He needed to be inside of her. He needed a condom, and he needed it now.
He started to pull back to tell her that—that he was going to pick her up and carry her inside. But as he moved his hands down her back to the incredible softness of her ass, the added pressure pushed her even more tightly against him, and God, God, God, the way that felt both against his dick, and in the palms of his hands…So instead he kissed her harder, deeper, longer as she rubbed herself against him, and then his fingers slipped beneath the thin fabric of her shorts, and he found her—hot and soft and wet.
He pushed one finger, and then two, just a little bit inside of her, and she came almost instantly, with a moan, right there in his hands, pressed up against him, and it was such an incredible, mind-blowing, total turn-on that he came, too.
The earth was shaking again and Shayla lifted her head from Peter’s shoulder.
“Aftershock,” he murmured. “Just a little one. We’re okay.”
Aftershock. Wasthatwhat this was?
Shay was still clinging to him, her legs still tight around his waist, the tips of his fingers still inside of her as he smiled into her eyes.
“That was a first for me,” he said.
So okay, theyweregoing to have a conversation right now. Like this. Before moving and adjusting and doing all those awkward post-orgasm things. She had to clear her throat to get her voice to work. “Sex in the backyard?” she asked.
“Well, that, too,” he said. “Sex—or not quite sex—with our clothes still on.”
“It’s calleddry humping,and you’ve seriously never…?”
“Nope. In high school I was pretty single-mindedly in love with Lisa. And back then, she wasn’t having sex with me.”
That’s right, he’d told her they hadn’t hooked up until college, in the relative comfort of their dorm rooms.
“For the record, that name for it is deceptive. I’m pretty sure it can’t be calleddryhumping at this point,” he said. “At least not on my end.”
Shayla laughed—which caused her body to tighten around his fingers and push him a little more deeply inside of her. She drew in a sharp breath, and their gazes met and locked. His eyes were hot.
“Let’s go inside,” he said. “I have a sudden burning desire for us to achieve a sexual hat trick. I’m thinking, I’ll make you come with my mouth while mygentlemen’s accessoriescatch up, and then, a little later, we can finish with good old-fashioned full penetration.”
Sweet God, yes please. But then Shay said,“Gentlemen’s accessories?”
“Isn’t that what you called it? It’s a nice euphemism, although I wasn’t in a position to discuss it at the time.”
Dear God, this man actually listened to the words that came out of her mouth—even after getting whacked in the balls and hit with a bucket of shit. So she told him, “Tevin and I were out shopping when he was just learning to read, and there was a sign—I think it was in Macy’s—and he thought the accessories were specific to the male anatomy, although that puzzled him, because aside from a jockstrap, he wasn’t sure what that might be. For a while, we called athletic supportersgentlemen’s accessories,and somehow it transitioned to become the full euphemism.”
He nodded, then leaned in and kissed her, and it was a replay of their first kiss—tender and gentle—and God, his lips were so soft and warm. “Let’s go inside,” he breathed against her mouth, before kissing her again—really kissing her now.
He tasted as delicious as he smelled—Navy SEAL–flavored, had to be—and she lost herself in the sweetness of his mouth, the feel of his hair between her fingers, the heat of his chest against hers.
But then she felt him start to shift, as if he was going to just stand up and carry her inside, so she made herself stop kissing him. “Wait.”
He waited, but the heat in his eyes had ramped up in its intensity.
“God, you’re beautiful,” she told him, touching the side of his face. “And as good as that…hat trick sounds, I’m just…Well, can we…not?”
She could tell that he didn’t fully understand, that he thought she was shutting him down, so she quickly added, “Go inside, I mean. I…don’t suppose you’d want to help me set up our…tent? It’s a pop-up. Pretty quick and easy.”
He got it—it was the going-inside to which she objected. “Oh, Shay, no. The likelihood of another earthquake—”
“I’ve read that sometimes the aftershocks come first,” she said. “And if that was an aftershock, the real quake’s gonna be huge. I mean, yeah, it’s rare, and I know I probably sound irrational and crazy, but…” Her voice shook and she felt her eyes fill with tears, despite her best intentions. “That scared thefuckout of me.”
“Fair enough.” Peter immediately nodded. “I’ve got an air mattress and one of those crazy-fast pumps. We’re gonna need a blanket or two, tonight’s gonna get cold. But other than going inside to grab that—and make sure the gas line’s okay—we can stay outside as long as you need to.”
Stupidly, his kind response to her crazy made her tears well and overflow. God, she hated crying in front of anyone—in fact, she hated crying when she was locked alone in the privacy of her own bathroom. She hated it, because it never changed anything; it never helped, it only impeded. And on top of that, it made her feel weak and helpless and gave her a congestion headache.
But everything she was feeling—or trying not to feel—was jumbled up inside of her. The residuals of her overwhelming fear—not for herself, but for her precious babies and even for Carter and Tiffany, but then also for herself as the quake had slammed her to the bedroom floor again and again—and the knee-weakening relief of finding out, quickly thank God, that everyone was all right, combined with the crazy whatever-this-was that she was feeling after dry humping her Navy SEAL neighbor in her own backyard…
