One of These Nights (20 page)

“This doesn't count as our date, by the way,” she told him. “If that's what you're thinking, I do expect something that requires leaving your house.”

“I'll take that under advisement,” he said. “So . . . what do you want to do? Watch a movie?”

The way his gaze moved over her face, as though he was much more interested in simply watching
her
, left her wanting to melt into the couch. Zoe's heart skipped in her chest as she smiled for no reason she could discern. She just felt kind of . . . good.
Stop it, he'll know you want to crawl all over him,
she told herself. But she couldn't seem to help it. Slowly, she shook her head.

“No, I don't really want to watch a movie. I guess we could play a video game or something.”

It was his turn to shake his head. He was so close to her she could see the little gold flecks in his eyes, the tiny scar on his forehead. “No,” he said, “I don't really want to play anymore.”

“No,” Zoe agreed. “Neither do I.”

He started to lean in, and Zoe tipped her chin up, lashes lowering, when his warm breath fanned her face with a whisper. “Does this mean you like my new shorts?”

She wasn't sure whether to slap him or kiss him, which was a problem she expected to continue to have. Tonight, at least, it was easy to choose the latter.

“It means I plan on liking you right out of your new shorts.”

Jason's groan rippled right through her. Every muscle tightened in response, a knot of pleasure forming in her lower belly that she could think of dozens of ways for him to untangle. It had been a long time. Too long, maybe. But she could think of no one she wanted to be with more than Jason, right here in this moment. They'd been circling each other forever.

Zoe was ready to dance.

She slid her hands up his chest as he brought his arms around her. Her lips parted instantly when their mouths met, and when he swept his tongue inside to taste her, Zoe's senses flooded. He tasted faintly of chocolate, sweet and decadent. She sighed into his mouth, picking up the rhythm of his kiss, tongue tangling with his until she was breathless. She slipped her fingers into his hair, finding thick, dark silk coiling over her hand.

He moaned softly, one hand pressing into her back, one cupping the back of her head. A thumb trailed down her jaw, gentle even as the heat between them built. He made her feel cherished and bold at the same time—enough that she found herself breathing out words, punctuating them with kisses along his cheeks, his nose, his jaw.

“I want you,” she told him. “So much.”

He nodded, a ragged breath escaping his lips before his mouth was on hers again, his hands roving restlessly over her back. Zoe curled her legs beneath her and leaned into him, trying to press closer, but the angle was awkward. She ended up half sprawled across him, propped up on one arm and with a nagging pain in her side. When Jason's hand roughly cupped her breast, his thumb abrading the tight bud of her nipple, she arched into him and immediately lost her balance. Her moan became a yelp as she flopped over his legs, then lay there for a moment, overheated and muzzy headed, before she could collect herself enough to speak. Jason twisted to one side to loom over her, his cheeks flushed and his breath uneven. Then he smiled at her, a mischievous grin that put her in mind of a naughty schoolboy, and Zoe found herself giggling.

“We are not smooth together,” she said. “I thought it was just you who was klutzy.”

“Blame my busted leg,” he said. “I blame it for everything. I don't mind sharing.”

“Hmm,” she said, reaching up to brush his hair out of his eyes. She'd been waiting to do it all week—longer—and to be able to touch him so easily now made her feel as though her entire body sighed. “I can try that.”

“Good. I know what else we can try.”

“Oh?” She quirked an eyebrow at him. “Do tell.”

He looked down at her, his smile softening into something she'd seen flickers of all week. She didn't want to think about what that look meant—she didn't want to be wrong. But there was so much more of him beneath the surface than he let on, she thought. He was as complicated and interesting a man as she'd ever known. He just hid it.
Purposely
hid it. She understood his introversion, his preference for quiet and peace—she had plenty of that going on herself, though she had an easier time being outgoing when it was called for—but she didn't understand why he only let most people scratch the surface, if that.

He was more than he let people see. It was the one thing about which his mother was just a tiny bit right . . . just not in the way she thought.

“We could go kick Rosie out of bed,” he said. There was a thread of longing in his voice that made her chest tighten, but she knew he wouldn't push her. It was one of the many reasons why it was so easy to say yes.

“I'll move Her Highness. You just . . . hurry.”

She unwound herself from him and stood, her legs feeling wobbly beneath her. Still, Zoe managed to make it from the couch to the bedroom without running into a wall or falling, which in her current state she considered an achievement. She heard Jason get up and glanced back once. He was sexily disheveled, his hair tousled, cheeks pink, and when she caught his eye the look in it sent her nearly running down the hall. If he could have chased her, she knew, he would have.

One day he will,
she thought, but tried to silence that little voice as soon as it appeared. She couldn't count on that. She wanted, just for once, to be fully present in the moment. She wanted tonight.

Zoe scooped Rosie up from the bed, cradling the little dog as she hurried back out to the great room and off-loaded her gently onto the couch. The Peke looked at her irritably through half-opened eyes, but she didn't seem inclined to come bounding after her, so Zoe headed quickly back to the bedroom. She started to shut the door but paused when she saw Jason sitting on the edge of the bed, stripping his shirt off.

She knew her mouth dropped open. She couldn't help it. His chest was all lean, rippling muscle, the kind a man got when he was faithful about working out without being obsessed with it. Zoe had always thought he was built well—you only had to watch him walk around in a pair of jeans to see that—but this was more than she'd expected. He glanced up at her, and whatever he saw made him smirk.

“Bet you thought I sit on my couch all the time, huh?”

“No,” she said, shaking her head. “No, not at—okay, maybe.”

“Well, I don't.”

“I can see that.”

He tossed the shirt on the floor and then, with another amused look at her, stripped off his shorts. He dropped those on the floor, too, tipped his chin down, and said, “Your turn.”

She sucked in her lower lip and looked away, suddenly shy. She wanted desperately to be against him, skin to skin. But being completely exposed to him, removing every barrier she'd had to keep between them, felt like a bigger step than just going to bed with Jason. She more than enjoyed him . . . she actually cared about him. And once a person mattered to her, she was vulnerable to that person in ways she was with very few people.

Zoe was careful not to allow people to hurt her. After tonight, she knew Jason would be capable of causing her pain. This would be her last chance to mitigate the damage, if things didn't work out down the line.

She told herself that . . . but a part of her knew it was already too late.

“Hey,” he said, drawing her attention back to him. His gruff voice had gone silken, even a single word from him skimming over her skin as though she'd been stroked. She had wrapped her arms around herself without realizing, a defensive posture he couldn't have missed. “Are you okay? If you don't want to do this, Zoe—”

“I do,” she said, making herself let her arms drop back to her sides. “I just . . .” She couldn't finish the thought, finally just giving a flustered smile and shaking her head. “I do,” she repeated. It was all she had for truth tonight.

“Then come here,” he said.

She shut the door, plunging them into darkness for a few seconds until the small lamp on the nightstand went on, casting a pool of warm light around the bed. Jason held out a hand to her, a simple gesture she found impossible to resist when coupled with the desire that darkened his eyes. He spread his legs and pulled her between them when she took his hands, then placed his hands on her hips and, in a gesture that shocked her with its sweetness, dropped his head to press it against her stomach. He breathed in deeply, breathed her in.

“Zoe,” he said softly, turning her name into a prayer. She lifted her hands, hesitated, and then sank them into his hair. She stroked his head, feeling him respond by leaning into her touch while his breath warmed her through her shirt. His thumbs traced small circles around her hipbones in a rhythm she picked up with her hands, threading her fingers through silken hair and then letting it fall, feeling that delicious tightness return in her lower belly. Her breaths grew shallower as Jason's hands began to wander, stroking up her hips and then down, thumbs following the vee that led to the heat at the apex of her thighs, his touch almost, but not quite, brushing against the place that had begun to pulse and throb for him.

She removed her hands from his hair, pulling her scarf over her head, then dragging up the long, thin sweater she wore and removing it, too. This time when he looked up at her, she felt no embarrassment. The naked longing in his expression left her shaken, even as power coursed through her like molten heat. He pulled back and ran his hands up her bare torso, and a soft sound escaped her.

“You're so beautiful,” he said, his voice scraping over her nerves with a friction her body immediately demanded more of. He slid his hands around her back to unfasten the simple black bra she wore, unhooking it with a deftness that surprised her.

“You're good,” she breathed, and meant it in a thousand different ways.

“I've only practiced that a million or so times in my head,” he replied, pulling the straps down her arms, freeing breasts that felt full and heavy, aching for his touch. He cupped them, filled his hands with them. Zoe leaned into his touch, eyes closing. She would have let him have her on the couch, fumbling in a rush of long-deferred need, and it would have been good—but this, having Jason drink her down slowly, was so much better.

He muttered a guttural oath, and then his mouth was on her, hot and wet, closing over the taut bud of one nipple to suckle. She gasped at the sudden flood of sensation, how it arrowed right to her core. She began to move against him with every pull of his mouth, every scrape of his teeth. Jason lavished attention on one breast before moving to the other. A gentle tug, and Zoe sank onto the bed beside him, stretching beneath his touch while he propped himself on one hip and continued the sweet torment with his mouth. When Jason took one of his hands and slipped it beneath the waistband of her leggings, Zoe spread her legs instinctively, allowing him the access he sought, and was rewarded as his fingers parted her slick folds and began to stroke her.

Zoe's mouth opened on a silent cry, her hands latching onto his shoulders as he toyed with her, his big hands deftly playing her body like an instrument. Zoe's head went back, even the light sensation of her hair brushing against her bare shoulders making her shiver. She was lost in a haze of lips and teeth and hands, her hips pumping restlessly in time to Jason's every rub and stoke as her body wound tighter, tighter, until she was shaking with her need for release.

Jason pulled his mouth away from her breast and rained kisses across her chest, her stomach. His breathing grew harsh as he rubbed her harder, faster.

“Come for me,” he panted. “I want to see you. So beautiful, Zoe, God.”

The world narrowed to a pinpoint, then burst in an explosion of sweet sensation. Zoe surged against his clever hand, throwing her head back and crying out, bucking against him. He cupped her hard while she rode her climax out, extending it with every light flicker of his finger. Then she was melting, barely able to keep her feet as he withdrew his hand and pushed himself back further on the bed.

When she opened her eyes, watching him through her sexual haze, he looked more animal than man, a barely tamed wolf at the end of its tether. “Now,” he said, pulling off his boxers so roughly it was a wonder he didn't rip them. She gave herself a moment just to admire him, perfect without a scrap of clothing on, lean and muscled and hungry . . . for her. He was rock hard, his cock as big and perfect as the rest of him, and as Zoe watched as he maneuvered himself back against the headboard and spread his legs. “Now,” he said again, and it was a plea.

She managed to strip off her leggings, along with the damp, silken scrap that passed for underwear, and crawled to him on all fours. Then Zoe leaned over him for a long, drugging kiss that was all hot tongues and nips and scraping teeth. She wanted to explore him the way he had her, to push him to the edge of his endurance with her mouth, but his eyes were wild, his muscles so tense every time she brushed against him that she felt as though he might snap from the tension.

He needed her. She'd forgotten what it was to be needed like this, if she'd ever known. It felt different,
more
. And because she needed him, too, Zoe was helpless to do anything but give him what he craved. She pushed up on her knees, hooked a leg over Jason, and straddled him, bracing her hands on his shoulders. He immediately gripped her hips and guided her down onto his cock, a slow, tortuous glide that filled the still air of the room with their gasps and moans. Zoe dug her fingers into his skin as he filled her, stretched her until she felt she could take no more of him. Then he was fully inside her, creating a low and rhythmic throb between her legs that she savored for a moment before beginning to move.

She lifted up, then sank down slowly, opening her eyes to watch Jason. His eyes squeezed shut, mouth opening on a harsh groan. He cursed, and on his lips the words were hot, sensual. The power between them shifted, and Zoe began to move on him, riding him with long, fluid pulses of her hips, grinding into him at the apex of every thrust. Watching him was a pleasure all its own, though Zoe soon found her breaths coming in time to his, her hips moving more quickly as he urged her on with his hands.