Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 72853 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 364(@200wpm)___ 291(@250wpm)___ 243(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 72853 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 364(@200wpm)___ 291(@250wpm)___ 243(@300wpm)
I’m the unstable one. I’m the one who might not be able to handle it when she leaves. That’s the cold. Hard. Fecking. Truth.
“With those kinds of arguing skills, you should have been a lawyer,” I say with a sigh.
“If by arguing skills you mean, dang it, Aspen, put your mouth to better use, then yes. Yes, I’ll accept that.” If I thought her eyes were wide and lit up before, I was wrong. “If by skills you mean that you would like to take me to the shower now and have me give it my all, then yes. I’ll accept that too. And if you—”
I’m out of my chair and scooping her out of hers before she can say anything else. I’m too ferocious. I want her too badly. I need to tone it down, or I’m going to scare her.
She grabs my shoulders and wraps her legs around my waist like she’s not afraid at all. She also claims my mouth like she’s not afraid of this kind of battle either. She’s okay with my level of intensity.
By the time we get to the bathroom upstairs, her dress is puddled at her waist, and my shirt is gone. Her bra has been yanked down, exposing her beautiful breasts, and her legs are locked so tightly around my waist that I’m not even sure I can feel my dick anymore. I’m kidding. He’s too painfully hard not to feel. He wants to be freed. He doesn’t want to be trapped between us with all these clothes on. He wants to be slippery and wet, with her hand wrapped around him. He wants to be inside her, with her walls clenching around him.
Jesus, if I keep thinking this way, I’m not going to last any decent amount of time. If I thought last night was embarrassing, this would be a new level. It’s been a long time for me. Definitely not since I got back to the States this time. I’ve been motivated enough to use my hand in the shower a few times over the past year and a half, but not really. It’s kind of been like sleeping. I do it only when it feels atrociously necessary.
I set her down and start the shower. By the time I turn around, her dress is fully off. She’s stripping out of her bra and panties, and heaven help anyone who gets in her way. She looks like a furious goddess who has one objective in mind. And that one objective is me.
Technically, I’ve always had a home. I’ve always had family, or at least I did until my grandpa died. But I know there are others out there. His brothers and his sister. Two of them are still alive. His sister is still alive. They’re all over the world. My dad was an only child, and my mom’s parents are dead now, but I have an aunt, though she’s never reached out. However, I don’t know that for sure. She might have at first, but if my grandpa continuously rebuffed her, and she didn’t know where I was, then maybe she just gave up. It has been a long time since I was a kid. More than thirty years.
I’ve traveled extensively, but I felt like I half belonged where I was at the time, with the people who surrounded me. A team. My brothers.
I do know this place has never felt like home. My grandfather never felt like any family I could know or love. And even if I had brothers, I didn’t belong to them the way Aspen has claimed me. Right now, even before this moment, ever since she first showed up on my doorstep, she was determined I shouldn’t have to face the rest of this life alone.
She didn’t have to do this.
She didn’t have to know me, want me, or upend and reorganize her life for me. She didn’t have to care about me or befriend me.
She didn’t have to show me how to belong to someone.
But she did.
Chapter twelve
Aspen
Rick’s eyes on me light up my body. I feel like I’m a thousand degrees, boiling in a cauldron of my own skin. I feel like those charred fries—already quite overdone. Something wild and untamable twists inside me, and I feel feral. Like a wild beast. Watch out; the double tree girl is going to turn into this monstrously awesome thing with the strength of a bear and the speed of a cheetah. It’s not funny imagining myself as this sexed-up mix-and-match beast, but I smile.
Rick doesn’t smile, but his eyes never leave me, and that’s more than enough. I’ve never been so aware of anyone in my life. He’s the only thing I can focus on. He’s been the only one I could focus on for a while now.