“I had to keep pretending friendship was enough and hope you’d still be free when I finished my tour.” A sardonic chuckle escaped him. “Which was a monumental fuckup considering what an incredible person you are. Why I thought other guys would miss that is a testament to my stupidity.”
The expression in his eyes was so soft, so warm, yet with an intensity that set a swarm of bees into a frenzy in my belly.
“Last fall when you started talking about some guy you’d met here, my whole world cratered. By Christmas I was pretty sure I’d lost you forever. I’d picked up the paperwork to extend my tour the same day you called in tears about how he’d walked out on you.”
I gasped. “You were going to reenlist? But what about college? And football?”
He shrugged. “Those things only mattered if I could share them with you. I damn sure didn’t want to come home to watch you be in love with someone else.”
“But you didn’t reenlist,” I whispered.
A smile ghosted over his mouth. “No, I didn’t.”
For the first time since that earth-shattering kiss behind Reed Hall, I relaxed. “You chose Mountain State because I’m here.”
The smile that always pulled me in threatened an appearance, but I had the idea Danny wasn’t quite ready to let it go. “Nailed it. The military pays regardless of where a guy wants to go to school, so I would have gone wherever you were.”
I smirked. “Even if the school didn’t offer football?”
That smile detoured from cocky to wry. “Let’s not go crazy, T. We both know you love football too. You wouldn’t have gone to a school without a team.”
After all our late-night conversations in the spring of his senior year of high school, I was positive the one attribute of the college I chose would be that it had a football team. Guess I was hoping he’d return home to give us a chance too.
“What now?” I asked, breathless.
“Now you believe that we’ve been dating all fall, that I’m not playing head games with you, that I haven’t kissed anyone but you since I was seventeen.”
I blinked. “But you like all the girls—”
“Before I met you that was true. Being a horny teenage boy, the new kid in school who couldn’t date the one girl he truly wanted, I was a man-whore fall semester after I started at Central Valley.” He stared deep into my eyes. “That all changed the night of Kaitlyn’s party.” His voice dropped. “You’ve been it for me for years. It was only a matter of timing.” Lowering his head, he brushed his lips over mine once, twice, and pulled back. “We’re so much more than friends.”
To this point he’d made all the moves, made his confession. Now it was my turn. The question was, did I have the courage to take the leap? What would happen if I had the same problem with Danny that I’d had with Aaron? Would our friendship survive it? I’d made it all this time holding my feelings in because his friendship was better than nothing at all. Taking the chance he was asking for risked losing him forever.
“T?”
The worry in his voice decided me. Maybe the problem I’d had with Aaron was that he wasn’t Danny. Maybe something inside me had recognized that and fixed it so I’d have to wait until the right person came into my life—or changed his status in it.
Leaning in, I pressed my mouth to his. After a beat Danny wrapped me in his arms and took over. When I opened for him, I released a tsunami. Both of us poured years of pent-up emotion into that kiss. Every nerve ending in my body tingled as electric heat sizzled through me. Danny dropped his big, warm hand to my hip and slid it along the underside of my thigh to my knee, coaxing me to straddle his lap. Without breaking the kiss that was slowly robbing me of my last brain cell, I rolled up onto him, my knees sinking into the mattress on either side of his hips as I wrapped my arms around his neck.
He tore his mouth from mine, and both of us panted in air as we stared into each other’s eyes. A slow smile turned up the corners of my mouth as I clocked the desire darkening his silver-gray eyes to black, and all the lost time melted away. A happy giggle escaped me before I leaned back in and set my mouth on his.
He banded one arm around me, anchoring me to him while plowing his other hand into my hair, holding the back of my head as he plundered my mouth. The chase and tangle of our tongues, the glorious pressure of his lips on mine, soon had me rocking against him. My needy clit was desperate for the friction that came from rubbing along the hard length I could feel growing between us. Danny’s hand dropped to my ass, squeezing and holding me closer, guiding me as I rode his lap.
Time disappeared as I reveled in kissing Danny Chambers, the reality so much sweeter, so much more intense, than all my fantasies. When at last I tuned in to the whimpers and moans echoing around the walls, embarrassment washed over me. I shifted on his lap, and he groaned as he kissed a trail down my neck, erasing my worry about my loud response to finally being with him the way I’d dreamed for so long. My nipples strained against the lace of my bra, and I feared I might have left a telltale circle in the crotch of my jeans. Yet the ache in my core left me helpless but to keep riding Danny’s fly.
Putting both hands on my ass, he stilled my movements. “Fuck, babe.” It took a second for his eyes to focus on mine as he lifted me up and down over him again then squeezed my cheeks and stilled me. “We do need to make up for lost time.” He grinned that grin that always wound me up. “But you have class, and I have practice, so it’s not going to happen today.”
“But—” My protest started as a whine.
“T, when we do this, it’s going to be right. Not rushed.” He gave my ass another squeeze. “And private.” A quick glance around his room. “This old house is cool, and I like living here, but the walls are thin.” Holding his thumb and forefinger together for emphasis, he continued. “Like,thin.” Cupping my face, he smiled again. “I love the sounds you make when all we’re doing is kissing. Honestly, I can’t wait to hear how you sound when I’m buried balls-deep inside you.”
I shivered at the thought, though I couldn’t be sure if it was from anticipation or fear.
“My roommates are great guys, but I don’t need to hear their commentary about us—and I damn sure don’t want you to hold back.”
Gazing over his shoulder at the size of his bed, I said, “Um, you should know I sleep on something substantially smaller than this.”
Dancing silver-gray eyes caught mine. “We could have an incredible time in a single. Just sayin’.”
