Page 114 of Flirty Fall Fling

“What?” Dark hair falls around her as she stacks the logs perfectly around some kindling.

“You’re fucking mesmerizing.” I shove my hands into my pockets as she strikes a match. It catches immediately.

She chews on the corner of her lip and steps back, watching the flames lick up the stone. She rises and dusts her palms on her jeans, then gives me a slow once-over on her way past.

Once she disappears into the kitchen, cabinets open and close. When Blaire returns, she’s carrying the pumpkin pie vodka in one hand and two shot glasses in her other.

“Shit. We’re getting started early. The sun is still up.”

“Do you have somewhere you need to be?” She sets the glasses on the coffee table and joins me on the couch as she pours them full.

“Right here,” I mutter.

Carefully, without spilling, Blaire hands me the glass. For a second, she watches me over the rim. “What should we celebrate?”

“Being together through the storm,” I tell her.

“To us,” she says.

“Love the sound of that.” I touch my glass to hers and swallow the toast down with the sweet burn.

The vodka tastes like a candle, but it goes down smooth.

“Very dangerous,” she whispers. “As I suspected.”

She pours a second round without asking. We drink this one slower, with her shoulder against mine while the fire crackles.

“When you’re with me, do you have to pretend?” she asks. “I keep thinking about the things you’ve said and things I’ve read.”

I scoot my body in a way that I can meet her brown eyes. “You’ve never gotten Jameson Cross, the character.”

“Can we keep it that way?” She sets her glass on the coffee table and turns toward me, folding a leg beneath her. “I feel the pressure pressing in on us. There’s a ticking clock and the public. The end is coming—I know that—but I want to be able to enjoy you. I don’t want the bullshit to ruin this.”

“You’re the only person who’s gotten the real me other than family. I could never pretend with you, Blaire. Not even when I tried,” I admit, tucking hair behind her ear.

She leans into my touch, and the teasing vanishes from her eyes. I set my shot glass beside hers.

Blaire climbs onto my lap. Her knees sink into the couch as she straddles me. I slide my hands up her thighs to her hips.

We kiss, the vodka sweet on her tongue. My hands slide under her sweater, and she reaches to pull it over her head.

I can’t explain what it does to me, but my grip tightens on her hips.

I kiss the hollow of her throat, and she arches into it. Fingers work down the buttons of my flannel until she pushes it off my shoulders. I turn us and lay her back on the cushions. The old couch is big enough to hold us both without any issues.

When she shivers at the cool air, I pull the blanket off the back of the couch and cover us. The fire is doing its best with these mountain temperatures.

“You’re so warm,” she murmurs against my jaw.

“You’re beautiful.”

She captures my mouth. I kiss my way down her throat and lower, learning her by the inch. I’ve already figured out what makes her sigh and moan.

“I want you inside me,” she confesses.

Who am I to deny her?

She’s tight around me and gasps with every stroke. The sound she makes when our ends meet will live in my head for the rest of my life. She wraps her legs around me, adjusting to every inch. With my face in both of her hands, she watches me. I keep my gaze focused on hers. Firelight moves over her throat and her breasts, and the flush spreads down her chest. I want to memorize her like this.