“Layla.”
“The water’s warm this time of year.” I unbuttoned my blouse. On Wednesday my hands had shaken when he’d undressed me. Today I was undressing myself and I was not shaking. “And I’ve been thinking all morning about everything I’m afraid of, and I’m tired.”
I pulled the blouse over my head and laid it on the dock. My bra was pale blue cotton, nothing fancy, and the late sun fell on my bare shoulders and my stomach and the tops of my breasts.
“I’m tired of being afraid,” I said. “So I’m going swimming. You can come or you can watch.”
His eyes tracked down my body and back up and the heat in them sent a flush from my collarbones to my navel. “I’m coming.”
“Then lose the boots, Bishop.”
He grinned. Boots, then shirt. He pulled the t-shirt over his head in one motion and I got the full breadth of his chest and shoulders in the late-afternoon light and my mouth went dry. His stomach was flat and tan and a line of sandy hair ran from his navel into his jeans. He was broad and solid, and I wanted my hands on every part of him.
I unhooked my bra and dropped it on the dock. His gaze landed on my breasts and stayed there and I watched his throat work.
“Your turn,” I said.
He unbuckled his belt. His jeans came down. His boxer briefs followed. He was hard already, his cock thick and flushed, and the sight of him wanting me in open daylight went straight through my spine.
I shimmied out of my jeans and underwear. For one second I was standing on a dock in full sun, completely naked, in the open air, with nothing between me and the sky and the water and this man. No Saloon walls. No string lights. No shadows to soften the edges.
He looked at me how he’d looked at me through the camera on Wednesday, except there was no lens between us now. Just air and light and the water lapping the dock.
“God, you’re gorgeous,” he said, and his voice had dropped into the low rough register that pulled tight between my thighs.
“Flattery later. Water now.”
I jumped. The lake closed over me warm and green and I surfaced laughing, my hair plastered flat to my head, water streaming down my face. It was heated from the June sun and silky against my skin. Wade hit the water two seconds later andcame up shaking water from his hair in every direction. The spray caught me full in the face. I shoved water at him and he grabbed my wrist and pulled me against him and our wet bodies slid together and his mouth found mine.
He kissed me hard. No slow build. His tongue pushed past my lips and I opened for him and his hands gripped my hips under the water and pulled me flush against him. His cock pressed hot and rigid against my belly and I rolled my hips into him and felt him groan into my mouth.
“I missed you,” I said against his lips. “It was one day and I missed you and I’m furious about it.”
“Be furious later.” He kissed my throat, the hinge of my jaw, the spot below my ear where my knees lived and died. His hands slid up my ribs and cupped my breasts, his thumbs circling my nipples, and the water lapped around us while my head fell back and the sky wheeled bright and wide above me.
I reached under the water and wrapped my hand around his cock. He hissed through his teeth. I stroked him slow, feeling him pulse against my palm, thick and heavy and impossibly hard. The water moved between our bodies and his hips rocked forward into my grip and his mouth fell open against my shoulder. I tightened my fist and he groaned, raw and low, and I decided right then that I was going to collect every sound this man could make and I was not going to be polite about it.
“Layla.” His voice had dropped to gravel. “What are you—”
“Touching you.” I ran my thumb over the head and his whole body jerked. “I spent thirty-six hours convinced I’d never get to do this again. So I’m taking my time.”
His forehead dropped to mine. His breath came rough against my lips while I worked him underwater, learning the ridge at the crown, the thick vein on the underside, how his abs clenched every time I twisted my wrist. His hands tightenedon my hips hard enough to leave prints and I wanted them. I wanted his fingerprints on my skin.
I pushed him backward until his shoulders hit the limestone shelf at the edge of the lake. The rock was flat and sun-warmed and he braced against it and I pressed into him, my breasts against his chest, the water at our waists. I kissed him deep and dirty and his hands grabbed my ass and squeezed and a sound came out of me that scattered a bird from the nearest oak.
“Sit up on the rock,” I said.
He looked at me. The heat in his eyes was dark and intent.
“Layla—”
“Sit up on the rock.”
He pulled himself up onto the limestone ledge. The late sun caught him. His wet chest, his thick thighs spread, his cock hard and curved toward his stomach. Water dripped from his hair down his neck. He was a frame I would have kept if I’d had my camera, except I didn’t want my camera. I wanted my mouth.
I braced my hands on his thighs and took him in. He swore, sharp and bitten off. I sucked him slow, savoring the weight of him on my tongue, the salt-and-skin taste, how his thigh muscles went rigid under my palms. I took him deeper and his hand found the back of my head, not pushing, just holding. His fingers tangled in my wet hair.
“Layla.” His voice was gutted. “Your mouth — fuck.”
