Page 16 of On the Line

He looks up with the most trouble-making smile I’ve ever seen. “What?”

“You know what.”

“I might need more specific instructions.”

“I hate you.”

“No, you don’t.”

Then his mouth is on my pussy, and I forget every smart thing I was about to say. I fall back against the pillows. He’s patient and thorough and much too pleased with himself about it, and when I come, I have to cover my mouth to keep from waking up half of Mercury Ridge.

He kisses his way back up my body. “Still hate me?”

I shove his shoulder, and he laughs. Then I reach down between us and stroke him through his shorts, and he stops laughing.

“Delaney.” His eyes close, and I get a ridiculous little thrill out of that. I tug on his waistband.

“Off.”

He doesn’t make me ask twice. A condom comes out of the nightstand drawer, and I send up a silent thank-you for responsible fake boyfriends. He kneels between my legs and looks down at me, and that same quiet look from the boat is back on his face.

“You good?”

“Yes.”

He rolls on the condom and settles over me, and the first slow push makes me gasp. He stops right away. “You okay?”

“Don’t stop.”

He drops his forehead to mine. “Wasn’t planning on it.”

He starts moving, slow at first and then deeper. I wrap my legs around his hips and pull him closer, and his mouth finds mine again. The only sounds in the room are the two of us breathing and the creak of the mattress.

This should feel reckless. I met this man yesterday. I don’t know his middle name or what he was like in high school. But I know how he looks at me, and how he keeps checking my face like what I’m feeling matters to him as much as what he’s feeling, and right now that seems like plenty.

“Liam.”

“I know,” he says, even though I’m not sure what I meant. Maybe he knows.

He reaches between us, pressing down on my clit.

“Oh!” I cry out.

“Yeah? You like that?” I feel him smile against my mouth.

It builds fast after that. I hang on to him, and when I come again he kisses me all the way through it. Then his rhythm changes, and he buries his face in my neck, and a few strokes later his whole body goes tight.

Afterward he rolls onto his side and pulls me along with him until my head is on his chest. His heart is pounding under my ear.

“So,” he says eventually.

“So.”

“Pretty convincing orgasms. Nothing fake about them?”

I smack his chest. He laughs and catches my hand and kisses my fingers, and it’s such a sweet little thing to do that I end up staring at our hands for a while.

“This is going to make Monday hard,” I say.