“Easy,” he murmured. He ran his fingers up and down my pussy lips, softly stroking me until I relaxed back into him.
With relentless patience, he teased me in languid strokes, his lips against the back of my neck as he slowly worked me up.
Finally, he pressed his palm against my clit and slid his middle finger the barest inch inside me, dragging a low moan from my lips. “See? Even soft and sweet, I can get this pussy wet, can’t I?”
I hummed and reached down, gripping his forearm. Urging him to go faster, deeper. But that move also made me tense up, the answering pounding of my head reminding me why he was doing this in the first place.
“Relax. I told you I’d get you there, didn’t I?”
I made a noise of agreement and once again melted into the warmth of him against my back.
“Good girl. You know I deliver on my promises, don’t you? Know I can make this perfect cunt come for me however I want.”
“Yes,” I breathed.
There was no denying the truth of that anymore. Not when my clit tingled as heat bloomed low in my belly, that familiar peak within reach. A peak he’d gotten me to countless times before.
“I’ve got you,” he murmured, pressing a kiss to my neck. “Trust me to get you there.”
Mere months ago, that statement would have been laughable. I didn’t trust easily, certainly not men.
But somehow, beyond all reason,thisman had worked his way in. Busted through the walls I’d erected long ago, as if they were made of nothing more than tissue paper. And then he’d settled in beside me as if that was where he was always meant to be.
A whisper in the back of my mind wondered if this was a good idea. If getting involved with my landlord—the person who held Laurel’s and my shelter in the palm of his hand—was in my best interest.
But before those worries could take root and grow into something I could no longer ignore, Atlas did exactly what he’d promised. With a soft circle around my clit and a scrape of his teeth at the sensitive spot behind my ear, I came.
“There’s my good girl,” he said, pure satisfaction in his tone.
This wasn’t the earth-shattering climax of a tsunami I was used to with him—one that dragged me under whether I wanted it to or not. Instead, it was soft waves lapping at the shore, a rush of bliss rolling over me as tension seeped from my bones.
With his hand still cupping my pussy, his cock undeniably hard against my ass, he brushed a kiss against my neck. His voice was a low rumble when he said, “Night, trouble.”
And just like that, I drifted off, snuggled into the only man I’d ever felt this safe with. Content with the knowledge that, for now at least, I was exactly where I should be.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
ATLAS
The last timeI brought a woman home had been never, which was probably why my mom had lost her shit over the idea of me dating someone. And not just someone, but a Starlight Cove resident. Though she was eager as hell to meet mygirlfriend, a sick librarian she’d had to cover for and a rogue raccoon causing trouble in the stacks had pushed this meet-and-greet back for two weeks.
Not that I’d minded. The longer I could put this off, the better.
“Meeting your family feels a little real for this whole fake dating fiasco,” Sutton said as we stood in my mom’s driveway, waiting for Laurel to get out of the SUV.
I glanced down at her—at this woman who was only supposed to be a means to an end but was turning out to be a whole fucking lot more than that. “Is that what this is? A fake dating fiasco?”
She tipped her head to the side, her gaze assessing as she studied me. “You tell me, big guy.”
The problem was, I had no fucking idea. I was flying blind here, and I hated every minute of it. Hated that I didn’t know what she thought about our arrangement. Hated that when Icalled hermine, it was just for show and not in response to the pull I always felt in my chest whenever she was around. Hated how much I loved that we’d taken our clear rules and broken every single one of them.
Before I could respond to Sutton—with what, I had no idea—Laurel stepped out of the SUV and shut the door behind her. Time was up.
I cleared my throat, leading the two of them toward my mom’s back door. “Are you two ready for this?”
Laurel pointed at her blank expression. “My game face is on.”
With a laugh, Sutton squeezed my tense forearm. “Relax. You worry too much.”
