It was the kind of kiss I’d been waiting far too long to make happen, fueled by everything we hadn’t said and everything we’d both been pretending wasn’t there.
She made a soft sound against my mouth, her hands gripping my shoulders like she needed something solid to hold onto. I kissed her like I’d been holding back for weeks, like every second I hadn’t been touching her or holding her had been a mistake.
When I finally pulled away, it was only because I needed air. My forehead rested against hers as I tried to steady my breath.
“I haven’t stopped wanting you,” I said quietly. “Not since the day you dropped those daisies.”
Her breath caught, her hands tightening on my shoulders.
“I wanted you then, too,” she said, the words rough and honest. “I was just too scared to be the girl who said yes.”
“You’re saying yes now?”
She smiled. “Oh, I’m definitely saying yes now.”
Her words were my undoing. “I need you, Jess,” I rasped. “So badly.”
She responded by crawling over the distance and straddling my lap. Her hands cradled my face. She looked in my eyes. “I’m here.”
I kissed her again, tasting the sweetness of her as she shifted closer. My hands settled on her back, drawing her in until her warmth was pressed against me, her hips grinding into me.
She smiled into the kiss, like she knew exactly what she was doing to me as she rocked her hips in a lazy rhythm. The friction built heat between us, and my cock hardened against my jeans with her movements.
I gripped her hips lightly, guiding her pace and syncing us together like we’d done this in the cab of my truck a million times.
“Mm-mm. Feels good,” I murmured against her mouth, while one hand slipped under her shirt to trace up her side and to cup her breast gently. She sighed and arched into my touch, her fingers threading through my hair as our kiss deepened, our tongues twisting together lazily.
Still, I kept the rhythm steady, my thumb circling her nipple through her bra until it tightened into a hard pebble that I flicked lightly. Just enough to make her moan.
She ground down harder, her breath quickening and her body responding with soft shivers. “Preston…”
I held her gaze. The words I’d been needing to say for too long tumbled from me, raw and vulnerable. “I know what we said, Jess. But this isn’t just one night for me. It never was.”
Her breath hitched, her eyes softening. “Not for me either, Pres. I think I’m falling in love with you.”
“I’m already there, sweetheart.” I kissed her again and pressed my hips up to meet her.
The pressure built, her movements growing urgent, butunhurried. My hand on her hip held her firm. I wasn’t letting her go anywhere. Not anymore. My fingers teased her bare skin under her shirt as she chased her release.
She came with a quiet moan, trembling against me, her forehead resting on mine as her climax washed through her. I kissed her softly through it and held her close until she relaxed into my lap.
We stayed like that for a moment, breathing each other in. The cab of the truck was suddenly so quiet after everything that had just exploded between us.
Jess moved first.
“There’s something you need to understand,” she said quietly.
My chest tightened, but I didn’t interrupt.
“When I told you I invested in Timberstone, I didn’t tell you all of it.”
“Jess, I?—”
“No.” She stopped me. “You need to know.”
I sat back, giving her the space to say what she needed to.
“I put everything I had into this project.”
