Beguiling (Tempting #2) (24 page)

I
watched him in silence
, his eyes at first desperate as they searched mine and then as my lips spread, the lines of worry in his forehead eased.

“Are you going to cross that one last item off your bucket list? The ‘break someone’s heart’ one? Don’t think I haven’t forgotten it.”

I smiled wider. He was cute. And sweet. And had a romantic side I hadn’t glimpsed until now. He’d done something very special for me, and he just told me he loved me.

Leo Madsen loved me.

The very thought made my heart shudder, quaking through my veins. Because I loved him too. And I was glad to love him—which felt significant. My love for Leo hadn’t gripped me unwittingly; I
wanted
to love him. To be loved
by
him was another gift. I was realizing just how precious the people in my life were the last couple weeks and I was thankful to have Leo by my side through it all.

“I…” I swallowed, and Leo seemed to interpret my pause for something negative, based on the way his eyes narrowed. “I love you, Leo,” I said, not wanting to make him wait to hear it. “In spite of our differences, and most likely because of our differences. I think I realized it when you came to D.C. for me, but I was already slipping down that path long before then.” I smiled with my whole heart and looked around the room, at the candlelight, and took in the odd cherry-scented smell that lingered.

Because my hands were still cradled by his, I brought them to my mouth and pressed a kiss to his knuckles. “And I don’t know where I’ll be a year from now, but until then I’ll be just across the street.”

His eyes cleared and he tilted his head. “What do you mean? What about vet school?”

“I’m not going—at least not this year.”

His hands went slack in mine and he frowned. “I am not letting you take off a year of school to be by me, Scarlet. No fucking way.”

“Oh, puh-lease.” I rolled my eyes at him. “Conceited much? Not everything is about you.” He raised an eyebrow as I laughed at him. I grabbed his hands since he’d let go of mine. “My mom is going to need help between running the church and caring for my dad and, well, frankly? I could use a break from being so freaking stressed out about getting perfect grades.”

He smiled then. “Does this mean I can keep knocking on your back door?”

“That would be a ‘no.’”

“I’ll still try it.” He pursed his lips and his eyes glittered in the candlelight.

“You’ll be back on campus soon anyway.”

“And you’ll be in the city a lot, right?”

I shrugged, relaxed as his thumbs ran over my fingers. “I’ll need to come to your games, right?”

He smiled widely at that. “We still have a bunch of bucket list items to cross off.”

“And maybe some we can repeat?”

He yanked me off my chair and brought me on to his lap. “Absolutely.” He framed my face in his hands. “You know, I’d have gladly figured out how to visit you if you’d gone far away for school. But this,” he leaned in and his lips met my neck, “is much more convenient.” He sighed against my throat and the warmth went straight to my veins.

I arched my neck, allowing him more space to kiss my skin there. “I’ll still live with my parents for the year.”

“Yeah, well luckily I won’t be. So you can spend weekends with me in Boston.” He hummed against my skin and I shifted in his lap, feeling his growing arousal between us. His hands came up my back, under my tank. Before I could stop him, he’d unsnapped the back of my bra. The straps slid down on my shoulders, wanting to give in to gravity.

“Leo,” I whispered. “I don’t want to get naked in your kitchen.”

He stood, hands cradling my ass as he pulled me to him. I wrapped my legs around his waist, and he squeezed. “Then let’s get you naked upstairs,” he said, carrying me toward the stairs.

“You’re just trying to show off now, carrying me around like this.”

“Is it working?” he asked at my ear, his laughter soft. In response, I pushed my body into his a little more, so that his erection was perfectly aligned with my center.

“If you keep that up, you’re going to get naked on my stairs.”

Testing him, I pushed against him again, felt my own arousal spread across my skin at the feel of him so close to me.

He groaned and quickened his pace up the stairs. “You’re going to kill me.”

“That’ll be a shame, since I won’t be a doctor now for a few more years.”

“A puppy doctor.”

I knew he was just trying to rile me up. “Energetic, pushy, pisses to mark its territory, always trying to bury its bone somewhere … did I just describe you, or a dog? The similarities are uncanny.”

Leo pulled his head back and raised an eyebrow. “Really, Scarlet?”

I tucked my face into his neck to hide my smile. With his breath at my ear and his hands on my ass, I felt that familiar quiver roll through me.

As he lowered me to the bed, I kept my grip on him tight, pulling him right along with me. He buried his face into my chest and exhaled—the heat going right through the cotton and warming my breasts. "Why do you smell so fucking incredible?" he asked, voice muffled.

I squirmed beneath him, "Don't make me wait."

He lifted his head, pushed his chin on my chest as he stared at me. "Maybe I will. You made me wait long enough to tell me you loved me." His hands came to my waist and squeezed.

"I waited just as long as you did, except you were a minute sooner."

"Let's not get technical here, Jennings." His fingers climbed up my side. "I was first. I win."

I rolled my eyes but then a light caress across my ribs made me burst out in a laugh, the tickle surprising me. "Stop!" I yelled, pushing against his hands and using my legs to scoot myself backward on the bed, away from his hands.

"Nuh-uh," he said, clamping his hands on my shins and yanking me back toward him. "You're not getting away that easily." His fingers resumed their ascent, up over my ribs until he was grazing his thumb across the sensitive flesh under my breast, where the bra had loosened. My breath caught in my throat as I stared up at him.

His thumb rubbed back and forth as his eyes held mine. Having him above me, staring down at me with that enduring intensity did more for me than if he had ripped my clothes off and slammed into me. The quiver rolled into a low tremble as his thumb skimmed up the curve of my breast and just lightly flicked over my nipple. His other hand held me just above my waist and I marveled over the sheer size of his hand, wrapped around my rib cage.

The hand under my bra reached up between my breasts and grabbed the center of the bra, yanking me up to a sitting position on the bed. Wordlessly, he lifted the tank and I raised my arms, enabling him to pull the shirt off over my head. When my arms came back down, the bra straps slid off my shoulders and the cups fell off my breasts. He grabbed my hands and pulled me slowly to standing in front of him. When his hands touched the waistband of my shorts, I lifted his own shirt off his head. We were standing so close that my nipples brushed against his chest, making me shiver.

Leo unsnapped the button on my shorts and pushed them down before he lowered himself in front of me. He pressed his mouth against the skin just below my belly button and then rubbed his chin against the top of my panties as he coaxed one leg up at a time to fully remove my shorts.

"Mmm," he murmured against the thin cotton of my panties. I felt the vibration strike right through me and tried to reign myself in. My hands found his shoulders and held on, gripping as his mouth moved lower, pressing warm kisses right through the cotton. When his mouth landed right over my center, I felt a light drag of his teeth over the cotton so that when he touched me, it felt like one deliciously rough graze.

He pushed me so that I fell backward onto the bed and peeled my panties down, taking care to remove them from each foot before he placed a hand on each knee and spread me wide.

It was so intensely intimate, knowing his eyes were right on me, right
there
. I knew it was blasphemous, but I had a quick, fleeting thought to pray he'd give me a release as I burned from the inside out. But no, he was content to let me writhe on the bed.

He brushed two fingers down my center and then smiled up at me, wickedly. "You're so turned on right now."

"Shut up," I groaned, arching my neck as he brushed my lips again. "Torture isn't funny."

"No, it's not," he agreed. I felt a pinch and my eyes bulged.

"Holy shit," I squeaked as the pleasure from the pain made my lower body clench in reaction. " Did you just pinch me … there?"

He nodded. “I remembered how much you'd enjoyed it up against that tree.” I blushed, thinking of how I'd come completely undone then. He stood, removing his jeans. He grabbed a condom out of his pocket and ripped it open.

"It was in your pocket the whole time?" I asked. "Optimistic much?"

After sliding the condom over his cock, he climbed on the bed, over me. He pushed lightly against my entrance but didn't go further. "I figured," he said, bringing his mouth to my breasts and nipping along my skin, "that it could go one of two ways." He pushed again, but still didn't slide forward. "The first way had you laughing in my face as I poured my heart out to you." He bit down on my nipple, almost punishingly so and looked up at me with a smile in his eyes. "And then we would have had some unbelievable goodbye sex on that table I'd set for us."

I arched under him as he slid inside of me just a bit. "With all those candles? Sounds dangerous."

He sucked my breast into his mouth and I arched again, finally hooking a leg around his waist to encourage him deeper. He let go with a pop and smiled at me. "The second way had you melting in a puddle of love at my declaration and throwing me down onto the table for celebratory sex."

I frowned for a second until he moved his attention to my other breast. "Well, neither of those things happened."

"I know," he said before capturing my nipple in between his teeth and rubbing it gently. He was still inside of me, but not moving forward or backward. "Because instead of melting, you told me you loved me too." He lay his head on my chest for a second and a warmth moved through me. "And that was even better than I'd expected." He lifted his head so he was looking into my eyes again.

"You're such a sap," I teased, because he was teasing me with his tongue and teeth. I hooked my other leg around his waist and tilted my hips, but he grabbed them with his hands and held me in place.

"Keep it up, Jennings, and I'll continue to slowly torture you."

I narrowed my eyes. "Keep torturing me and I'll kick you in the balls."

He laughed. "I love you, Scarlet. I do."

Damn him, I laughed too as my love for him spread in my chest. "I love you too."

And then he slid completely inside of me.

“
S
o
, before we get out of the car, you should probably know something.” I drummed my fingers on the top of the steering wheel and stared up at the traditional brick house in the West Mount Airy part of Philly that Scarlet and I had lived in for the last six months. “She’s not expecting you. She’ll love you, though. Don’t worry.”

He snuffed out air, pawing at the console. I turned toward him, grinning at his tongue lolling out of his big, blockish head. Scarlet might kill me. But then she’d look at the dog, at his adorable floppy ears and big black body with white patches and remember how fucking much I loved her, and forgive me instantly. I scratched underneath his jaw before I unhooked my seatbelt.

She was home, I knew that much. She didn’t have class on Tuesday afternoons. It was one of the days we always made sure to spend together. Tuesday was my day off during the season. Even though I was the backup QB for the Eagles, I still had to work my ass off in the weight room and on the field, helping prepare our team for the games on Sundays, and keeping myself sharp in case I was needed. And other than missing some time with Scarlet when we had away games, it was the coolest fucking thing to be part of an NFL team.

Scarlet had started at the University of Pennsylvania the same time I started training camp, but now that we were settled, I knew she needed something to care for. Besides babies, which we were not even remotely prepared for.

“You ready?” I asked Charger. He wiggled his butt against the passenger side door and leaned forward to lick up the length of my face. I hooked the leash to his collar with a smile on my face and got out of the car, motioning for him to hop over my seat. He did, sniffing the driveway furiously as soon as his paws hit the ground. His whip-like tail thumped against my leg, and I patted his muscular haunches. “All right, big guy, let’s go meet your momma.”

Charger was lunging forward, tugging on the leash in his excitement to make his way around. He was strong as shit too, around seventy pounds of tightly packed muscle. I unlocked the latch on the fence leading into our backyard and then let him go. As soon as I removed the leash and told him to explore, he ran, first making his way around the perimeter of the fence, then he stopped, wiggled at my feet and took off again.

While he was exploring, I jogged up the stairs on the deck and then quietly opened the door going into the kitchen. Scarlet had her back to me where she was looking in the fridge. I took a second to watch her. She’d just cut her hair, but it still fell past her shoulders, and when she had it up in a high ponytail like that, I could see the long, pale line of her neck. When I slid my hands around her waist, she jumped.

“Holy shit, Leo.” She turned and smacked my shoulder. “You scared the crap out of me!”

I dropped a quick kiss on her smiling mouth. “Sorry, babe. I came in the back.”

“Are you done with your errands?” Scarlet didn’t even let me answer before she kissed me again, sighing into my mouth when I slanted my head and licked my tongue across hers.

I made a noise of assent into her mouth, then dropped both hands to grip her ass, pulling her flush against me. She wiggled and wrapped her arms tightly around my shoulders.

“Do I dare ask what you were out doing?” she asked breathlessly when I finally let her pull away. “This is how you usually act when you come home after a winning game when you’ve been able to play a few snaps.”

I laughed, smoothing my hands up and down her back. She was right. Last year, my rookie season, our starting QB had taken a massive hit, so they sat him for a few series to make sure they were following concussion protocol.

The three snaps I’d taken, two run plays and one pass, had been enough to make me feel drunk after the game. The third play, a play action and then a pass to one of our rookie receivers who ran a fade route that got us a gain of about thirty yards, had been so damn beautiful that I almost cried.

That night, when I got home to a waiting Scarlet, I screwed her blind on the stairs just past the doorway, with her legs up over my shoulders.

“Maybe I’m just happy to see you.”

She quirked an eyebrow. “I suppose.” I was just about to say something when Charger started whining at the back door. Scarlet’s mouth popped open. “Is there a dog in the backyard?”

“Scarlet, come meet your present.” I herded her to the door, laughing at the shocked look on her face. But when she walked out behind me and caught a glimpse of Charger, she melted. She absolutely fucking melted.

“Oh, look at you,” she breathed, holding a hand out for him to sniff. Then he flopped against her legs, almost knocking her onto the grass and Scarlet laughed with delight. “You’re a strong boy.”

“His name is Charger. He’s eight months old, totally housebroken and knows his basic commands. He’s good with other dogs, hates cats, and apparently loves the kids at the foster home he was staying at for the last couple months.”

Scarlet kneeled down onto the grass and scratched Charger’s sleek black coat, then grinned up at me when he licked at her hand with a furious, slobbery tongue.

“He looks like maybe Lab and Pit? Is that right?”

“Yeah, that’s their best guess.”

“Leo,” she said on a breath, not taking her eyes off of Charger. “He’s so handsome.”

I rocked on my heels, almost knocked back at how happy this made me. Seeing her so delighted at the fact that he could shake and sit and roll over.

“You know, I was going to go the whole nine yards, tie a ring box to his collar.” Her hand movements stilled, but she didn’t look up at me yet.

“Were you now?”

Even though I didn’t have her eyes on me, I shrugged. “Somebody’s got to make an honest woman out of you. Eventually I’ll knock you up, and you better believe you’re gonna be my wife when that happens.”

Finally, she turned her face to me and gave me a blinding smile. “My dad already had a heart attack, and that was
before
he even knew about you. If he’s survived us living together for the last year, I think he’ll be okay. You don’t have to propose on his account.”

It wasn’t the first time I’d dropped a hint about how I was going to propose to her, and she always did that, brushed me off, maybe because she thought I was just playing. But I wasn’t. And the two carat solitaire in the Tiffany’s box that was hidden in my part of the closet wasn’t fuckin’ playing either. She’d find that out soon enough though, my little church girl.

Scarlet clapped when she realized Charger could play dead. Then she shook her head at me. “I cannot believe you got me a dog.”

“Can’t believe it like, I’m so thoughtful and sweet? Or you can’t believe I didn’t get your input?”

She rolled her eyes, but then cracked up when Charger practically bowled her over running circles around her. “Definitely some of the former. Maybe a smidge of the latter.”

When I joined them on the grass, Charger stretched out between us and his tail wagged with furious movements. I thumped a hand along his warm belly, peering at Scarlet out of the corner of my eye.

“I have a good reason, I swear.”

“Of that I have no doubt.”

“Charger, sit.” He whipped over onto his feet and plopped his butt down on the grass instantly. “Good boy,” I crooned, scratching his broad chest. “See, I figured that we’ve got this big fenced-in yard, so we can handle a larger dog. And you always tell me stories of black dogs that don’t get adopted because people think they look scary.”

“That’s very true.”

“So it made sense to me to get you a sweet dog that looks scary to protect you while your sweet boyfriend who’s actually very scary is out of town for away games.” I looked over at her. “It’ll make me feel better knowing he’s here with you when I can’t be.”

She leaned into me, and I wrapped an arm around her shoulder. “You think there are people who think you’re scary, Leo?”

I kissed the top of her head. “Oh sure. If not now, they will eventually. Someday we’re going to fill this nice house with mini Scarlets, and between me and Charger? They’ll be the least fucked-with kids to walk the planet.”

Scarlet lifted her head, and in the bright, dappled sunlight filtering through the oak trees, her brown eyes looked almost hazel. Then she smiled at me, tilting her chin up for a kiss.

I gave her one. I’d always give her one.