slipped her fingers into the waist of his boxers, edging them down over the head of his cock and then off his hips. He sucked in air, suddenly light-headed.

“Watch,” she breathed, and he opened his eyes and did as she asked.

Her hand curled around his shaft and it was everything. Everything. His breath sawed in his chest.

“I wanted this,” she said. “Even before I really knew what it was.”

Yes. Yes. He understood that. A snake brain longing when they were too young to really know.

“I wanted to kiss you and touch you, and I wanted to be kissed and touched by you,” she said.

He kissed her forehead. She circled her thumb around his dick.

“You really are so beautiful.” She stroked him, over and over, and he stood there and took it for as long as he could. Holding on to control by a thread until it suddenly snapped in her fingers, and it was stop her or come all over her belly.

He grabbed her hand, taking it off his body.

“Cam—”

“I know. But I’ve got some things I need to do.”

Her laugh was a quiet humph. “Like what?”

He picked her up again by the waist, kissing her and walking her backward toward the bed, toppling them both onto it. Her legs parted and he slid into the cradle of her hips like this was a dance they’d done a million times.

Her legs wrapped around his waist and his cock rocked against her. He held his breath and pushed aside his own reactions, studying hers. Listening to how her breath broke and noticing when she shuddered and shook.

He cupped her breast and she sighed. He sucked her nipple and she cried out. He bit her nipple, just a little, and her entire body arched against him.

Yes. Yes. He was learning her. They way he’d always wanted to. And when his fingers slipped down over her stomach into her damp underwear he found her wet and hot. Her skin flushed and her eyes closed and he watched her face as his fingers found the spot that made her tremble against him.

“Yes,” he breathed, feeling like he’d cracked a code or unlocked a safe. Here she was open and on the edge at the very tips of his fingers. He stopped and her eyes flew open.

“Just checking,” he breathed.

“Please. Please, Cameron.”

And now he was cracked open. Totally revealed. His name on her lips in just that way was the end of him. Abruptly he stood.

“What—?” she gasped, as if he’d yanked some rug out from under her.

“Condom.”

She blinked, her mind gone in some anticipatory haze. Some half-finished blown-out bliss, and he smiled at her and felt himself slipping. His very protected idea of what exactly this was between them losing it edges.

Fuck her and move on. That had been the plan. Answer the question that had burned in the back of his brain for so long: What would we be like together? And walk back out the door. Maybe they’d stay in touch this time. He could visit her when he found himself in New York City.

Or not.

But looking at her on that bed, his fingers still damp, his mouth still tasting like hers, he thought the worst thing he could think right now. She would be so easy to love. Again.

“Cameron?” She pushed herself up to her elbow and then onto her hand. “Are you okay?”

So strange that the only person he could talk to about this was her. I’m in trouble, he wanted to say. I’m in a lot of trouble with you.

“Good,” he said and went into the bathroom to get the condoms. His dick was so hard it hurt.

He came back to the bed and tossed the condoms down beside her on the bed. She grabbed one as he grabbed her hips, pulling her down to the edge of the bed.