Growing and Kissing (4 page)

He just stood there. The sun behind him meant I couldn’t see his expression. “They’ve grown too big for the pots, so the roots are being strangled. You need bigger pots, like three times as big.” I nodded towards the stack of pots by my plants. “I have some spares. You’re welcome to them.”

He just stood there. I still couldn’t see his expression but I swore he was staring at me. With hate? Anger? I was painfully aware that he could jump down the ladder and be on me before I could get down the stairs. He could grab me....

Grab me...and do what? I could feel my heart hammering in my chest but there was something else, too, a giddy, fluttery feeling that left me light-headed.

He took a step towards me. Just a single step. And suddenly I was bolting down steps two at a time, and I didn’t stop until I’d reached the tenth floor and was safely back in my apartment.

***

“
Dirty Dancing?
” asked Kayley. “I’m fourteen, not eight.”

“You need to watch more wholesome movies,” I told her. “Be glad that there’s kissing.”

Kayley crossed her arms grumpily, but settled down to watch. Movie nights were one of our favorite traditions, even if it did mean a few compromises. I hadn’t been kidding about the
wholesome
thing, though. It felt like she was growing up too fast. Fifteen would be bad. Sixteen, seventeen—
urgh.
I remembered what a pain I was when I was that age and Kayley was way more of a party animal than I ever was.

Kayley was our parents’ “miracle child.” Complications after me meant my mom thought she couldn’t have any more children. Eight years later, out of the blue, Kayley comes along. The fact I was so much older meant that I was sort of a mom to her even before the accident.

Don’t think about that.

I tried to bury myself in the movie and that kept the memories at bay until I turned in. But alone in my bedroom, with Kayley’s soft snores coming through the wall, I lay awake and worried. We were close to broke. Kayley’s basic medical insurance would cover the blood tests but if it
was
some hormone thing that needed regular treatments we were going to start running up some big bills.

I lay there for a full hour, staring into the darkness with my brain working overtime. I needed to sleep. We had the follow-up appointment at the hospital and I had work in the afternoon.
Think of something pleasant.

Sean’s face swum into my mind.

No! Not him!
Sean was everything dark and forbidden. Dangerous, destructive, illegal…

...and hot as all hell.

What if he’s out there right now?
What if he was out in the hallway, standing in front of our front door?

Of course he’s not. He’s out at some bar with a blonde in his lap.

But what if he
was?
What if he
had
been looking at me in the elevator, and again on the rooftop? Being the object of his attention would scare the hell out of anyone...everyone knew that Sean O’Harra didn’t stop until he got what he wanted. But what if he wasn’t looking to beat someone up or wreck a business?

The darkness seemed to grow tighter and warmer around me as I thought of him
,
standing out there in the hallway in his tight jeans and tank top. Would he knock with his fist or with the tip of his hammer? Given the size of him, it would barely make a difference. I imagined it echoing through the apartment: a giant’s knock, the door rattling on its hinges.

No. A man like that...he wouldn’t knock at all.

I saw the door erupting inward, transformed into splinters and firewood. In my fantasy, Kayley winked out of existence and it was just me in the apartment, alone. I imagined jumping out of bed and running barefoot through the apartment, my green nightshirt flapping around my thighs. Running towards the danger, drawn to it.

He was already advancing towards me, the floor seeming to shake with each heavy footstep. He was so
big,
not just tall but wide-shouldered and broad-chested—he seemed to fill each doorway he passed through. A low coffee table was in his way and he simply crushed it underfoot, the glass shattering into a million tiny diamonds. His arms swung by his sides, the tan globes of his shoulders and biceps gleaming in the half-darkness. Part of me was pushing me towards him but another part was telling me to flee. A split-second’s hesitation, standing there open-mouthed and panting, and it was too late.

He had me.

He grabbed a fistful of my nightshirt and used that to lift me off the ground. The fabric pulled tight around my struggling body as he twisted his hand. He pushed me up against the cool plaster of the wall and the solid heat of his body made me twitch and tremble like some small helpless creature pinned by a bear. With every breath, my stomach brushed against his abs and I went weak as I felt the hard ridges there—God, he didn’t have an ounce of fat on him.

He still hadn’t spoken a word.

“What do you want?” I panted. Somewhere far away, I was in my bed, on my side, my hand trapped between my thighs, and I whispered the same words under my breath.

He didn’t answer. He just grabbed the hem of my nightshirt with his free hand and tugged it up: over my thighs, then up to my waist. Even in the room’s dim light, I could see from the tilt of his head that he was gazing straight between my legs. I felt the arm holding me tense as he saw my panties. They were just simple red cotton briefs, nothing sexy, certainly not made for seduction, but I saw that powerful chest rise as he drew in a long, shuddering breath, as if he could barely contain himself. It felt as if the cotton was burning away under his gaze, leaving me naked. I felt my nipples harden under my nightshirt and, since I wasn’t wearing a bra, I was painfully aware they were starting to jut out through the soft fabric, especially with it drawn tight across my breasts.

He was still holding me off the ground with one hand. The arm that extended up towards my panting body was as steady and solid as if it had been cast from iron—that was the most overwhelming thing, how
easily
he could toss me around. And with his fist twisted into my nightshirt like that, the soft mounds of my breasts brushed his knuckles each time I inhaled. Each tiny contact sent a new ripple of heat washing through me.

He tugged my nightshirt higher and the soft, pale skin of my stomach came into view. He snaked a hand over it and I gasped. His fingertips traced the line of my waist, then skimmed up, up, teasing at the nightshirt’s hem just below my breasts. I was breathing in big, desperate gulps, now, panic mixed with lust, the need to escape and the need to stay.

He was still looking down at my groin, and the intensity of his stare was making me twist and melt inside, a heat like I’d never felt building fast. I realized I was unconsciously grinding my ass against the wall and tried to stop. I couldn’t.

Then his eyes flicked up to meet mine. “What do
you
want, Louise?” In the half-darkness, every detail of his voice stood out. Half Ireland, half California, rich amber liquor over sharp-edged blocks of ice. He leaned in towards me and his pecs pressed against the softness of my breasts. Even through the fabric, I knew he must be able to feel my nipples. He said it again, his accent making the words buzz through my body. “What do you want?”

I swallowed and tried to speak, but I couldn’t. The heat was making my mind cloudy: a thick, spinning fog where the hard press of him against me competed with my need to be sensible, to be safe, and to be
good.
Every passing second made it spin faster, everything becoming a blur.

Something pressed between my knees: his leg, the denim rasping against my bare skin. God, he was so hard, so solid, the heat of him throbbing into me. I thought of those muscled thighs spreading mine, that long, thick cock inside me, and I made a half-hearted attempt to twist away because I knew this was wrong. But that only made my groin stroke along the taut hardness of his thigh. Bolts of pleasure shot up inside me. He groaned and I bit my lip, barely managing to stop my own throaty moan.

“What do you want?” he asked for the third time. I knew he wouldn’t ask a fourth.

This is crazy. I’m up against the wall of my living room. I don’t even know him. He’s a criminal. I can’t do this.
I opened my mouth and said, “Stop. Let me go.”

Except it came out as,
“You.”

My eyes went wide and my mouth fell open as I realized what I’d said. I saw those cobalt-blue eyes gleam in the darkness and narrow in lust. Then his mouth was coming towards mine and I wanted to yell, “
Stop! No! I made a mistake! I’m not like this!”

But I barely had time to draw a breath before our lips touched. Then we were kissing and any sane thought in my head was vaporized.

I’d never been kissed like that before. It was a moving, twisting, panting epic with full orchestra that made every kiss I’d had until that night seem like a shonky rehearsal. It wasn’t something we
did;
it was something we
had to do,
as if neither of us could survive unless we kissed each other right then.

I’d never felt so delicate, so insubstantial, as when I first felt Sean’s kiss. I was as light as a breeze blowing between the trees of a forest and he was heavy darkness and heat, a creature born of lava and brimstone, scorching me with every touch, making the air shimmer and ripple. We whipped around each other, twisting together, good and bad, air and earth.

My head pressed back against the wall, my mouth suddenly feeling so soft next to his insistently searching lips. Every touch of him sent fresh ribbons of heat twisting down towards my groin, every breath coming faster and faster until both of us were panting, desperate for air but even more desperate to stay in contact. His tongue stroked at the join of my lips and then my mouth was flowering open under him, welcoming him in. I knew that any protest I could make would be exposed as a lie because he could
feel
how much I wanted him.

His tongue explored me, seeking me out. At first, as we twisted and panted, I just let him take the lead, going submissive, letting him invade my softness and relishing it. But every time the tip of his tongue caressed mine, it sent a jolt of heat down through me that turned to trembling, maddening need. I sought him out: tentatively at first, but every play of our tongues together felt so good I couldn’t stop. I heard him growl as he felt me come alive.

Kissing him back wasn’t enough, though. Not enough contact, not enough of
him.
I grabbed for him blindly, finding his muscled shoulders and going weak at the muscled bulk of them, then sliding my hands up his neck. My fingertips slid over the sandpaper fuzz at the back of his neck and buried themselves in his thick, black hair.

The kiss was still moving and changing. The only sounds in the room now were the rustle of our clothes and my soft gasps of need every time our lips parted. My mind felt like it was lifting, separating from my body, and rising up to the ceiling, leaving all my worries far below. It was hot, but it was more than that: it was floaty and magical, like that first kiss when you’re a teenager, the one you’ve been anticipating for years. I hadn’t known kissing could feel like that, as a grown up.

And then I felt the fabric of my nightshirt hauled up, my nipples catching for a second on the hem before my breasts bobbed free. The shock of air against them made me gasp and a thin thread of sanity tugged on my floating mind.
This is where you’re meant to tell him to stop.

He broke the kiss—only so that he could start kissing down my jaw and throat, but it left my mouth free. I opened my mouth to say,
“Okay, enough. Wait. This is too fast.”

But his lips felt as though they were on fire and the winding trail he was following might as well have been drawn in gunpowder. I knew exactly where it would end and the anticipation was making my whole body twitch and writhe.
Wait! What am I doing? I don’t do stuff like this!

His lips grazed the soft skin of my upper breast and I caught my breath. They glided down, ever so slowly, and I arched my back helplessly. My eyes half-opened, heavy-lidded with lust, and I watched, transfixed, as he came closer and closer to my aching nipple. A hot, moist breath from his mouth and then—

I cried out as he took me into his mouth, closing his lips around my nipple and then lashing it with his tongue. I squeezed my eyes shut as the heat rocketed up inside, thrashing my head from side to side to release the pressure. He kept up a steady, insistent stroke: left then right, back and forth. I squeezed my thighs together, locking his thigh between mine and grinding against him. The heat was like a furnace now, burning me up from the inside out, leaving no room for thought.

Just as I thought it couldn’t get any better, he opened his mouth wider, taking more of me inside and enveloping me in hot, sucking wetness. He began to nibble at me with his teeth: first with his lips as padding and then, gently, without. The edge of pain was like liquid silver on top of the molten heat. I gasped and stiffened. My ankles crossed and my feet twisting against each other. I could hear the blood rushing in my ears, my orgasm swelling inside me, filling every part of me—