Maddox Walsh is a beautiful canvas, but his insides are the real artwork.
“My mom always said my mouth would get me in trouble,” Maddox murmurs over my mouth after showing his appreciation for my inability to keep my hands to myself. “If I had any clue this was what she meant, I would have done it sooner.” I wish like hell for the sock to slip off my face when he drags the tip of his finger down my nose. His eyes are always the bluest when he does that. It is as if it calms him as much as it does me. “Watch your head as you come out. Caidyn will kill me if a drop of your blood spills here.”
He uses Caidyn as his scapegoat anytime he feels out of his comfort zone. He thinks he doesn’t have what it takes to pull off Caidyn’s suaveness. I’m not so inclined to agree.
“Two more steps, then we’re heading right.”
“Right?” I ask, certain I heard him wrong. Nothing but a small patch of grass is on the right. Mr. Walsh has stated numerous times he didn’t buy this plot of land for its size and accessibility. It was the views he was sold on. Almost every window in the cabin has a water view because Mrs. Walsh designed it that way.
Instead of answering me, Maddox guides me to the far end of the front porch. How do I know we’re at the end if I can’t see? The sun that’s slowly rising is beaming through the threads of the sock.
“Stay right there.” Maddox waits for me to nod before he shuffles away from me. When he speaks again, he only sounds around three or four feet away from me. “On the count of three, remove your blindfold—”
“On three or after three?”
He chuckles about my need to know everything down to the finest detail before he commences counting down. “One… two… three!”
I yank off my blindfold with so much excitement, the time I was almost choked by one is pushed to the back of my mind.
My excitement doesn’t blister for long.
“What is it?” I ask Maddox, who’s standing next to a pile of wood palings with his arms held out like he’s a model onThe Price is Right!
I don’t know whether to burst out laughing or crying when he replies, “It’s a doghouse.” He rakes his eyes over the mismatched wood pieces before mumbling, “Well, itwillbe a doghouse… when I finish building it.”
“You’re building a doghouse?” My voice is so high, it sounds as if I sucked on helium.
When Maddox nods, I question sheepishly, “For me?” Tears prick my eyes when he nods his head for the second time. “You’re getting me a dog?”
When Sloane forced me to write a wish list for my eighteenth birthday, I only jotted down three things. For my dad to still be here, to be free of this life, and to have a dog. I then burned the letter in the fireplace at Sloane’s demand and shut down any hope of my guardian angel granting me my wishes. Maddox can’t bring back my dad, but every day I spend with him makes the loss more bearable.
“I’m not getting you a dog, Demi.” Maddox speaks as if he doesn’t know the dams in my eyes are about to spill over. “I’mbuilding you a doghouse.You’rebuying the dog. Then we’ll live together, happily ever after.” He traces the slither of silver in my right cheek before murmuring words I’ve heard him mumble many times the past few weeks. “You’re strong enough to stand by yourself, but I’d rather you didn’t need to.”
His mumbled words shift to a moan when I balance on my tippytoes so I can plant my lips on his mouth. Words can’t express how happy he makes me, and I much prefer showing him.
Lust consumes me when Maddox takes control of our kiss. It’s a deep, warm, carnal embrace, but the initial reservedness of his kiss catches me off guard. We’re normally clawing at each other by the second duel of our tongues, panting with want and shameless to where we are when the urge to maul each other hits.
This morning’s kiss is far from savage. It’s tender, loving, and sickly sweet, and it has me craving so much more.
“Not yet,” Maddox murmurs against my skin when he drops his lips from my mouth to my neck. “If we start this now, the doghouse will never be built.”
I’ve never been more torn in my life. I have wanted a dog almost all my life, something I could love as my own, but I’ve also wanted Maddox just as long.
When I say that to Maddox, he mutters, “Fuck, Demi. You can’t say shit like that to me and expect me to act like a gentleman. I’m trying to schmooze you, treat you how you deserve to be treated, but now all I’m thinking about is fucking you on a pile of wood, hopeful a splinter in the ass will remind me that today is meant to be about your dreams, not mine.”
I step closer to him, grinning like a cat eyeing a bowl of milk when my closeness doubles the thickness behind the zipper in his trousers. “Why can’t it be aboutourdreams?”
“You know I can’t multitask. I’m not cut out for that shit. It will start out being about you, then it will shift to me and my greedy cock. It has no class when it comes to you.”
I breathe in the moan he releases when I scrub my hand over the bulge in his pants. “Good. I very much like it that way.”
“Demi…” His groan makes it seem as if I’m truly killing him, and it has me switching tactics in an instant. “Fine. We will do it your way.” I gallop down the two stairs that lead to the microscopic patch of grass like my thoughts aren’t as sinister as they are. “Did this come with instructions, or are we going in blind?”
“That’s it?” Maddox’s tone is high enough to cause an echo. “You’re going to tease me, then leave me hanging. Not cool, Demi.Not cool.” He playfullytsksme before joining me next to a pile of wood that now seems so much more sentimental. “You do realize erections don’t occur by magic. Every one of them puts my heart in grave danger.”
I cock my hip before splaying my hands across it. “Really? I thought I just needed to breathe in your direction to make you hard enough to drill for gold.”
Maddox cusses under his breath when I add evidence to my claim by circling my lips and blowing air in his direction. “For you, that’s how it works, but it wasn’t always like that.”
