hip bone, stringing kisses over the sensitive skin until he reached her left hip bone. Every long, sweeping upward pass of his hungry mouth brought him closer to the mouthwatering tits he hadn’t fully explored.
“Can I touch you now?” she asked, a bit breathlessly.
“Nope. I’m still touching you.” He tongued her nipple. “How sensitive are your tits?”
“What do you mean?”
Devin kissed the tip. “You admitted you’ve kept them bound for years. Has it affected sensitivity?”
“Not that I’ve noticed.”
He enclosed the nipple in his teeth and bit down until she gasped, then drew the tip into his mouth and gently suckled away the sting. The section of skin along her side seemed particularly sensitive, so he caressed and stroked that area while he focused on the other breast.
“You weren’t kidding when you said you’d worship my chest,” she murmured huskily.
“Hard to tear myself away from perfection.” He flattened his palm and inched his hand down the center of her body until he reached her mound. His middle and index finger followed the split in her sex to her wet opening. Then he shoved the fingers in and rotated his hand to manipulate her clit with his thumb. “I want to get you off before I fuck you again.”
“And if I said I’d rather you just fucked me now?”
Devin lifted his mouth from her nipple long enough to answer. “I’d say it don’t matter what you’d rather and you’d better come fast.” He blew a stream of air over the wet tip just to hear that throaty moan.
“I can’t come again. God. You made me come three times already.”
He grinned at her. “And isn’t that a helluva nice surprise for me? Because knowing you can come like that?” He planted kisses down her belly. “Sweet”—kiss—“hot”—kiss—“sexy”—kiss—“woman of mine. I’m on a fuckin’ mission to make you come like that every time.”
“Devin. Seriously. I can’t.”
“You know I’m gonna make you eat them words . . .” He dropped between her thighs. “Right after I eat you.”
Maybe it surprised Liberty that she came against his mouth in a pulsing wet rush about two minutes after he spread her wide open and feasted on her sweet pussy. But it didn’t surprise him.
While she collected her brain cells, Devin rose to his knees and dug into the side dresser drawer, fishing out a new box of condoms.
As soon as he tore off a single plastic packet, Liberty sat up and plucked it from his fingertips. “I’ll do that this time.” She opened the package with her teeth. Keeping her fist around his shaft as she rolled the condom on, she leaned forward and kissed him.
Devin groaned—from her sure and steady touch on his cock and the kiss that turned him inside out.
She cupped her left hand around the nape of his neck, holding his head in place as her tongue explored his mouth. Then she whispered, “Betcha can’t get me to come again.”
He laughed against her smirking lips. “Challenge accepted.”
Afterward, they were lying side by side in his bed and he still had his hands—and alternately his mouth—all over her. He couldn’t not touch her. And he’d turned on the lights to see her better while he touched her.
“Go ahead and ask,” she said softly.
He traced the thick pinkish scar on the outside of her thigh above her knee. “This is where you were shot?”
“The shooter got me here”—she touched another scar on the upper right side of her chest below her collarbone—“and here”—her fingers slid over to another scar on the same side, two inches lower—“and by some weird trajectory, when he fired the third and fourth bullets, he hit my leg in almost exactly the same spot, so I have one big scar instead of two.”
“On a scale of one to ten, how much did it hurt?”
“About a five when it happened. Then, when I was in the hospital, it jumped to a thousand. The first shot went clean through me and came out my back.” Liberty rolled. “See that huge scar next to my shoulder blade? That’s what an exit wound looks like.”
Devin swept his thumb across the mark; his stomach cartwheeled thinking about what she’d been through.
“Open wounds like that take longer to heal. The second shot lodged in bone, so they had to operate to remove it. The medical staff over there is quick and efficient, but they patched me up after surgery and put me on a transport to Walter Reed.”
He kept caressing her, wanting to hear about her ordeal and challenges while at the same time he wanted to distract her from the pain of her past.
“The weirdest part? That morning I left the barracks and reported for duty. After the incident, I was aware I was shot, aware I was headed for surgery. But then I didn’t wake up again until I was in the hospital in the United States. It freaked me the fuck out.”
“I can’t imagine.”
“By that time they’d called Harper. She and Bran and the boys showed up within two days of my arrival.”
Devin wondered if his sister would show up that quickly if something happened to him.
Probably not. When have you been there for her?
“I hated that I was injured and I’d serve out the remainder of my enlistment on disability. Harper is a fixer. It about killed her that she couldn’t just slap a Tweety Bird bandage on me and make it all better. Poor Bran had to deal with surly me, his distraught wife, a two-year-old and a baby. But he handled it all in that way he has about him. After a month of bed rest, I started physical therapy with a vengeance. By the time they discharged me, I was in the best shape of my life.”
“I’ll say,” he murmured and bent down to kiss her scar. “Then what did you do?”
“Looked for work. But jobs were hard to come by. My years of specialized training meant I was qualified to be a security guard in an office building or a mall cop.” She sighed. “I’m not belittling what they do; I just knew I couldn’t do it. I hated school, so the idea of enrolling in higher education made me think that janitorial work wouldn’t be so bad.”
He laughed.
“Then I . . . meandered until I interviewed with GSC. The rest is history.” Liberty faced him. “You were so quiet I thought maybe I’d put you to sleep.”
“Not even close.” He touched the scars on her chest again. “The reason you don’t wear cleavage-baring shirts isn’t because you wanna hide your impressive cleavage. It’s because you wanna hide your scars.”
Liberty blushed. “Well, yeah. I have scars everywhere. Not just those. But they are the newest, so they’re the most prominent.” She brought up her leg. “See this one?”
Devin reached down, curling his hand around her ankle. His thumb swept over the scar above her ankle bone. “What happened?”
“I broke my ankle when I was ten. We never had insurance, so my mom didn’t take me to the doctor. By the time the school nurse saw it, I’d done some serious damage to the bones and ended up having several surgeries.”
“I hope your mom felt like shit for not getting you in sooner.”
“I doubt she even remembers it.”
“You never talk about your mom.”
“You never talk about yours either,” she shot back.
Devin went motionless. Even when Liberty had told him that she planned to call him on his shit, he hadn’t believed it. And he really didn’t like it.
Except she was the first woman in a long time—maybe ever—who cared enough to even try to get past those monumental walls he’d erected.
“I’m sorry for snapping. There’s not much to say—my mother needs a man in her life like she needs air. When men recognized she was the type of woman who’d suffocate them and bleed them dry, they left her. She never understood why. Besides, I haven’t seen her in years, and if I never cross paths with her again . . .” She shrugged. “No great loss. I still have Harper and Bailey. I don’t need her.” She pulled the sheet up, covering her nakedness. “Now, are you done playing doctor with my scars?”
Devin was surpr
ised she hadn’t retreated into defensive mode sooner. So he kept it light. “I’m done. But I’m pretty sure at some point in the next two months I’m gonna play connect the dots on your body.” He ran his hand down the side of her face. “I’m debating on whether whipped cream or chocolate syrup would be better to draw the lines between your freckles.”
“How about . . . both?”
He chuckled. “Definitely gonna be fun goin’ to the store with you.”
Chapter Fifteen
Liberty wasn’t used to waking up naked.
Not that she was cold. Devin was practically lying on top of her as she was sprawled on her belly in his big bed.
She shifted slightly and he rolled to his back, freeing her.
Should she sneak out? Wake him up? Hop in the shower and hope he joined her? The bus was still moving, which meant they’d stopped for gas while she and Devin had been conked out. Or they hadn’t noticed the bus stopping as they’d banged each other’s brains out.
Three times.
Three incredible times.
The man had certainly made her body sing last night. Holy shit, the things he could do with that golden mouth . . .
“What time is it?” he asked, his voice sandpaper rough.
“I was just about to go check.”
Then he rolled her to face him. He gave her a soft smile and reached out to run his knuckles down her cheek. “Stay in bed with me a little longer.”
“Once I wake up, I’m up. I can’t go back to sleep.”
“Who said anything about sleepin’?”
“Well, I thought . . .”
“That this was just a one-night thing with me? Wrong. And, sugar, you knew that goin’ into it last night.”
She blinked at him, unsure what she should say or do.
Turned out she didn’t need to do anything, because Devin just took over.
He knocked the pillows aside and traced the length of her arm from her shoulder to her wrist with such erotic intent, she shivered. “I want you. My way. Arms above your head, palms facing the ceiling.”
Here was the test between them.
Part of her had attributed his aggressiveness last night to the fact they were finally acting on the sexual tension between them. But the heated look in Devin’s eye wasn’t playful or teasing.
Liberty had spent her life taking orders from men. But she’d always drawn the line in the bedroom. In her experience, most men needed direction when it came to sex, and she was more than happy to provide it.
But Devin had hit all her hot spots last night without any input from her besides moans and gasps of pleasure.
That’s because he’s been with so many women he’s got a big playbook and he knows all the right moves.
While she waffled and argued with herself, he kept up that sweeping caress, just on her arm. His eyes were a deep midnight blue, his breathing was slow and steady, but his cock was completely hard.
“I don’t know how to do this,” she admitted.
“That’s the thing; you don’t need to know anything. You just follow my instructions and I’ll take care of the rest. I’ll take care of you.”
Sounded simple. So why was she making it so damn complicated?
“Liberty, do you trust me?”
She nodded.
“Yes or no. Say the words.”
“Yes.”
“Good.” He wrapped his fingers around her forearm. “And did we do anything last night that you didn’t like?”
Liberty started to shake her head, but remembered he wanted a verbal response. “No.”
He smiled. “Then, darlin’, what’s the holdup?”
“What do you mean?”
“Put your arms above your head, palms facing up, like I told you to.”
Keeping her eyes on his, she did as he asked.
Devin’s gaze moved across her face and down, stopping above her breasts. “Now turn your head to the right and give me that sexy neck.”
She closed her eyes as her forehead connected with her biceps.
Then his body crowded hers. His warm lips brushed her ear and he placed his hand on her belly. “You have no idea what it does to me to have this trust from you.” His hot breath teased the hollow below her earlobe and she trembled. “So I’ll show you. Relax, baby, and let me have you.”
That deep, lazy, sex-soaked voice rumbling against her skin set every nerve receptor in her body on high alert.
Devin’s mouth followed the cords straining in her neck, treating her skin to nibbles, kisses, licks. The scrape of his teeth caused her to arch and moan.
“Like that, do you?”
“Yes.” Liberty suppressed a whimper when he hit the sweet spot below her ear.
Of course Devin noticed. His lips skated over the swell of her upper breast. He latched onto her nipple and sucked, causing her to arch up.
After backing off on the suction, he kept his lips soft around her areola as his teeth sank into the distended tip. At first she loved that nip of pain, but then it was too much. “Ouch. Stop.”
He laved the stinging skin and blew a stream of air over the wetness. “Tell me if I go too far. But I wonder if you just need a little distraction while I’m doin’ that.” He slipped his hand down her belly until his middle finger connected with her clit. His tongue and his finger rubbed each area in perfect synchronicity.
She was already embarrassingly wet and he’d barely touched her. When he teased the nub until it swelled beneath his finger, she fought against her normal response—to tell him exactly how to set her off. It was as much a test of her ability to hand her pleasure over to him as it was to see if he could set her off without any help.
About a minute later, Devin proved last night wasn’t a fluke and he didn’t need any instruction whatsoever. She couldn’t stay quiet; she couldn’t stay still when that first pulse throbbed against his finger. She gasped when his teeth sank into her nipple, harder than before, but somehow, it turned the pain into pleasure as she was coming.
Then he switched. He enclosed his mouth over her clit. His soft, wet tongue flicked over the swollen flesh, coaxing another orgasm from her as he pinched her other nipple hard. The second climax was short but intense, and she attempted to muffle her cry.
Her body quaked in the aftermath of back-to-back orgasms, and she focused on finding balance since Devin had knocked hers off-kilter.
Devin scattered soft kisses across her lower belly. “Look at me.”
Liberty peeled her eyes open and turned her head. He was right there, nose to nose with her. “I expect to hear you come every time unless I tell you to keep quiet. Don’t ever hide that from me.”
“Okay.”
“Now brace your hands against the headboard. And I do mean brace yourself, ’cause I need it fast and hard.”
She watched as Devin snagged a condom off the dresser and rolled it on. But even as he did that, his gaze roamed over her with such hunger she shivered again. There was no sign of the charming, laid-back Devin as he scooted closer on his knees. He grabbed her ass cheeks and slowly slid them onto his thighs, the crisp hairs on his legs scraping over the soft globes of her ass in an erotic glide.
Pressing the backs of her legs against his chest, he held her right ankle by his left ear as he positioned his cock and drove into her.
He angled forward, curling his right hand over the top of the headboard and clamping his left arm over her legs as he pumped his hips. “Fuck, you feel good first thing in the morning.”
“So do you.” He looked good too. That mishmash of golden and dark curls was a tangled mess from her fingers. Stubble darkened his rugged face. There was a determined set to his jaw but a soft set to his mouth. And the way he fucked her—hard, deep, without pause. Damn. First he’d made it all about her; now it was all about him.
He drove into her faster. Sweat dampened his brow. She felt the slickness of his chest and his increased rate of breathing. She couldn’t look away from him, hungering to see that mome
nt he lost control. And when it finally happened, she bore down on his pistoning cock, her focus solely on the way his head fell back and how tightly his arm squeezed her thighs.
Devin came in silence, his expression fierce as he rode out his orgasm. But he didn’t remain lost in bliss too long. He slid her legs to the mattress and stretched out on top of her, burying his face in her throat. “Christ, woman.”
She reached around and ran her fingers through his silky hair just because she could. She’d wanted to get her hands in this sexy riot of soft curls since the first time she’d seen him without a hat on.
He nuzzled her neck. Then he lifted his head, peppering kisses across her lips, on her chin and then the tops of her breasts. “You wanna shower first?” He looked up when she didn’t answer right away. “I’d like nothin’ better than to shower with you, but we’d end up fucking again, and I don’t want you to be too sore for what I’ve got in mind for tonight.”
“Should I be worried?”
“Yep.” He pushed up. “But I promise you’ll like it.”