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“Favorite color.” Her hoarse voice murmured against the hard planes of Sly’s chest. Reaching out, she flicked his nipple, making him jerk. She grunted, lifting his head from where he’d been laying against her pillow. His gaze caught hers, holding it captive, the heat, want, desire, and intensity she saw there made her heart trip over itself.
“Your eyes,” he whispered huskily, his words as striking as the look on his face.
What was this? Why did it feel like a single look from him could turn her inside out, flip her on her head, and shake the shit out of her?
“Favorite food and drink?”
“Would it be cliché to say your pussy for both? I could eat you for every meal and still be ravenous for the taste of you.”
Heat blasted from her pussy to her breasts, up her neck, and into her face. Never in her life had a sentence turned her on so fast and so completely. She could come if he even just touched her again.
Touch me all over, Sly!
No. More conversation. More learning about each other. Less dick in vagina. The only thing she’d learn from more sex was that, yes, he did have the power to obliterate her ability to think logically.
Speak words, dummy!
Rolling from her back to her belly, she inquired, “Tell me about you, Sylvester White. Where did you grow up? Do you have any siblings?
Sly, still gloriously naked beneath the thin sheet covering his delectable parts, turned onto his side and rested his head on his palm, his elbow planted in the mattress. An aura of ease and playfulness moved over them both, calming her, almost as though it were telling her it was okay to let her guard down…because he was close to doing the same.
“I guess I have one of those all-American tales. Small town, big dreams…. My parents are originally from Liverpool, England, so I am a first-generation American. They settled in the rinky-dink town of Furneyville, about seventy miles inland from here.
“Do you go back to visit?”
“No, when my dad retired, he and my mom moved west, to Arizona. They prefer the dry heat of the desert over the muggy, mosquito heat of Florida. My dad says that if he wanted to continue living in pea soup, he’d just move back to England.”
“That, I can understand. So, do you go visit them often? What about brothers or sisters?”
“I visit them about twice a year. Surprisingly, they are busier now than they were when they were working. My dad is the head of the HOA, terrorizing his neighbors about the right height and shape of hedgerows—which are an English thing, from what he says, and my mom is taking every baking, cooking, and pottery class she can fit into her schedule.”
“That sounds amazing—not the hedgerows thing, but definitely the cooking and baking thing your mom is into.”
“Yeah?” He leaned forward, brushing a gentle kiss over her forehead.
“Yeah. My mom came from a small family. She was an only child of two only children, but my abuela loved to cook. Her kitchen was her domain, her kingdom, her judgment seat. She ruled the house like the queen she was. And my mom learned to cook from her. I cannot tell you just how good that woman was. You’d have to have been there eating her food. There is no experience quite like it. She could take chicken, tortillas, and some random spices and make the most mouth-watering meal you’ve ever tasted.”
“She sounds amazing—your abuela, too. Did your mom teach you to cook?”
“When I was little. She…she didn’t have much time to teach me once I started middle school.” And there went the cold, ugly, terrible memories she’d been—thus far—so good at keeping locked away. No, her mom hadn’t had much time to give to her kids because the bottle had become her best friend, medication, escape, salvation, and eventually her murderer.
“Why?” Sly asked, genuine curiosity in his tone, his dazzling eyes missing nothing as they scoured her expression.
“She just…shifted her priorities.” From family to fermented grains.
“What about now? Do you get to spend any time with her?”
God, hit me where it hurts! It wasn’t his fault, though, that she was shit about sharing any real personal information with him.
Swallowing the ball of regret, self-hatred, and grief that had lodged itself in her throat, she forced out, “She…passed. Seven years ago.”
Silence met her admission, but Sly reached out a large, warm hand and pulled her into him. Her chest crushed against his chest, his steady heartbeat guiding hers.
“Damn, I’m sorry, baby.”
“Yeah, me too. She was such a beautiful person—inside and out. And, God…she loved AJ and me, so hard. She was that type of woman, ya know. When she loved, she loved with all herself—mind, body, and soul.”
“She sounds amazing.”
