Christina Lauren - Beautiful Beginning

I loved his voice in the middle of the night, all deep and gravelly. I loved it even more after he’d had a middle-of-the-night orgasm . . . even if he’d had it from sneaking into the bathroom and stroking himself. His voice was always deeper after he’d come, his words delivered more slowly. He was impossibly sexier. “What were you thinking about?”

He paused, his thumb smoothing up and down the back of my hand. “Your legs spread over my face and your mouth on my cock. Like the other night, except without your teasing.”

“Who came first?”

With a groan, he said, “I don’t know. I wasn’t . . .”

I smacked his chest lightly. “Oh please. I know how specific your fantasies are.”

Rolling to me in the dark, he said, “You came first. Of course you came first. Okay? Can we go back to sleep?”

I ignored this. “Did you come in my mouth or on my—”

“In your mouth. Sleep, Chloe.”

“I love you,” I said, leaning to kiss him.

For a moment, he let me take his lip into my mouth and suck on it, nibble it. But then he pulled away and wrapped his arms around my waist, shifting my head closer to his chest. “I love you, too.”

“I don’t want to get up and go to the bathroom,” I said, smiling into the darkness.

I heard his mouth open but it was several seconds before he made a sound. “What do you mean?”

I rolled to my back and spread my legs so one of them was bent and resting on top of his thigh.

“Chloe . . .” he groaned.

I found that I was already wet, just from the idea of what he’d done, and what he’d been thinking. I was wet from the memory of his voice in the bathroom when he came: it was the sound of relief mixed with regret, and the fact that I could tell it was more out of necessity than fun made it so much hotter. I slid my fingers over my skin, rocked up into my hand.

Beside me, Bennett held very still until I let out my first quiet moan, and then he shivered and melted against me, rolling so he half covered my body, and ducked to kiss a path from my throat to my breast.

“Tell me what you’re thinking,” he whispered into my skin. “Tell me every fucking thought.”

“It’s your hand,” I said, feeling my pulse quicken with my own strokes, “and you’re teasing me.”

His voice was so deep it was barely more than a vibration when he asked, “How so?”

Swallowing, I told him, “I want you to touch my clit and you’re just dragging your fingers in tiny circles all around it.”

He laughed, sucking a nipple into his mouth before releasing it with a quiet, slick kiss. “Slide just one finger inside. Keep teasing. I want to hear you beg for it.”

“I want more.” My finger was so much smaller than his, and one of his was never enough. One of mine was a torment with that voice in my ear and that breath on my skin. “I want faster, and bigger.”

“Such a demanding body you have,” he said, sucking on my jaw. “I bet you’re slippery and hot. I bet I know exactly how you taste right now.”

My fingers circled, still teasing, knowing it’s what he would do. What he wanted me to do. I pressed my head back into the pillow, whispering, “Faster. Please, more of something.”

“Both hands,” he relented quietly. “Two fingers inside and work the outside. Let me hear it.”

I slid my other hand down my body and inched closer to him, feeling the unyielding shape of his renewed erection against my hip. With both hands, I touched myself, relishing the clean sweat and soap smell of him beside me, the rough scratch of his stubble on my neck and chest as he kissed me hungrily, whispering, “Goddamn it, Chloe. Let me hear you.”

My breath caught as he slid his palm over my breast, squeezing it roughly before ducking to pull the peak deep into his mouth. I loved the sound he made when he suckled me. It was desperate, and rumbling; a sound so rich I could feel it behind my eyes, and in the center of my bones.

“Oh, God,” I groaned. “Close . . .”

He released my nipple from his mouth and reached to whip the covers off my body, exposing my skin to the cool air of the hotel room and the blazing heat of his eyes.

“It’s my hand you’re fucking,” he growled. “Show me what you like.” I lifted my hips from the mattress, wanting to please him, wanting him to relent and climb over me, claim me as his.

But instead, Bennett slid one of my legs higher up my body so he could reach down and land a sharp smack on my backside. “I’d do better; my hand would fuck you harder than this. I’d make you scream.”

It was a sufficient stand-in, and with his lips pressed to my ear telling me he was going to fuck me so long and so rough on Saturday that the next day I’d wish it’d been my own hand instead, I managed to come, hot and pulsing against my fingers.

But it wasn’t even close to what he made me feel.

We fell back against the pillows in breathless, unsatisfied silence.

It wasn’t enough to orgasm, and to feel his breath on my breasts and his filthy words on my skin. I wanted to feel his pleasure when he came in me, or on me, or simply with me. I wanted to witness every time he felt that moment of release. He was mine; his pleasure was mine, and his body was mine. Why was he making me wait for it?

But as he ran a big, possessive hand from my hipbone to my shoulder, stopping at every curve along the way, I understood what he was doing.

He was giving me something other than the wedding to think about.

He was being a withholding ass so I would torment him.

He was making me torment him, and pretending to hate it.

He was ensuring that this week would feel like us, and we could be outwardly focused on everyone else while staying focused only on each other behind every blink, in every dark room, and in each one of our private thoughts.

Bennett was ensuring that we would see each other at either end of the aisle and know we made the best choice of our lives.

“You’re pretty brilliant, do you know that?” I asked, curling into him and running a hand up over his shoulder and into his hair.

He pressed his lips to my neck and sucked. “You can thank me later, Einstein.”

He turned his head to kiss me and I groaned into his touch. His lips were so firm, so commanding and I gave in to him as he parted them and pressed his tongue inside, sweeping, searching.

I shook when his hands returned to my skin, warm and rough, feeling every curve and dip, every small hollow. I felt the hard press of his cock against my stomach and tried to roll him on top of me.

“I want you inside,” I said. I heard my own voice and it was hoarse and needy. I ran my hands up his neck, cupping his face and trying to pull him closer.

But he inhaled, turned and pulled my fingers into his mouth.

“Fuck,” he groaned, taking each of them between his lips and rolling them over his tongue, tasting my sex. He pushed my hand away, sweeping a frustrated palm over his face and rasping, “Goddamnit.”

“Ben—”

Before I could hold on and keep him there, he’d rolled out of bed and walked back to the bathroom, slamming the door behind him.

I could barely open my eyes the next morning.

Bright yellow sun filtered through the open balcony door, warming my skin where it cut across the bed. I could taste the salt in the air; hear the sound of the tide as it washed along the beach. I could feel the heat of Chloe’s body where it pressed against my side. Naked.

She mumbled something in her sleep, slipped a smooth leg up and over mine, and shifted closer. The sheets smelled faintly of her perfume and even more of her.

With a groan, I extricated myself from her grip and very carefully rolled her to her side. Swinging my feet to the floor, I stood, looking down at my very hard, very selfish dick. Really? I thought. Again? I’d gone to the bathroom on two separate occasions last night—both before and after Chloe’s little one-woman show—and still. Always the traitor.

Chloe thought I was brilliant for having us wait until Saturday, when in reality it was starting to feel like the worst idea I’d ever had. I felt anxious and on edge—aware of a persistent hum beneath my skin and a need for exertion—to fuck until I was too tired to stand or sit, too exhausted to do anything but fall into bed and pass out.

Under normal circumstances I’d have cut off my right hand before considering leaving a warm bed and naked Chloe. But these weren’t normal circumstances, and frankly, my right hand had proven invaluable the last few days.

I’d almost caved last night, and at this point, it would be like surrendering to the enemy. I needed to get out of here.

I found my phone in the living room and typed a message to Max. I need to run. You in?

His response came less than a minute later. Definitely. I’ll grab Will and meet you at the main pool in 10?

See you then I typed back, and tossed my phone to the couch.

I’d have time to jerk off, clean up, and escape the room before Chloe was even awake.

Max had most definitely gotten laid. I watched him as he neared the pool, hair a mess and limbs loose and relaxed. It would be easy to hate this guy if I wasn’t so damn happy for him.