“Oh, for Pete’s sake, will you shut up and kiss me?” Ashley whined.
“Yes, ma’am,” he replied. This position would give him every last inch of her. She was ready, but so inexperienced. Shifting over Ashley, he squeezed her ankles, as he thrust his hips between her legs and began breaching her core. Slowly. So slowly. He slid just the tip of him inside, letting her body adjust to his girth, to this intimate intrusion. Tripp allowed time, sweet time for her to accept him as slick ridges met hard, heavy steel. That steel shank sank deeper as, millimeter by millimeter, he fed himself to her, until she bucked her pretty ass up off the mattress and growled for more.
Her impatience made Tripp smile. He let Ashley take over. Reaching around him, she latched her fingernails onto his ass and slammed him home. Filled herself up. She whimpered. He groaned. For a meek little thing, Ashley had just joined them to the hilt, in heat and in blood. In heart. Hot damn.
Tripp pursed his lips at the slick, fiery heat of their union, then growled at the sudden shock of their coming together. Sparks crackled up his spine and danced down the insides of his legs. But he refused to hurt her. This woman deserved to be handled with kid gloves her first time. He tipped his torso away from her, needing her eyes. “Look at me,” he ordered.
Ashley blinked up at him, her lashes spiked. “It’s okay. I knew it would hurt. Just don’t stop.” She squirmed against him, moving him around inside her body.
“We need to take it slow, honey. This is all new to you. Hurting you was never my intention.”
“I know, I just…” Her gaze shifted to something over his shoulder.
He tipped forward, spreading her legs wider, but without sinking in deeper. He settled his forearms alongside her shoulders. “Relax. We’re not here to set any records. Let me show you how good this can be.”
“I… I…”
“Look at me, Ashley.” Tripp cupped her jaw, rotating her head until she blinked and looked at him. “I’m not afraid of you, and I sure as hell don’t want you to ever be afraid of me. You did just fine. We don’t have to do anything, okay? Let’s explore. Let’s get to know each other better.”
“You make it sound easy.” She was still blinking, and he knew damned well her sensitive folds had to be stinging from the blunt head still embedded deep inside of her.
“It is easy. Slow and easy,” he said, easing out of her slick heat, then just as slowly, easing back in, but not going in as deep. “It’s like dancing. You lead, I’ll follow.”
She arched her hips, meeting his gentle thrust. “I like that.”
“See? No pain. You’re so ready for me. The wetter you are, the easier.”
Her hips began to arch in rhythm with his thrusts. Each time he went in a little deeper. Each time she met him with more force. Tripp took over from there, easing in and out, giving her body time to acclimate to his girth. Watching pleasure replace the worry lines on her face. Looking down between her legs, he noticed everything.
When she finally relaxed completely, his body turned into a giant, feral piston, striving to please her, pushing for more. Deeper. Then deeper still. Ashley growled, their mouths still sealed together, their tongues tangled and mated like their bodies. She was talking to him, saying something with her mouth full.
He’d never felt anything so intense or this perfect before. Tripp tipped away from her pillowy breasts just enough to see her. “Yes, ma’am?” he huffed, his back already arched into another thrust.
There were tears in her eyes. Man, he loved this woman. He was so screwed.
“Do it,” she ordered, her bottom lip quivering. “I’m not going to break. Fuck me, Tripp. Harder.”
Whoa. He never expected that word out of her mouth. Another side to this amazingly complex woman. Ordinarily, he’d get right to it. Never in his life had he refused an invitation like that. But he couldn’t. Not this time. He came to a full stop.
Because this wasn’t just fucking. Something else was going on here, on this bed, in this rented room, with this woman. It was that something else most of the guys in Tripp’s office had with their wives. This was that forever thing he’d been resisting ever since he’d seen Ashley fighting for her life on the sidewalk just last Friday. This wasn’t another lookie-loo hook-up. This was that elusive, intangible more staring him in the face, daring him to get close enough to get burned. To finally invest in a life that mattered more than playing hero after dark.
“Where’d you hear that dirty word?” he asked gently, his momentum blown and his wits scattered. Not that he hadn’t fucked plenty of times before. He had. But hearing it from her mouth…? Reducing what they were doing to—that? Somehow cheapened everything.
She stilled. “Did I do something wrong?”
“No. Not you. But that word...” He didn’t dare repeat it. He wouldn’t give it power. “That’s not what we’re doing here tonight, Ashley. I hope you know that. That crap happens on TV, on all those bed-hopping soaps. That’s what shallow people do. They’re all cheaters, losers, and users. But us…” He let his words trail away, not quite ready to jump into forever. Yet there he lay, with a woman beneath him who meant more than any other he’d ever taken to bed. For the first time in his life, Tripp wasn’t sure what came next.
He cleared his throat and told her to, “Look down between us. What do you see?”
Ashley tucked her chin and did as he asked. It was so damned sweet the way she bit her bottom lip at the sight of his body sealed tightly inside hers. “Umm, us. We’re… together.”
“We most
