Page 53 of Hot Under the Collar

His stiff cock bulged from his pants, begging to be freed from the layers of underwear and fleece.

She lifted her gaze back to his. His mouth parted, breath shallow, eyes hungry.

“Bedroom. Now,” she instructed.

He lifted them both from the couch as she wrapped her arms and legs around him. They both broke out in laughter as he shuffled across the living room, her bouncing in his hands. His bare skin felt deliciously warm pressed up against her.

He closed the door and she released him, feet finding the floor, but Leo kept her wrapped up in his arms. The room was dark except for a sliver of sunlight spilling through the seam of the blackout curtains. As he drew her lips to his, she felt him slip his hands under her shirt.

“Turn on the light,” he whispered. “I want to see you. I want to hear you. I want everything.”

Damn. He was good.

She padded over to the nightstand, clicked on the light, and bathed them both in its warm yellow glow.

Leo was beside her again in an instant, slipping off her shirt then smoothing strands of hair onto her chest. He eyed her lacy, black bra like it was a belated birthday present. The best one he’d had in years.

“Wait,” she said softly, fingers combing through his thick hair. “Before we do this, I need to tell you while you’re awake.”

His brow furrowed. “Hmm? Tell me what?”

“I love you,” she said, steady and confident now. No longer whispered in the dark. “I did then. I do now. I just … I needed you to know that before you kissed me again.”

For a second, he didn’t move, didn’t breathe. Then he rubbed his nose against hers and let out a long sigh, like he’d finally come home.

“Good,” he said, voice rough. “Because I was going to tell you the same damn thing.”

And this time, when they kissed, there was nothing left unspoken. He’d been waiting for her to come to her senses, to see him for the man he was now.

She saw it now. She felt it.

She unlatched her bra, and she watched him take off his pants. They both slipped out of their underwear. And then they paused, fingers tracing, his jaw clenched from want, her own breath coming in ragged.

“You don’t realize how beautiful you are, Lynne,” he whispered.

“I do when I’m with you.”

Relief spilled across his face. “Come here.”

He picked her up and laid her on her back then climbed into the bed with her.

“I love literally everything about you.” He ran his fingers through her hair. “I love your hair,” he said, “and these.” He gently kissed each of her eyelids, and when she opened them, they held each other’s gaze and smiled.

“And this,” he whispered, as his mouth pressed into hers, every new kiss deeper and better than the last.

His lips traveled down her neck to her collarbone, and she shivered, a wave of goosebumps forming on her arms. “Oh, and this part especially. So sensitive. It’s the most beautiful sound in the world when you moan.”

As if on command, he pulled an “uhhh” right out of her.

“I love these, too,” he said before taking his time to lavish her breasts with short nips and long licks, coaxing out her nipples until they were swollen stiff and pinched between his soft lips. Her legs reflexively coiled around his torso. Her body ached like it might burst, her center already so wet just from this.

So he slowed his pace and chartered down the long line of her abdomen then planted a kiss on each of her hipbones. Her knees parted, and he settled between them.

“I love this, too,” he said, brushing the narrow strip of softness she kept there, as if he understood the care behind it. “Always have.”

He buried his nose into it and inhaled, his breath tickling, the vibrations from his mouth as he spoke making her ache. “The way you smell, Lynne. God, I love it.”

He slipped his hands under her thighs and pulled her down toward his face, widening her legs even more. His warm breath lit her skin on fire, one sharp “oh god” slipping out of her mouth. The kind of “oh god” she’d say at the top of a rollercoaster. The kind of “oh god” she hadn’t said for five long years.