CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Finn
way her mouth closed around that slice of salmon, her lips pinker than the sweet flesh that slipped between them as she closed her eyes and let out a little moan of pleasure had me nearly doubled over. The blood rushed to my dick so fast I got dizzy.
I dug the heels of my hands into my eyes. When I opened them again, she was staring at me. "Are you okay?" she asked, concern in her voice.
How had she gotten even more beautiful in a few passing minutes?
"Damn," I stammered, sounding like a fucking middle schooler whose voice hadn't changed yet. "I need to get you to be in our commercials."
She leaned forward with a grin. "Why? You think I'm acting?"
I licked my lips and leaned forward, suddenly unable to be away from her. "God I hope not," I confessed.
"I'm not," she repeated.
I reached out, brushing my hand up her arm, my dancing fingers causing a trail of goosebumps to rise up behind them like sparks. I smiled to see it. She was feeling it too. "Who are you, Bee?" I heard myself ask.
That was a new one.
Her lips quivered in a suppressed laugh. "Who am I?"
I shrugged, smiling. "Yeah. What's your story?"
I'd never asked that question before. It had never even occurred to me to ask a woman to even just talk to me, much less tell me her story. But suddenly I needed to know everything about her.
"Not much to tell," she breathed in a long exhale. "I just moved here."
"Family?" I guessed.
Her mouth quirked oddly. "Actually? Pretty much the opposite."
I leaned back a little, still clasping her hand. "Tell me," I urged.
She took a deep breath. "I was married," she started, then looked up to see my shocked expression and laughed. "Operative word there being was."
"But you're..." I swallowed. "Forgive me, but you're so fucking young."
She nodded, looking down at where our fingers were entwined and brushed her thumb over the ring finger of her left hand. "Zach. That was his name. Zachary Nash. His farm was adjacent to my parents' land."
"Your parents are farmers?" I asked.
She shook her head. "They own a bed and breakfast." Her eyes darted to the side for a moment and then back to me. "From the time I was five years old onward, my life was devoted to making the guests happy. My parents treated me like an unpaid staff member, teaching me to smile and be polite. I was always doing chores, working in the kitchen and stuff." She shrugged. "That's where I learned to bake."
"And then you got married?"
She laughed a little. "Pretty much. Zach started hanging around and... I don't know. I was young, only thirteen when he first decided we'd be boyfriend and girlfriend. And since I'd spent my life up to that point figuring out how to make other people happy..." She pulled her hand back. "And since it made him happy to kiss me, and it made my parents happy that I found myself a good catch," she bit off the words in clipped anger, "I guess I never really considered what I wanted, you know?"
I nodded but stayed silent, watching the emotions that played across her face.
"I got married on my eighteenth birthday," she confessed. "At my parents' B&B. That night I moved out of their house and into his."
"He had a house already?"
She nodded. "An outbuilding on his parents' land. Basically a converted barn. And he…" She took a deep breath. "He always told me how lucky I was that he found me." Her cheeks were coloring with a furious shade of pink. "Because I needed someone to take care of me, you see. I was hopeless, and not very pretty..." I growled something profane and she looked up at me and smiled a little. "And I was lucky to have landed a husband at all."
"Fucker," I hissed.
She nodded. "And since I'd always worked so hard to make other people happy, I wasn't even sure what it was I wanted." She traced her finger across the table. "But what I definitely did not want was a husband who came home from boys' night smelling like some other woman's perfume."
"Holy fuck."
"I threw my wedding ring into the gully between our properties," she declared with an evil grin. "Some days I wish I hadn't though. I could have sold that thing and bought myself a nicer delivery truck."
I was floored. "You just walked away?"
She nodded, then cocked her head. "You seem surprised."
"I'm not surprised," I confessed, lifting her fingers to my mouth. "I'm in awe of you. You've got bigger balls than I do."
Her eyes gleamed. "I'll take your word for it."
I swallowed hard and she must have caught the look of desire on my face because she lifted her chin. "You okay?" she challenged, licking her lips.
"I'm okay," I told her, brushing my fingers under her chin and tilting it upward. "As long as you're here."
She licked her lips again, adding a delicate sheen to the bee stung pinkness. Like a magnet, I felt myself pulled, and suddenly I was leaning across the table and kissing her.
She melted against me as I drank her sweetness in, long and slow. I stood up, still kissing her as I walked around the table to be closer to her, searching her mouth as I drew nearer.
Every nerve in my body seemed to be firing at once. I slipped my hand behind her neck, cupping the back of her head to draw her nearer. And Bee, sweet Bee, threw her hands around my neck in a way that made me want to do a victory lap around the building.
Fuck, she wanted me as much as I wanted her. I couldn't believe my fucking luck. She wanted my body against hers, she didn't hold back, and at that realization, my cock was suddenly pressing hard against my pants, everything tight and uncomfortable, straining towards her.
All at once I heard a noise. A strange one that made me pull back. I turned to see that Jackson was standing there watching us, his expression unreadable.
"I thought you might want dessert," Jackson drawled. "But I see you started without me."