Including make them a picnic basket.
My eyes widen as he sets a particular dish out on the table.
“Is that…?” I say.
He grins. “Apple crumble from the Starlight. Fresh. Baked maybe twenty minutes ago. You’ve had a hard couple days. I wanted to treat you right.”
“So, you were actually paying attention?”
“How could I not pay attention to you?”
He says it with such surety, as if he doesn’t understand how I could even ask such an obvious question.
My cheeks feel like they’re on fire. My eyes rest on the table for a second while I try to find something to say, but it’s like my brain’s quit working. All I can think about is him. How good he makes me feel.
Then I think about something else.
About the lasting memory of our kiss.
How I can still feel the sensation and taste of him on my lips.
How I want that again.
Finally, my tongue starts working.
I look up and see that he’s watching me. Totally focused. And with a small, knowing smile shining at me on his handsome, bearded face.
“I’m not that hungry right now. Do you want to go upstairs?”
“Are you going to tell me how things went at the lawyer’s?” He says.
“Something like that.”
Another moment. There’s concern on his face. “And you’re sure? You’re OK?”
This man cares.
“I want to, Blaze.”
He holds out a hand. “Follow me.”
Holding onto him for support, I squeeze his hand gently and he squeezes me back, a simple expression sets my body tingling in anticipation. The eighteen steps up the staircase go by in a blur; one blink I’m downstairs, the next I’m in the doorway to his old bedroom; my breaths go from deep and even to short, hushed things stolen between kisses; my hand releases his and take hold of his back and his brawny chest.
He is so solid, so strong, so warm. My life might’ve fallen apart, but he’s doing his damnedest to help me put it back together; I’ve never told anyone about what happened to me, never felt secure enough to say a word, but it’s different with him; Blaze knows what it's like to have your dreams and potential fall apart, and he also knows how to fight to put it back together.
He makes me feel like it’s only a matter of time before I’ll have my life back, too.
I lean into him. Feel every one of his hungry kisses set my body on fire.
“We shouldn’t be doing this,” I whisper. It’s a lie, it’s the stupid logical part of my brain that always tries to assert itself. I tell it to shut up.
“Why’s that?” He murmurs in my ear while he kisses my neck. “Don’t you want it?”
“I do.”
“Then what’s the problem? I ain’t going to hurt you, Tiffany.”
“You’re a criminal,” I whisper as watch him remove his autographed Backstreet Boys shirt.
“I am.”
I put my lips to his chest. Kiss and touch the hardened muscles of his torso. I can’t stop myself. Don’t want to stop myself.
“You’ve hurt people.”
He rumbles. Runs his hands through my hair. “I have.”
Now, I’ve undone his belt. Now, I’m unhooking the buttons of his jeans. Now, I’m on my knees.
“You’ll hurt people again, soon.”
“If that’s what it takes.”
His jeans hit the floor. As does his underwear. I take him in my hand, he’s already halfway hard, and it only takes a few gentle strokes and a lick to get him to full, mouth-filling thickness.
“You didn’t hesitate to say that. You’re used to hurting people.”
I’m trying as hard as I can to give myself a reason to walk away — to get him to say something, anything, that’ll justify me taking my hands off his cock and stepping away from this maddening path we’re on; this path leads to violence, to criminality, to compromising so many things I believe in.
Give me a reason, Blaze, I beg. Give me a reason not to care for you as much as I do.
He nods his head, but whether that’s because he’s agreeing with me or because I’ve taken the length of him down my throat, I can’t tell. He tastes so good and his smell — leather and pine and smoke, probably smoke ingrained in him from all those years fighting fires and saving lives, I think — fills my nose and makes my head swim in divine intoxication.
“I don’t hold back. If it’s someone I care about, I’ll never stop.”
He pops free of my mouth and I run my wayward tongue along the tip of his cock, my eyes peering up at him, scanning every inch of his rugged jawline, every crack and cranny of character in his chiseled features, looking for some sign of deceit. But that’s the thing, I never see deceit; Blaze thinks with his heart, lives by his heart, and his heart is so full of fire and love for those he’s close to that there’s no room for deception.
The things this man strives for aren’t measured in career achievements, award plaques, pay raises, or promotions; it’s in the smiles and love and gratitude of people he cares for.
And I’m one of those lucky people.
I meet his eyes. They burn with fire and lust.
“I believe you,” I whisper.
With a movement of his hips, a pull of my hand, a relaxing of my throat, I take him. All of him. My eyes roll back in my head, I catch spare breaths in between his thrusts and moans, and I shut off the
