Page 60 of Practice Makes Perfect (Pine Barren University #2)
MIKE
Sophie’s nervousness vibrates through her like a tuning fork—her lips crashing against mine with the desperation of someone trying to beat a shot clock, her hands grabbing fistfuls of my shirt, my hair, whatever purchase she can find on my body.
Meanwhile, I’m playing a different game.
When she pushes for more speed, more intensity, I cup her face between my palms and deliberately soften our kiss, stretching each second out until she makes a small, frustrated sound in her throat that arrows straight to my cock, making it twitch against my jeans.
“Why do you keep doing that?” The accusation threads through her breathless voice as she pulls back. “Every time I try to move things along, you?—”
“Because we have all night.” I rest my forehead against hers, drinking in the sight of her—cheeks flushed, irises dark. “And I want to savor every second of it.”
“But—”
“But nothing.” I brush my thumb across her bottom lip, feeling it tremble slightly under my touch. “Has anyone ever taken their time with you before?”
The way she glances away, suddenly fascinated by my shoulder, tells me everything. How many guys has she been with who treated her body like a speedrun? Who blasted through foreplay, trying to get to the “good part”? Who never once asked what made her toes curl?
I want their addresses.
For violence purposes.
Not that I’m claiming to be a saint over here. Before last year, I was just as guilty—showing up, getting mine, and bouncing with the vague assumption that my partner had enjoyed herself too. I’d never asked and never checked, because I’d never needed to.
Because hockey players don’t have to work for attention.
Which is maybe why Sophie intrigues me so much. She clearly has no idea I play hockey, but she made it crystal clear at the bar that she’s interested in the other parts of me—the terrible clay pottery, the guy who quotes The Office at inappropriate moments—so I rolled with it.
If she’s learning to slow down for the first time, I’m learning what it’s like to just be Mike. Not Mike, captain of the Pine Barren Devils hockey team, or Mike who might go pro next year, just Mike—the guy who’s currently harder than his human movement final and trying not to show it.
The irony isn’t lost on me. Here I am, reformed and eager to worship at the altar of her pleasure, and she keeps trying to rush past her own communion. I want to bury her under an avalanche of pleasure, and she’s content to kick a few stones and be done with it.
A memory ambushes me. Melissa’s eyes (or was it Melanie?) going glassy when I’d delivered my standard “not looking for anything serious” speech after our third hookup. The dignity she’d gathered around herself like armor before walking out. The text: Did I do something wrong?
No, Melissa (Melanie?), I did.
Then came my ankle. My spiral. My therapist’s office with its too-comfortable chairs and the tissue box I definitely didn’t need, thank you very much.
Her gentle dismantling of my entire personality, helping me see I’d been using people like ice packs, a temporary relief for all the bruised places inside me.
She also helped me to understand that my obsession with hockey wasn’t just about the sport, but about having a clear scoreboard for my worth. Previously, I didn’t know who Mike Altman was without hockey, but now I know he’s a guy who makes pottery that looks like melted traffic cones.
“I was a selfish dick,” I say aloud, not meaning to.
Sophie’s eyes snap to mine. “What?”
“Nothing. Just…” I shake my head. “Thinking about how I used to be.”
“And how was that?”
“Selfish, especially in bed.” I trace the delicate shell of her ear with my fingertip, watching goosebumps cascade down her neck like dominoes. “I never asked what my partners wanted. I just took what I needed and figured my mere presence was gift enough to them.”
Her breathing changes as I map the elegant line of her collarbone with my thumb. “And now?”
“Now I’m like one of those former smokers who becomes militantly anti-cigarette after they quit.” My lips find her temple, tasting the faint salt of nervous sweat there. “Turns out, making someone else totally lose their mind is the ultimate high, even if they’re nervous...”
“I’m not nervous,” she says, but it’s too quick and too sharp to be convincing, like a slapshot with no follow-through.
“OK.” I don’t push. “But if you are—which would be completely normal—I want you to know I’ll check in with you every step of the way, Sophie.”
The tension in her shoulders doesn’t ease. She’s wound tighter than playoff overtime. I remember her earlier remark about preferring not to think during sex, about wanting to follow someone else’s lead, and I wonder why being a passenger is the goal.
“How about this?” I guide her hand to my wrist, letting her fingers curl around it. “If at any point you’re uncomfortable or want me to stop, just squeeze.”
Relief transforms her face, and she lets out a long exhale. “That’s… that’s actually perfect, Mike.”
“Good.” I kiss her again, softer this time, tasting strawberry lip gloss. “Now, can I undress you?”
Her eyes go wide. “Yes.”
I start with her shirt, lifting it with reverence. Inch by inch, pale skin emerges in the amber bedroom light, soft shadows pooling in the hollows of her throat, highlighting the gentle rise and fall of her chest. I lean in, pressing my lips to her neck, feeling her heartbeat against my mouth.
She gasps, her fingers digging into my shoulders hard enough to leave marks she’ll curse me for tomorrow. “Mike…”
“Is this OK?” I murmur against her skin.
“Yes.”
I trail kisses down her throat, across the ridge of her collarbone, to the soft swell of her breasts above her bra.
Simple cotton. White. Practical, rather than seductive, which somehow makes my cock throb harder.
I reach around to her back, finding the clasp and releasing it with a practice I’m not particularly proud of.
The bra falls away and, Christ, she’s perfect.
Small, firm breasts topped with pale pink nipples that tighten under my gaze like they’re camera-shy.
I cup one gently, feeling the weight of it in my palm, and run my thumb over the peaked tip.
Color floods her skin and she arches into my touch, making a sound that’s half-gasp, half-moan, all music.
I continue my exploration of her body. I kiss down her sternum, where I can feel her heart hammering, over the subtle curve of her stomach that trembles under my lips, to the waistband of her jeans. I look up, waiting for her nod before I pop the button.
When she gives it, I push her back onto the bed and she gasps at the sudden shift. Then I’m peeling denim down her legs like I’m unwrapping the world’s best Christmas present, pressing kisses to each new territory I conquer—the inside of her knee, the soft skin of her calf, the arch of her foot.
She lets out a sound that’s half-giggle, half-gasp, and her toes curl. “Mike…”
“Ticklish?” I grin against her skin.
“A little.” Her voice wobbles between embarrassment and arousal.
I work my way back up, lingering at her inner thigh where the skin is silk-soft and scented with her arousal. All that remains are her panties—white cotton like the bra, practical and somehow impossibly sexy for it—and I can’t wait to see what’s beneath.
But, first, my fingers hook into the waistband as I pause. “These too?”
There’s a heartbeat of hesitation before she nods. “Yes.”
I glide them down with the same reverence I showed her jeans, watching her face as I reveal her completely.
She shivers as the cotton passes her thighs, her knees, her ankles, until finally she’s bare before me.
But I don’t immediately cover her with my body or dive between her legs like rookie me would have.
Instead, I kneel at the foot of the bed like a supplicant, just looking at her, memorizing every freckle scattered across her chest like stars, every gentle curve, every place where her skin flushes pink. She squirms under my attention, thighs pressing together, but she holds my gaze.
Brave.
Perfect.
I crawl back up the bed, bracing myself above her on forearms that shake slightly, not from exertion but from the effort of restraint. My cock strains against my jeans, demanding attention I refuse to give it at this moment, because this moment is all about her.
She surprises me by maintaining eye contact even now, despite the nervousness swimming in those gray depths alongside curiosity and something that might be trust beginning to bloom like a fragile spring flower. It ignites my desire even more.
“Can I kiss your neck?” I ask, my voice rougher than intended.
She nods, and I descend.
I start at her left nipple, and when I suck gently, she gasps and arches against me, her body moving with an honesty that makes my head spin. The response is so immediate, so raw, that I file it away in the part of my brain labeled “Sophie’s Instruction Manual.”
Chapter One: This spot right here.
I suck harder, and she moans, a sound so genuine and uncontrolled that I feel reverberate through my chest. Her hands tangle in my hair, not pushing away but pulling closer, like she’s trying to climb inside my skin.
I have to close my eyes and think about anything that isn’t how badly I want to be inside her right now.
“Mike,” she says, breathy and desperate, and it nearly ends me.
My hand drifts down her stomach, feeling the muscles jump under my touch, stopping just above where I know she’s aching. I pull back from her neck to meet her eyes, and understanding dawns on her face followed immediately by a blush that paints her from chest to hairline.
She nods before I can ask.