I push those thoughts of other people aside and feast on him. I want to lick him dry.
I want to.
I want to worship him without competition. I want to appreciate the man he’s become. I want to pay homage to all he does for others without any expectation of selfish returns. I want to reward his dedication for three years of playing the long game. I want him to feel as worthy of adoration and respect as his brother. I want to make him feel special. To me.
An abrupt snore prompts me to open my eyes and abandon my attempt at a human Hoover.
The rat bastard doesn’t have his mouth open in pleasure. He’s sound asleep. With his hard dick still in my mouth.
So much for not competing.
I suddenly know exactly how the color guard captain must have felt.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Something tickles my shoulder. I shrug it off.
A low chuckle with perfect tone and timbre flirts with the haze of sleep I’m not ready to let go of.
Sensations come into focus. Firm lips glide across the bare skin of my shoulder blade while a warm, big hand wraps around my upper arm. He nuzzles his face against my neck, a scrape of morning scruff irritating to the sensitive skin there. His naked body plastered to mine radiates heat. And his morning wood pokes my left butt cheek.
“Fuck off, Jim. You didn’t want any last night; you’re not getting it now. Go … work out or something.”
Another chuckle, followed by warm breath and a soft, damp, open-mouthed kiss to my neck, wakes me up the rest of the way. “I wanted it. I’ve wanted you for years.”
I glare at him over my shoulder. “Really? You have a strange way of showing it.”
He thrusts his stupidly hard dick against my ass a few times like he’s showing me now exactly how much he wants it. “What did I do that was so heinous this time?”
I return my head to its spot on the pillow, facing away from him. “Passed out with your dick in my mouth.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Yes. You did.”
“Never happened. No way.”
“Fine. You want to make this into a reality competition? I must have been the one who passed out. I dreamed the whole thing. There. You win.”
He uses his stupid muscles to roll me onto my back, so he can try to get me to back down with his sexy, first-thing-in-the-morning look—unshaven jaw, shirtless, messy hair. “Your knee-jerk reaction is to get mad at me, but you’re failing to see a very important fact.”
“I don’t have to worry about my gag reflex because you don’t actually like when a woman licks your hot dog?”
He grins. Damn him. He’s so hot when he wakes up. “I trust you enough to pass out with my dick in your mouth.”
“You shouldn’t. Next time, I might bite it off.”
His stupid grin just grows wider. “We’ve trained ourselves to fight. You punch then expect me to jab back, but I’m only concentrating on the words next time.”
I roll my eyes and immediately decide that’s a horrible idea, so I throw my arm over my face. “Jim, I’m too tired to fight. Just win this round already, so you can go work out, and I can go back to sleep.”
My mouth isn’t being protected from the horrid sunlight by my arm, so he brushes his lips against mine in a kiss that ends with a smile. “Sundays are rest days. And I’d much rather stay in bed with you all afternoon.”
Afternoon? I bolt upright and glance around for wherever the hell I left my phone last night before donning his bedsheet. “What time is it?”
“Afternoon,” he repeats like I’m dumb. “Do you have someplace you’d rather be than in bed with me?”
“Yes!” I leap out of the bed in a panic. I don’t even care that he has a full view of every flaw on my naked body in the bright sunlight streaming through the window or that my hair must be a matted mess or that I’m scrounging for my clothes from yesterday on his floor.
He reclines against the headboard and crosses his arms over his chest while he watches me nearly fall over, trying to put my skirt on. “I’d like to say I’m surprised, but I didn’t really think erasing three years of your hate was going to be easy. I hoped. Prayed a little. Made a sacrifice to a voodoo priestess.” He shakes his head. “I’ve really gotta stop asking other people for advice and just go with my own gut on this.”
He doesn’t have a gut. He has a six-pack.
“I’d like to say I’m surprised you went to all those lengths, but I don’t have time right now to reminisce with you about all the lengths you’ve gone to just to piss me off in the past three years because my parents are going to be at my apartment any minute to finally move me in, and it’s going to be awkward enough when I show up, looking like a hungover train wreck.”
He bolts out of bed, too. “That’s today? Why didn’t you tell me?”
I throw my arms out to the sides. “Because I never tell you anything you could potentially use against me!”
He places his hands on his very nicely defined waist and glances down at the erection that’s basically parallel to the ground. “I gotta jump in the shower first.”
We dance around each other as he grabs clean clothes, and I try to tame my appearance into something that doesn’t resemble sleeping naked all night with the hottest man alive after getting drunk at a frat party.
I can already hear my mother’s reprimands.
“No wonder my balls hurt so much,” he mutters before firmly kissing me on the lips. “Let me get this under control, then I’ll meet you there.”
I stop him from heading out the door with a hand on his arm. “How do you even know where my new apartment is?”
He shrugs. “Shannon’s the voodoo priestess. The right sacrifices get me the right information.”
My mouth drops open in horror and a dash of betrayal. A loud slapping noise on the wall snaps me out of it.
“Shut up!” she screams. “I’m trying to sleep!”
Maybe she is a voodoo priestess.
Chapter Thirty-Three
There is a gaping hole in my kitchen from floor to ceiling.
“Put a plant in front of it,” Dad suggests. “Like one of those big tropical trees you can get at IKEA.”
Mom rolls her eyes.
The water is gone, and the soaked carpet has dried, sure. The building management did exactly what they’d said they would. They repaired the burst pipe. And that is all.
My sister, Sarah, wraps her arms around my waist. “You have to come home. This place is gross. I want you to come home.”
I lay my cheek on top of the blonde hair that matches my shade almost exactly. “I have another year of college left. Besides, you like coming to visit me at State, remember?”
“Mom doesn’t like when I come here,” Sarah whispers.
Not softly enough that we don’t all hear it, but she knows it’s not a nice thing to say out loud.
“You only come to visit when Aunt Karin can’t stay with you,” Mom reminds her. “Just like she couldn’t stay with you today while we move Sophia into her new apartment.”
Another argument between me and Mom about what’s best for Sarah brews on the horizon. I have never been so grateful to see Jim walk in my front door, uninvited. And he’s brought the cavalry.