Twisted Up (Taking Chances #1) - Erin Nicholas Page 0,68
flooding through her, too fast and too many to name or concentrate on.
“You didn’t even know this story. That’s not why you’ve been kissing me for the past year.”
“I’ve been kissing you because I really fucking like kissing you.” He shifted her on his lap, emphasizing the bulge under her right butt cheek. “But I also like ruffling your feathers. Because it’s hard to do. I didn’t have to know the story to know you’re tough and confident and strong. Trust me, making a woman like you melt in my arms is a rush I’ll never get enough of.”
Emotions choked her and she couldn’t respond.
“I’ve never thrown you away, A,” he said gruffly. “I’m very happy to say I’m smarter than that. I hated your letter. I’ve hated it every day since I read it. Once I kissed you again . . . I’ve been trying to get close to you for a year.”
But he’d leave again. He was going back to Kansas City eventually. He wasn’t enlisted this time. This time when he went it really would be because she wasn’t enough to keep him here.
Still, he was here now.
“Melt in your arms?” she asked, forcing cockiness into her voice and lifting an eyebrow.
His intense expression smoothed into a mischievous grin in a snap. “Yeah. Something like this.”
He slid a hand around her rib cage, grazing her breast as he did it, and up between her shoulder blades, sending tingles throughout her body. Then he brought her in for a kiss.
If the kiss outside of A Bar had felt different because she’d admitted that she liked him, this kiss—with the story of the past and the heartbreak and the anger out in the open—felt like a whole new world.
Jake’s kisses had always heated her blood, made her crave things she couldn’t even name, and put a yearning in her gut that made her think of nothing but getting closer to him.
Now, it was all that and more.
She couldn’t open wide enough for him, she couldn’t touch enough of him, she couldn’t press close enough.
He seemed to feel the same way. Tongues stroking, their breathing heavy, he turned her to straddle his lap. He pushed her shirt up and pulled the cups of her bra down, his fingers rolling and tugging on her nipples.
Her hand didn’t fit adequately between them, but she itched to touch him, to stroke and squeeze, to feel him pulsing in her grasp.
“Jake. Please.”
“I know, I know.” He kissed her again. “We should . . . go somewhere.”
“We should definitely go somewhere.”
They kissed again, their hands roaming, the frustrating inability to really do anything about their hunger ratcheting up the emotions to a near frenzy.
“I want you so bad.”
“I want to taste you.”
“I need to feel you.”
“Now, please.”
A hot rush of jumbled words and emotions filled the truck.
Until they heard the rumble of another engine.
The fire truck. The crew was here to prep for the bonfire. Avery sat up straight on Jake’s lap.
His hair was mussed from her fingers, his lips wet from hers, and his eyes heavy with lust.
“Wow, you look good like that,” she said as she pulled her bra and shirt back into place.
He grinned. And looked even better.
“Ditto.”
“Let’s skip the bonfire.”
His eyebrows rose. “The fire chief is going to skip the bonfire? I think people might notice.”
“It’ll give them even more gossip to keep their minds off things. Especially after my spectacular exit from A Bar.”
He chuckled. “That it would.” His gaze went to something over her shoulder. “But we’ve already been noticed.”
She pivoted to look and saw that not only was the fire department present, with two big trucks, but so was the police department. Specifically, Chief Mitchell.
Along with his wife.
Avery slid from Jake’s lap, all of the endorphins from their make-out session seeming to evaporate at once.
“So, I heard your whole story and I . . .” Jake trailed off and gave a heavy sigh. “I’m not happy. I’m still processing the fact that I want to yell at my mother and punch my father.”
Avery ran a hand through her hair. She was certain Jake had never even thought about doing either of those things before. She’d witnessed his family’s interactions for years. They were damned near perfect.
The fact that he felt those things now, because of her, made her want to climb right back into his lap no matter who was outside.
“But,” Jake went on, redoing the buttons Avery had gotten open so she could run her hands over