We win as a team and lose as one.
But none of them feel the same crushing defeat as I do right now, because a nagging feeling in the pit of my stomach is telling me I’m about to lose a lot more if I don’t play my cards right.
When the hotel door opens I’m still leaning over the bathroom sink after splashing water in my face to cool off, white knuckling the counter while the water runs. I don’t bother telling Ivy where I am before she walks in and stops right behind me.
Two warm arms wrap around my naked torso, squeezing me in silence. A cheek rests between my shoulder blades and a small breath escapes me as I reach forward and turn off the faucets.
Instead of talking, I turn around and tilt her chin up so she’s looking me in the eye. There’s an understanding between us as she nods a few times and raises on her toes to meet me halfway for a brief kiss. It lasts no more than a few seconds before I break it off and trail my hands down her sides until I’m peeling my jersey and her under shirt off at the same time. She unbuttons her jeans and lets me pull those and her panties off as she unhooks her bra and lets it fall to the floor until she’s completely naked in front of me.
I study her body, mapping her curves with my eyes and feeling myself harden by the second with every swipe over her bare skin. She takes my hands and puts them to her chest, her full tits filling up my palms before she slowly trails my hands down her smooth stomach, over her navel, and leaves them gripping her hips.
Leaning forward, I close the distance and kiss her again. This time harder, needing her to taste how badly I want to get out of my head. She starts rubbing my chest, palming my pecs, and moving her hands down to my boxers to pull them down until my cock springs free.
The kiss continues, a game of give and take, before she moves us so her body bends over the sink with her back to me. She moves her hair over one of her shoulders and looks at me in the mirror. She leans forward so her supple ass is nearly brushing my erect cock, one of her hands snaking behind her and wrapping around my shaft, slowly pumping me.
Groaning, I step toward her as she lines me up with her opening and pushes back until the tip of me is inside of her. Choking down the noise rising up my throat, I watch her settle her forearms on the sink, biting her bottom lip and pushing into me further. When we lock eyes in the reflection, she gives me a small nod before I bottom out in one full thrust, my balls hitting her ass. “Fuck, baby.”
Her eyes close and head drops forward as I withdraw and repeat the action with a little more confidence. My hands grip her hips as I thrust inside of her, the feeling of being clenched every single time driving me to go faster and harder until I’m grunting and listening to the way she moans with me.
Ivy’s body shifts forward the harder I thrust, so I grip the wall with one hand and grab a fistful of her hair with my other. Her lips part as I bury myself inside her and circle my hips before jackknifing over and over and listening to the little containers of soap and lotion on the sink rattle with the impact of our slapping bodies against the hotel vanity.
“Touch yourself,” I demand in a strangled voice, knowing I won’t last long enough to get her off.
One of her hands disappears between her legs, and another sharp breath escapes her lips as I twitch inside of her tight pussy. Grinding into her once, twice, a third time, I quickly pull out as she moans my name and absorb the sound of her orgasm, stroking myself until I cum on my hand and her back.
Her body slumps forward as she breaths heavily, my cum still slick on her pale skin. I grab the hand towel hanging beside the sink and wipe her off, then clean myself before throwing the balled-up cloth on the bottom of the tub.
She starts standing when I grab my boxers from the floor and slide them up my thighs, jaw ticking as I watch her hair shield her face from her reflection in the mirror.
“Never let me use you like that again,” I growl, gathering her clothes and handing them to her with a hard expression on my face. “You deserve better than that, remember?”
She steals a peek at me from under her lashes. “Is that your way of saying I can do better than you, Aiden?”
I swallow. “It’s me saying you can do better than what you think you deserve. Nobody should use your body like that.”
Walking out of the bathroom, I stop a few feet away from the door when I hear, “You’re wrong. I let people use me before because I didn’t think I could do any better. I let you in because you needed me, and I wanted to help. There’s a difference.”
I turn to her, brows furrowed.
She’s still naked, my jersey clenched in her palms and barely covering her naked breasts as she steps forward. Her dusty pink nipples peak through the thin material she’s clinging to like it’s her lifeline. “You needed something, and I gave it to you. I don’t know much about love, but I’d like to think that’s part of it. Don’t make it less.”
My eyes close as one of my hands swipe down the side of my face. “Ivy…”
“Don’t make it less,” she repeats, her tone pleading until it busts something inside of me. “I can’t take hearing that when I’m finally accepting what I’ve always felt about you. I want to be there for you if you’ll let me. I don’t know where that’s going to lead us, but you can’t give up on me now, Aiden. Not now. So, please. Don’t make this less.”
I shake my head, her words smacking into me harder than they ever have. “Never.”
She doesn’t look like she believes me, so I walk back into the bathroom and make her look at me. My thumb brushes her flushed cheek and swollen bottom lip, as I search her uncertain eyes that are darker than normal and glazed with unfallen tears.
“Never.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Ivy
Instead of staying with Aiden’s parents at the small family-owned inn on the outskirts of Lindon, Porter stays on the couch downstairs. He’s reluctant to agree, quiet when it’s just us two alone after Aiden went upstairs to chill with the guys, but he sets his backpack down on the cushion between us and sits on the opposite end of the sofa from me.
My hands drag down my thighs as I watch him study the room like I did when Aiden first brought me here. His legs spread to get comfortable, his arms resting crossed over his chest, and when he finally looks at me, I don’t expect him to ask, “Are you and Aiden a thing?”
Legs crisscrossing under me, I shove my hands into my lap and fight the blush that wants to creep under my skin. “Is that really what you want to talk about?”
He shrugs. “Seems like a good place to start considering he went through all the trouble to get me here.”
Knowing he has a point I give him the best answer I can conjure. “I’m not sure what Aiden and I are right now. We’re…” Like him, my shoulders lift slightly. “It’s a work in progress, like a lot of things are in my life. I don’t want to talk about that. We have years to catch up on. Things I should explain.”
“You don’t need to explain anything.”
“How can you say that? I up and left. Do you not want to know why? Get closure?”
He averts his gaze, making me feel anxious for his reply. “Mom and Dad told everyone you went to live with Grandma Gertie.”