“Fuuuck, Logan—”
“Atta girl,” I rasp, pressing in slowly until she cries out, body jerking. “Ride my cock with my thumb in your ass and my name on your back.” My grip on her hip tightens as I thrust up into her. “Want you to come all over me.”
Her answer is a moaning sob, her body clenching tighter, moving frantically to chase it.
“Say it,” I demand, voice raw. “Say you’re mine.”
“I’m yours, all—oh god, yours!”
“That’s right, Lu.” I thrust up hard and crook my thumb deep. “Come for me. Let the whole street hear it.”
She breaks with a scream, shattering around me, her body pulsing so hard it drags me under with her. My release rips through me, spilling into her, and I hold her steady, watching my name ripple across her back.
We collapse in a heap, sweaty and shaking, and still tangled together.
Her laugh is ragged as she slips off and turns, falling breathlessly against my chest. “Guess this counts as you being neighborly, huh?”
I grin into her damp hair. “This is the only kind of neighborly I’m interested in with you.”
For a moment, it’s only the sound of our breathing, the thud of our hearts still racing. Her eyes blink up at me, glassy and bright, and something in my chest twists. I brush her hair back from her face, knuckles lingering at her temple, then skim my hand down her cheek until she leans into it.
She swallows, letting her eyes trace over me. Fuck, she’s beautiful. The kind of beautiful that looks like a fairytale from the outside, except she’s the princess and the dragon and the knight. Fire and fight and grace in one. The whole goddamn story. And I’m already certain I want to spend my life inside every page.
My hand tightens on the jersey at her hip. “You wore this for me.” My voice comes out rough. “Not for a joke, not for them. For me.”
Her lips part, a shaky breath escaping. “Of course I did. Who else would it be for?”
The words hit like a punch, simple and devastating.
“Nobody’s done that for me before.”
“Well,” she whispers, smile trembling. “I’ll be your nobody, then.”
I don’t think. I just grab her, clutching the jersey at her back and hauling her closer to me. My mouth finds hers, not desperate this time, but slow. Certain. Needing her to feel exactly what she just gave me.
She sighs into me, fingers sliding into my hair, anchoring me there. I want to live in these seconds between us—her breath warm, lips soft, heartbeat slamming against mine. It feels messy and too much and exactly right.
When I finally draw back, I keep her face in my hands, my voice stripped bare.
“You’re not my nobody, Lulu. You’re my everything.”
Chapter twenty-seven
It’d just be like we never existed
Lulu
By the time I hit the top of the hill, my lungs are burning, and my thighs hate me. Dusty doesn’t notice, of course. He bolts ahead, then circles back just to remind me he’s lapped me twice.
“Show off,” I mutter, dropping into the grass. He flops beside me with a satisfied groan, rolling onto his back and kicking his paws skyward.
The clearing stretches wide and quiet, Sloan’s Lake glinting in the distance, the faint lights of the city blinking as Denver starts to wake for the day.
Halloween was barely a week ago. The fog machine smoke has finally cleared off Birch, but not Betty’s memory of “DaddyRat,” whom she keeps asking me to invite over for a round of Betty Boopers. I’ve explained they’re on the road again. Not that Hutch would attend a Betty Porch Party even if they weren’t, but she appears to have selective hearing.
Which means Logan’s been gone for three games straight, and I’ve got his dog and his empty house staring at me every night.
A dandelion sways gently next to my sneaker, pushing stubbornly through the frost-hardened earth, and I pick it out, twirling it between my fingers, then blow. Seeds scatter into the cold air, spinning away.
