***
June—Two Months Before Accident
The ribbon-wrapped box sits on the crisp white linens of the hotel bed, and I creep toward it, unable to resist the lure of an unexpected gift.
Strong arms encase me from behind, and I feel Nate’s breath hot in my ear. “I got you something.” His mouth drops to my neck, where he nibbles his way down to my shoulder and sends little shivers whipping through me.
I close my eyes against the pleasure and moan. “I saw that. You shouldn’t have.”
“Hmm,” he groans, his hands already sliding inside my shirt. “You shouldn’t say that until you know what it is. It might be more for me than it is for you.” His fingers skim over my belly then slide into the band of my jeans and sweep lower, sending my knees weak. “You want to open it?”
“You’re kind of making me want something else right now.”
He chuckles and nips my neck one last time before pulling away and grabbing the box off the bed.
“You should stop buying me things,” I protest lamely.
“Don’t steal my joy, woman.” He nudges the gift toward me, and I take it in my hands and pull off the lid.
I’d like to pretend I’m one of those worldly girls who doesn’t shock or embarrass easily, but I’m not. The gift inside this box both shocks and embarrasses me, but I make myself pick it up and hold it in my hand as I say, “Thank you?” Unfortunately, any attempt at sincerity is lost when the words come out like a question.
He chuckles. “You don’t sound like you mean it.”
“Um, no, I do mean it. Thanks.” I put the box down on the bed and study the object. “I just… I’m not sure why…”
“It’s a vibrator, Hanna. Not a medieval torture device.” He steps closer and closes my hand over the toy, twisting its shaft under my fingers.
“Oh!” I squeak when it starts buzzing in my hands, but he holds tight, keeping my fingers wrapped around it. A giggle slips from my lips. “Um…should I be worried that you said this is more for you than me? I mean, I’m game to try new things, but I’ve never been with a guy who wanted—”
He grunts. “Not like that.”
“No. I want to give you what you want. Um…” I motion toward the bed and bite my lip as laughter bubbles up in my chest. “Bend over?”
He grins and steps closer. “I have other plans, but thanks for the offer. Means a lot.”
“I’m very open-minded,” I say sagely.
“Your face when you opened it doesn’t support that claim. Have you ever used one of these before?”
My lips part as his hands lead mine over the vibrating shaft in long, lewd movements that kind of turn me on. “I guess I would just prefer the real thing. You know. If someone would give it to me.” I pout. “It’s the least you could do when you’re going to be leaving me for the Middle East in September.”
“I promise, having sex now wouldn’t make a month apart any easier.”
My shoulders sag. “I hate that you’re going. I’m going to be worried sick until you’re home safe.”
He groans and nips at my ear. His hot lips sweep over my neck and then his hands slip under my shirt, making circles around my navel. “You’re cute when you’re worried about me. Now get naked and lay your sweet ass on that bed so I can show you just what I want you to do with this.”
“Oh.” I grin and unbutton my jeans, watching him as I push them off my hips. I leave my panties and T-shirt on and climb onto the bed. “In that case…”
“You’re not naked.”
I lift a brow. “Neither are you.” I love his hot eyes on me.
“Lie down.”
I obey, and he runs his eyes over me again and again. Nate looking at me is as good as any foreplay I’ve ever known.
He hands me the vibrator then moves to the end of the bed. “Put it between your legs.”
“I’d rather you do it for me,” I protest. Turning the device in my hands, I look up at him through my lashes. I know how badly he wants to touch me, how much self-restraint he’s using to stay at the foot of the bed when he could be on the bed with me. Touching me.
“You’re going to have to figure out how to use it yourself.” He folds his arms and stares down at me like a warden supervising his charge.
I grin. “You think I don’t know how to get myself off? Aren’t you cute?”
A muscle in his jaw jumps, but he raises a brow and holds my gaze. “Prove it.”
My heart leaps into my throat at the challenge, and I lick my lips. When I part my legs, his nostrils flare and his eyes go darker. “With this?” I ask, holding up the vibrator.
“Show me how you do it.” He drops his arms and his fists clench at his sides.
I release the vibrator on the bed next to me. Keeping my eyes on him, I cup myself between my legs. I’m so turned on from all this talk of masturbation and the look in his eyes. I’m already slick and swollen, and if he joined me on the bed and put his hand between my legs, he could get me off in seconds flat.
But he isn’t on the bed with me, and I’m not going to rush this. I rock my hand against myself, applying just enough pressure to my clit to make my eyes float closed.
“Here.” His hard voice has my eyes flying open. He’s leaning over the bed and tugging my panties from my hips in one smooth motion.
I squeak as my ass falls back to the bed, and he gives me that shit-eating grin.
“You have touched yourself without the panties before, haven’t you?”
I take a breath and part my legs farther. He watches, and that’s what does it for me—his gaze between my legs, like that private bit of me is the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen, the rising and falling of his chest as I slide my hands up my inner thighs.
I’ve never done this before—never let a man watch me touch myself. I would have thought it would be awkward or that I’d worry I might look like I was enjoying my own touch more that I enjoyed his, but there’s nothing awkward here, and we both know it’s Nate’s touch I want. All I feel is heat and lust and this need to give him anything he wants.
As I settle on hand over myself, taking my clit between two fingers, I bring my other hand up to my chest and squeeze my breast through my shirt. I’m not wearing a bra, and the sensation of my sensitive nipples scraping across the cotton makes my hips buck and my body ache for more. For his mouth on my breasts, his tongue toying with my nipples until he draws them into his mouth—hard and tight and merciless.
I enter myself with one finger as I imagine it, and he steps closer. I love that I can make him damn near lose his self-control. I imagine his mouth against the flat of my belly before dipping lower.
I squeeze my clit gently. Right where I want his lips. My hips rock faster and his eyes grow hotter.
I’m close. So damn close. But my own hand isn’t enough when he’s right there, when I can reach out and touch what I really want. “Nate,” I whimper.
“Do it, angel.” His nostrils flare as I pinch my nipple through my shirt again. “I want to hear you come. I want to watch.”
“I want you to do it.”
“Do this for me.” His breathing is ragged. As if he’s been holding me up and fucking me hard rather than standing here watching.
I can see what I’m doing to him. I can see it in his eyes, hear it in his voice.
“Fuck your hand for me, baby. Just like that.” His words make me wild and my hips move faster, my hand at my breast pinches tighter, and then I’m gone—tightening, squeezing, and exploding into a hard and fast release that’s better than any orgasm I’ve ever been able to give myself.
As I lie limp in bed after, he climbs in beside me and brushes my hair from my face. “I swear to Christ, you are a living fantasy.”
I force my heavy eyes open. “That was amazing. I wouldn’t have believed I could make myself…”
“Get off?”
I shake my head. “I knew I could do that, but it’s never that good. But with you standing the
re…”
He presses a kiss to the side of my neck. “That’s what I want you to think about when I’m gone. When you touch yourself, imagine me at the end of the bed watching you.”
I hear the hum of the vibrator clicking on, and then he’s pressing it against the inside of my thighs and sucking at my neck as he inches the vibrating wand closer to the apex of my thighs.
“What are you doing?” I whisper, reaching for the button on his jeans. “I think it’s your turn.”
“I might have had an ulterior motive for buying this for you.”
“What’s that?” My breath catches as he brushes it lightly over my clit before returning it to my thighs. I part my legs instinctively.
“I want to fuck you with this, Hanna. If I can’t have my cock inside you, I still want to fuck you.”
I slide my hands into his hair and lock my eyes on his. “If you want me, I’m yours. I’ve told you that.”
His kiss is hard and sweet at the same time. I know he’s trying to be noble, and I don’t want him to be. I release him from his jeans, and he groans as I take his hard length into my hands.
“I’m ready,” I promise.
He buries his face in my neck and presses the vibrator lightly against my entrance. The sensation is new and intense, and I cry out even as I rock my hips toward the intrusion.
“Just imagine it’s my cock sliding into you.”
I want to make a joke about his magically vibrating appendage, but the words die on my lips. I’m too distracted by the round tip of the vibrator poised at my entrance. He slides it in, inch by inch, while kissing my neck. Slowly in. Slowly out. Long, languid movements that already have my body pulsing in response.
“Nate.” I try to draw back, to escape the sensation before I’m lost in it. He lowers his mouth to my breast and sucks hard. Then instead of pulling away, I’m rocking forward. Instead of withdrawing from the pleasure, I’m running toward it.
“I can’t stop thinking about how it would feel to be inside you,” he whispers. “You are so fucking responsive, and I could get off right here just imagining that pussy squeezing around my cock.”
I cry out, my hips rising off the bed. “Please.”
He groans in my ear and rocks the toy inside me, moving it deeper this time. “I know, baby. I want it as much as you do. But you’ve done something to me.” He removes the vibrator, and I cry out, hungry, empty, desperate.
“Fuck me, Nate.” I wouldn’t have had the courage to say those words to anyone before meeting him, but he brings out this bold side of me. This wicked side. “Don’t make me wait anymore.”
“It would be so damn good.” He touches the vibrator to my clit and my body squeezes tight, climbing higher. “I’d never get enough of you. I’d fuck you from behind. I’d fuck you with your legs wrapped around my waist. I’d fuck you in the shower and until you thought you couldn’t come again.”
“Now. Please.”
He slides two fingers inside me and holds the vibrator snug against my clit. “Not until you’ve made a decision. Not while his ring is waiting in your jewelry box.” With those words, he rocks against my clit and curls his fingers, and I’m gone. Flying. Falling. Releasing.