Total pages in book: 73
Estimated words: 69018 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 345(@200wpm)___ 276(@250wpm)___ 230(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 69018 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 345(@200wpm)___ 276(@250wpm)___ 230(@300wpm)
I make a jumbled-up, horrible sound, but she grins at me before she kisses me.
She gets it. She always has.
Right from the start.
Even when I didn’t understand myself.
Chapter sixteen
Ephemeral
Ispread my legs wide over Thorn’s thickly muscled thighs. I’m wearing one of my usual crazy cat dresses with no tights. The bulge of his erection presses right into my core, and I lean forward, rocking against it in a grind that sends dancing fantasy rainbow cats with laser beam eyes dancing behind my vision.
“I’m so glad you’re here.” I’ve already told him this, but I need to say more. I can’t convey with mere words how sorry I am for that morning. I should have at least stayed to talk it out. I was afraid that if I did, I wouldn’t have the strength to leave, and it was what we both needed at the time.
Just that.
Time.
And I hoped that fate or destiny or life would somehow intervene.
I can’t imagine anything worse than finding the person you think might be perfect for you but knowing full well they can’t be perfect at that time, and neither can you. It’s even worse to think that the time might never be right. And that you might never be right either.
Here I was, trying with all my might to work up the courage to see if things had changed. I so badly wanted them to have changed, but I didn’t think two months was long enough. Would years be long enough? I didn’t stop to consider that maybe two imperfect people can be together. That maybe, even if things aren’t one hundred percent correct, they can still be right. Maybe it’s the imperfections that make things the most beautiful. I must have subconsciously figured out something like that because I was doing my best to mind-summon Thorn. And sending up freaking signals to the sky, hoping he’d see them. Figuratively, obviously.
“You better punish me for being bad and leaving you like that, Thorn.” I swivel my hips over his bulge. I bet he can feel how hot and wet I am through my panties, his pants, and his boxers.
His hand glides up my thigh, his huge, rough palm sparking electrical currents that run deep under my skin. I love watching the way his shoulder and arm muscles ripple, just with that simple little movement. He’s so massive, and I love that it makes my legs burn just to straddle his beefy lap like this.
My skin doesn’t feel like my regular skin. It’s like all my senses are heightened. Erogenous zones? It’s my entire body, and Thorn, with his delicious scent, his muscles, his lovely hard face, his prickly personality, and his beautiful heart beneath, is my aphrodisiac.
He toys with me, dragging his hand so slowly up my thigh, but then soon, it’s at my center. His finger sweeps my panties aside, letting the cool air mingle with my overheated flesh. I shiver at the delicious dichotomy.
“I’m going to rip these panties right off of you,” he grunts. I think he’s joking, so I laugh, but he proves me wrong.
They’re not all that flimsy, but he grasps the fabric, balls them up in his hand, and tears. They come clean off my body with a single jerk. I yelp at the sting and then again as his massive hand cups my pussy. I shamelessly surge forward, grinding my clit right into the heel of his hand. I’m soaking, making a mess of him already.
“You sure about being punished?”
I know he will never take anything too far. Despite his brutal size, he’s not a brutal man. I don’t need safe words or anything. We aren’t playing that kind of game.
Also? His whole side is freaking stitched up. He’s probably in a good amount of pain, even if he’s as tough as the toughest of all nuts.
He traces a finger down my folds, glancing over my clit in a mean way without really touching it. I know now what kind of punishment I’m going to get. I’m going to be edged to the extreme.
I tamp down a mewl as he plays with me, tracing every inch. I might have closed the curtains so we don’t scandalize Peach Lips, but I don’t want to scare her with animal-sounding noises. The last thing she needs to think is that a coyote somehow got onto the bus.
“I know I’m supposed to be keeping the sexy, serious, and stoic face, but it’s hard,” Thorn admits as he teases my entrance. “You’re soaked. You’re goddamn gorgeous. I thought I might never see you again.”
“I’m sorry. I should have given the note a PS. that said if we were ever in a situation that meant we could be a set of matched tools, you should contact me. I was hoping you would. Hoping against hope since my luck seems to be…well, I didn’t think it was very good, but I might change my mind now. Life is just hard. But it doesn’t mean that it’s bad. I can’t think of it that way. Not when, all in all, mine really has been beautiful.”