“That may be the way with you.” I scrunched up my nose. “But I’m sure that normal people don’t feel that way.”
He snorted, as if he wasn’t believing my line of bullshit either.
I knew I was a pretty girl. I was petite, had long hair, and a cute face. But I wasn’t movie star beautiful or anything.
“You don’t see yourself the way I do. The way a man does,” he pointed out. “You have all that hair and ass. You have a cute little frame that we can wrap up easily. You’re literally the perfect fit for right here.” He patted his lap. “You’re beautiful, you have a gorgeous smile. And you’re pregnant, which is giving you this glow. Which is really fuckin’ real. A glow. But you have it, and it’s obvious. Plus, from the back, you don’t look pregnant. Your ass is all round and…” He gestured with his hands to amplify my assets.
“Whatever.” I smiled. “But I did see some man staring at me in the grocery store yesterday. He was standing next to his wife, though. So I wasn’t worried. Well, I was worried for him and what his wife was going to do to him when they got home. But I figured he was only looking because of the amount of groceries in my cart. Not because of my assets.”
He gave me an unrepentant grin. “You ready?”
I was.
Getting up, I stretched my arms up high over my head, and he used that moment to move in close and put his arm around my back, pulling me into his body.
I went ahead and crossed my arms behind his neck while I was at it, staring up at him with hearts in my eyes.
“You’re pretty hot yourself,” I blurted.
Bram was hot and he knew it. Everyone always commented that he was the ‘hottest’ Crow brother.
I thought it was due to his brooding personality and his refusal to talk to anybody. The ‘broken’ aura he had about him was always enticing.
His eyes heated more, and he dropped a kiss onto my nose before saying, “I think you’re biased. I’m pretty normal, babe. Beards instantly make any man more attractive.”
He had a point, but before he’d had a beard, I’d been attracted to his angular jaw.
His beard wasn’t long by any means. He had to have his beard short and well-groomed due to the respirator he had to wear while he was underwater welding, but when it was the weekend, and he would be off for several days, he usually allowed it to get a little more unruly.
It was just enough that I could tug it if I curled my fingers just…
“Ow!” He laughed as he pulled his face away from where I’d been tugging it teasingly. “That hurt!”
“Chocolate,” I said. “From the small bite that you were able to steal.”
He snorted and brushed his beard as if searching for any stray crumbs. “You ready?”
I nodded, and instead of grabbing my hand like he usually did, he jerked his chin toward the door.
I proceeded to walk in front of him and felt his heat at my back.
When he got to the door, though, he moved in front of me and exited first, his eyes already scanning the surroundings.
I caught the door with my butt and already started scanning too, not able to see much but from the sides.
There were people everywhere.
As in, they were milling about on the railings, along the planters. On the dock by the bay. On boats.
There was literally nowhere that people weren’t around.
This place was hopping, and I was honestly surprised we’d gotten in as fast as we had. But Wake had suggested the place and also told us to drop his name. Which we had.
And we’d gotten right in, surprisingly.
Wake obviously knew the owners.
“Come on, darlin’,” he urged, bumping me with his hip when I’d stayed behind. “We gotta move.”
I jumped into step behind him, not quite ducking my head, but not making eye contact out of habit.
I passed so many people.
As in, four or five times the amount that’d been there when we’d arrived.
“Geez,” I said as we finally pulled free of the crowd. “This joint is extremely popular.”
“This place is nice,” he said. “On the beach on a corner lot. You see the Gulf on one side and bay on the other. And it’s a small place that barely fits anyone in it. It looks busier than it actually is.”
He had a point.
Still, even more people were hanging out in the parking lot by their cars.
By the time we made it to the X7, I was a little more freaked out.
I didn’t like crowds. Never had, never would.
And to distract myself, I watched Bram’s ass move in his pants as he walked in front of me.
“Your chariot, my lady,” he teased as he opened my door for me.
I rolled my eyes but settled them on the bulge in his pants.
He wasn’t hard. The jeans had pretty much exemplified his assets, too. As in, they left a nice sized bulge due to their tightness.
He closed the door once my feet were inside the SUV, and I was thinking about how I was going to peel those pants off of him later when he got in and shut the door.
Then he pulled the skillet out of his jacket and set it down in my lap.
“Bram!” I cried out. “You criminal.”
He leaned back in his seat and burst out laughing.
That’s when I couldn’t stop myself anymore.
I all but crawled over the console, planted myself in his lap, and kissed the hell out of him, somehow hitting the lock button as I’d moved.
The kiss started to get a bit out of control when he started to slowly push my long dress up.
“We’re in a parking lot, Bram Crow,” I teased, nipping his lip. “With about half the population of Florida in attendance.”
He grumbled something under his breath, his fingers continuing to delve under the yards of fabric to get to bare skin.
Did I mention it was a really long, stretchy T-shirt dress?
It looked absolutely adorable on and covered every single inch of my body from chest to toes.
“Except that we have really tinted windows,” he said. “And nobody will know what we’re doing in here. They can speculate, but they won’t know.”
“And when the Beemer starts rocking?” I asked. “Will they know then?”
“Again, speculation.” He caught the skin of my neck between his teeth, then sucked lightly.
I hissed, unable to stop myself from rocking against his erection.
I threaded my fingers through his overly long hair and started to kiss my way down his neck.
My belly, which was now starting to get in the way, pressed against his, causing him to practically curve himself around me.
He moved his hand to my ass and froze.
“Baby,” he rumbled against my neck. “You’re not wearing panties.”
I wasn’t.
I’d had them on earlier, but I’d taken them off in the bathroom because they were just barely on the verge of too tight.
They’d been digging into my hips, and I’d been hyper fixating on them and the way they felt.
So I’d taken them off.
In no way had I planned for this particular moment, but it’d turned out perfectly, nonetheless.
“My ass is bigger,” I told him. “They were killing me on the long ride over here. So I took them off when I went to the bathroom that first time.”