Folding forward, she claimed a deep, hot kiss. “I need you now, Xander.”
He smiled into their kiss. “Let me taste you first.”
“No.” She hadn’t intended to sound so harsh, but her hunger was too strong. “I mean, later, and yes please, but right now I need to feel you moving inside me.”
“You’re bossy.” He flashed a feral grin. “I like it.” Banding her ribs with one arm, he scooted her up to suckle first one breast, then the other, each deep pull drawing sharp pleasure from her clit. With his free hand, he fumbled the nightstand drawer open and extracted a strip of foil packets.
She watched, panting, as he quickly rolled the sheath over his ruddy cock. She lifted onto her knees, notched him at her entrance, and sank down on a long, ragged moan.Heavenlywas too weak a word for this sensation as he stretched and filled her, impossibly hard inside her softness. Together they undulated, swaying slowly at first until they found their rhythm. Xander’s eyes fluttered closed on a gasp. Gripping her nape, he pulled her to his chest and breathed her name like a prayer.
She rode him, and he rocked against her, slow and deep, each thrust a delicious shock, tightening her nerves to the point of unbearable bliss. For a moment, they poised together at the top of the wave, eyes locked, mouths gasping—and then the surge crested, tumbling her down, down into a vortex of ecstasy. Xander followed, head thrown back, strong throat working as he growled her name one last time, his cock pulsing deep inside her.
Panting, slick with sweat, they clung together. When she finally moved to roll off him, he held her tighter. “Stay with me, Hannah.”
“Can you breathe with me on top of you like this?”
He chuckled into the crook of her neck. “Breathing is overrated. I just want to feel you.” His hands stroked lazy arcs and spirals over her skin. “Every inch of you is delicious.”
She rose onto her elbows and smoothed his hair back from his damp forehead. “That was—” She giggled. “I don’t even have words.”
“Right?” He kissed the tip of her nose. “Indescribable.” With a playful whoop, he rolled her underneath him. Propped on one forearm, he peppered her breasts and belly with comically loud smooches. “I want to spend the rest of my life naked with you.”
Laughing, she squirmed beneath him. “How are we going to do our jobs from this bed?”
He nuzzled her ribs. “Work from home is a thing. Haven’t you heard?”
She wriggled away. “Your beard tickles.”
“I’ll shave it off.” He sprang to his knees.
Up till now, she’d had only glimpses of his playful side. She liked it. A lot.
“I happen to love your scruffy jaw.” She looped her arms around his neck and pulled him down for a kiss, soft and sweet. “It’s sexy. You’re sexy.”
When he came up for air, something had shifted behind Xander’s eyes. His expression became solemn.
She braced herself as a thread of fear wound around her heart and squeezed.
“Hannah, I’m falling in love with you.”
She opened her mouth, but all that emerged was a squawk.
“That’s what I was afraid of.” He rolled onto his side, snugged her against him, and stroked his fingers into her hair. “But hear me out, okay?”
She nodded, too tongue-tied to do otherwise. Because love? Holy flaming poop on a stick, how had they leapfrogged so far in just one hot encounter? And why was her heart dancing a frantic samba inside her ribs?
She couldn’t be in love with Xander. It was too soon. She hardly knew him…and couldn’t stop thinking about him, about ways to help with his shop, about how to keep him in Trappers Cove…
He rested his cheek on his biceps, a sight so entrancing she nearly swooned. What would it be like to wake up to that view every morning? To fall asleep in his arms?
She yanked hard on the reins of her runaway imagination and tried to focus on his words, and not the mesmerizing play of his fingers in her hair.
“I know how crazy this sounds. And I don’t expect you to be there yet. But I’ve spent so many years telling myself I wasn’t destined for love, that I could do without it.”
Damn it, she did know, because she’d told herself the same lie.
“And maybe it’s Zora’s tarot cards, or some kind of beach magic, or even Gus’s ghost pushing us together, but this,”—he took her hand and placed it over his heart. Its strong beat thrummed beneath her palm. “This is real, and I’d be a fool to deny it just because it arrived at an unexpected time.”
“I, um…” She couldn’t think straight while pinned by those pleading eyes, so she trained her gaze on his broad chest instead.
