Chapter 13
Jade
“Holding a grudge only makes your shoulders sag.”
~ Nora O’Sullivan
My thighs trembled under the tender, methodical press of Hayden’s lips as they moved at an unbelievably slow pace toward their target.
I wanted to beg him to stop teasing me and give me what I ached for. I wanted to growl and pound my fists against his shoulders and order him to stop fooling around and just get to it already.
Of course, I wouldn’t. I couldn’t. That would mean giving him the satisfaction of knowing how deeply he was affecting me, and that was something that I wouldn’t do. Not in a million years. However, I couldn’t control the small moans and gasps of pleasure that his touch gave me.
It was like time slipped away when his hands and mouth were on me, evaporating like fog in the noonday sun. When his skin and mine were pressed together, I was a hormone-crazed teenager. No doubt about it.
Still. That didn’t mean I had to let feelings get involved.
Yep. My resolve was strong on that point, if no others. No feelings, no how, no way. No question. As I’d drifted off to sleep last night, the last thing that I’d promised myself was that no matter what, I would not open my heart up to him again. My friendship, maybe. But not my heart. He’d annihilated it and I wasn’t sure I could survive if he did it again.
So for now, I was just going to lie back and enjoy myself. I’d worry about the rest of it later.
When Hayden finally drew near the hot center of my desire, he stopped and blew on the exposed flesh. The unexpected sensation sent my eyes rolling back in my head.
The feelings only intensified as his hot mouth covered my mound, and he ran his tongue up and down my seam, his hand pressed firmly on my belly to keep my traitorous hips from wriggling too much.
I closed my eyes and surrendered to the swirling sensation that took over my brain as the warmth of Hayden’s demanding mouth covered me.
Why was I letting this happen? Scratch that—why was my body begging him to make this happen?
What was it about Hayden’s voice, his touch that completely took away my ability to speak, or even think? He took every ounce of my self-control and shredded it like the strings of hash-brown potatoes down at the Spoon?
It was a real predicament.
As wave after wave of pleasure engulfed my body, crashing over me in the same rhythm as his tongue moving through my velvet folds, I knew that I’d never arrive at a simple answer to that question. He had a power over me that I couldn’t control.
A raw cry tore from my throat and my back arched involuntarily as a particularly sharp knife of pleasure sliced through me. Hayden knew exactly how to touch me. Even after all these years, he had magic fingers. Not to mention, a magic tongue and lips.
His strong hands grasped my hips and pulled me against his mouth, holding me firmly as his tongue flicked over my sensitive nub. It felt so good that I wondered if I might explode from the sheer force of the electricity pounding through my muscles, jolting me in a way that was shocking in its intensity.
How much longer could I withstand the force of this unbelievable ecstasy before I came apart against his mouth and melted into a puddle of spent jelly on the floor?
Damn. I wanted it to last forever. At the same time, I didn’t think I could stand it for that long—because, as good as it felt, there was an undercurrent of bittersweet melancholy running through it that I didn’t want to acknowledge.
The fact that Hayden made me feel this good, that I felt so connected to him when he touched me, was a brutal truth that I had no intention of facing. Not anytime soon, anyway, and certainly not on a post-migraine morning like this one, spread wide open on my couch while his mouth worked its magic between my legs.
I felt the first wave of a building orgasm start deep within my belly, and my hands flew to the back of his head, burying my fingers deep in his hair and pressing him even tighter against my body. My heels dug into the cushions, giving me more leverage to angle my hips upward, and I thrust myself up into his warm and waiting mouth again and again as my pleasure built.
That’s when he kicked it up a notch. His finger had been massaging the tender flesh at my opening, but as my release grew nearer, he pressed his finger inside of me and my body clenched around him. I jerked from the invasion even as my muscles sucked him deeper inside my canal. I could feel my inner walls spasm around his thick digit.
After several pumps of his finger and continual licks of his velvety tongue, my entire body contracted in an orgasm so powerful that it shook me to the core.
“Yes! Right there! Yes!”
I wasn’t even aware that I’d screamed the words until I heard them in my own voice, ricocheting around the room, bouncing back to my ears and shocking me with the level to which I’d been swept away.
On the inside of my squeezed-shut eyelids, I saw swirls of light and explosions of fireworks against the dark backdrop and it was all I could do to keep my emotions clamped down tight so that they didn’t explode right along with my body.
As my breathing slowed and my heart started beating within the confines of my chest again, I finally pried my eyes open and saw, to my surprise, that Hayden was standing above me, smiling, his keys and phone in hand.
“Are you leaving?”
“Yes,” he answered simply before whistling for Ranger.
“Seriously?”
His smile blossomed into a full-fledged grin. “Seriously,” he said, and winked. “See you soon.”
With that, he walked to the door, waving back at me over his shoulder as Ranger trotted beside him.
The door shut and I stared in disbelief. He left. Just like that. This was exactly why I was keeping him good and out of my heart. This just confirmed it.
As I stood and gathered my discarded underwear and cutoffs, though, I did have to admit one thing.
My headache was most definitely gone.
Shit. Why did he have to be so…him?
I stepped into my clothes and went to the bathroom to shower. I could smell him on me and I didn’t want any reminders. My core was still tingling from the aftermath of one of the most explosive orgasms I could remember having. Some reminders wouldn’t be so easy to get rid of.
I pulled the shower curtain back and turned on the water, giving it time to heat up while I used the bathroom. I grabbed the counter as I lowered down onto the toilet because the seat was wobbly. It was number eight on my to-do list, which now I could now tackle since I was feeling better.
Except the seat didn’t slide. I took my hand off the counter and scooted back and forth. Nothing. It stayed in place.
I looked up and realized one of the bulbs in the vanity had been replaced. It had seemed brighter when I turned on the light but I had assumed it was just leftover light sensitivity from my migraine.
“What the…?”
I pulled up my pants and rushed to the back door and opened it. Nothing. No squeak. I ran to my dining room table and pushed on the left side. It didn’t budge. No wobble at all. The next few minutes were spent running around my house like a crazy person checking things like the lock on my bedroom window, the shelf in my closet that kept falling, the hole that I’d punched in my guest room when I’d used it as a gym and got carried away with a kickboxing routine.
After confirming that everything on my to-do list had been completed I stood in my hallway panting and heard the shower water still running. I walked back into my bathroom with the enthusiasm of going to my own execution. I might be able to rinse the smell of Hayden off of me, but he’d left his imprint through my entire house.
If anyone would’ve peed and marked their territory last night I would’ve thought it would’ve been Ranger. But no, it was Hayden.
He’d just inserted himself in my home, my life, and my body.
The wall around my heart had started cracking when he’d intercepted an unwanted maternal visit. Now, he’d worked his magic to get rid of my migraine, stayed with me all night and somehow played Mr. Fix It without waking me up, given me one of the best orgasms of my life, and then he just left without expecting anything in return.
How was I supposed to guard my heart against that?