Total pages in book: 119
Estimated words: 116268 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 581(@200wpm)___ 465(@250wpm)___ 388(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 116268 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 581(@200wpm)___ 465(@250wpm)___ 388(@300wpm)
His rock-hard body screams closer and more. Bucking against me—damn.
Damn. This guy could fuck me all day. I grip the tiled edge and use my build to pin Maximoff to the corner. His head tilts back, arousal trying to turn his eyes. He groans with a sharp breath, “Fuck.”
I whisper rough in his ear, “Did you like that?” He responds with a hard kiss, his skilled tongue parting my lips. I massage his cock above his red knee-length Speedo, his erection growing beneath my palm.
Fuck, I’m throbbing. Beneath the water, lit by a soft blue pool light, he clasps my muscular waist—and he flips us. Pinning my shoulders to the corner.
His chiseled build pushes up against mine, and my hand roams the carved ridges of his abs.
Maximoff slows down, his breath deepening, and I watch him trace one of my tattoos with his fingers. Near my collarbone, a blood-red sparrow flies through the mast of a gray-scale ship.
He’s looking at me like I’m the treasured celebrity. As though I’m the most valuable one.
I skim the faint bruise on his sharpened cheekbone.
I hate seeing you hurt. And I’m not the only one. After the firecracker incident last week, all of his younger cousins and two of his siblings approached me at a family cookout. Behind Maximoff’s back.
Basically, they said, “Promise us you won’t let Moffy get hurt again.”
His brother added, “Or die.”
“He’s not going to die,” I said, assured of this. I still am.
“Then hurt,” they all said in unison.
“Promise us,” Audrey Cobalt, the youngest Cobalt of seven emphasized, a knife in her hand for a whole blood oath thing that I declined.
Eighteen times, I said, “I promise.” Until they believed me.
And I’ve never carried a promise like a burden, but here, now—remembering the pure, unconditional love those kids have for Maximoff, I feel the fucking need to at least caution him.
I run my hand down to his smooth jaw. “You need to be more careful.”
“I’m the same as I’ve always been.” His eyes dance over my mouth and cheeks. Maximoff has one arm out of the pool. And he uses his weight to cage me, keeping our shoulders above water. “So is this my bodyguard talking or my…?” He pauses.
“Wow.” My brows rise, a smile edging across my mouth. “He even can’t say what we are.”
“Are we…?” His chest rises in a bigger breath. Either he doesn’t want to say the word first or he’s not sure if it’s the “normal” time for labels.
I tilt my head. “Your virginity is showing.”
“Pretty sure I lost my virginity a long time ago.”
“Relationship virginity.”
In the water, his hand dips down my swim shorts, rubbing my bare ass. I bite down, my pulse hammering. I tuck him closer to my chest, even if he’s the one anchoring me to the corner.
“How long is a long time ago?” I ask him. It’s not public knowledge, and he hasn’t really told me yet.
Maximoff stares at my lips for a long moment.
I splash water at his face.
He lets go of the edge just to wipe the water. “Thank you for that.”
“Stop imagining your cock inside my mouth.”
He feigns confusion. “How’d you know?”
“Wild guess.”
His voice lowers to a deep whisper. “When did you have your first sexual experience with someone?” He needs me to answer first.
I don’t mind. “Thirteen. I was young, and I mistook you have a great ass for love.” Some people are into casual hookups or NSA sex, but that’s not my favorite thing. I prefer getting to know the person before or during or after for a while—and I can’t stand open relationships.
While you fuck me, you only fuck me.
His lips lift, but then they fall in deep contemplation, mulling over my words: I was young, and I mistook ‘you have a great ass’ for love. And then he asks, “How do you know that’s not happening now?”
My brows jump. “That’s assuming I’m in love with y—” I cut myself off, reading his stiff, rigid body language clearly. His features start padlocking. Shutting me out. No. No. “Hey, I’m fucking with you, Maximoff. I’m an asshole.” I clutch his impassive face. My stomach twists. It’s extremely hard for him to be vulnerable. I know this.
I shouldn’t have made that joke.
“It’s fine,” he says, his voice void of emotion. “I get it.”
“No you don’t.” And I tell him bluntly, assuredly, without a fucking doubt, “You’re my boyfriend. And from the jump-start, this has always been more than just sex.” Yeah, we wanted to fuck each other’s brains out, but for Maximoff to take this risk, it had to be more than what he can get at a nightclub.
His shoulders try to loosen, and he starts to smile, water dripping off our wet hair. “Boyfriends. Are you sure that’s what we are?”
“A hundred percent.” I pause. “Are you?”