Upside Down (Breaking the Rules #3) - A.M. Madden Page 0,100

more as a moan than a word. Every sound he made meant the soreness was gone. And knowing that caused me to lie over him, my hand wedged between us, to kiss him deeply.

Determination crossed over his face, and he held my waist in an ironclad grip. I broke our kiss to find his eyes staring directly into my soul, making his first experience with me an absolutely perfect one. All the things that drove me crazy during a hot fuck culminated. But adding emotions to the mix, ones I could clearly see in his eyes, flooded my senses. Combined made the experience something other than fornicating. I was making love to Cooper. I was making love to a man for the first time in my life.

We both became manic just before his release spurted hot and sticky on his abs. My own orgasm hit hard, filling the condom in what felt like a never-ending discharge of all the lust I’d carried for him since the very start.

My skin felt tingly all over. My insides felt amazingly charged. My heart pounded from the energy we’d just exerted. My smile told my lover that he had just rocked my world.

But when Cooper palmed my jaw and leveled me with an honesty I’d never received from another man, in that moment my life forever changed.

Chapter Thirty-Four

Cooper

Six months later

After Ricky arrived in Jersey unannounced, being unemployed gave me the time to properly show him my home state from edge to edge. We spent most of our days relaxing on different beaches or exploring national parks. At night we’d eat at my favorite restaurants, trek into Manhattan, or just chill at home. During that time, he also met my friends from the university. We double-dated with Sam and Lydia on many occasions and even spent quite a few days hanging at my parents’ house.

Having him in my apartment night and day, week after week, moved our already serious relationship into an entirely different territory. Strange as it may sound, my laid-back attitude served as a balm to his cockiness and arrogance. He could turn me on with a conversation as effectively as he could with a salacious move. We fit. We made sense. In Ricky Burrows, I had finally found my person.

And then one day we blinked, and November approached with its chillier temperatures. The day the thermometer measured no higher than forty degrees was the day he announced it was time to get out of Jersey. He suffered through a few more weeks until we celebrated Thanksgiving with my family… under the condition that we’d fly to Florida immediately after.

Rebecca came up with Marco and the kids, and Sam and Lydia were also with us, announcing they were pregnant, due the following May. My mom spent most of the day cooking and crying, ecstatic that her family was growing and her Cooper was happy.

To think the year prior, I’d been there alone because Riana couldn’t join me. That entire day, being his pricky self, Ricky ruined my holiday by asking questions that were none of his business and getting under my skin. No one could’ve predicted where we’d end up a year later.

Ricky insisted we keep the condo I rented for the times we would be visiting my parents or Sam and Lydia. Arguing that was an unnecessary expense proved to be in vain when he surprised me for my birthday by purchasing the damn thing. He claimed he always wanted a home base in Jersey. My ass, he did. The man was a total nutjob. Despite that, I still loved him hard.

Packing my life up while leaving a good part of it behind felt strange. Besides my clothes, personal items, books, and photos of my family, the rest of my stuff stayed for any future visits back home. Ricky went ahead and unpacked some of the clothes he had brought with him, shoving them into my closet and a few cleared-out drawers. He even went as far as purchasing other things he’d need to cover during the colder seasons.

As promised, the Saturday after Thanksgiving we flew back to Florida, but it had been nonstop since. After being there for a few weeks, we then spent our first Christmas with his mother and John in Indiana. From there, we spent the new year in California so we could visit my brother Griffin and his family. Our last stop was in Texas, where my sister Janis lived. By the time we jumped into our