Page 12 of At First Smile

CHAPTER SIX

Fuck Michigan Ed Sheeran

Rowan

T he shower’s spray beats against my taut muscles.

Between the hike and this afternoon’s proximity to Pen, I’m on fire.

I could fucking combust with need. My body buzzes with the memory of her delicate frame draped over me.

The way her ample breasts, hard peaks poking through her shirt’s thin fabric, snuggled against my chest. Our hot breath mingled as her honey gaze, with a glint of hunger flashing in the pupils, peered down at me from below my hat’s brim.

The way that pink tongue darted across her bow-shaped lips.

Her candied aroma still lingers in my nostrils.

My hand trails down my stomach towards my cock, still hard despite the frozen temperature of the water.

Like a damn teenager again, my dick has been in various stages of erection since meeting Pen.

I grip my shaft and close my eyes. My mind drifts to Pen’s full lips.

Gripping tighter, I let myself fall into the fantasy.

Her almond-shaped eyes. Glossy lips wrapped around me, while her dainty hands work my base.

Her needy moans and whimpers fill the shower.

Jealousy surges at the droplets coasting across her naked body.

I groan, imagining my hands tangling into her wet strands to guide myself deeper. She clenches her thighs together, wanting me as much as I want her. Her arousal mingling with the water swirling down the drain. Like a queen she rules over me.

“My Pen,” I moan.

The slickness of my hand is a poor substitute for what I imagine is the ecstasy of her mouth. Pumping faster, pleasure spools tight at the base of my spine.

“Fuck,” I rasp as my release claims me.

Hand placed against the slick, tiled wall, I pant and allow my mind to circle back to the reality that it was my hand and not Pen’s pretty mouth that I just fucked.

Greg and Sasha teased that I had it bad.

This orgasm’s intensity warns that they’re not wrong.

I just came harder than I’ve ever come in my life and all I did was imagine Pen.

God, what would sheathing myself entirely in her do to me?

Her body writhing beneath me while I take her to the edge again and again prolonging both our pleasure until we each plead for release.

Because once I am inside her, I won’t want to leave.

This woman has possessed me. Not just with her gorgeous looks, but her entire self.

She’s brilliant, funny, a little silly, feisty, strong, kind, and sweetly earnest. I’ve only known her for ten hours, and I barely remember my life before Pen.

She’s brand new to me, but somehow my heart acts like it’s always known her.

There’s something dangerous in that. In her.

My naturally protective guard is lowering its defenses.

I must mentally reinforce my armor around her.

Pen’s openness has me sharing more than I share with anyone.

I’ve talked more to her about my dad in the past ten hours than I have in the last twenty-three years with my brothers or mam.

With Pen, I want to tell her everything.

This isn’t like me. This is more Finn’s territory.

My brother falls in love more in a single summer than most people have in a lifetime.

“It’s not love. It’s just hormones.” I shut off the shower and step out.

It’s just pent-up sexual energy. In January, as it looked more certain that the L.A.

Bobcats were playoff bound, I gave up all extracurricular activities of a carnal nature.

No letting off steam with a few of the women I have an understanding with.

No taking up Emma Sinclaire’s many, many thinly veiled sexual offers. There’d be no repeating that mistake.

“Pen wouldn’t be a mistake,” I argue with myself.

Wrapping the towel around my middle, I swipe my hand over the fogged mirror.

My green eyes reflect back to me, the truth written all over my pinched expression.

This attraction to Pen isn’t just my cock wanting to come out to play after months with only my right hand to keep it company. I like Pen… a lot .

I like her so much that after that old man scolded us, as we hiked back down to the pool at the waterfall’s bottom, I didn’t touch her, didn’t pull her back against me. Didn’t claim her sweet and sassy mouth. My feelings for Pen keep those instincts at bay.

Those instincts almost vibrate within me.

Hold her. Let her unlock me. Wipe away her tears, not pretend I don’t see them like I did today as she talked about Aunt Bea.

Be the only one taking pictures of her adventures with Cane Austen.

Fuck her until the only man’s name breaching her lips is mine.

I want to ruin her for anyone else but me.

But mostly I want to keep her safe, which means not giving into these urges, no matter how hard they thrum inside me.

I’m not the sweet man she says I am. The media circus that is my life right now and my reputation would taint her. She’s too perfect to be sullied by me. I know this, yet I am still here thinking about meeting her.

After the hike, we grabbed sandwiches from a deli. I told Pen I needed to work on a few things and would eat in my room.

“I get it.” Her small voice almost gutted me. “I should catch up on some work emails too,” she’d said, the rustle of the to-go bag in her hand overpowering the car radio’s quiet hum.

Hands clenching the steering wheel, I fight the urge to reach over and take her hand.

To unwrap her fingers from the bag and bring them to my lips.

Even I know I’m throwing her mixed signals, pushing away and pulling her back.

I want to assure her how much I want her, although I can’t have her. It wouldn’t be fair to her.

“Though, all work and no play makes Pen a dull girl.” Her lips quirked.

“I may take up Lola’s offer and have a drink at the inn’s bar to listen to her nephew.

I’m a little interested in hearing sexy Ed Sheeran.

If you want to join…” The dismissive shrug of her shoulder counters the breathless challenge in her invitation.

“You mean Michigan Ed Sheeran.” The annoyed huff of my response is unmistakable.

Two hours later, here I am staring at myself in the mirror in a losing debate with my reflection.

Its counsel is for me to find a movie on the TV or pull out the advance copy of Finn’s latest novel, the one that doesn’t come out until the fall that I promised him I’d read once the season was over.

Instead, I’m thinking about what to wear to listen to a small-town version of a big name musician.

I pick up my mobile from the creamy quartz countertop and text Wes.

Me: Tell me no.

Wes: Why, hello to you bosom buddy. Hand Waving Emoji.

I grunt.

Me: Don’t be cute. Just tell me no.

Wes: First, I’m always cute. Have you seen this face?

I groan at the attached selfie of Wes in my tub.

Me: First, don’t EVER send me pictures in the bath. Second, are you taking a bath in my bathroom? You were under strict orders to not go into my room while you’re watching GB.

Wes: You should know that I never follow orders, which is why I won’t be telling you no. Although, guess I’m telling you no to your asking me to tell you no. What am I telling you no about? Is it about Emma? That I’ll gladly tell you HELL NO to crawling back into that she-devil’s bed.

Me: Not Emma.

Wes: But someone else??

Me: I met someone.

Even as my fingers type those three words, I know I’m fucked.

Wes: Dude, are you actually reaching out to me to process your feelings about a woman? This is facetime worthy. Incoming!

I decline the call.

Me: I’m not facetiming with you while you’re in my tub. Boundaries.

He calls again.

Knowing he’ll keep doing this until I relent, I answer. “You’re the fucking worst.”

Wes’s dark eyes sparkle with mirth as he fills my mobile’s screen. “You love me or else you wouldn’t have reached out. Let’s dish, boyfriend.”

Why the fuck did I text Wes? I should have messaged Gillian.

He’d have responded with a fuck off . I thought since Wes makes a sport out of telling me no, that he’d give me what I’m so desperate for…

. For someone to talk me out of meeting Pen at the bar.

Leave it to Wes to tell me no to telling me no.

I let out a beleaguered breath. “Her name is Pen Meadows…”

As the story tumbles out, I know that this is a hundred percent the Pen-effect. Wes calls me the vault. He’s made it his mission to pry open my combination lock with little to no success.

“So, what’s holding you back? She doesn’t sound like a fame fucker like Emma,” Wes asks, forehead puckered.

“Pen’s not like that,” I snap.

“Easy tiger.” He whistles. “I say she isn’t. I’m looking at her social media, and your girl is like a foxy do-gooder.”

“She’s too good for me.”

“Probabl y .” His dark eyebrows shrug. “Is this because you punched Landon? I know you’re taking a lot of heat for that, but what does this have to do with your new lady love?”

“She’s not my lady love.”

“Maybe not yet, but the growly face you’re making at me says she’s something.

” He wags a finger. “Okay, my brother from another mother, let me drop some knowledge on you. You like this woman. Clearly a lot because you’re emotionally processing with me, and we know you hate all emotions except for annoyance, aggression, and anger.

You want someone to tell you to not do something you want because you’re scared. ”

I open my mouth to protest.

He raises a hand. “Hush, a grown up is speaking.”

“I’m five years older than you?—”

“Yes, but unlike you, I have the emotional maturity of an eighty-year-old, thanks to my therapist mother. You feel something and that scares you. You’re using all the excuses to keep her at a distance.

From what you’ve said, it seems like this woman actually likes you, the real Rowan, not the famous hockey player. And the feeling is mutual.”