Page 77 of Solo

Her clear, dark-blue eyes are wide and fixed on mine, her beautiful, soft pink mouth slightly slack.

“Drew,” she whispers, “I had no idea anything could feel this good.”

A garbled cry interrupts her words as I pick up the pace and thrust more assuredly. It’s like I was born to be connected to this woman. I can’t even speak. I can only gaze down and watch as her forehead wrinkles and her eyes close, as if she’s in deep concentration.

Things are happening fast and I can already tell I don’t have much time here. I reach down between our bodies, finding her slickness and rubbing her swollen clit with my thumb. She gasps so loudly I think maybe I’ve hurt her for a second, but then she’s murmuring my name over and over, her head thrashing from side to side on the pillow. When I feel her nails rake down my back, I thrust harder still. Suddenly Katherine’s eyes fly open and she screams as she comes.

The feel of her tightening, fluttering, spasming around me is more than I can bear.

I explode and it’s like nothing I’ve ever experienced before. The intensity leaves me panting as I collapse atop her, brushing her face with my lips and feeling my heart beat against her chest.

Chapter Thirty-Six

Kate

I’m lying, head nestled into the crook of his arm, my left leg slung over his, my hand resting lightly on his chest. We’ve been quiet for a while now, lapsing in and out of light slumber, each of us processing what’s happened in our own way. Finally, he’s the one to break the silence.

“Regrets?”

“None,” I say, not needing a single second to consider my answer. “You?”

“None,” he echoes. And then he chuckles, filling my ears with the rich sound as it reverberates through his chest wall. “But, you know…”

“Yeah, I know.”

“What?” he asks sitting up a little to get a better look at my face. “What do you think I was about to say, Miss Smartypants?”

“Okay, well, first of all, I don’t seem to be wearing any pants, smart or otherwise.” I giggle for just a second but then make myself sober up so he knows that I get what he’s saying. “You’re going to tell me that this can’t happen again.”

His brows arch in surprise. “Exactly. But not forever. I mean, not unless you don’t want to…”

“Oh, I want to,” I inform him with an enthusiastic nod.

“Good.” He smiles down at me. “That’s really good.”

Before I can stop myself, I’m blurting out the question that’s niggling at the back of my mind.

“Did you mean it? When you said I’m beautiful?” I feel a little needy and a lot embarrassed for asking. “Or was that just—you know—one of those ‘heat of the moment’ things that guys say?”

He shifts his head so that he’s looking up and out through the window, where the outline of mountains is just visible against the clear night sky.

“Always,” he says after a long beat. “I’ve always thought you were beautiful. Since the first time I laid eyes on you.”

His words are soft and thoughtful. And I promptly ruin them by snorting. Loudly.

“Oh, please. You did nothing but scowl at me that first day of freshman theory.”

“That wasn’t the first time I saw you.” He grins down at me.

I sit up on the bed so I can get a better look at his face.

“No? Then when?”

“It was the night before that. I was working late in the office, preparing for my first day of classes at Shepherd. It was after eleven and, as I was leaving the building, I heard this music. I followed the sound to the practice rooms and found you holed up in one, playing the piano. Your eyes were closed. There wasn’t any music on the stand. You were just playing. And you were stunning.”

“Huh,” I say thoughtfully. Too thoughtfully.

Drew looks down at me. “What are you huh-ing about?”