Page 26 of Just This Once (Stone Family #2)

Dante

I n the half hour I’ve let Taryn soak in the tub, I have emptied her dishwasher, played a few rounds of tug-of-war with Frankie, and took some measurements of the living room. But I can’t stand the idea of her naked and wet without me anymore, so I knock twice on the door before opening it.

She lifts her head, appearing a bit dazed, and maybe my plan worked a little too well. I wanted her to enjoy herself, but I still need her to have a bit of life left in her for what comes next. She can’t be a wet noodle.

That’s my job. To make her boneless.

“How’re you feeling?” I ask, noting the gummy bears are gone and all of the bubbles have disappeared, allowing me a clear view of her glistening skin, her light-brown nipples, the dark triangle of hair between her legs, and the roundness of her kneecaps poking up out of the water.

Maybe I’ll add a bathroom renovation to my list. Because Taryn deserves a tub she can fully lay out in.

I’d have to rearrange everything in here, since three people share it.

Then again, if she ever wanted to get rid of the top-floor apartment, I could convert it to another level with bedrooms for the kids and really give her a bathroom fit for a duchess.

I remove the plank from the tub and hold out the fluffy robe as she stands up, quickly covering herself. It’s clear she’s still uncomfortable being naked in front of me. As if I’d be suddenly turned off.

Could never happen.

My dick would fall off first.

Once she’s wrapped up in the robe, I hug her to me, trailing kisses up the side of her damp neck. “How do you feel?”

“Mmm.”

“Mmm?”

“Mm-hmm.”

“I got something else for you.”

I guide her to her bedroom, scented with the few lavender candles I lit. I also kept the lights on, hoping she wouldn’t mind. After shucking off my shirt, I lean back against the headboard and invite her to lie down between my legs.

“What are you doing?” Her voice is breathless as I uncap the little bottle of oil.

“Taking care of you.” I nudge the sides of the robe down so I can massage her shoulders, working my thumbs up her neck.

She exhales a long, audible breath, so I focus there for another few minutes, making sure all the knots release from her muscles.

Then I trace over the small purple flower tattoo on the back of her shoulder. “This is pretty.”

“For my mom,” she says quietly, rolling her head to the side, granting me better access to her neck. “Her name was Violet.”

“Ah, violets for Violet. Tell me about her.”

“She was wonderful, kind, and so smart. She loved to laugh. Her favorite show was I Love Lucy . ”

“I assumed it was your favorite, with all of the memorabilia you have.”

“Yeah, I loved it. Mostly because Mom did. She would make us a bowl of popcorn, and we’d watch a few episodes on weekend nights. She worked so hard, and my brothers and I fought over one-on-one time with her, but those were my nights with her. Laughing on the couch at Lucy.”

I nuzzle my face into the crook of Taryn’s neck. “I wish I could have met her.”

This earns a slight pause, a barely noticeable tension in her muscles before she relaxes again and admits, “Yeah. Me too.”

“Will you take off your robe?”

She shoots me a glare over her shoulder, and I raise my eyebrows in innocence.

“I can’t keep massaging you if not.”

Our first night together, she fought me on the lights and seemed to find it laughable that I’d be really fucking physically attracted to her.

The night in the shed, it was relatively dark with only the soft glow of the twinkle lights.

And the other day in the closet at The Nest, it was bright, but I only had her naked from the waist down.

Here, now, she can’t hide from me. The lights are on, and there is nothing for her to cover up with.

But I see the moment she overcomes her insecurities.

From the second I laid eyes on her at Tabby Cat, I wanted her. It had nothing to do with her body. I don’t care about stretch marks or surgery scars or the size of her thighs. All those small details add up to the person she is. And I want her, whole and forever.

Fuck .

I want Taryn forever.

The realization makes me break out in a sweat, and for a moment, I almost miss how the stress bracketing her mouth fades away. Almost .

Because even the idea of spending the rest of my life with this woman is not enough for me to ignore the gift she’s offering me.

“Good girl,” I murmur as she slides the robe off her arms before leaning back against me, completely naked.

With our position, I have a perfect view of all her hills and valleys, the slope of her breasts with tight tips, the roundness of her belly, and the flare of her hips and thighs, leading down her long legs to her cute little toes.

“Put your head on me, beautiful. Relax.”

She does as I say and rests all her weight against me, arms at her sides, legs partly spread, nice and even breaths raising her torso. I pour more oil into my hands and skate them up and down her right arm, making her skin shine. “Feel good?”

She nods. “You’re going to spoil me.”

“That’s the point.” I pinch the webbing between her fingers then roll each of her digits out before giving the same attention to her left arm. By the time I finish, her chest and throat are flushed with color, and I’m not even sure she knows she’s wiggling back and forth.

I turn the bottle upside down, drawing a line of oil from the dip in her collarbone to just below her belly button and smooth my palms over the same path, rubbing it all in, luring soft moans out of her, and honestly, I don’t know who’s enjoying this more. Me or her.

With both of her breasts in my hands, I plump and play, brushing my thumbs over the stiff peaks, rolling them between my fingers, watching goose bumps dot her skin.

She pushes against me, arching her neck, silently asking for more.

And I will never deny her anything. I caress and massage, learning she likes it when I scratch my blunt fingernails in circles around her nipples, but never quite touching .

She hisses and throws her hands around my head when she eventually can’t take it anymore, digging her fingers into my hair. “Dante.”

I smile against her cheek at her sweet whine. “Yes?”

“Stop teasing me.”

“No, I don’t think I will.” I glide my hands down her stomach and hips to her thighs. “Keep your hands where they are. Don’t move your legs.”

“I can’t,” she says on a gasp when I brush my fingers over her pussy.

“Yes, you can. You can do everything, anything you want to. Especially be my good girl, can’t you, duchess?”

Her answering groan sends my lust into overdrive, and I concentrate on the way my fingertips leave tracks on her skin with the oil, pushing her thighs open farther so I can part her slick flesh.

The scent of the lavender candles and her arousal is a heady mixture, and I inhale deeply before dipping my chin, rubbing my lips back and forth across her shoulder, my fingers echoing the motion as I drag them over the lips of her pussy, then slip along the crease of her thighs, gripping them hard, putting her in the position I want. Knees bent, legs open.

I squirt another few drops of oil on my fingertips then use my left hand to expose her clit. We both watch in rapt attention as I circle it with my right index and middle fingers, slow. So slowly, she whimpers.

But we have a long way to go.

Even if my cock is hard as steel in my sweats and I already know how good it’ll feel to be buried balls deep in her.

I add a little more oil to make her really wet and then speed up. Since our first night together, I could tell Taryn needed a little extra moisture to get her going, and it was pretty easy to buy this almond oil.

In bulk .

She squirms in my hold as I add a third finger, rubbing that sweet spot faster and faster until her moans become long and loud. Then I back off.

She huffs. “What… What are you doing?”

“Playing.”

“ What ?”

I pinch her nipples. “You’ve never been edged before?”

She shakes her head.

“Well, babe, your only job is to lie here and enjoy it.”

“I’d rather have an orgasm.”

“You’ll get one.” I scrape my teeth over the shell of her ear and keep rolling her left nipple between my fingers, moving my other hand down to her clit. “Eventually.”

I laugh when she curses me, but I swiftly lose my humor as I work her up again into a writhing mess. Then immediately back off. She growls my name. I merely massage her hips and belly.

Then I start again, stroking her clit until she’s trembling, her breath coming faster. So close to the edge.

And stop.

“Oh my fucking god!”

I pour more oil into my hands, rubbing her tits, fingertips drawing circles around her nipples.

“Dante, please.”

I love hearing her beg, love knowing I’m the one making her feel this way. Because I’ve been begging her for weeks.

She’s got me on a tight leash and doesn’t even know it.

I slide my hands down, thumbs tracing her now soaking-wet sex, her clit swollen and sensitive. And I give it a light smack.

She jerks but groans softly, so I do it again. This time hard, and she sucks in a sharp breath, hands slamming down on the mattress outside of my hips, as if she’s out of control of her body. Then she hits me with a request. “Again, please.”

Fuck me .

I can’t come in my pants again. Once was a funny story. Twice is an embarrassment.

I slap her clit again, and I know she’s riding the edge hard, so I soothe the sting with my fingers, and she plants her feet on the bed, hips lifting up.

“Fuck,” she swears, chasing my touch and orgasm.

I’m chasing my own.

She is just so hot.

This is so hot.

Being with her, I lose my place in space and time. All I hear is her gasp, all I feel is her heat, all I smell is her desire, all I taste is her skin, all I see is how she loses herself. In me. In us.

Knowing I can give this strong and independent woman pleasure, make her beg, bring her to her metaphorical knees while I get on my literal ones…it is all-consuming.

When I’m with her, nothing else matters.

Nothing but her and me and this ever-growing fire between us.

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, that’s what they told us in church. And that’s what I am. Ashes without Taryn.

She shakes, muscles twitching, body pink and practically leaping off the bed with every pass of my fingers over her clit. She’s ready, and so am I.

“You want to come, duchess?”

“Yes,” she sobs, hands fisted in the bedsheets.

“How bad do you want it?” I fondle that sweet little button again, not giving her enough to send her over the edge, but enough to keep her right there, on the brink.

“So bad,” she says, her voice barely audible, her jaw tight. “Please, Dante. Please let me come. ”

I give her what we both hunger for, circling my fingers faster and harder until she cries out, her stomach contracting, her pussy pulsing against my hand. I can feel her come, can feel the wetness, the heat. It’s fucking beautiful.

She collapses against me, limp, and I wrap my arms around her, her pulse racing against my lips when I kiss her throat, my own heart beating so hard against my chest, she can probably feel it.

Once she comes down, I tip her chin toward me, kissing her mouth as I roll us both to our sides, my chest against her back, her ass nestled in my lap.

My cock is straining so hard, it’s poking out of the elastic of my sweats, and after I have them off, it twitches reflexively.

I wrap my fist around the base, willing my excited member to cool it.

We just put Taryn through the wringer; I can’t fuck her like a farm animal.

I slide my arm under her neck and kiss her throat, earning a soft smile and whispered, “You’re gonna be nice to me now?”

“I’m always nice to you,” I say with a nip to her ear.

“Yeah, that’s why I like it when you’re a little bit mean.”

I exhale a harsh breath because my lady knows exactly what to say to get what she wants.

“You ready for me to fuck you?” I ask, but I don’t wait for an answer. Instead, I skate my palm up and down the length of her rib cage then between her legs. She’s still wet, still ready for me. “Yeah, you are.”

I push in, moaning into her neck at the stretch and pull of her body accommodating mine, not being particularly careful or slow, thrusting in and out how I want.

But she likes it and twists to kiss me, her tongue finding mine, welcoming it into her mouth, and it’s not lost on me how special it is that she has invited me not only into her bed but her life as well.

I know enough about her to know she doesn’t put her faith in a lot of people. And I won’t let her down .

Not ever.

I wrap my arm around her, start to move fast, rocking in and out of her with enough force to earn a choked sob with every thrust. I roughly squeeze her breast and hip and waist. Anywhere I can reach that will keep her as close as possible to me.

Her most intimate muscles clamp around my cock, and both of us lose the kiss, unable to coordinate.

We merely pant into each other’s mouths.

She arches her back, and I pinch her nipple.

She meets my plunges, and I hold her leg up.

Both of us climbing higher and higher.

“Come for me, duchess. Come on my cock. Let me feel you.”

She does, her body convulsing, yet I can’t luxuriate in the pulsing of her pussy, because I need to pull out. Barely making it in time before I come on her robe trapped beneath us.

“Oh fuck,” she mumbles, sounding half asleep already.

I can’t argue. I hardly have the energy to toss the robe to the floor and turn off the lights. Taryn doesn’t say a word when I slip back into her bed, naked and wrapped around her, my sweat-slicked chest against her back, my palm on her belly.

And I know, without a doubt, that she is it for me.

The one. Taryn Stone.

She’s gonna hate it when I tell her.