“Your shirt has cherries on it.”
I distract myself from the golden skin of his chest by looking up at him, at his jaw covered in thick nighttime scruff, into his ice-blue eyes. But his face is just as tempting as his body, and so, admitting defeat, I close the gap between us.
He leans down farther. The poor man. I wonder if our height difference causes neck cramps. And then everything flies out of my head as we come together.
I kiss him first, just a tentative sweep of my mouth to his. That might have been all, just an innocent peck. But, with a guttural oath, his mouth captures mine, staking a claim. He’s a marauder. And I’m his willing prisoner. His tongue plunders. I moan and tiptoe higher as he sweeps me against him, lifting. He grasps my curves in his large hands to hold me up, and my legs wrap around his hips.
We go from innocent to R-rated in the span of an accelerated heartbeat. I moan, shifting to find relief against him. The friction of us is exquisite, taking me higher.
“Please,” I cry between long, drugging kisses.
In answer, he turns in a swift movement and settles me against the wall until I’m riding him. His hips find a deep rhythm with only my thin underwear and the fabric of his pants separating us. I’ve never been hotter, more turned on.
My head falls back against the wall, and he rains kisses on my neck, alternating between the gentle press of his lips and laps of his tongue as if I’m the best thing he’s ever tasted, all the while grinding against me in a way that drives me beyond thought. Beyond anything rational. I’m only needy want. Flesh and pure desire.
He sucks at a spot below my ear, bites down, then soothes my sensitive skin with his tongue until I shiver. I need to be naked, need his cock driving into me with no barriers between us.
“Ronan,” I plead, desperate now.
He changes the angle slightly so that there’s even more friction against my clit, and when I can’t go any higher, I burst apart in a thousand shattering pieces of pleasure.
I cry out, the sound loud in the dark. I’ve never been loud before. But then again, I’ve never felt anything like this short, wild ride.
He captures my mouth with his as he presses me against him with a harsh, pained groan.
He’s still rock-hard against me, still breathing deeply, but he’s gentle now, bringing me down from my high in long, slow, drugging kisses. We finally break to catch deep breaths of air. And I see the moment in him, sense the moment in me, when we both come out of the fog of desire and back into our senses. He slides me down his body.
“Holy heck,” I say. Shocked. “I’ve never…that was. Yah. Wow.”
He turns away, swearing softly and running his hand through his already messy hair. He tilts his head up and swears again, louder this time.
“Fuck, Poppy. I’m sorry. That should never have happened.”
“Well, it did happen,” I say. “And by the way, your response is not what a girl wants to hear after being given the best orgasm of her life. But maybe it wasn’t as good for you. I mean, I don’t think you…um…finished. And I don’t exactly have a lot of experience in this department. You know, with hookups.”
“Poppy.”
“Yes?”
He rubs his neck. When he makes that motion, it causes his arm muscles to pop very attractively. Damn him.
“Shut up.”
I huff a little.
“That’s not very nice—”
“You’re fucking incredible in this department. And in every other department there is. There’s nothing I want more than to take you upstairs and fuck you long. Fuck you hard. Fuck you in every way I can. All night.”
“Then what’s wrong?” I ask, my brain unable to focus. I’m flushing at his hot words, at every single thing he just did, every way he looks at me. “I wanted this. You didn’t take advantage of me.”
“I’m your boss. You’re my daughter’s nanny. Belle worships you, and if you leave early because this doesn’t end well, then I’d be the worst, most selfish dad in the world.”
“Yeah, darn it. There’s that,” I say, my tingly high coming down at his sobering words. Now he gets talkative. When he’s explaining all the reasons we can’t be together, he’s been downright chatty.
“Fine,” I agree, grumpy now. “But,” I add. “It was really good, right? I thought it was really good.”
He grunts and looks up, as if asking the other Nordic gods for patience, which is fair because he already kind of told me what he thought of it, and here I am basically begging for more words of affirmation. It’s one of my love languages.
