Page 61 of Where the Roses Bloom

CHAPTER 21

Rhett

The skillet was stillwarm on the stove. Rosemary and browned butter hung in the air, a promise we had no intention of keeping.

We were supposed to be eating.

Instead, Willow was spread out across the kitchen table, thighs locked around my shoulders, her head tipped back, hair cascading like honey over the edge of the wood. Sunlight poured in through the windows, catching in the curve of her jaw, the arousal between her thighs, the way her chest rose and fell in sharp little gasps every time I sucked at her clit.

One of her hands was tangled in my hair, the other grasping the sugar bowl we hadn’t bothered to move. The plates were still on the counter. The toast was cold. The coffee was untouched.

And I didn’t give a damn.

This was how most mornings went now. I’d walk past her, maybe brush my hand across her waist while she stirred something on the stove—and she’d look up at me with those eyes. That soft, secret smile like she already knew what was coming. And before I could think better of it, I’d have her on thecounter, or against the door, or sprawled across this very table, wet and begging and mine.

I couldn’t stop touching her.

She was so soft under my hands. So open. Her breath hitched with every slow drag of my tongue, her hips rising to meet my mouth like her body was desperate to chase the next wave. I let her grind against my face, let her use me however she needed, my grip tight on her hips to keep her steady.

Her thighs trembled around my ears. Her voice broke on a moan that shattered straight through me.

I kissed higher, mouth trailing up her thigh, her hipbone, the tender dip just below her belly. I pressed my face into the heat of her, groaning as I felt her throb beneath my tongue.

“Don’t stop,” she whispered.

Like I ever could.

I swore this was what I was made for—to worship her like this. To start every damn day on my knees with my mouth on her, drinking her in like the most sacred kind of sin.

Willow reached down and cupped my face, guiding me, hips rolling, breath ragged. Her fingers slid into my hair again and pulled, sharp and sweet.

“Rhett,” she gasped. “Oh my?—”

The front door flew open like it had something to prove.

“Rhett?”

Beau’s voice. Casual as hell.

Like he wasn’t about to walk into something he’d never recover from.

“You better not be dead, man, it’s been?—”

“Well…bravo, big brother!”

That was Whit—waymore amused and far less bashful.

Willow shrieked.

Her whole body jolted upright, sending a half-empty coffee cup skidding across the table and the sugar bowl flying off the edge. I barely caught it before it shattered.

“Shit,” I muttered, pulling her off the table and behind me to block her from view, heart hammering, slick with sweat and salt and…her. I swiped the back of my hand across my mouth, even though it was a lost cause.

No amount of wiping would erase the sin glittering on my lips.

Willow grabbed my t-shirt from the floor and yanked it over her head. Her hair was a mess, cheeks flushed, thighs still trembling. I was in nothing but my boxers, hard as a damn rock.

Beau stood frozen in the doorway, eyes wide, mouth half-open like he didn’t know whether to laugh or back out slow.