And that worries me.
I mean, it should worry me, right?
I had a guy I was crazy about. A guy who I thought was perfect. A guy who everyone thought was perfect. Only it turned out he wasn’t. He was a deeply disturbed guy. I keep telling myself that Brecken isn’t a guy. He’s a man. That he’s nothing like Harrison, and I know he’s not. I. Know. He’s. Not.
But in six years I haven’t come close to this.
The sex. The intimacy. The sleeping holding each other. The staring into each other’s eyes. The stolen looks and the sweet smiles and his eyes. God, his eyes and the way they look at me. I am nothing but sensation with him and I have no idea how to stop it.
Especially when I told him I’d try.
Plus, he’s so fucking adorable sitting on my sofa, tucked under my huge comforter with me, listening to the crackle of my fireplace and reading… ready for it… Twilight. He looks delightfully perplexed and intrigued as he flips pages because reading is really all we can do. I don’t exactly have board games for either of us. I have games I play when Stella comes over to stay, but mostly she and I talk books because like me, she’s a lover of all things cool and slightly nerdy in the book world.
It makes Landon very happy that his twelve-year-old daughter would rather keep her face in a book than in a tablet or—shudder—looking at boys. I’m reading on my Kindle, an awesome menage romantic suspense that is getting to the climax—nonsexually—so I haven’t been able to put it down.
But that doesn’t mean I’m not checking in on Brecken with Twilight. A book he has never read and only knows about because his sister—like me and every other girl—was obsessed with it when it came out.
“So. Wait.” His eyebrows are comically furrowed as he stares at the page with a tilted head. “She’s obsessed with this guy who stared at her like she was the antichrist and then was rude to her? Then he disappears and she’s asking a million questions about him and his family? Why does she give a shit? Because he’s hot?”
I laugh. “Partially. But also because she doesn’t understand it and it makes her uncomfortable to interact with him. She’s also intrigued and curious about him and his family.”
“Um. Yeah. Okay. I’m starting to think I don’t understand women all that well. Why didn’t she just straight up ask him what his problem was? I don’t like that she has no spine or confidence. I feel like that sets women back a bit. And why did he treat her like that? Isn’t the whole premise that he’s into her?”
I roll my eyes, though he’s not wrong on the Bella Swan lack of spine and confidence thing. At least in this part of the book. “Well, yes. But he’s also a vampire. A vampire who doesn’t drink human blood. Well, not anymore,” I amend. “But her scent is potent to him, so he was a dick as a means to save both of them. If that makes sense.”
“It doesn’t.” He shakes his head, growing agitated. “But we don’t know any of his story yet. I only know he’s a vampire because Aria droned on about Edward Cullen forever.”
“You don’t have to read it.”
“Oh no, I think I do. Because clearly I’m missing something huge all women seem to be in on. This is like unlocking a secret garden filled with all your spoils.”
“I’m not sure if it is or isn’t since most women—and Bella is a girl—don’t act that way. But yeah, there is something about that series so maybe you’re onto something with that. I swooned impossibly hard over Edward Cullen. I never got into Jacob, but his team was deep.”
“Jacob?”
“He’s coming.”
Brecken groans, sagging back against the cushion as he absently kisses the top of my head. “I think I should have started with something easier.”
I lean back and kiss the underside of his jaw. “Your dedication to learning the inner workings of the female psyche is admirable.”
“Or insane. Nothing makes sense to me. Men aren’t like this. We’re concrete. If a dude is a dick to us, we either ask them what’s up or just forget about it and move on. End of story.”
“A dude?”
He squeezes my breast, pinching my nipple. “You know what I mean. I meant as an interaction or whatever, but I guess you can flip that around and replace dude with chick.”
“Because you like chicks.” This time I can’t stop my grin or my sarcasm as it drips from my lips. I’ve been trying, but it’s futile
“Does my hand on your breast not adequately convey that? Because I’m happy to dive under this blanket and show you just how much I like chicks. One in particular. One in particular who is very fond of the way I eat her pussy.”
A hot flush runs rampant through my body, making my thighs squeeze together and the aforementioned pussy clench. Jesus. We had sex like an hour ago. And I’ve pretty much lost count by this point of all the times we’ve done it since he showed up on my doorstep last night.
He nips my earlobe, knowing the exact effect he has on me. “Now what do you have to say?”
“That I should get up and start dinner.”
He growls in my ear. “That made me hard.”
I laugh, trying to stifle it by biting down on my lip. “Oh yeah. Good to know cooking gets you hot and bothered.”
“Say it again. Cooking.”
I elbow into his side, and I feel his smile against my neck as he kisses me.
“I have to go cook us dinner.”
“Damn. Any time you want to talk dirty like that, hit me up. You have no idea how sexy it is when you say that to me.”
“Pig.”
He chuckles against me. “Do you want me to help? I can put it in your oven if you want.”
“I wish you could, but there’s no power, so the oven is out.”
“Hmmm,” he groans, his hand massaging my breast a little harder, working me up. “If it weren’t freezing in here, I’d splay you out on your kitchen island and have my wicked way with you over and over again. Something to look forward to though. For now, let’s go make dinner together because believe it or not, I like to cook.”
I moan, leaning back into him, my hand running along his hardening cock through the fabric of his jeans.
“See, cooking is an aphrodisiac for both of us.”
Right. Cooking. Or more like the way he’s playing my nipples like an instrument.
“We can cook later.”
“Oh no,” he whispers. “Dinner first. Then dessert. Believe me, I plan on taking my time with you tonight, Angel.”
A delicious shiver runs through me that has nothing to do with the chill in the room. He helps me off the couch and I head for the kitchen. I was worried about all the food in my fridge and freezer going bad, so we packed a lot of it up into a couple larger coolers I had and set them on my patio since it’s only about twenty degrees out. In October.
It’s absolute madness.
I had texted briefly with my brothers this morning, and we all seem to be doing okay. Landon and Stella went to my parents’ house because the compound has generators, and they don’t live too far from them. But given the road conditions right now, none of the rest of us who all live in the city were going to brave it.