Or I thought they had.
But Heath’s gaze was more than any fumbling set of hands could ever have been.
His hands were fisted at his sides and his knuckles were turning white with the force his was obviously exerting to keep them there.
My nipples ached for a touch that I knew would not be fumbling or awkward. But I also ached for more of this, of this distance that was more intimate than anything I’d ever experienced.
“Keep going,” he growled.
I’d just been standing there, half-naked, my hands poised on the button above my bellybutton, staring at his fists and imagining them on me.
I did as he asked. Immediately.
My dress pooled around my ankles a moment later.
I was still wearing my shoes. That and a white pair of panties.
Nothing else.
But Heath’s stare, of course. And that covered me in a way clothes never would.
His jaw was iron.
My fingers went to the edges of my panties.
“No,” he snapped.
I paused immediately.
He was in front of me in a slice of a moment.
He wasn’t touching me.
“Lie down,” he ordered.
I ached to touch him, to press my naked body to his clothed one, to wrap myself up in him and kiss him since it felt like an eternity since I’d done that.
Instead, I did as he asked.
The comforter felt rough against my skin. But the air itself felt coarse against my skin. Because I’d never been this naked—truly naked—in my life.
I expected Heath to cover his body with mine, or at least start undressing, but instead, he knelt at the side of the bed, never taking his eyes from mine.
His hand circled my ankle and lifted my leg, working the straps of my wedges so they fell to the floor with a resounding thump. He continued upward from my ankles so slowly it was torture, I felt like I was coming apart from my skin but unable to move.
I inhaled roughly as his hands got to the top of my thighs and his thumb brushed against the apex of my legs, right above that magical spot that was all but crying out for his attention, for a release.
My entire body reacted to the barely-there touch.
Violently.
I almost lost it all then. Just from his hand brushing me.
I’d had orgasms before. All but one self-induced. The one was only because the boy in question had done extensive research on the female anatomy and obviously learned nothing from that, but was very open to direction.
So I knew what it felt like.
But the soft brush of his thumb against me showed me that I knew nothing. Not a damn thing.
“Heath,” I whispered, my voice raspy and thin.
His eyes darkened. “Like that, Sunshine,” he murmured, moving his hands up the side of my thighs so they were fastened on the edges of my panties. “You breathing my name when I’m close enough to taste how much you want me. How sweet your pussy’s gonna be.”
My core spasmed from just those words. Words pushing me closer to the edge.
Heath purposefully moved his eyes from mine to the triangle of lace covering me. Another nudge toward the edge.
My heartbeat was thunder inside my chest. A fricking earthquake inside my bones.
Then he moved his hands down my sides. And since my panties were clutched in his grip, they came too. Instinctively, I lifted my hips up slightly so he could get them down.
He let out another strangled hiss.
Because he couldn’t speak.
Because of what I was doing to him. Upon first glance, him being fully clothed and me being naked on the bed would’ve seemed like an obvious exchange of power. I’d assumed that he held it all, until that moment. It was me. Naked, and at his mercy, I had the power. Power to make his body so tight he was shaking with the force of making his movements so small and tender.
Power to make his gaze turn animalistic with the need for me.
And power to literally take the words from his mouth when I exposed myself to him. His eyes were fastened on my core as he moved my panties down my legs.
It should’ve been embarrassing, uncomfortable to have a man so close to a place that hadn’t been intimately inspected in such a way…well, ever. A place that was hidden and personal, sacred.
But it wasn’t.
Because his gaze told me that he considered it just that. Sacred.
He was literally on his knees in front of me.
Like he was fricking worshipping me.
Me.
His hands were up at my hips and he dragged me across the bed until my legs rested on his shoulders and I was inches away from his mouth. The apex of my hips was right in his fricking face.
My body was an inferno.
Heath moved his gaze from in between my legs to my eyes.
My thighs clenched instinctively from that gaze, from this whole fricking situation.