Page 27 of Smokin’ Situation (Masked Men of Sage Springs #3)

Annie

The room was dark as I stirred, slowly opening my heavy eyelids.

Falling asleep wasn’t my plan, but once I hit the plush bedding after my shower, the exhaustion had taken over.

Food was a secondary need, although a gnawing hunger was making itself known, my tummy grumbling as I sat myself up against the pillows.

Trying to regain my bearings, I scanned the room. Something was different.

The lingering scent of wood smoke seemed stronger than when I’d taken off my dirty clothes, but I could’ve just been imagining things.

Sliding my naked body from beneath the warm covers, I walked toward the dresser on the other side of the room, scanning a tray filled with food.

Grabbing a bundle of grapes and some crackers, I inspected the pile of clothing next to the tray as I ate, thankful for the soft sweater and terry cloth shorts.

A smile drew at my lips when I realized there weren’t any underwear in the pile, but at this point, I wasn’t sure why I bothered worrying about it.

Tripp hadn’t seemed to mind my lack of appropriate undergarments.

Squinting as I looked across the room, I tilted my head at the closed bathroom door. I was sure I left it open earlier when I practically sleepwalked to the bed after finally washing my hair with actual water pressure.

When the sound of the shower starting carried through the room, my heart skipped a beat.

He was home.

Well, not home , per se. Still, he’d returned to the lodge and to me .

As of yesterday, I no longer had one of those, but I was starting to think that maybe home could be a person, and not just where you laid your head at night.

That thought had broken open something inside of me that’d scabbed over after we lost our parents and our grandmother died a few years ago.

I began to see past all the trials that life had thrown at me, hope blossoming in my chest that maybe the future wasn’t something to dread.

Reese was safe. And we’d both escaped from a dangerous situation where things could have easily ended differently, so there was a lot to be thankful for.

While I was not one to jinx things, maybe we’d both escaped the family curse.

Knocking on the wood of the dresser top, I stared at the door to the bathroom, debating whether I should join him.

But it wasn’t a hard decision, and I was across the room within seconds. Careful to enter quietly, I slowly pushed the door inward, but Tripp was facing away from the door, the room shrouded in darkness.

He was standing with his forearm braced on the tiles, his other palm gripping the solid length of his cock. Heat rose to my cheeks at the thought I’d interrupted him, but then I noticed his arm wasn’t moving.

My bare feet were silent on the wooden floor, my body drawn to his like a magnet. He didn’t move when I slipped into the shower behind him, laying my cheek against his back and wrapping my arms around his chest.

His skin still smelled of fire, like smoke and destruction, but if the firebreak he’d worked on half the day worked to halt what we’d already lost, maybe it could be the smell of rebirth.

We’d learned enough about ecology in high school science, and I knew not only the fictional phoenix rose from the ashes. The growth after a fire could be a rebirth for the forest. A new chance for life to flourish.

Maybe that’s what this fire represented for both of us, a way to start anew .

His warm hand covered mine, and I kissed the center of his back, just savoring this innocent moment of connection between two people who had felt lost in their lives. Maybe his appearance in Sage Springs was a divine intervention of some sort. For both of us.

“Are you okay?” I whispered into his skin, and he shuddered, inhaling a shaky breath.

“I am now.” His voice was rough—raspy and tired. “I missed you.”

“Do you think the break will help? Are we safe here?”

He turned, cupping the sides of my jaw with his large, warm, calloused hands, rubbing the pads of his thumbs across my cheekbones. “I promise I’ll keep you safe, Rhey, wherever we end up. But I don’t want to talk about the fire. I just want to lose myself in you.”

Closing the distance, his upper lip nestled between mine, caressing my mouth softly. Lingering at an almost drowsy pace, he kept the kiss slow and sensual, dipping in further with each pass of his lips.

My head swam, his presence entirely intoxicating, but I didn’t push further, enjoying his closeness.

It’d been a long time since I just enjoyed kissing someone without rushing through it.

Not wanting to bring anyone else into this time together, I pushed the thoughts of men who’d come before him out of my mind and concentrated on how he made me feel.

Tripp spun me away from where I stood inside the shower door, pinning my back against the cold tiles, and I gasped at the sensation. I tipped my head backward as his palm dragged down my overheated skin, cupping my neck firmly while lips and teeth nipped at my lobe, his pants heavy in my ear.

“You have no idea what you do to me. How much I crave you.”

While he’d given me the freedom to lead in the cabin, he was clearly taking it back, holding me possessively and using his hips to trap me in place, completely helpless to the way he was owning my body.

His hips rocked forward as he reclaimed my lips, kissing me roughly .

“I need to be inside you,” he growled, his throbbing cock trapped between us, a heavy reminder of his attraction to me against my stomach.

“Here,” I gasped, bringing my thigh up to wrap around his waist. “Now.”

“Fuck, baby. I—” he broke off, his groan reverberating off the tile. “You know I want you, but I don’t…”

“Bare. I want nothing between us this time.” Slowly drawing back to look at my face, he searched my eyes, a crease between his eyebrows. “I get the shot. It’s safe.”

His jaw clenched, something almost feral flickering in those deep blue eyes before he dragged his palm down the center of my chest, lingering between my breasts before he trailed it lower, his fingertips easily sliding to where I was warm and aching for his touch.

He teased me, circling where I was desperate for him, but still holding back. “Are you sure? We don’t have to have sex. There are plenty of ways for me to make you come that don’t involve my cock.”

“I know,” I whispered, pressing my hand above where his heart thumped steadily.

Slowly, I slid it upward, my fingers lingering on the rough skin of his scar before I grasped the hair at the back of his head, gripping it firmly between my fingers.

“But right now, I need you to fuck me. Show me how much you need me.”

“Rhey.” My name was a feral growl in his throat, but that was all the permission he needed, his large palms grasping the backs of my thighs and lifting, my back sliding up the tiles effortlessly.

He pressed forward as he reached for one of my hands.

Interlocking our fingers, he pinned it to the tile above my head.

Strong hips supported my weight as he reached between us, lining himself up and teasingly pressing the head to my clit before he dragged it lower.

“Is this where you need me, pretty girl?”

“God, yes,” I panted, fighting to keep my eyes open and focused on him .

“Do you need me to make you come?” He was watching me with a glint in his eyes, enjoying teasing me when I just needed to be connected to him.

Well, two could play that game. Lowering my voice to a throaty whisper, I looked up at him from beneath my wet eyelashes. “Be a good boy and make me scream your name.”

“Fuck.” The word was low and drawn out as his hips shifted, his bare cock sliding inside me. “Oh, fuck. You’re so fucking warm. God damn. I’m not sure how long I’m gonna last this way.”

“Then I guess you’d better concentrate.”

And concentrate he did, tilting his hips and thrusting into me hard enough my back slid up the tiles. Anchoring myself to him, I held on tight as he fucked me, growling into my ear, his fingers squeezing mine tightly.

There were still so many things in my life that were unsettled, but I didn’t want to regret anything with him.

Being with him like this, trusting him without any barriers between us, may have seemed reckless—and although the timing was terrible and circumstances lingered at the back of my mind—I was so glad I met him. In the aftermath, I’d found refuge.

“What do you need?” he asked, nipping at my ear, hips slowly rolling, his cock hitting a place that had me breathless.

“Just keep doing that…” My voice was a breathy pant as he slowed his pace, grinding into me.

“You mean keep fucking you?” he whispered in a rough tone, and I lit up, the feeling of being surrounded my him, held captive to his thrusts with his deep voice in my ear, was intoxicating.

“Keep driving into you with my hard cock and watching you lose your mind with pleasure when you shatter around me?”

“Fuck, Tripp…” His hips tilted and I lost my words.

He let out a rough chuckle at my breathy exhalation against his strong, muscular shoulder.

“Yes, Rhey,” he growled into my neck. “I am absolutely the man fucking you right now. And I’m going to be the man coming inside you bare as soon as I feel that pretty pussy flutter around my dick. ”

“Oh God,” I gasped, squeezing his hand tight as I met each hard thrust, my legs locked tightly around his waist. I was lost in him, absolutely at his mercy and so close to the edge when his teeth bit down on my earlobe, a feral groan from him sending me flying, my body pulsing around him.

“That’s right, baby. Come on me. Your moans make me so fucking hard. You’re just desperate for me to fill you with my cum, aren’t you?”

Gasping in his ear when he picked up the pace, I dug my nails into his scalp and the back of his hand. He drove into me like a man possessed, his grip borderline painful until he stilled, groaning into my ear as he throbbed, emptying himself inside me.