I was positive I hit every creaky board as I made my way up the stairs. There was no way he didn’t know I was coming. Well, he thought I was coming up to sleep in the spare room.

I wasn’t.

Nerves twisted tighter as I walked past the first bedroom. I had no idea why I was anxious. It wasn’t like we hadn’t had sex before. But this was different, wasn’t it? Tonight, I wanted to give myself to him, show him how I felt, take that next step…even though that step led nowhere. Because not experiencing that with him one more time was unthinkable.

What if he’d changed his mind? What if he turned me away?

It was a risk I was willing to take. Since my mom died, I hadn’t taken a lot of those. My life had been in constant upheaval for a lot of years and I’d wanted the opposite of that. But instead, I’d taken the easy route, the road I was familiar with, and I’d clung to it.

I didn’t want to be that girl tonight.

The door was slightly ajar, and I gave it a little push. His room was dark but there was an orange glow from a small fire on the right. I hadn’t noticed it when Hank showed me around. It hadn’t been going. It was down to embers, left to burn out.

“You need something, Birdie?”

I spun around to the huge bed on the other side of the room. It was too dark to see Hank clearly, but the moonlight provided enough light that I could see the looming form of his impressive body sitting on the side of his bed. His elbows were on his knees and his head was in his hands. Those beautiful, big, rough hands.

I knew instantly that he’d lit that fire for me. He’d wanted me there with him tonight and when I put my bag in the spare room, he’d let it go out.

“Yes,” I whispered. “I need something.”

I watched him drop his hands and twist to me, silent a beat. “You still hungry?”

“No,” I said softly, shakily.

“There are more blankets in the hall cupboard if you’re cold.”

“No, I’m not cold.” I took a step closer.

More silence. He’d gone still.

I watched his wide chest shudder, and heard the sound of his rough exhale. “What do you want, Birdie?”

I was halfway to him. He still hadn’t moved, but I knew he was watching me. The way the moonlight filtered in meant that I was under its spotlight and he was in shadow, but I knew his eyes hadn’t left me once. I kept coming until I was right in front of him, only a few inches from his spread thighs. Reaching out, I cupped his jaw, his beard prickling my palm, and slid my thumb over the warm skin of his cheek just below his eye.

He took another shuddering breath.

“Birdie…” he rasped.

“I want you, Hank, before tomorrow comes and this ends.”

His hands shot out and gripped my waist, fingers digging in, and he groaned as he tugged me forward, filling the space between his splayed thighs with my body. His head dropped forward, resting against my chest, and those strong hands slid up and down my sides.

I threaded my fingers through his hair and gently tilted his head back, so I could see his face. “Do you want me?”

His fingers dug deeper, pulling me in closer. “Yes. Christ, so much.”

He was only wearing his boxers. I was still dressed, so I tugged off my sweater and proceeded to strip under Hank’s hooded gaze. When I was down to my panties, he grabbed my hands and held them behind my back.

“Let me just look at you,” he said, shaking his head. “Fuck, Birdie. I dreamed of you, sweetheart, before I found you that day. I dreamed of you, but I never thought…I never thought…” He leaned in and pressed his mouth to belly, cutting himself off.

Oh God.

I kept my fingers firmly in his hair as he dragged his mouth over my bare skin up to my breast, drawing a nipple into his mouth, teasing me until the hard peaks were dark and tight and so sensitive I thought I might actually come that way. But then he moved lower until his lips teased the top of my underwear.

One of his hands left my waist and cupped my pussy, middle finger pressing deeper, giving much-needed pressure to my aching clit, and making me moan.

“So wet, sweetheart. Soaked.”

“Yes,” I said and shamelessly spread my legs wider for more of his touch.

Shoving my panties aside, he pushed a finger inside me, and then his mouth was there, sucking my clit through the damp fabric. I cried out and used my grip on his hair to hold him there, never wanting him to stop. That long finger of his had no trouble finding and working me deep inside, and when he added a second and pushed even deeper, a gush of wetness left me. Going by his growl, he’d felt it, felt what he did to me, how much I wanted him, how close I was to coming around his thrusting fingers.

“Oh God…I’m going to…” His fingers vanished, and I was lifted, spun, and planted in his bed. I cried out, frustrated at being deprived of his touch, of the orgasm that was only seconds away.

Hank covered me, shoving my legs wide. I gasped at the feel of his massive erection, and ground up against him, lost to the pulsing need I had for him.

“When you come, it’s going to be around my cock again, not my fingers, Birdie.”

“Yes,” was all I could manage to say.

The sound of tearing fabric filled the air as he tore my underwear from my body. I reached down and shoved his boxers over his ass. One of his hands moved between us and he shoved them down at the front, freeing his beautiful cock.

“Please,” I said on a moan. “Please, Hank. God, I need you.”

He made a pained gasping sound and buried his face against the side of my neck. “I…fuck,” he bit out. “I don’t think I’ll ever stop wanting you.”

My head was still spinning from his words when I felt the head of his cock nudging against me, dragging through my slit, through my wetness, then pressing against my opening. I spread wider for him, accommodating his massive body, and cried out when he started pushing inside, filling me. I clawed at his back, sucking and biting at his shoulder as he stretched me wider, wanting more, wanting to feel him thrusting into me with all his immense power.

“You feel so good, sweetheart, so perfect and warm and tight,” he said through gritted teeth. “So wet for me. That’s all for me, isn’t it, beautiful? You love the feel of me inside you?”

Did he even need to ask? I turned my head, my mouth to his ear. “I’ve never wanted anyone the way I want you.”

I felt a shudder move through his frame, then his hips snapped forward and he filled me to the root, giving me all of him. I screamed and dropped my hands to his ass, digging in my nails. Wanting more. Wanting everything. He lifted his head, and his mouth came down on mine, his tongue thrusting in time with the thrust of his hips. He slammed into me over and over in a way that was all about animal need, about listening to his body and what I did to him.

I felt my orgasm rushing me, and knew it was going to blow me apart. I had no control over my thrashing limbs, my nails scoring his skin, or over the sounds I made.

“Don’t stop, never stop,” I cried as I started tightening, spasming around him, crying out as it hit, and fired through me. My toes curled, and I was only half aware of Hank lifting to his elbows above me. I held nothing back, absorbed it all, released everything, gave it all to him. If this was our last time together, I refused to hold one damn thing back from him.

When the last waves of pleasure washed over me, forcing helpless moans past my lips, I opened my eyes. Hank was hovering over me, his gaze moving over my face, intense, dark, hooded. Fierce.

He was still hard, his thrusts slower but powerful. “You’re so beautiful, Birdie. Watching you like this, Christ…I’ll never forget a second. Never.”

He started moving faster, more intense, but he didn’t bury his face against my neck. He stayed where he was, eyes locked on mine. I saw it when he was about to come—could see the way his features tightened, the way his mouth flattened—and I was right there with him again, another orgasm building inside me hard and fast.

His body started trembling and I held him tighter.

“Birdie…” God, the sound that left him was close to a sob as his thrusts got wilder, the rhythm unmeasured. “Only you,” he said, then he grunted out my name over and over, his cock pulsing inside me, filling me with everything he had.

Hank

Birdie lay curled into my front, her face buried against my chest, each exhale tickling my chest. I’d woken up hard, but with her warm breath on me, her smooth soft curves, her small hands holding me, I was getting harder by the second.

Her face as she came apart under me flashed through my mind. I’d never forget it, never. Thinking about letting her go, taking her home today, physically hurt. But I couldn’t hold her here, no matter how much I wanted to. I couldn’t keep her trapped in the mountains and expect her to be happy.

How could I be enough for her?

I couldn’t; I knew that much. My dad, Beau, and me, we hadn’t been enough for my mom. I’d watched her fade over the years, lose the sparkle, the joy in her eyes, until she finally couldn’t take another minute stuck out here and walked away, never looking back.

I couldn’t, wouldn’t do that to Birdie, no matter how much I wanted her, how much I loved her…

I love her.

Birdie moaned softly, and tingles shot down my spine. Her hands gripped me tighter, her arms sliding around my belly, and she nuzzled her face against my chest. I thought she might still be asleep, but then she tilted her head back and smiled up at me. Her eyes were sleepy and hooded, hair wild around her face and shoulders.

“Hey,” she said, voice still husky and sexy as hell from sleep.

Christ, she was beautiful. My gut clenched, and my cock pulsed against her soft belly. “Hey.”

She pressed a kiss to my throat, no hesitation, then gently nudged my shoulder with her hand. I rolled to my back and she immediately climbed on top of me. Her smile turned to a grin, and my heart stuttered behind my ribs then burst into action, hard and thumping as I looked up at her.

“I want you, Hank. You okay with that?” she said, eyes not hiding one ounce of what she was feeling in that moment, how true her words were.

I lifted a hand and curled it around the side of her head, my fingers burrowing in her warm hair. “God, yes.” I pulled her down and kissed her, deep and wet, filled with everything she was making me feel as well.

She ground her wet pussy against my stomach and I growled, my hips thrusting up, seeking her out all on their own. She didn’t break the kiss, but reached behind her, gripped my erection, lifted her lovely round ass, positioned me, and stank down, talking all of me inside her in one downward stroke.

I groaned, my hips snapping up again at the exquisite feel of her wrapped around me, so hot and wet and perfect. But I kept my eyes on Birdie, watching as she rose up, the way her mouth dropped open as I filled her, the way her cheeks grew more flushed with every passing second.

Her hands slid up my chest, nails digging in, then she rolled her hips, squeezing around me at the same time. I barked out a curse, my hands going to her hips to hang on.

She bit her lower lip and did it again. “God, Hank, y-you’re so deep.”

My fingers sunk into her flesh hard enough to leave bruises, holding her tighter. Sweat beaded my forehead and it was taking everything in me not to roll her to her back and pound into her over and over again. “Fuck me, Birdie. Please, sweetheart, I need you to fuck me.”

Goosebumps lifted over her skin then she started moving—really moving. Lifting up and grinding down, working her hips against mine in a way that had the ability to make me insane. The sounds of our lovemaking filled the room: panted breaths, her gasps and moans, my deep grunts, wet flesh slapping wet flesh.

Her breasts bounced and swayed, and I gripped one in my hand, shuddering at the way she overflowed my fingers, at the feel of her tight nipple against my palm.

She moaned desperately.

Then I felt it, felt her clutching my cock over and over again. Her scream echoed around the room as she came for me—and I lost it. Curling my arm around her waist, I flipped her to her back and went with my instincts. I hitched one knee high, so she was spread wider, so I went deeper, and pounded into her with frenzied thrusts that jarred her whole body and had her tightening more, screaming all over again.

My own orgasm nailed me, and I slammed forward, filling her as deep as I could go. I roared like the animal I was in that moment, filling her with my come, grunting with every pulse of my cock.

My body trembled so hard the bed shook. I pressed hot kisses over her cheeks, her forehead, her lips. “So perfect, sweetheart, so damn perfect. What will I do without you?” I gripped her tighter, shoved my face against her throat, and kissed the racing pulse there. “What am I going to do?”