“I’m going to be okay. I have tools to help me, but most importantly, I have you to come home to.” He grins. “I do, right?”
Sucking my breath in, I bite my bottom lip. “Beaumont, you can’t base your sobriety on me, on us, you can’t do that. That’s too much pressure on me.”
He shakes his head. “Not like that, Hutton. I would never do that to you. I’m just saying, this is too important for me to screw up and fall off the wagon. Sixteen weeks and then I’m taking a long time off, making a new album and spending time with you.”
Beaumont lifts his hand, sliding up my arm slowly, leaving a wave of goosebumps in its wake. He wraps his fingers around the side of my neck, then shifts them to the back and twists them in my hair. He gently tugs my head back, exposing my neck, but doesn’t make a move to kiss me immediately.
“Sixteen weeks, four months,” I breathe.
He hums, dipping his chin as his mouth touches the center of my throat. “You can come and visit me anytime you want. I’ll fly you and Laurie out,” he offers.
“Beaumont,” I hiss as his tongue tastes me, then his teeth nip my skin.
He makes a noise in the back of his throat, his fingers tightening in my hair as he lifts his head.
“Darlin’?”
God, the way he says it. His voice full of desire, want, need and the huskiness that fills the room causes me to press my thighs together. I shouldn’t want him. I’m too sore, too worried about the future, too everything. I do though. I want every part of him to swallow every part of me whole.
“I just…”
His lips tip into a cocky smirk and he chuckles as he lowers his face, closing the distance between us again.
“This is good, Hutton. Between us, this will work. Swear to fuck, we will make this work. I don’t want to lose you again.”
His words, he means them, and I want them to be true, but part of me is still holding back. I can’t take a blind leap, not when it comes to him, no matter how badly I want to. Instead of saying that, though, I rise to the balls of my feet and press my mouth against his.
He uses his grip in my hair to shift my head, forcing it to slant to the side, then he takes the kiss even deeper. I whimper at the feel of his tongue as it fills my mouth. Opening wider, I take even more of him inside of me, wishing that it was his dick filling me instead of his tongue in my mouth.
His feet walk me backward, the backs of my knees hit the bed and I whimper as I fall back against the soft mattress. His heavy weight is on top of me, his mouth never breaking the kiss. I widen my thighs, wrapping my legs around his waist, bringing him even closer to me.
Lifting my hips, I moan as the hard length beneath his jeans presses against the wet center of my own. He grunts, rolling his hips one more time before he releases my hair. He wrenches his mouth from mine and removes his weight from my body.
“Beau?” I ask, lifting to my elbows as I look at him standing in front of me.
He’s panting, attempting to catch his breath, his dark eyes practically black and completely glittering liquid as he stares down at me. Sitting up a little more, I reach for him, my fingers grasping the hem of his shirt.
Pressing my lips together, I run my fingers over his washboard abs, wondering what kind of workouts he’s had to do to get these, then wondering if he would let me watch next time.
“Hutton,” he warns when my fingers drift beneath the waistband of his jeans but don’t dip very far.
“It’s no secret that I want you,” I whisper as I tug on the button of his jeans, popping it free.
Beaumont reaches for my hands, wrapping his fingers around my wrist. “We’re good?” he asks. “I’m proposing a commitment between us, that means I’m gone for sixteen weeks, but you’re mine. Nobody else gets in here, Hutton.”
I almost snort at his words, then decide that they piss me off. “Thinking you don’t have to worry about me so much, Beau,” I snap, tugging my hand free of his grasp.
His lips twitch into a smirk, and he shakes his head as he reaches for the back of his shirt and slowly drags the soft cotton material over his head and arms before he tosses it to the side.
Standing in front of me, his entire chest on display and the button of his jeans popped open, I forget why I’m irritated with him. He reaches for me, cupping my cheek.
“No women for me. No men for you,” he murmurs.
The irritation immediately returns. “Beaumont, once again, I’m not the one that needs a reminder. I’ve had a total of three lovers since you broke up with me,” I inform, then press my lips together as my eyes widen, unbelieving that I’ve said those words aloud.
Beaumont freezes, his eyes even wider than mine, which I didn’t think was possible. “Hutton?”
Sighing, I shift my gaze to the side to look down at my floor. Unfortunately, his hand is still on my cheek and he guides my gaze back over to him. Lifting my eyes from his crotch to his face, I grimace.
“How?” he asks.
I shrug, not wanting to answer him now, or maybe ever. But judging by the way he’s staring at me and he’s no longer taking his clothes off, I assume he wants to talk about this before we get down to business.
Honestly, I just want to get down to business. Before him, I hadn’t had good business in a loooong time and I need it as much as possible before he leaves.
“I’m frigid,” I grind out.
I haven’t said the words aloud in years, but they are always there in the back of my mind. Two of the three lovers said it to me, and the last one, that was the last time I even tried to date or have sex with someone before Beaumont came barreling into my life again.
That word.
It just broke something inside of me. Until Beaumont came into my life, he woke something up, or maybe he’s just so good that he didn’t notice that and he’s distracted me so much that I haven’t been able to think about it. I don’t know what it is, but I don’t know how much I care either. He makes me feel amazing.
Before I can say anything else, he bursts out laughing. “Who told you that shit?” he asks.
“Does it matter?”
He shrugs one shoulder. “Not anymore, but just to say. They lied, darlin’ girl. You are soft and sweet, you’re shy, but one thing you are not is frigid, not even when you were a virgin. Fuck me, you’ve always been the hottest woman I’ve ever been with.”
“You don’t have to lie because you have feelings for me,” I whisper.
Beaumont reaches out, wrapping his hand around the back of my head and grasps the strands of my hair between his fingers, tugging my head back and forcing my neck to arch so that I can look nowhere but up and into his eyes.
“Never would I lie to you, Hutton. We’ve established that. Those guys said that because they probably didn’t know what the fuck they were doing so they wanted you to feel bad about yourself. But it just simply ain’t true.”
“Beau,” I exhale.
“Tellin’ you the truth, Hutton. You’re the best I’ve ever had. You aren’t frigid. Trust me when I tell you that I would not have been jackin’ off to the memory of you for a fuckin’ decade, if you were.”
I can’t say anything else, because he won’t let me. His lips smash against mine and he takes me in a hard, bruising, claiming kiss.