Page 40 of If You Like It, I Love It

His shirt is on my bedroom floor in a matter of seconds, the chair in the corner catches my dress, his jeans join his shirt on the rug, and our underwear fly, landing who-knows-where. All I can track now is the warmth of his hands on my body . . . his mouth on my skin as he kisses his way down my neck.

We stumble to the bed with our legs practically intertwined. He suddenly pushes against my shoulders with force—not hard enough to hurt me, just enough to surprise me as I fall back onto the mattress. My breath catches in my chest, and I hardly have time to regulate it before his smiling mouth is on mine again, his entire body blanketing me, guiding us farther up the bed with the shifting of his legs and arms.

He’s never been reserved in bed, but never quite this aggressive either. I’m not complaining, too busy trying to keep up with his physical cues and trying to remember to breathe through this ravenous kiss.

When he has us where he wants us on the bed, he begins to slide down my body, pausing to kiss and nibble on my neck, my chest, my nipples, the dip where my ribcage parts. Each touch of his lips spawns a new layer of goosebumps over my skin, but his warm hands follow to soothe away the excited chill.

He plants gentle kisses along the small, faint scar from my appendix surgery. It’s low and angled downward on my abdomen, inching him closer to more tender places. The way I’m anticipating his mouth on my pussy has my thighs trembling on his shoulders.

I can’t tell if it’s just an internal vibration or if he can feel it, too. His tongue meets my clit and removes all doubt. My thighs shake unmistakably as he flattens his tongue and lavishes attention across my swelling, tingling nerve endings, pressing and circling, pulling me into a near frenzied state. He only allows me to experience the building pleasure for a few seconds before he takes his tongue away to lick through my seam, taking his time tasting me.

He’s really going to tease me when it’s been this long since we’ve seen each other? I’m not proud to admit it, but he has a hell of a lot more restraint right now than I do.

My head sinks lower into the pillow, and I try to relax my shoulders. I want nothing more than to luxuriate in everything he’s doing, to get blissfully lost in this encounter.

When the first scream reaches my ears, it’s nothing more than an unwelcome distraction, and I press the back of my head down, hoping the sides of the pillow will rise up to muffle the screech. Enzo’s warm mouth doesn’t slow down, so he must not hear it at all. I’m grateful because I don’t want anything to distract him right now.

Seconds pass, and the scream comes again, too loud to ignore this time. It doesn’t sound far off in the distance this time. It’s close . . . too close. I sit straight up and look around the room, my brain struggling to catch up with reality.

Enzo cocks his head toward the window. “Is that—”

“Oliver!” I jump out of bed and throw open a dresser drawer, grabbing the first option I find.

As I’m scrambling into a pair of shorts, Enzo hops on one foot to pull up his other pants leg. He tosses me his shirt, and then shoves his sockless feet into his boots. I slip my sandals back on and we run.

21

Enzo

I throw open the gate to Oliver’s pen. The motion-activated lights mounted on some of the fence posts shine brightly, but I don’t see any threat, only Oliver standing and screaming all alone. Maybe something got to him but ran off before we made it outside?

Joni is right behind me, but even she can’t get Oliver to settle. He’s the only alpaca I’ve ever been around, so all I can do is follow her lead. We talk to him, try to rub his neck, but he insists on throwing his head back to fend us off, and he continues to scream.

“He doesn’t want to be touched,” I say. “He’s acting like he’s in pain.”

“I know. I’ll call Dr. Abernathy.”

She runs inside to get her phone while I keep attempting to calm Oliver. I have no idea what I’m doing. I don’t see any injuries on him anywhere, but he’s clearly in distress. Keeping my voice level, I assure him he’s okay but he doesn’t seem to hear my words over his own shrieking.

“Doc’s on the way.” Joni takes over trying to soothe him, shoving her phone at me for safekeeping. I don’t think she even realizes she’s given it to me. She’s on autopilot.

I step back and watch her interact with this unusual pet she loves so much, racking my brain, trying to think of something we might not be able to see.

“Do you think it could be a snake bite?” I ask.

“I hope not!”

Shit. I didn’t mean to panic her.

By the time Dr. Abernathy arrives, Oliver hasn’t settled entirely, but his screams are more spaced out now. The vet pauses to look me up and down. I’m still shirtless with one leg of my jeans haphazardly scrunched at the top of my boot. It’s more than obvious that I dressed in a hurry. Joni is wearing a pair of cutoffs that are barely visible under my shirt, which I just realized she put on inside out.

We’re a walking pair of context clues that no one could miss. There is no plausible explanation other than the truth: we sprang out of bed to come help this animal. I’m not sure how many people she’s told we’re dating, but if her boss didn’t know before, he does now.

He moves in to examine Oliver. “Did he eat and drink okay today?”

“Yeah,” Joni answers quietly. She’s scared, and I hate that there’s nothing I can do to make this better.

“Activity level?”