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Jasmine snuggled in close and read over my shoulder. I waited until she was done to flip pages on the e-reader. She’d give me a nod, her hair brushing my cheek, and I’d take the signal to turn the page. We read along for a few minutes, occasionally nudging each other or giving some snarky commentary.
Over a couple of chapters, things heated up between the characters. When things went from kissing and ‘oh-no-we-mustn’t’ to the inevitable, I felt my skin go hot in response to the descriptions, but it was when Jasmine started shifting and wiggling at my side that I realized she was affected by it as well.
“Hey,” I said, my voice husky as I turned to her, setting the tablet aside. When I tried to meet her eyes, her face was flushed, and she looked away as if she were embarrassed. “Did you like what we were reading?” I asked in a low voice, leaning in closer. She nodded, seeming shy all of a sudden.
I tucked her hair behind her ear and kissed her cheek, then just below her ear. I could feel her breath catch in her throat so I did it again, grinning a bit at the gratifying response I got. I reached for her and she came willingly into my lap. A few seconds of shy maneuvering and we were kissing, lips locked and her smooth, hot skin under my hand, which had crept up the back of her shirt almost without my intending it.
She held on to me for dear life and we kissed like that for what could have been ten minutes or six hours. It was hot and blurry and timeless in the best way. Then she started to pull away, only to lean back in and kiss my neck.
I dropped my hands to the armrests and gripped them as she straddled me. My head went back and Jasmine kissed a hot line along my jaw. With one hand I grabbed the full curve of her ass and held her to me, my other head sliding her shirt up. I coaxed her up and up until my mouth was on eye level with her navel and my hot mouth ran along the waistband of her jeans, making her stomach clench and her sounds grow sweater and more reckless. I unbuttoned her jeans.
When the zipper slid down, I was so hard, so eager to get my mouth on her and make her scream, that I wasn’t thinking about the other people on the plane, the brother sleeping, the one watching a movie. They didn’t need to see the way we were ready to act on our primal urges after being spurred on by a spicy book. With my thumb, I pushed down the waistband of her purple panties and kissed her there, just above her mound. With a throttled cry, she ground against my eager mouth, clutched at my hair.
Jasmine wanted to ride my face, and I wanted to give it to her again and again. But it wasn’t the time or the place. Despite how wound up we both were, it was time to call it quits until we could all be together at the cabin. It took a superhuman effort on my part not to lay her back across my arm and feast on her, making her come and come until she begged me to quit.
I raised my head, using every ounce of willpower I had to my name, and met her fevered eyes. She sat back onto my lap, tipped her head to my shoulder and tried to catch her breath. She understood, we both did. This wasn’t the time for a fiery fling. It was a chance to enjoy each other’s company and share a really lousy book that did have some above-average spiciness to it.
“Let’s wait,” she said, her voice breathy. I nodded and kissed her on top of her head.
I nodded in agreement. It felt like every muscle in my body was coiled maximum capacity, a painful tightness that I used to bring myself down from that maddening level of arousal.
She climbed off my lap and straightened her clothes a little self-consciously. I wanted to check in with her and make sure she was okay, but I was busy making myself recite Greek verb declensions to finish calming down. My body was slowly coming back down to a normal pulse and temperature but it took a lot of intentional effort to make that happen. Looking over at Jasmine at any point in that process would have defeated the purpose and put me right back at square one. Finally, I felt like I was sufficiently in control of myself. I released my grip on the arm rests and looked over at her,
“Maybe we should stop reading for now,” she said with a giggle.
I huffed out a deep breath and nodded my agreement.
19
JASMINE
After I pulled myself together from making out with Ty, I switched seats to watch out the window. It was my first time on an airplane and the view fascinated me. I’d already taken a dozen or so pictures of just the clouds and of the highway below, things that any veteran flier would have taken for granted.
I leaned my temple against the window and stared at the ground far below us. I was on a borrowed private jet with four brothers, flying off for a lavish resort vacation in the mountains. How was that any less far-fetched than the fictional story of Kelsey and the paramedics? It seemed unreal to me.
They were all wildly handsome and sexy, not to mention strong and thoughtful and interesting. Any girl would be fabulously lucky to have one of them, much less all four. I was a teeny bit nervous about that part, but in an excited and curious way. I trusted them completely, and I knew we’d have a great time together. As long as I didn’t allow myself to think too long about the real reason for this conveniently timed trip.
My ex was in town looking for me. I was scared out of my mind to the point I couldn’t remember things or do basic tasks without fumbling or getting distracted and confused. I shook all the time, felt clammy and sweaty and jumped when the phone rang. I couldn’t go on like that, and since they couldn’t rack him down immediately without any reasonable indication that he was up to some criminal activity, and I didn’t want them to hunt him down and kill him, we were at a stalemate.
The Burns brothers had done this incredibly nice thing for me, generous and thoughtful. The least I could do was block out the bad stuff that was weighing on my mind and tearing at my fraying nerves and make sure I was present in the moment and enjoyed it all. As soon as we landed and were whisked away in a private car, I was able to focus, to hold Jake’s hand and look out the window, admire the looming mountains nearby and catch my breath at the loopy drop-offs at the edge of the road as we climbed higher to the resort.
I’d never seen the Adirondacks even in pictures. Nothing could have prepared me, not even photographs online, for the splendor. Everything that wasn’t coated white with velvety thick snow was a pale gray stone with hints of lavender, a delicacy of shadow that made the entire place, despite its breathtaking size, seem fairytale-like and gentle somehow.
It was not the sort of mountain resort with antlers and taxidermy everywhere, walls studded with framed vintage photos of big game hunters standing with a booted foot atop their kill. Inside the building itself, I felt that I was inside a jewel box nestled in the palm of the mountain’s hand. The hulking stone mountains, the towering dark pines seemed friendly and sheltering, not intimidating.
It felt good and right and welcoming. The light scent of lemon and sage fragranced the air of the lobby and I peered at the label on the candles burning in rustic glass jars, their label indicating that they were handmade in a local shop. I’d never bought a candle that cost more than ten dollars, but I felt the urge to ask how much they were.
Maybe I was swept away by the holiday atmosphere of my first vacation. Maybe the whole place was so beautiful and it didn’t seem real and I wanted to capture at least the fragrance of this retreat to help remind me of it once I was hundreds of miles away back home again. With a sigh, I looked around, standing in one spot and looking up, turning in a full circle trying to take it all in, the openness and warmth, the way the whole place made me ache with homesickness in a way I couldn’t explain. I’d never visited or lived in a place like it and I was sure my mother never got to either. Something about it made me miss her and my sister so much it almost broke me then.
I stopped gaping at the lobby and moved over to lean my elbow on the counter at the front desk as Eli checked us in. Drew joined me, his hand warm on the small of my back.
“You okay?” he asked.
“Are you kidding?” I said, forcing a cheerful smile. “This place is like something out of a fantasy. It’s amazing.”
“It sure is. I wasn’t asking how the resort looks. I asked how you are. You closed off and kind of withdrew all of a sudden.”
“I was thinking about my mom, which is so stupid because I haven’t seen or talked to her in years, my sister, too. Something about being in a place like this, where everything is nice and perfect and safe and even smells good… it isn’t just that I want her to know I’m okay, that I’m with good people who look out for me. I want her to be okay too, and to know my sister is doing well. I just—I want my mom, Drew,” I said, my voice cracking a little before I straightened my shoulders and wallowed hard, fighting back the well of sadness opening up in me.
