Total pages in book: 121
Estimated words: 115198 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 576(@200wpm)___ 461(@250wpm)___ 384(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 115198 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 576(@200wpm)___ 461(@250wpm)___ 384(@300wpm)
I laugh in response, euphoric.
“Sore?” he asks.
I shake my head in his cupped hands, and he releases me, gently pressing a palm to my breastbone, coaxing me to lean back onto my elbows. With leisurely shifts of his hips, West fucks me slow while his big hands roam all over me, caressing my breasts and throat, lips and cheeks, stomach and hips and thighs. But eventually, I feel the urgency rise in him, the growing tension of his torso. Setting one hand gently at the base of my throat and using the other to grip my dress around my waist, he begins in earnest again, eyes fixed on the most perfect coordinate in the world, the place where he disappears inside me.
It’s the kind of raw, honest sex I’ve never had before and will want desperately again, but I’m too distracted to commit to the mental focus I’d need to come a second time. Instead I watch, rapt, as his pleasure plays across his features, watching the way concentration pinches his brow, watching the sheer power of his lovemaking. I am a starving dragon, deprived and obsessed, inhaling every one of his tells: his grip growing tighter, forming a fist around the fabric of my dress; his jerking, rough breaths; those rare seconds he squeezes his eyes closed, wincing in pleasure. And when he makes a sound—a new one this time, deep and warning—a desperate, aching awareness rises in me. I gasp out a pleading yes and West’s eyes turn up to my face, his focus on my lip trapped tightly between my teeth, his pace turning furious for a blurred, euphoric handful of seconds. With a groan he drops his gaze again, sending his hand between us as he jerks out of me and sends his pleasure pulsing across my skin.
Wild victory tears through me as he stares down at my stomach, gasping, and then bends over me, resting his sweaty forehead to my chest. “Holy shit.”
I dig one hand in his hair, dizzy with relief and lust and infatuation, scratching lightly at his scalp while he heaves in sharp, jagged breaths. Finally, he tilts his face up, stretching to kiss me, slow and adoring.
“You okay?” he asks.
I can only tell him the truth. “That was the best sex I’ve ever had.”
He smiles, kissing me again. “Yeah?”
I nod, and for a few perfect seconds, we share the same breath, kissing like we’ve done it for centuries.
Pulling back, I reach up, pushing his sweaty hair off his forehead. “Definitely worth burning the shit out of the pizza.”
* * *
I’M STILL A LITTLE shaky and jelly-limbed, so even though he just did the bulk of the work, West handles the task of tossing the first pizza and getting a second one started. I tiptoe into the banquet room and feel around the dark walls for an entrance to a ladies’ room where I can clean up a little.
The entire thing feels like a sexy Scooby-Doo episode, and I continually expect to be busted by the mysterious owner of the island walking in with a group of goons brought to arrest us for the crime of Countertop Fornication. But in reality, it’s all fine. I find a bathroom. I use it. I make my way back to the kitchen where West is still in there, alone, and his smile is more relaxed than I’ve ever seen it.
I laugh down at our now-clean sex counter. “You’re the best guest. I swear that didn’t occur to me.” Apparently while I was gone, he graciously went digging for cleaning supplies and found a clean rag and a bottle of Lysol.
“Stealing a couple pizzas is one thing,” he says, turning with an oven mitt and pulling the pizza out. “Leaving your gorgeous ass print on the counter is another.”
We slip out to the covered patio, where we find a rolled-up rattan mat, set ourselves down, and eat pizza off paper plates, staring out into the darkness at the wild surf crashing on black sand in the distance.
I have no idea what time it is; West’s phone is dead and mine is back at the bungalow, but we guess it’s a little after one in the morning. It’s warm and humid, the perfect temperature for a walk across a quiet island, but I’m tired enough that the trek all the way back to our bed feels impossible.
“It’s maybe twenty minutes,” West says, pushing our plates away and lying on his side facing me, propped on an elbow. He reaches with his free hand, walking two fingers up my back as I hug my knees.
“I want to stay here a little longer.”
“Think of how comfortable the bed will be.”
“Think of all the snakes in the grass between here and there.”
“I’ll protect you.”
“But who will protect you?” I ask, looking at him over my shoulder. “That’s what I worry about.”