Before I Let Go, page 26
His hand coasts from my breasts and down my stomach to rest between my legs, touching me through drenched panties. Our eyes lock and he presses his thumb to my clit, nudges aside the silk and flattens his hand against me. As his eyes burn into mine, fiercely possessive, he cups my pussy.
“This is mine tonight, Yas.” His voice is half growl, half groan.
No one has touched me there since he last did and doing this with another man has not seriously occurred to me. He wouldn’t believe it, looking down at me with his doubts hovering just beyond his desire. He sees the woman who sent him away. He wouldn’t understand how my body has felt hollow since the last time he was inside of me. That I miss him so much, sometimes I wear his shoes to feel close to him. That at night, alone in my bed, I hear echoes in our room of him gasping my name like he did all the times he lost himself in my arms. He wouldn’t understand that, so I just nod my agreement. Tonight I’m his.
My breath quickens when he slides the underwear down and off. He turns me so my legs hang over the side of the bed and goes down on his knees. I stare at the top of his head, the deep waves of his hair and the strong line of his shoulders. He leans down to kiss the skin inside one thigh, repeating the intimate gesture on the other, before lifting my legs and resting my heels on the mattress. This position exposes me completely and my knees drop together with involuntary modesty.
“Open,” he says, pushing them apart. “I want to see you. I’ve thought about this pussy so many times.”
He runs a knuckle between the lips, brushing my clit, stealing my breath and making the muscles in my legs go tight. He dips his head, drawing a deep breath through his nose.
“God, yes,” he rasps and lowers his mouth to me.
I writhe under the assault of lips and tongue and teeth. He grips my hips, dragging me closer and holding me in place for his mouth. The deep rumble of his groan vibrates through the center of my body and I’m head-to-toe shaking, on the verge of shattering. When he adds one finger, two, three, all the while sucking on me and licking at me like he’s afraid to miss one drop, my hands claw at his hair. I can’t help it. I push his head, his mouth deeper into the vee of my thighs. Shameless, I grip my knees, pressing them wider, holding myself open for him as my hips buck and my chest heaves. I come like crashing waves, wet and hard, drowning every rational thought.
“Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, God.” It’s a chant, a prayer, a litany that falls from my lips over and over as my head tosses back and forth on the bed. The orgasm clenches the muscles in my stomach, in my legs. My toes curl and I fist the sheets. He runs his fingers over my pussy, locking his eyes with mine. We both hear how wet I sound, and he licks his fingers clean as I slowly come back to myself.
I’m still a trembling mess when he gently turns me back onto the bed. My mouth is slack and my eyes are hungry as I watch him strip. He jerks the sweatshirt over his head, revealing a slab of muscled abs and precisely cut biceps. I’ve always loved his chest, the pecs carved and smooth, his nipples dark discs in the rich brown of his skin. His pants and briefs follow, and I literally lick my lips. I want him in my mouth. I had always been squeamish about blow jobs, much to former boyfriends’ dismay, but from the first time I wrapped my lips around Josiah, I loved it and gave him head eagerly and often.
“Don’t look at me like that,” he says with a rueful chuckle and climbs onto the bed. “I promise I wouldn’t last long in your mouth.”
I almost say, “Next time then,” but remember there will be no next time. Only tonight. The desire to have him inside of me right now, fast and hard, wars with the need to slow everything down so I can savor this one-night reprieve.
He puts on a condom, and I almost laugh and ask him why. We haven’t used condoms since our early dating days. I was always trying to get pregnant, or definitely not trying and on birth control. That was in a monogamous relationship founded on complete trust. We aren’t that anymore. We’re both…single. He was in a relationship with another woman and can’t assume I haven’t been with anyone else.
When he settles between my legs, I expect him to thrust inside, but he dusts kisses over my jaw, down the curve of my neck and opens his mouth on my nipple in greedy suction. I clutch his head to me, tangling our legs while he worships my breasts. He braces his weight on his elbows, and I reach between us to take him in my hand. I stroke, at first slow, and then fast, tightening and loosening my grip. He releases a harsh breath, dropping his forehead to mine.
“You better stop,” he says. “Unless you want me to come all over you.”
With a wicked smile up at him, I guide him inside. I’m not prepared for this moment, the reunion of our bodies after so long. Every part of me gasps at the feel of him. Not just my body, but my soul clicks with his again. His fingers play over me like tumblers on a safe and I open for him. Only ever for him this way. He goes still, and instead of moving, lowers his head to kiss me. He’s hard, but the kiss is so soft, my eyes water. I caress his shoulders, his back, his ass, rediscovering the ways he’s always been beautiful and noting how he’s changed. He’s as big and hard as I remember. The fit is just as tight and if possible, more perfect. My body moans a welcome as he starts to move.
“Fuck, Yas,” he groans into my hair and grips my thigh, bringing my knee up to bracket his hip. “This don’t make no sense.”
I love how his voice, his language, roughens during sex. The completely controlled, always polished front collapses when he loses himself in me. I stifle a whimper when he hits the spot that always makes my eyes roll back in my head. He doesn’t have to fumble or search or guess. His body knows mine. Our skin, our hands, our breaths find a familiar rhythm that is as exciting as the first time. He pounds into me, our grunts and groans mingling as the bed moves and the headboard bangs into the wall. I close my eyes and give myself over to the primitive dance of our bodies and the feral sounds we make as we take and take and take and give and give and give until he reaches between us, stroking my clit so I come again before he does. He drops his head, kissing our temples together, one hand braced above on the wall behind us, the other gripping my thigh.
“Baby.” It rushes out of him on a long breath as he tenses over me.
I go still at the endearment he probably didn’t even notice slipped. I want his body, but I yearn for this intimacy, his affection, just as much. Clutching him close, I map the muscled terrain of his back with desperate hands. I suck at the taut skin of his throat, sink my teeth into his shoulder, clench around him reflexively as he lets go.
My heart pounds so hard, I swear I should hear it, but the only sound in the room is our ragged breaths. It is the quiet shock that follows an earth-shattering event. We watch each other mutely as all the pieces fall around us, reordering the world as I had come to know it.
In the middle of the night I awake with his strong arm holding me from behind, his grip possessive, his hands wandering. He cups my face in one large palm, his thumb brushing over my cheek, eyes blazing in the lamplight, and he kisses me. We said once, but he fucks me again, and it’s even better the second time. It is slower and more tender and more heartbreaking because I know this time…it is the last.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Yasmen
Mom, what’s for dinner?” Kassim asks, peering through the French doors of my office.
I glance up from an email from Harrington’s boosters about new uniforms for the band. You wouldn’t catch Deja dead in a band uniform, but Kassim keeps threatening to take up trombone, so I may get involved.
“What’s for dinner?” I lean back in my chair and tease him with a smile. “Why am I the only one in this house cooking all the time?”
Kassim looks abashed, his eyes going wide and his mouth dropping open a little. “Um…well…’cause I can’t cook?”
“You telling me you can assemble a robot from scratch, but you can’t follow a simple recipe?”
His brows lower, furrow. If something is “simple,” Kassim assumes he should be able to do it.
“Maybe spaghetti?” His voice evens and his shoulders square with determined confidence.
Today, spaghetti. Tomorrow, the world.
“I already ordered Indian.” His features relax with what looks like relief and I laugh. “But thanks for the offer.”
My cell phone rings on the desk, and Mark’s contact flashes up at me on-screen. I frown, tempted to ignore the call. We were never exclusive or serious. I was completely honest with him about that, but it still feels wrong talking to him when I can’t move without long-unused “screwing” muscles aching from my night with Josiah. That man still puts it down. I’ve been shoving away memories…okay fantasies…spawned by that night in Charlotte ever since he dropped me off from the airport yesterday and headed home.
“You gonna get that?” Kassim asks, flopping into the chair across from my desk and pulling out his phone.
“I guess privacy’s too much for a mother to expect,” I mutter, knowing he’s oblivious.
I grab the phone on the fourth ring. “Mark, hey.”
“Yasmen.” A pleased note runs through his voice. “Glad I got you. Thought for a minute it was gonna roll into voice mail.”
“Sorry. I was…” I glance at Kassim, engrossed in his game. “Busy. How are you?”
“Good. I’ve missed you.”
I’m not sure how to respond to that in a way that is honest and also not hurtful.
“That’s so sweet.” I wince at my not-exactly-enthusiastic reply. “It’s good to be home. What’s up?”
“I wondered if you’ve got your Christmas tree yet?”
“Christmas tree?”
I regret the words as soon as they leave my mouth. Kassim’s eager eyes flash up to meet mine. We’d usually have our tree up by now, even though Thanksgiving was only days ago.
“My family owns a tree farm,” Mark says. “That lot off the square that sells trees all month? That’s my dad’s.”
“Oh, those are the best trees in Skyland.”
“That’s what the sign says,” he chuckles. “I just grabbed a great one from the lot. I could bring it by if you wanna take a look.”
Kassim’s stare has been fixed on me since “tree.” He and Deja love Christmas, and I did have getting the tree on my list for this week.
“If you don’t like it,” Mark continues, “I’ll just take it to my sister. She’s a single mom of four and works full time. Knowing her, she hasn’t thought of a tree yet.”
“Why not just take it to her then?” I ask, keeping my tone light.
“Because I’d like to see you, and this seemed as good an excuse as any.”
It’s just a tree, but when he puts it like that…
“Oh…okay.” I agree after a beat of silence. “Why not?”
“And maybe we could grab dinner after the tree’s up? Or a drink?”
“Um…it’s a school night and my kids—”
“Right. Sorry. I wasn’t thinking. I can just drop off the tree then.”
The man is bringing me a tree.
“I ordered takeout,” I force myself to offer. “You’re welcome to stay for dinner.”
“You sure?” he asks, but I hear his yes poised and waiting.
“Of course. I hope you like Indian.”
“I hope you like this tree.”
Thirty minutes later, Mark stands on my front porch with one of the biggest Christmas trees I’ve ever seen.
“You weren’t kidding.” I laugh, my gaze climbing the branches to the top. “It’s massive and beautiful.”
“Is this our tree?” Kassim asks, poking his head from behind me to the porch. “Whoa!”
“If you want it.” Mark raises querying brows at me.
“Yes!” Kassim shouts before I can confirm.
“Of course, we want it.” I step back so Mark can come in and maneuver the tree with him.
I’d already set the base up in the family room in front of the window we use each Christmas. Mark makes quick work of getting the tree in the stand and upright, its branches brushing the ceiling.
“Day!” Kassim bellows from the base of the stairs. “Come see our tree!”
At the top of the landing, the door to Deja’s room opens and she sticks her head out. Half her hair is loose and held in clips on one side. The other half is in braids. Blue this week.
“What tree?” she asks, her eyes settling briefly on me before shifting to Mark behind me in the foyer. “Hey, Mr. Lancaster.”
Her tone is studiously polite considering she mocks him as “the goofy guy with the signs” any time he’s mentioned.
He returns her greeting with a smile, and an awkward silence settles over the four of us. The sound of the doorbell saves the situation from getting even more weird.
“Food’s here.” I rush over to the door and take the bags of savory-smelling food from the delivery man.
“I guess I should get going,” Mark says, his eyes drifting up the staircase to Deja’s face set in lines of careful impassivity.
“No, stay.” I tilt my head toward the kitchen. “I told you we’d love to have you for dinner. It’s the least we can do after you brought us that amazing tree.”
“They make the best butter chicken,” Kassim tells him.
“Did we get chicken masala?” Deja asks, fully emerging from her room and coming down the stairs.
“Yeah.” I hand her the bag. “You guys get started.”
With a quick look between Mark and me, she takes the bag, bumping Kassim with her shoulder. “Come on, freak.”
He practically skips around the corner to the kitchen ahead of her.
Boy loves him some butter chicken.
“Like I said, we’ve got plenty,” I tell Mark and slide my hands into the back pockets of my boyfriend jeans.
“I’d love to stay.” He steps closer, glancing in the direction my kids just took. “There’s only one thing I’d love more.”
He leans down to press his lips to mine, and I freeze. We’ve had a few dates. A few kisses, and though I haven’t exactly burned with passion, it was fine. Pleasant. This isn’t pleasant. After the night I spent with Josiah, this feels like a betrayal. I know how stupid that is because Josiah warned me it would never happen again. We would never happen again. And yet…Mark’s mouth presses more firmly to mine, seeking something I can’t give. Not now.
“Mark,” I mumble into the kiss and pull back. “I…no.”
His brows gather into a confused frown. “I was hoping—”
“I don’t think we should see each other again. At least, not like…that.” I lower my gaze to the small patch of hardwood floor between our feet before forcing myself to look him in the eyes again. “You’re great. You really are, but I’m not ready even for a casual situation.”
“I see.” Understanding clears the frown from his face but clouds his eyes. “Is it that I’m not the one or that he still is?”
A grin-grimace is all I can manage, his insight and straightforward question taking me by surprise. “I guess both?”
A wry grin pulls up one corner of his mouth. “You did warn me that I was first at bat, huh? Not the first time I’ve struck out. Won’t be the last.”
I search his blue eyes—intelligent and kind in his classically handsome face. He’s successful, ambitious, principled. Maybe one day I’ll regret letting a guy like him get away, but the kisses, the touches, the whispers in the dark I shared with Josiah are too fresh. My feelings for him too visceral, for me to consider anyone else right now. Apparently I need to put down these feelings for my ex before I cultivate any for someone else.
“You, Mark Lancaster,” I say, taking his hand in both of mine, “are someone’s home run.”
He nods, bending to drop a quick kiss on my head and turning to the front door. I follow, standing on the porch as he takes the steps down and heads for the Tesla in my driveway.
“Oh, and, Mark!” I call, causing him to turn just as he opens his car door. There’s disappointment and acceptance in his expression as he waits for my parting words.
“You’ve got my vote.”
A slow smile works its way onto his face. He gives me a jaunty salute, climbs into the car, and drives away.
“Mr. Lancaster didn’t want to stay for dinner?”
I turn to find Deja standing in the foyer studying me, a LaCroix in one hand, curiosity scribbled on her pretty face. Arms folded against the chill, I go inside and close the door behind me.
“No, it was time for him to go.” Sniffing the air, I walk past her toward the kitchen. “Let’s eat.”
Chapter Thirty
Josiah
How was school?” I ask Kassim as we pull out of Harrington’s parking lot.
“Good.” He turns around to pet Otis, who lounges in the back seat, before pulling out his phone. I know he’s going straight for Roblox.
“Hey. Talk to me for a minute before you get lost in that game.”
He lays the phone in his lap. “Yes, sir.”
“How’s class been? You’re not getting bored?”
“Ms. Halstead has been giving me some extra stuff to do. Like, different from the rest of the class.”
“And how do you feel about that?”
Damn. I sound like a therapist. Dr. Musa would be pleased to know he’s rubbing off on me.
Kassim shrugs. “It’s okay. Some of the kids tease me, like I think I’m so smart.”
“You are so smart.”
“I don’t want to rub it in, though.”
“Good. Don’t be that guy. You’re not better than anyone else. Ms. Halstead just recognizes you need more of a challenge than the classwork was offering. She sees your potential and wants to make sure we’re doing all we can to fulfill it.”
“Yeah. Jamal says it’s kinda cool that I do stuff nobody else can do yet, and that I might get to skip a grade, as long as we can still hang out and play Madden and stuff.”
