Dream of You

“Fuck,” he groaned, and then he was moving.

Not away, but standing, and then he was hovering over me, his other hand curving around my hip. He lifted me, and I wasn’t a small girl. I marveled in the act as he laid me on my back, his mouth never leaving mine. One elbow planted into the cushion of the couch beside my head, and he kept his body off mine even as the demand of his lips increased and the pleasure of his mouth moving over mine heightened.

I didn’t know a kiss could feel like this.

Like he was touching every part of me.

I clung to him, willing him to lower his body to mine so that I could feel his weight. A shiver worked its way across my skin as my fingers sifted through the soft brush of hair along the nape of his neck. He tasted decadent, a deep, rich maleness.

And when he lifted his mouth again, I whimpered from the loss. Actually, whimpered. “I like that sound,” he said in a rich, sensual voice. “Really fucking like it.”

Colton kissed me once more. “There’re a few things I want to get straight.”

“Does that require talking?”

His answering chuckle brushed my lips. “It does.” There was a pause as his mouth brushed the corner of my lips. “But I can multitask.”

“Thank God,” I whispered.

His body shook with another laugh and then his mouth was moving along the curve of my jaw. “You’re not pretty.”

My eyes flew open and widened. “Excuse me?”

“I don’t think you’re pretty.” His mouth found my pulse. “I think you’re fucking beautiful.”

“Oh.” I gasped as my hand curled around the straining bicep. A warmth grew in my chest.

“I thought you were beautiful damn near a decade ago.” The hot, wet lick against my pulse caused my back to arch. “With your dark hair and fair skin, you were like a living Snow White.” That mouth of his was on the move, coasting down my throat, scattering my thoughts. “I don’t have a type, Abby. I don’t go for just blondes or whatever.” With his other hand, he worked my shirt to the side, baring my shoulder. “Checkered?”

At first, I didn’t get what he was referencing, but then I felt his finger trailing the lacy strap of my bra. “I think checkered print is underrated.”

He laughed and then he pressed a kiss to the hollow of my throat. “And something else I want you to understand, Abby. You’re not average. You could never be average.”

My breath caught. “You barely know me.”

Blazing a trail of fiery little kisses across my collarbone, he dragged his hand down my side, over my waist, to the flare of my hip once more. “Nothing about you screams average. Never did. I know damn well that hasn’t changed.”

This had to be a dream.

His hand squeezed my hip as he coasted those lips all the way back to mine, kissing me slowly, deeply. Blue fire still burned in his eyes when his gaze met mine.

Then he slowly pressed down, the hardest part of him against the softest part of me. I gasped at the feel of the heavy bulge. Liquid heat pooled. A tempting warmth built inside of me, a raw fire. God, I hadn’t felt this way in…

“That’s what you do to me,” he said, nipping at my lip as he rocked his hips against mine. Desire darted through my veins. Goodness, he was—there were no words. “You get what I’m showing you?” he asked, lust hardening his words.

Part of me did. There was the other part that couldn’t comprehend his interest, and finally, another part that wanted to stop talking and start kissing again.

But that second part of me won out. “Where do you see this going?”

He didn’t answer immediately, and in that short space, reality kicked in. Maybe this wasn’t the best time to ask that question, but what were we doing? Last night had been the first time we’d talked in years and now we were kissing? Hell, we were doing more than kissing. I was flat on my back and he knew I was wearing a checkered print bra.

And I also now knew that all areas of his body were exceptionally well-proportioned; something in my wildest dreams I never thought I’d ever have personal knowledge of.

I thoroughly believed in insta-lust. Criminy, I’d experienced it several times at the gym, but I was never one to act on it. Or was I? I never really had the chance to do so. I’d never given myself the chance.

But this seemed so fast, because it was fast. Possibly record-breaking fast, but he, the guy I’d admired from afar for quite some time, thought I was beautiful. And he thought there wasn’t a single thing about me that screamed average.

My wry gaze flicked over his handsome face as the seconds ticked by. Uncertainty slammed into me. “Colton, I—”

His mouth silenced my words, but the softness of his kiss, the tenderness behind it, quelled the brimming disquiet. When he spoke, his nose grazed mine. “That’s a hard question to answer, but you know what I do know, Abby? Despite how you came back into my life last night, I was thrilled to see you. I came over this morning because I wanted to see you again and I didn’t want to wait for a better excuse. I’m impatient like that,” he added, and I felt his lips form a grin against mine. “And I kissed you and I am right where I am because I want you. I think you can feel that.”

“I can feel that,” I said, my voice throaty. There was no way I couldn’t feel that.

“And I think the way you kissed me back tells me you are right where you are because you want to be here.” He kissed me softly, stirring up the flutter into a crazy spiral. He lifted his head slightly and stared down at me. “I don’t know where this is going or what to expect, but I know what I want and I’m the type of guy that goes for it. Why would I wait getting that message across? It doesn’t feel like something that’s going to change in a week or a month.”

The type of guy who goes for it.

Was it really that simple? He wanted me, so he was going to go for it. Why waste the time? Could it really be that simple for me? Because I did want him. I wanted him so badly it was a physical ache. And why did I really need to even think about the future, where this could lead? We were both consenting adults, and there was no mistaking the fact that he was attracted to me. Could I pass this up?

Pass up the chance to feel again? To be alive?

Because that would be what I was doing if I listened to the tiny, annoying voices in the back of my head. In the hours spent here and there with Colton, I’d felt more than I had in the four years since Kevin passed on. The most I felt was through the words and stories I edited. Was there something wrong with wanting to feel alive again, for wanting more?