Chapter 23
Ace leaned his shoulder against the doorjamb and looked across the kitchen to where Stephanie was standing at the stove. Last night, when he’d returned from visiting Scott, she’d been sound asleep. Simone had waited for him before heading back to school and she’d told him that Stephanie had been feeling a lot better. The two of them had watched new episodes of the Gilmore Girls, which apparently was a big deal.
She was wearing sweats and a loose shirt. Her hair was pulled up and piled on top of her head and she was swaying along to the melody she was humming. Even from her profile, she looked happy. As he watched her he thought that this might be the cutest he’d ever seen her. Of course, that same thought struck him probably fifty times a day, every day, so he wasn’t the most objective person to judge her most adorable moments.
“It looks like someone’s feeling better,” he announced as he made his way across the kitchen tile.
She spun to face him, her eyes twinkling. “Oh, you’re up. I didn’t hear you. I’m making tea, but I can make coffee, too.”
She turned back towards the cabinet and he slid behind her and reached out wrapping his arms around her waist, pulling her against him. She sucked in a startled gasp and her body melted into his. He nuzzled his face into her neck, inhaling her strawberry and mint scent. He pressed his lips to the soft skin just below her ear and he felt her tremble against him.
He’d missed this. He’d missed holding her in his arms. He’d missed kissing her. He wanted to take his time and reacquaint himself with her body.
“I’m glad you’re feeling better.” The huskiness in his voice had nothing to with the fact that he’d just woken up and everything to do with the things he wanted to do to the woman in his arms.
“I’m glad you’re up.” She emphasized the word by rubbing her backside against exactly where he was up.
That was it. That was all it took to push him over the edge. He needed her. Now.
With lightning speed, he spun her around so they faced each other and slid his hands down her body and gripped her ass. He lifted her off the ground, sweeping her up off her feet and caused her to draw in a sharp breath. She wrapped her arms and legs around him tightly and he stepped forward and sat her down on the counter. She kept her legs tightly encircled around his hips but loosened the grip she had on him with her arms enough so that she could tangle her fingers in his hair.
God, he loved that. The way that her touch felt stroking through his hair. He watched as her lips parted and she licked her lips. It drove him crazy, making him want to capture her mouth with his. Not seeing any reason to ignore that impulse, he did exactly that. He kissed her with all of the passion that had been pent up since the last time he’d tasted her. He brushed his lips against hers and drove his tongue into her mouth with a savage intensity. She met him lick for lick. He felt the moan in the back of her throat before he even heard it. A roaring urgency ripped through him pushing him to the brink. He had to get her naked, and it had to be fast.
He didn’t know how much longer he could survive without the feeling of her skin against his. She let out a groan of protest when he broke their kiss, but it was replaced by a sensual sigh of approval as he moved his hands beneath her shirt and pulled it up. It slid up and over her head easily, exposing her perfect, pink nipple-tipped breasts.
When the shirt dropped to the ground she lifted her hips to slide her sweats down as well, but he planted his hands firmly on the top of her thighs, holding them in place. Her next move was reaching for his sweats, but he grabbed her wrists and pinned them to her sides, giving her a wicked grin. It had driven him crazy when she’d taken the lead the last time they were together. He figured he’d return the favor.
“You had your turn when I was out of commission,” he rasped. “It’s my turn now”
She started to protest but he covered her mouth with his, still holding her wrists at her sides, until every muscle in her body was trembling with excitement and her breathing was nothing but alternating pants and gasps. Her hips bucked against the rock-hard erection that was throbbing heavily and straining to be free from his sweats. Even through the cotton barriers he could feel her damp heat as she ground her core into him.
Wanting to taste more of her, he tore his mouth away and began kissing her neck. He trailed down it, licking and nipping her soft, supple skin.
She arched her back as she pleaded, “Ace, please.”
He slid his hot tongue lower, over the swell of her luscious mounds. Releasing her wrists, he lifted his hands and cupped her full breasts. Pressing them together he used his the tip of his tongue to trace little circles around her areolas. With her hands no longer restrained, her fingers threaded through his hair and made fists. The sting of her grip shot straight to his groin.
His already pulsing member twitched with arousal as she pressed her flesh more firmly against his mouth in a silent plea. He engulfed first one hard nipple in his hot mouth, swirling his tongue around it, bringing it to an even stiffer peak of pleasure, and then moving to the other. He alternated between them, driving her to the cusp of an explosion before pulling his mouth back and letting her cool down for a moment before moving to the other hard nub.
“That feels…so good…your mouth…feels so good…your…tongue…feels so good…it feels…so…good,” her encouragement came between pants.
While he continued to suck on her sensitive nipples, he slid his hands down her sides, and tugged her sweats down her legs. Then he ran his hand between her silky thighs. When he reached the apex of her legs he pushed aside the thin fabric of her lacy panties. Slowly he rubbed his fingers up and down her wet slit, always amazed every time he touched her at how hot and slick and ready for him she was.
Her body jumped as if she’d received an electric jolt every time his fingers brushed her clit. He could tell that she was so close. It would’ve been the easiest thing in the world to get her off right then just by rubbing in rhythmic little circles on that pleasure button. But that would’ve been too easy. Too simple. He wanted to give her something more explosive, more layered, more full and rich. So he slipped two fingers inside of her and began to move them back and forth as he started making those same slow circles with his thumb.
All the while, he never broke his mouth away from her nipples. Not that he would’ve been able to with the way that she was pulling him forward onto her breasts—and he would never even dream of trying. He wanted her to know what it felt like to come while all of her pleasure centers were being stimulated at once. He wanted her to feel that kind of intensity. He wanted her to come apart with his mouth on her nipples, his thumb rubbing her clit and his fingers buried inside of her.
It may have been possessive, it may have been primal, it may have been a “caveman beating his chest” kind of thing; but he didn’t care. He wanted to brand her. He wanted to mark her and possess her. He wanted her to be his and no one else’s. And the best way that he could think to do that was to give her the kind of pleasure that would do just that.
He slowly built up the speed and intensity of all of his movements—mouth, fingers and thumb—coordinating his rhythm, carefully and thoughtfully building up the layers of pleasure in her body. When he felt her begin to clench onto his fingers he flicked his tongue faster, driving her over the edge before she had a chance to think about it. He took her from the first hint of the tremors of pleasure all the way to the fireworks going off in her brain.
He could see her lose control as she began shaking with release. Her thighs trembled violently as her head fell back and a cry of release fell from her lips. Her going up and over the edge there on that kitchen counter, her legs spread wide and panties pulled to the side with his fingers sliding in and out of her body as he sucked on her breasts was the one of the hottest things he’d ever seen in his life.
He continued all of his oral and manual ministrations, slowing them as she came down, giving her a gentle landing as she fell back to earth. He knew that she was back with him again when he heard her breathe, “Oh, God, Ace. That was…amazing. That was so good.”
Finally, then, he lifted his mouth away from her breasts, now glistening with saliva, and smiled a smile full of sensual promise. “Not was,” he corrected. “Is.”
Before she could even get the words out to ask what he meant, he hooked his thumbs on the hem of her panties, and tugged them firmly down her hips and off her legs. Then, he grasped her knees and pushed her thighs apart, and kneeled in front of her. He began outlining her still swollen lips with his finger. Gently, ever so gently, he ran his tongue up and down against her slit, licking the arousal that coated her seam. He didn’t get close to her pleasure button, yet. He knew she wasn’t ready. Even the softest touch would feel too intense, too rough at that moment. Closer to pain than pleasure.