Staking His Claim

She threw her head back on a sob and began to shake. Almost there. Come on, pretty baby. “Oh, Jesus…Matt…”

Just a little more, and she’d blow. “Lucy, if I wake you up at two a.m., dying to eat your pu**y, I want you to open your thighs and say yes, please, Matt. Do you understand me?”

“Yes, yes…oh.” He felt the telltale squeeze grip him and pushed hard into it, holding deep so he could feel her quake all around him. It was the closest to heaven he would ever get and he absorbed every shudder, every word. Eyes appearing blind in the dim light, she chanted things that made no sense, still pinned to the counter by his hips. “Matt.”

After a moment, the tension in her lessened slightly, but not completely. He was still hard enough inside her to break through steel. Seeing his woman rosy and satisfied in front of him shot a fresh surge of hot, pulsing adrenaline through Matt. Her chest rose and fell on gasping breaths when he twisted his hips, to let her know they weren’t finished. Oh no. We’re far from done. You’re going to get it again. She must have read his thoughts on his face because her lips parted on a breathy moan and she nodded.

She’s perfect for me. I want to be perfect for her. He released one of her legs and let it drop to his side, continuing to hold the other by the ankle. Keeping his eyes trained on her face, he moved it across his body, slowly turning her around so she faced the counter, remaining inside her the entire time. A sweat broke out on Matt’s forehead at the twisting sensation, the inside of her body stroking him sideways as she turned. By the time he had her completely shifted around, he’d gone a little insane.

He forced her up against the counter, unable to stop himself from sinking his teeth into her neck. Lucy tilted her head on a cry. “I’m going to f**k my little spinner now. She’s had it too easy so far.” With a hand on the back of her neck, he urged her facedown onto the cool surface, hands still secured behind her back with his belt. It put her ass on display for him and he had no choice but to slap that tempting flesh, once, twice, before surging into her. Her knees gave out, slamming into the cabinet beneath them as she screamed. “Feel that, Lucy? That’s as hard as it f**king gets.”

“More, please. Again.”

His vision blurred around the edges at her husky request. Never. He’d never had this part of him accepted before, countered so perfectly, and it felt like coming home. He wanted to shout at the rightness of it, but his body was begging to be relieved. Everything before now suddenly felt insignificant. This is where he belonged. She was where he belonged.

Matt reached down and gripped her shoulders as he rode her. His hips bucked against her hard, bringing him in and out of her with blissful friction. Their groans mingled with the sound of smacking flesh, sending him toward his peak quicker. With a final drive, he came with a roar, feeling as though his soul were expanding even as his body depleted. He fell on top of her, giving in to the compulsion to hold on to her. In fact, he couldn’t hold her tight enough. In his current state, the irrational fear slipped in that she could be taken away from him and he actually bared his teeth over the thought, tightening his grip.

“My Lucy,” he whispered fervently into her hair, kissing the fluttering pulse at her neck.

Words he’d had such a hard time coming by in the past swirled around his head now, bumping into one another at breakneck speed. They wanted to pour out of his mouth for Lucy to hear, but he determinedly kept them in check. He’d said enough for now. Bravely and beautifully, she’d accepted his need for control. Embraced it without question. He couldn’t ask her for more now. If she knew what he wanted with her, what he intended to have with her, she might get spooked. He needed to take it slow. More importantly, he needed to do this right.

That’s why first thing tomorrow, he was going to find his best friend and tell him the truth. He’d fallen in love with Brent’s sister and there wasn’t a goddamn thing in this world that could keep him from trying to make her love him back. His life, the happiness he’d never hoped for or expected, depended on keeping her. Her keeping him.

After kissing her hair one final time, Matt released her hands from the leather belt, cradling her against his chest and carrying her to the back bedroom. He wanted more than anything to lie down beside her and sleep, but he wouldn’t allow himself the privilege yet. Not until he’d done the honorable thing, thereby giving legitimacy to their relationship, even if relationship was a puny word to describe what they had.

They were connected.

Eyes closed, she snuggled into the pillow, already appearing half-asleep. Jesus, he could have stood there all night looking at her, reveling in the fact that he’d exhausted her energy.

“Matt?”

Lucy calling his name from bed, all rumpled curls and flushed cheeks. He tucked the memory of it away for later and leaned down to kiss her forehead.

“I’m going to go now, baby.”

“You are?” She sat up, holding the comforter over her br**sts. “Oh…I’ll let you out.”

“Stay here. Sleep.” Matt tugged the bedding back down and tried to communicate with his eyes what he wouldn’t allow himself to say out loud yet. When he finally slept with her in his arms, there wouldn’t be a hint of doubt or wrongness lying between them. “We can’t keep sneaking around like this. I need to do the right thing, Lucy.”

With a nod, she started to lie back down, then changed her mind and leaned up to kiss him. It wasn’t a see-you-later kiss. No, she obviously had something else in mind. She appealed to his dominant nature by letting her head fall back on her shoulders, so that he towered above her where she lay vulnerable in the bed. Her mouth parted on a sigh, tongue sliding into his mouth like an offering. Matt nearly lost his balance, her taste, her surrender had such influence over him. A split second before it became impossible for him to do anything but follow her down into the pillows and never leave, she eased back.

Matt took a final inhale of her scent. “I’ll be there tomorrow. At the bench.”

“You will?”

If he hadn’t gotten so lost in her, he might have spent more time scrutinizing the odd expression on her face, but all his focus went into leaving before he could no longer manage it.

He nodded, commanding himself to stand. “Bye, Lucy.”

She watched steadily him from the pillow. “Bye, Chuckles.”

Chapter Eighteen

Lucy sat on her grandparents’ bench in Central Park and stared across the green expanse of lawn that seemed to stretch for a mile, before disappearing into the trees. Absently, her fingers traced the carving of the familiar names inside a heart, just to the right of her thigh.

Virginia and Frankie Mason Until the World Stops Spinning.

Knowing five minutes from now would be the sixtieth anniversary of her grandfather’s proposal to her grandmother, she tried to muster a smile, but it withered and died on her face. Instead of commemorating the event, she felt like she was tainting it with her nervous energy. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes, trying to picture her grandmother in a fashionable hat, ankles crossed primly and sitting in that very spot. The man she’d been crazy about for months sat beside her with sweaty palms, an engagement ring burning a hole in his pocket. Lucy remembered the proposal story by heart and replayed it now, hoping it would serve to distract her from the uncertainty threatening to topple her over.