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CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

SUTTON

Even the physical distance between us as I’d driven home in my car with Atlas following in his SUV hadn’t been enough to dull this hum beneath my skin.

What I’d hoped would dissolve with time and space only seemed to intensify.

It didn’t matter if I lived in the guest cottage.

It didn’t matter if he was close enough to touch or if he disappeared for days at a time.

None of it mattered, because he was constantly on my mind, regardless.

If it wasn’t the explicit memories bombarding me, then it was the smaller gestures he’d made since I’d moved here to Starlight Cove.

The coffee and the delivered lunches and my always-full gas tank.

But it was also the emergency kit he’d assembled for my car in deference to the upcoming Maine winter.

And when he’d adjusted the thermostat to be warmer in the mornings after I’d come downstairs wrapped up like a burrito.

It was him .

Atlas didn’t say a word as he followed me to the back door.

Or when I pressed my fingerprint to the scanner.

Or when the door unlocked and he reached around me to open it.

Not a single syllable as the heat of his chest pressed into my back, his breath ghosting over my neck as he guided me inside.

He might not have said anything, but the way he stared at me left very little to the imagination.

I knew exactly what he was thinking because it was written in every coiled inch of his body and in the hungry way he stared at me.

He wanted to bend me over this kitchen island and fuck me until we both saw stars.

And I couldn’t lie to myself and say I didn’t want the same thing.

I blew out a breath and averted my gaze.

“Don’t look at me like that.”

“Like what?” he asked, his voice low and rough, gravel coating his throat.

“You know exactly like what. Like you don’t care that no one is around to witness it, or that my daughter is in her bedroom down the hall.” I swallowed thickly, trying to put as much conviction into my words as possible.

“Or that we’ve already established rules.”

“The ‘only in public’ rule was yours, not mine.”

“And it’s a good one! You know sex between us will only complicate things now that Laurel and I are living here.”

“We’ve already had sex, trouble. Several times. And if you think I don’t spend half my day remembering exactly what it feels like to be inside you, you haven’t been paying attention.”

I leaned back, bracing my trembling hands on the edge of the counter, and shook my head.

“See? That’s what I mean. I can’t do this with you.”

“No?” he asked, stalking toward me until he braced his hands on either side of mine.

“So you don’t want me to lift you onto this island, sit down on that stool, and dine on my favorite meal? Make you come over and over again against my tongue until you beg me to stop?”

I exhaled a shaky breath, my voice coming out in a croak.

“No.”

He hummed low, the vibration echoing from his chest to mine.

“Just to be clear, you also don’t want me to take you into my bedroom and give you every fucking inch your pussy has been aching for?”

“No,” I breathed, the word just a whisper in the space between us.

Dropping his face to my neck, he traced along the column with his nose, the only part of himself he allowed to touch me.

“Then I guess you also don’t want me to use one of your battery-operated friends while I’m fucking you? Which kinds do you have? Would I be able to stuff your ass full of one while you took me inside your pussy? Or maybe I could press one of those little clit suckers against you while I filled up your perfect little cunt until you soaked me with your come?”

This time, I didn’t even try to speak.

Instead, I shook my head in response.

Too worried that if I opened my mouth, I’d actually tell him, Yes, abso-fucking-lutely yes .

I did want him to do that, along with everything else, multiple times.

Atlas’s gaze pinged over my face, reading every subtle shift in my expression.

With a single nod, he stepped back and tipped his head toward the steps.

“All right, then. Let’s go upstairs. I’ll close myself off in my room and pretend you’re not getting yourself off with your new little toy, and you can go into yours and pretend I’m not stroking my cock imagining it.”

I wasn’t going to admit to Atlas that I’d done exactly as he’d suggested I would.

I’d been so worked up, I hadn’t even needed my toy to get me there.

But I’d grabbed it anyway because I relished the idea of him imagining me doing so.

I’d fucked myself with it, the suction against my clit and the fantasy of Atlas standing in my doorway watching me sending me over the edge in less than a minute.

Usually, orgasms were my ticket to dreamland.

If I was having trouble falling asleep, a quick fap session was my surefire way to get there.

This orgasm, though?

This only seemed to rev me up more, had me strung even tighter in the end.

I glanced over at the clock, the red 1:27 glaring back at me.

Taunting me, just as it had for the past hour.

Because I knew the answer to my problem of not being able to sleep was, in fact, another orgasm.

It just wasn’t an orgasm by my own hand.

After tossing and turning for another seventeen minutes, I slammed my arms down on the mattress and huffed out a frustrated groan.

Between an early morning wake-up, courtesy of the kitten, followed by a full day of patients at the clinic, and then a festival to top it all off, it had been a long-ass day.

I was exhausted. Obviously sleep-delirious.

That was the only excuse I had for throwing off my covers, tiptoeing out of my bedroom and into the hall, and turning the knob on Atlas’s door.

Not even a creak broke the silence as I crept into his room, the hardwood floors cold under my bare feet.

This was a bad idea.

An epic, colossally horrific idea.

He was probably sleeping anyway.

All his talk downstairs had no doubt been just that—talk.

He wasn’t as worked up as I was.

Didn’t come up here and stroke himself off to the thought of me using my toy.

Wasn’t climbing the walls, thanks to this insatiable craving under his skin.

A craving that just wouldn’t go away.

He’d probably been asleep for hours and wouldn’t even know I’d made this little slipup.

I could just?—

“Don’t even think about leaving, trouble.” Atlas’s low rumble cut through the silence.

I froze mid-step, standing there in nothing but his flannel while I waited for my eyes to adjust to the darkness because I couldn’t see a damn thing.

He, apparently, didn’t have any such problem.

“You think you can walk in here wearing my shirt and I’m going to let you leave before I find out what you have on underneath it?”

I swallowed thickly and turned back toward him.

“That’s pretty forward of you.”

“Oh, are we going for subtle now? I thought you’d tossed that out the window when you opened my door.” There was a rustle of fabric and then a soft click as the light from his bedside lamp softly illuminated the space.

While I’d been able to make out the vague shape of Atlas in his bed, now I had an unobstructed view of him.

With his chest bare, the white sheet pooling low across his hips, he sat leaning back against the dark wood headboard, his gaze locked on me.

And my god , he was a sight.

He looked so fucking sexy sitting there, his hair in disarray, his eyes heavy—with sleep or lust, I wasn’t sure.

I wanted to stroke my fingers over the dark hair on his chest, wanted to trace that path all the way down to where that intimidating bulge taunted me from below the sheet.

Wanted to use those massive shoulders for leverage as I sank down on his substantial length and rode us both to sleep.

While I’d been soaking in every inch of his glorious body, he’d been doing the same, his attention never straying from me.

His gaze ghosted over me from head to toe, that bulge only growing more prominent as he did so, and I couldn’t deny the heady feeling that gave me.

Knowing I was affecting him.

It was all too intense.

The fact that he was there, shirtless—arguably naked—and I was over here without any panties on like a fucking idiot.

I’d come in here without any armor.

Nothing keeping me from strolling straight over to his bed, climbing astride him, and taking that thick cock inside me.

In an effort to distract myself, I averted my eyes, my gaze bouncing around the room and cataloging everything in quick succession.

The framed picture on his dresser of Atlas with three other men and a woman—his brothers and mom, no doubt—the well-worn baseball hat with the high school’s logo tossed on the chair in the corner, and the familiar romance book on his nightstand, each giving a glimpse into the real him.

The one he seemed to keep locked up tight.

“What are you doing in my room, and why are you still standing all the way over there?” he asked, his voice just a soft rumble in the otherwise quiet house.

Because it was infinitely safer this way.

Instead, I said, “I couldn’t sleep. And I think a better question is, why do you have a copy of the book I’m reading on your nightstand?”

“Coincidence,” he said without hesitation.

“Uh-huh.” I breathed out a laugh and shook my head, narrowing my eyes at him.

“You really weren’t fucking with me that night out by the pool, were you? You knew exactly what chapter those four mobsters finally put her out of her misery and fucked her.”

He grunted.

“Now that we’ve cleared that up, come over here.”

As if my body were controlled by his voice alone, I walked toward him, reveling in the way his gaze tracked my every step.

My nipples pebbled under his scrutiny, the way his attention snagged on the hem of his shirt, making my clit throb.

And I hoped to god he was going to do something about that.

Once I stood next to his bed, he reached out, placing his rough palm against my bare leg, just below his shirt.

“Here’s what’s going to happen, trouble. I’m going to slide my hand under this shirt of mine you decided to wear to sleep. If I find out you came in here with a bare pussy, I’m going to throw you down on the bed and put that sweet little cunt to good use.”

My breath caught in my throat, and I had to force myself not to clench my legs together at the promise, knowing he’d feel my reaction.

“But,” he continued, gaze never straying from mine, “if I find out you’re wearing panties, I’ll send you on your way. You can go back to your room, and we don’t have to talk about this ever again. Deal?”

I should have told him no.

Should’ve just turned around and walked out because I knew he wouldn’t have stopped me.

I should’ve headed back to my room, taken a gummy, and hoped it would finally lull me into sleep.

Instead, I said, “Let’s say you don’t find anything under this shirt… Aren’t you worried about the rules?”

“Fuck the rules. Now, do we have a deal or not?”