Matched to Her Rival
She bit her lip, contemplating. “Shoes. And this is a horrible thing to admit, but I really, really like chocolate.”
He couldn’t even laugh. She truly had no clue he’d meant for her to tell him what she liked sexually. Probably no one had ever asked her before or she had less experience than he’d assumed. The seriousness of the trust she’d shown hit him in a place inside he’d never realized was there.
“Why is it horrible to like chocolate?”
“Because it goes straight to my hips. I gain weight easily.”
“That’s impossible.” Because he wanted to and he could, he shifted onto his side and ran the back of his hand down the curve of her waist, over the not-chunky hip and around her thigh, and it was nice indeed. “You’re so thin you’d have to run around in the shower to get wet.”
She snorted. “Thanks, but I didn’t always look like this.”
The small slice of pizza, the unfinished lunches, came back to him suddenly. She really didn’t eat much. And somehow, this fear of gaining weight was tied to her self-image issues.
“You’d be beautiful to me even if you weighed more.” In fact, she could stand to gain a few pounds.
“I thought we were doing the show part,” she said pertly and slid her leg along his, opening herself without seeming to realize it. It was so unconsciously sexy, he let her change the subject. Plus, the new subject was one he happened to approve of.
“Yeah?” he growled. “You like it when I show you how much you turn me on? Let’s begin with exhibit A.”
And then he mouthed his way down her stomach to the juncture of her thighs, parting them easily, and she gasped as he tasted her sweet spot, laving it lightly to give her time to adjust to such an intimate kiss.
Her hips rolled, shoving his lips deeper against her wet center, and he sucked. She moaned on a long note and that was it—she pulsed against his tongue with a little cry that he felt clear to his toes. His own release almost transpired right then and there. It took all he had to keep it together.
He couldn’t wait to be inside her any longer.
Slipping on a condom with quick fingers, he rose up over her and caught her gaze, communicating without words, letting all his desire for her spill from his expression. She stared back, eyes luminous with satisfaction.
Slowly, so slowly, he bent one of her gorgeous legs up and nestled between her thighs to complete their connection. She sighed lustily as he pushed. When he’d entered her fully, a wash of pleasure slammed his eyelids shut and he groaned in harmony with her.
It was a dazzling thing to be joined with Elise, and he couldn’t hold back. Her name tumbled from his lips, over and over, as he spiraled them both higher. Nearly mindless, he sought to touch her, to caress her, to make her come again before he did...because there were rules. But she shifted, and the angle was so sweet, he lost complete control. Splintering into oblivion, he cried out as answering ripples of her climax sharpened his. The powerful orgasm sucked him under for a long moment, blinding him to everything but the release.
With the fireplace crackling merrily and the warmth of an amazing afterglow engulfing him, he lay there, unable to move. Elise cradled his spent body, both of their chests heaving as one, and he experienced the most profound sense of bliss.
That’s what he’d missed.
Happily ever after just might begin with one day of happiness that you found so amazing and wonderful, you woke up the next day aching to repeat it. And didn’t let anything stop you.
* * *
Elise finally coaxed Dax into bed and they thoroughly christened it in what was the most monumentally earth-shattering experience of her admittedly short list of sexual encounters. So far, she’d managed to keep her total cluelessness from him, but she couldn’t let this particular first slide.
She snuggled up against his absolutely delicious body and waited until he’d pulled the sheet up around them to spill it. “You’re the first man I’ve had in this bed.”
“Ever?” His voice was soft with a hint of wonderment. As if she’d given him a special gift he’d always wanted but never received.
Was she that far gone over a couple of orgasms? She was assigning all kinds of emotions to Dax that she had no business assigning. Her head needed to be plucked out of the clouds really fast, before she got ideas about what was going on here that would only lead to disappointment.
She’d consented to sleep with him, but not to fall for him.
She nodded against his shoulder and opted for candor. “I bought this set about a year ago and I didn’t want to sleep here night after night with memories of a past relationship gone wrong still haunting it.”