17
IAN HAD SAID he’d make her legs give out, and Kelsey shouldn’t have doubted him. The man wasn’t making idle boasts. She swayed on her feet, clutching him around the neck to keep upright. What in the world was going on here? The things he did to her body, the noises he elicited from her throat—she hadn’t thought people could actually do those things to one another. She’d certainly never thought her brain could shut down the way it did when Ian touched her. After the way Anthony had messed with her head, it seemed like it ought to be impossible for her to relax so much. But she hadn’t worried once about being with Ian like this, just as Ian didn’t seem to be worrying about her dog in the next room.
Ian pressed a kiss against her stomach as her trembling slowed down. “Ready for the sofa?”
There ought to be nothing left of her, but looking down at him, Kelsey was surprised to discover she was more than ready. Ian’s eyes twinkled and his lips turned upward in what should have been an utterly smug expression. Instead, Kelsey found it charming and sexy as hell.
“Always ready.” She kicked her jeans off the rest of the way as Ian carried her over to the couch, also exactly as he’d promised. Setting her down on the arm, he kissed her again. His mouth was delicious but not enough, and she tugged on his shirt. “You’re wearing too many clothes.”
“My apologies.” Ian tossed off his shirt, and there, that was better.
Kelsey was glad he hadn’t taken offense at being called pretty, because he really was like a perfect statue brought to life. Perhaps there was a better word for him—and perhaps, as a writer, she should be able to think of it—but when she was looking at him, her words failed her.
Ian stepped out of his pants, and that was better still. Even his cock was perfect. Kelsey had never thought of male genitalia as being attractive, but his might be the exception. He was hard as a marble statue, too, as she wrapped her hand around him.
Ian closed his eyes and sucked in a breath. “You’d better be careful with that.”
“Or what?” She lowered her head and took the tip of him in her mouth. She never had gotten the chance to do this last time, but she’d wasted enough hours thinking about it. His skin tasted good and salty, and she was enjoying herself too much to worry about whether she was doing this right. The noises coming from Ian’s throat sure made it sound like she was doing well enough.
“Condom.” Ian pulled away and began going through his jeans.
Too amused by this to protest, Kelsey leaned back against the couch arm. “If you don’t have one, I’m going to be most upset.”
“Oh, I have one. I shouldn’t, because I shouldn’t have a need for one, but I did bring one.”
“How presumptuous.” How adorably insufferable.
“More like hopeful. Or maybe terrible, since we aren’t supposed to be doing this.”
No, they shouldn’t be doing this, but at the moment, Kelsey couldn’t remember why. She could reproach herself later when her brain was functioning again. “It’s for your therapy.”
“This is probably the sort of behavior that makes therapists lose their licenses.”
“Good thing I’m not actually a therapist.”
Ian rolled on the condom and kissed her hard, backing her into the couch, and Kelsey dug her fingers into his sides, holding on to stay upright. “A very good thing,” he agreed. “Turn around.”
Kelsey raised an eyebrow and turned her back on him. Warm arms wrapped around her as Ian slid between her legs, and whoa. As much as she didn’t like not being able to see him, being bundled in Ian’s long, strong limbs was pretty nice too. And when he kissed her neck and buried his face against her from behind, it might even be as good as being able to watch him. He moved slowly at first, the pressure building up inside her until she was gasping for breath.
“Good?” Ian raised one hand so that his fingers could toy with her breast, and Kelsey closed her eyes with pleasure.
It didn’t matter that she couldn’t see him. She could feel him so much—inside, outside. She was drowning in him, high on the scent of his skin. “God, yes. More.”
She could feel his other hand slip down, and Ian’s fingers pressed between her legs, seeking out her most sensitive skin. Pleasure, so strong it ripped a scream from her throat, almost overtook her. It was too much more. It was perfection.
She came a few seconds later, Ian’s fingers moving in rhythm with the rest of him. She caught her breath, listening to him cry out, feeling his body convulse against hers soon after. She still wished she could have watched him, but the heft of him against her back, the way he squeezed her almost painfully tight, was bliss too.
Shit, shit. Shit. They weren’t supposed to do this a third time—or a fourth or more—but now all she was going to be able to do was contemplate other positions for sex with Ian. Sometimes having a potent imagination was a curse.
PULLING OUT OF Kelsey sucked as much the second time as it had the first. And this time, Ian was aware that they had an audience. Juliet was in the kitchen, stretched out on the tile floor, eyes barely open. Ian wondered if they’d woken her from her post-dinner snooze.
He also wondered how he’d managed to completely forget that she was there, probably no more than twenty feet away the entire time. Her leash could have gotten loose.
If it had, he wasn’t sure he’d have noticed. And if he had noticed, he wasn’t sure he’d have stopped with Kelsey. Apparently, his lust was stronger than his fear. Was that good or bad?
Also, was it any kind of lust, or did Kelsey simply arouse him more than his anxiety could bring him down? Oy. He hoped it wasn’t that, because if this was all Kelsey . . . Ian shook himself mentally. No, he didn’t have time for that. Besides, they agreed this wouldn’t happen again.
Of course, they’d agreed that last time, too, and as he tore his gaze away from the dog and focused it back on the far more appealing woman next to him, Ian doubted his willpower. A naked, flushed Kelsey with red, swollen lips and skin shiny with their combined sweat was one hell of an aphrodisiac. He already wanted her again.
Kelsey seemed to notice Juliet as she was pulling on her underwear, and she cast him a questioning glance.
Ian did his best to ignore these heavy thoughts by offering her a light smile. “Told you I could last.”
“Impressive. There might be hope for you yet.”
There might be. But dinner was cooling off on the kitchen table, and Ian was far less certain about getting through it without his cock seizing control of the situation a second time.
Ten minutes later, though, Kelsey had reheated their dinners and brought them into the living room. Since the original plan had been for Ian to eat and watch a movie with Juliet nearby, they were combining those two activities. Kelsey said it was because they’d spent too much time doing unapproved and unexpected things, but Ian wondered if it was because she thought they were less likely to use the couch for sex again if they had dinner on it. If so, he was fine with that. It was smart. Disappointing as well, but he had to stick to the no-more-sex-with-Kelsey plan as well as he’d stuck to the how-I-want-to-bang-Kelsey plan. For some reason, the former seemed like it was going to be way more difficult.
“Movie?” Kelsey turned on the TV.
Juliet had crept into the living room while Ian got dressed, but as long as she kept to Kelsey’s side of the couch, he wasn’t too antsy about it.
“Sure.” Ian watched her pop a fry in her mouth and couldn’t stop from remembering how she’d taken him into her mouth. He might get over his dog issue thanks to her, but he was going to need a Kelsey intervention next. “Something with explosions.”
Kelsey groaned. “Of course you’d want that. How about something with a story?”
Ian actually didn’t care too much about what they watched, but he did need something compelling enough to keep his eyes on the screen and not on the woman next to him.
Or her dog. Funny that the dog was an afterthought.
“String enough explosions together and you have a story,” he said.
“Seriously?”
“Just because you write romance . . .” Ian wasn’t sure where he was going with that, but it didn’t matter, because Kelsey smacked him with a throw pillow. “All right, that’s what we need—a compromise.”
Kelsey turned to Juliet, who was gnawing on something that might have been a bone. “Men. You know what it’s like, don’t you, girl? We both have two brothers.” She ruffled the dog’s head, and Juliet barked once in solidarity.
“Here we go, the perfect compromise.” Ian had been scrolling through the movies available on Kelsey’s streaming service.
Kelsey glared at him. “Terminator? Isn’t that an old Arnold movie?”
“It’s a classic. Have you really never seen it?”
“Before my time, and I don’t go seeking out old movies about killer robots, and before you ask—I haven’t seen the more recent ones either. I like movies with plots, and they get bonus points if the people in them are dressed in uncomfortable-looking, historical costumes.”
Terminator was before his time too. Ian wasn’t sure exactly how old Kelsey was, but he couldn’t be much older than her. He did, however, go seeking out classic movies about killer robots. And tended to avoid those with historical costumes.
“Yes, Arnold is in it, and so are killer robots.” He held up a finger to cut her off. “But so is Linda Hamilton. You will like Linda Hamilton. Trust me. Especially when we watch T2.”
Ian could totally see Kelsey becoming Linda Hamilton’s badass character if the situation ever called for it. She was secretly kind and caring, but she also had the take-no-prisoners attitude down flat. Any woman who bought him—a guy she supposedly disliked—a snowbrush for no good reason would totally threaten to kill a man with a pen if he stood between her and someone she loved. In fact, if he had to place bets on the winner between Kelsey and a killer robot, he’d probably go with Kelsey.
“We’ll see about that.” Kelsey grumbled something, but selected the movie. “And I never agreed to a sequel.”
“We’ll consider it for my next dog therapy session.”
“You’re being so presumptuous again.” She was smiling as she said it, and a strange little ache awakened in Ian’s chest.
He liked seeing her smile that way far too much.