Page 73 of Manors & Mischief

My body trembles with an aftershock, and after placing a kiss above my pubic bone, he leaves again, returning to the bathroom.

I don’t bother getting dressed while he’s gone, but I do sit up, keeping my legs wide. One thing I’ve learned is that Devon doesn’t usually end things quickly once they’ve started.

He bites his lips when he comes back into the room. “Good girl.” He slides me to the edge of the table, my pussy snuggling his cock. “What do you want? My fingers? More tongue?”

I press my lips together, moving my hips against him. “I want you to bury yourself inside me, carry me up the stairs, lay me down in my bed, and make love to me.”

He swallows, almost like he can’t believe we’re about to take it to the next step. “What my sweetheart wants, she gets.”

He grabs his cock, angling himself toward me. He cups my face, and with one thrust, he slides inside my pussy. I grip him until he’s fully seated, then wrap my legs around his ass, squeezing. When we’re wrapped up in each other, I pull his shirt off, dropping it on the dining room floor and marvel at his body. I don’t care if the man is a decade older than me. He is sexy.

Devon picks me up, moves down the hall, and carries me up the stairs. He maneuvers me so easily that it’s far less scary than I imagined, and before I know it, we’re in my bed and he’s laying me down like I’m something precious to behold. He threads his fingers through mine, then pins my hand to the mattress above my head, stroking lazily. Then he does the same to the other hand, and I’m trapped under Devon Lachey as he worships me. Kissing. Touching. Burying himself inside me over and over.

“I thank the universe every night that you moved here,” he tells me softly, whispering it into my ear so it’s just for me. A sentiment between two people that truly care about each other. “I was lost without you.”

He claims my mouth next, kissing me stupid until I’m a mess of breathless moans.

I think he’s right. I was lost without him, too. He was the thing I was missing this whole time. Not the house. Not the community, but Devon. The guiding light in my life. The protector. Someone to encourage me instead of offering backhanded support.

Devon moans, his grip on me tightening. His strokes become rhythmic, faster, stronger. I wait for him on the precipice, my vision blurring as the pleasure hits a boiling point that my body refuses to go over until Devon pumps inside me and stays, moaning into my ear. It’s then that my body comes apart, following right after him with a sharpness that overtakes my every sense until I’m nothing but a beacon of pleasure, writhing on the bed.

“You’re so beautiful to watch,” Devon murmurs.

It takes me a few moments to recover before I can wrap my arms around him, caging him to me. My lips threaten to tell him everything I’ve been wanting to say but have held back on. The love word floats in and out of my brain, begging to be said.

“I don’t want to leave you,” Devon prompts, angling into me again, and I moan.

“If only we could do this all day and still get everything done that we need to.” I run my hand down his muscular body, the dips and planes of his abdomen.

“Now that I know what your pussy feels like, I might not get any work done again.”

“Mmm.”

“Don’t give me that look. I’ll stay up here forever.”

My brain rationally knows that this was a big step for us to take, but at the same time, it’s just so natural. Inevitable.

“Are you sure this is what you want?” I ask, still too stunned to believe how easy being with him is.

“You have no idea.”

26

EMBER

“Ready?” Devon asks.

My heart is nearly in my throat. It’s the opening of the Children’s Haunted House. Spooky music plays in the background like an untethered lullaby. Candles flicker in the foyer. Devon installed dimmer lights last minute, and the house looks fantastic. It looks every bit the creepy manor I wanted it to be when I purchased it.

The ballroom, too, is absolutely vibing with the child-friendly horror factor. The haunted house itself is shrouded in black. Inside, there’s a doll room, a ghost room, a vampire room, and a children friendly cemetery. It’s more Disney than Universal, if you know what I mean, and I honestly couldn’t be prouder of ourselves.

All the work we put into this has certainly paid off. Yesterday, we let our friends walk through, and they had a blast. It was the pick-me-up I needed to be confident to launch today.

“You’re going to kill it,” Bea announces. She took the evening off from the café so she could man one of the booths we have set up in the ballroom. She’s on apple fishing, but we also have gourd decorating and pin the eyes on the ghost.

“I would’ve loved something like this when we were kids,” Trav says, mimicking the first thing he told me when he stepped out of the haunted house last night with the mayor.

“You guys are too nice. I feel like I’m going to puke, but I’m ready.”