Johanna's breath caught.
His hand lingered, and his thumb brushed her cheek.
The rough pad of his finger contrasted with the softness of the touch, and something inside her melted.
Then there was that look.
The one that always made her feel known.
Not because Blaze was trying to charm her. Because he genuinely saw her.
Especially the pieces she tried so hard to hide.
His gaze dropped briefly to her mouth before returning to her eyes. Slowly, he stepped closer. Close enough that her pulse immediately stumbled.
"Jo," he murmured.
Just her name and nothing more. But the way he said it wrapped around her heart.
When he finally kissed her, the tenderness of it nearly undid her. There was no urgency. Just warmth, affection, and years of history woven into something so simple it stole her breath.
Johanna sighed softly and lifted her hands to his shoulders. The broad, familiar shape of him grounded her instantly. Blaze's arms came around her, feeling steady and safe. The kiss deepened slowly, naturally, as though they were rediscovering something that had belonged to them all along.
Standing there in the quiet kitchen with the ocean rolling beyond the windows, Johanna realized she wasn't thinking about the past anymore. For the first time in years, the future didn't feel uncertain.
It looked a lot like Blaze.
Blaze’s large, calloused hands clamped around her waist, lifting her off the kitchen floor as if she weighed nothing at all. He deposited her onto the cool, polished granite of the island, immediately crowding into her space and pulling her hips flush to the edge until she was intimately bracketed by his solid frame.
"Rest your legs over my shoulders," he murmured, a low, gravelly command that brooked no argument as he slipped her panties off.
Johanna obeyed, heels resting on his back as she looked at him. His eyes burned with a hunger that sent a shiver through her. The intensity in his gaze stripped away the years, yet the man standing before her was infinitely more dangerous than the boy she’d once known.
When he dipped his head, she instinctively braced her hands flat against the granite. His tongue took a long, hot glide against her sensitive center, and Johanna’s vision actually blurred. The contrast of the cold stone beneath her palms and the searingintensity of his mouth was intoxicating.She couldn’t remember the last time she had experienced such pleasure.
"I want to taste every inch of you," he confessed against her damp skin, his breath a wicked caress.
Johanna gasped, her body tensing for a fleeting second as the rough, masculine stubble of his jaw rasped delightfully against her inner thighs. In a heartbeat, every lingering ounce of shyness evaporated. She stopped caring about how she looked or the chaotic mess of her hair. She focused on the way his tongue ravaged her, made her feel like the most gorgeous woman on earth.
Blaze paused, glancing up through his dark lashes to pin her with a fiercely possessive stare, letting her see exactly what he was about to do before he lowered his mouth once more. Just the sight of him, dark, focused, and utterly consumed by her, transported her back to when they first started dating, yet this was entirely different. This was a man who knew exactly what he wanted.
He parted her folds gently with his strong fingers, and then completely devoured her clit. His mouth was warm and steady, his hot breath teasing her swollen flesh and pushing her terrifyingly close to the edge.
"Braxton!" she cried out, using his given name as she writhed under the onslaught of his lashing, suckling tongue.
"God, I forgot how sweet you taste," he rasped, the vibration of his voice humming directly against her skin.
Johanna abandoned all pretense of control, moaning shamelessly into the quiet kitchen. She thrashed her hips, instinctively trying to match the driving rhythm of his velvety tongue. When the pleasure became too sharp, too blinding, she tried to draw back, but his large hands gripped her thighs, anchoring her in place. He refused to let up. Blaze attacked the task with the same focus he brought to a fire scene, single-minded and impossible to stop.
"Yes," she moaned, her fingers sliding frantically across his head. It was sensory overload, too much to bear, yet nowhere near enough.
Blaze found that single, desperately sensitive bundle of nerves and drew it fully into his mouth. Johanna’s back bowed off the island, her spine arching like a drawn bow. "Blaze, please, I’m about to—"
"That’s it, sweetheart," he coaxed between wet, greedy pulls. He slid one thick finger, and then a second, deep inside her. He began to stroke her, establishing a wicked internal rhythm while his mouth continued its relentless assault.
A low, feral purr echoed in the room, and it took Johanna a breathless second to realize the sound was ripping from her own throat. Blaze pressed his thumb firmly against her most sensitive spot, bearing down just as his fingers curled inside her. Johanna stiffened, seizing so fast and hard that the climax practically shattered her. "Blaze!" she screamed, pleasure detonated through her, stealing the breath from her lungs.
She collapsed backward onto the countertop, her chest heaving as she fought to drag oxygen back into her lungs. When her heart finally stopped hammering against her ribs, she fluttered her eyes open. Blaze was standing between her thighs, watching her with a primal, deeply satisfied hunger that made her pulse spike all over again.
