Page 53 of Offside

I glanced down at it again, then met his stare. “It’s my favorite,” I said quietly.

He watched me for one more second. Then his mouth was on mine. Another version of us; hungrier for each other. Feral. The hottest kiss I’d ever had in my life.

I had one second where I could have stepped back. Made it a question, put some air around it, given myself the out I’d been carefully maintaining for three months. I knew the answer. I registered it the way I a door closed behind me—not with dread, just with the clear-eyed understanding that this was a choice I was making, and it was mine to make.

He lifted me, and I wrapped my legs around him without hesitating and met his energy with everything in me. Every fantasy I’d ever had about him coming true in this very moment in front of my door.

He pressed me back against the wall and I exhaled against his mouth and he made a low sound I felt more than heard as our tongues tangled and he pressed himself against me.

“Bedroom?” I asked on a breath, and he nodded before carrying me down the hall. Oh my god, this is happening. Ryan Lindqvist is taking me to my bedroom. Holy shit.

He set me down on the floor at the side of my bed and stepped back, and I understood he was watching me, taking me in exactly the way he’d described on the phone, so I let him. An old Minnesota State sweatshirt that hit me mid-thigh, soft from years of washing, the lettering cracked and faded. Hair down, not expecting company. I waited for the self-consciousness and it didn’t come. The way he was watching me made it impossible.

“Come here,” I said.

He closed the distance and kissed me slower this time, one hand moving into my hair. I got my palms flat against his chest, warm skin, the solid weight of him, and undid his tie, before tossing it behind me, and started unbuttoning his shirt. Taking a breather, I focused my attention on the muscles I was uncovering beneath his shirt, and my heart pounded impossibly hard while I ran my fingertips over the hard ridges of his abs.

“You’re staring,” he said, watching me.

“I’ve had my hands on you professionally for three months,” I said as I turned my face up to meet his eyes. “This is different.”

His expression shifted, amused and a little undone. “Yeah,” he said. “It is.”

“Can I take this off?” he asked. His hands found the hem of my sweatshirt. Well, his sweatshirt technically. Though, I was pretty sure the statute of limitations was up and it was legally mine now. “I’ve been thinking about this,” he said, “since the parking lot. Since Cole’s kitchen.” When I nodded, he slid his hands up my ribs, dragging the fabric with them. “Since the first time you put your hands on me and called it work.”

“It was work,” I said.

“Maren.” He growled my name as he inhaled deeply at my neck before licking and kissing me there.

“Mostly work,” I amended, and he pulled the sweatshirt over my head and dropped it to the floor, leaving me in my short, and a bralette.

I reached for him but he grabbed my hips and pushed me gently back against the mattress. Crawling backward, I made room for him to join me, and he lowered himself to the bed, following me.

His shirt was still half buttoned, and I moved to finish the job I’d started. “Not yet.” Low. Certain. “I’ve been waiting nine years and nine months for this. You’re going to let me take my time.”

My breath caught. “Oh…Oh, okay.” It was all I had. His warm body was covering mine, and his lips pressed to my collarbone while my legs instinctively opened wider, making room for him while I played with his hair, running my fingertips along his scalp.

He braced above me and stopped.

His forearm was by my head and his mouth an inch from mine and he did not move, and he waited until I opened my eyes and looked at him.

"Is this what you want? I need you to be sure." His voice had dropped somewhere I'd never heard it go and it was hot. Was I sure? I was now.

I nodded, staring into his eyes.

“I need your words, baby.”

Baby? Jesus Christ, I just melted right into the mattress. I am deceased. This man.

“I want you, Ryan. I want…this,” I replied.

“I need to taste every fucking inch of you, Maren.”

He worked his way down slowly. His mouth at my throat, the curve of my shoulder, the soft skin below my collarbone. He took his time on my breasts, his thumb dragging down the cup of my bra and over one nipple while his mouth was on the other, and I stopped trying to stay quiet about it. When he unclasped it and gave them his full attention, he raised his eyes to me when I gasped, satisfied with what he found there, and kept going, licking and sucking. I was writhing under him, desperate for more. For all of him. The burning ache for him to fuck me was driving me out of my mind.

“Tell me what you want,” he said against my skin as he slipped a finger into the waistband of my shorts.

“Everything,” I said. It came out more honest than I’d intended. “I want everything with you.”