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Her eyes widened.“On one hand? Are we including the thumb?”
“All the words that just left my mouth and that’s what you’re focusing on?”
She laughed wickedly and I kissed her, needing to feel it on my lips.“I’m just surprised,” she said when I pulled back.“You’re really good at it… unfairly good, actually.”
Click.
“I read a lot.”
“Hmmm, lucky me. Nerds always do it better.” She flung herself over my chest, a hand delving beneath the covers until she held my cock in her silken grip. I groaned long and low, head burrowing against the pillow.“So, how many are we talking, exactly?” She held her other hand up, fingers and thumb spread wide.
I knew what she was asking so I shook my head in answer. She gave me a slow pump and my mouth dropped open at the sensation. Then she lowered her thumb and I shook my head again. Another pump and she lowered her index finger. That time I nodded.
Three. Three women, including her.
She kept stroking me slowly.“How is that possible?”
“It shouldn’t…” Her thumb circled the head. I could barely talk.“It shouldn’t come as a surprise… that a borderline reclusive whisky distiller doesn’t see… see a lot of action.”
“It does actually. Skye is brimming with hot, young tourists who’d give anything to trade places with me.” I heard how genuine her words were and I couldn’t help wondering how her vision of me differed from my own. When she looked at me, I felt capable, dependable. When she touched me, I felt desired. Women haddesiredme in the past and her comment about tourists wasn’t too far off the mark. Callum joked that he saw more action in one busy summer season on Skye than all the years he lived in Edinburgh.
“It might make me selfish,” she continued, the speed of her strokes picking up.“But I’m glad the number is so few.”The number doesn’t matter, it could be zero or a hundred, there’s only you now.Somehow, I held the words in, dragging her back across my body instead with a swiftness that had her giggling.
Her hands landed on my chest.“On top again?” She sounded surprised.
“Yes,” I gritted through my teeth, already lining myself up.“Is that all right?”
She answered by dragging my all too willing mouth down to her breast.
Once we were spent, we slept.
April took up two thirds of the bed and wrapped my sheets around herself like a cocoon, which was fine, because I kept waking to drag her closer.
It was the best night’s sleep of my life.
26
APRIL
Delilah – Aeris Roves
My vagina is broken.That was my first thought as I woke.
The weight of the small dog at my feet felt familiar, but everything else, the masculine scent clinging to the sheets, the slightly too-soft pillow, the burning between my legs brought each delicious moment of the night before racing back. My eyes shot open. Mal’s cottage was so still I knew I was alone. The clock on the wall ticked, Dudley and Boy breathing in easy tandem.Why didn’t he wake me?Then I reminded myself of our promise to give one another the benefit of the doubt.
Before I could worry further, there was a faint crinkle of paper from the pillow beside me. A note rested atop one of his folded plaid shirts. I sat, giving Boy’s soft coat a stroke as I read Mal’s messy scrawl.If you wake before I’m back, go to the kitchen X
The kiss at the bottom was a little smudged, like he wrote it without thinking and tried to wipe it away. I knew my smile bordered on deranged as I pulled the shirt over my naked body and raced to the kitchenette as though it were Christmas morning. Three cooked pancakes waited on a plate beside another note that read,Heat me.A bag of ground coffee and various bowls were spread over the counter, covered with foil. When I peeled each back, I found chopped fruit, nuts, and a small container of maple syrup.How early must he have gotten up to prepare all of this?I wasn’t even hungry, yet I heated the pancakes thoroughly, tears pricking my eyes, then ate every morsel beside a vase of daisies I was positive hadn’t been there the night before.
When I took my plate to the sink, another note awaited me, balanced on top of the copper taps.Bathroom.Real tears formed as I took in the unlit candles lining the tub, along with a jar of bath salts. I removed the lid and inhaled. Lavender mixed with something sweet. Mal didn’t strike me as a lavender kind of guy.
Get in. At least thirty minutes.The note at the bottom of the empty claw foot tub read. I laughed, hearing the clipped demand in my head. Last night, even when sweet and tender and forfeiting all control, there was an air of authority to Mal’s tone. It gave me goose bumps just thinking about it. Sweet Mal was undeniably sexy. ButbossyMal? That side I was desperate to play with too.
I sunk into the hot water with a groan, letting the healing salts soothe my strained muscles. He wasn’t here, and yet he still found a way to take care of me. I’d been in year-long relationships where I never found that level of comfort in my partner. Laying my head against the lip of the tub, I let myself imagine for the first time what it would be like to truly belong to Malcolm Macabe. For him to belong to me. Every day would be like this, because if Mal held another’s heart, he would treatit as he did everything that mattered to him—with thought, purpose, and rigid determination. There would be no half measures.
For just a moment, soaking in his bathtub, in his cottage that contained the few possessions he held dear, I imagined that woman could be me.
I eventually found Mal in the distillery, bent over thewashback, reading numbers from a small dial. It was muggy here thanks to the heated yeast, and his hair stuck to his temples.“How’s it looking?” I asked. He startled, smacking his head hard off the wooden washback lid.“Shit.I’m sorry. I thought you heard me.” I raced to his side. Instead of addressing me, he dropped to a crouch, greeting Boy and then Dudley who licked his hands with enthusiasm. When he finally turned those storm cloud eyes on me, I found him blushing.“Good morning,” I tried again.
