I trail a line down her spine with my fingertips. “Yeah,” I mutter as I wait for my heart to slow.
She lifts her head, her eyes finding mine. “I need more,” she whispers, “but I understand if you need time to recover. Age and all...”
She’s fucking with me. I know. She’s challenging me, and because I’m a man who never backs down, I roll over until I’m on top of her. “My girl gets whatever my girl wants,” I tell her, letting the remark about my age slide. I crawl backward, spreading her legs until I’m nestled in between. “I’m not stopping until you beg me.”
“Oh,” she says, looking down her body at me. “I like this challenge.”
“Me too,” I say as my mouth finds her flesh, and it takes three orgasms until she finally begs me to stop, but I make her have a fourth before I relent.
15
LULU
“Are you ready for this?”
Oliver looks at me and then back to the exterior façade of the Hook & Hustle. “I don’t know.”
He’s adorable when he’s like this. He’s always so sure of himself with his cocky grin and pushed-back shoulders, looking larger than life.
I take his hands in mine and smile. “They already love you.”
His forehead crinkles in just the right way to make him look more distinguished. “Why?”
“Because you’re a protector.”
“You mean I have a record.”
I shake my head, keeping my eyes on his. “My family doesn’t care about that. Hell, my grandpa has a record too, but his crime wasn’t noble like yours. And you don’t have a record, Oli. It was wiped away.”
“Don’t get me started,” he grumbles, still salty over our field trip to Mark’s apartment. It’s going to take time for him to get over it.
“You’ve met almost everybody anyway,” I tell him, ignoring the sour look on his face. “There are only a few more.”
“But all at once.” He draws in a deep breath and cracks his neck. Ouch. I don’t understand how people can do that without using their hands, and even if they can, why the hell they’d do it in the first place.
“Come on.” I pull him toward the door because my stomach is rumbling, and it’s not warm enough to stand outside much longer to have a conversation.
When the door opens and we step inside, everyone turns their attention our way.
“Fuck,” Oliver whispers.
“Hey,” I call out, giving a one-handed, half-assed wave to my entire family.
But in true Gallo fashion, a second later, they go back to their conversations and ignore us.
“See,” I tell Oliver, pitching my thumb toward the dining room where everyone is milling around. “They don’t care.”
“Sure,” he says, his front plastered to my back. “They’re luring me in and making me feel safe.”
I swat at him over my shoulder. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
Zoey waves her hand, drawing our attention. Wemove through the dining room, stepping around clusters of other cousins in conversation to get to Zoey’s table.
“Hey there. Welcome,” Zoey says to Oliver. “Want a beer or something?”
“Sure,” he says, but there’s a quaver to his voice.
“We won’t judge if you drink a beer, Oliver. We own a bar, for shit’s sake,” Zoey tells him. “You want something stronger to get through this night?”
