Page 21 of Death Sentence

“How do you know I haven’t always lived here?”

The crease vanished and his worried expression turned amused. “You don’t sound like you’re from around here. Not enough drawl in that prim little accent of yours.”

“I guess that makes sense.” He paid more attention to her than she’d realized and she wasn’t sure how to feel about that. She felt vulnerable around him, not just because she was wrapped in nothing more than her undergarments and a thin robe, but because he always seemed to see and know things that others missed. He was constantly watching her, assessing what made her tick with heated eyes.

“How long have you lived here? However long it was, it was too long to have never tasted gumbo.”

“Five years,” she said, chin coming up to look at him more fully. “I’ve never gotten around to it.” Not that she really wanted to, but she had been busy, and it wasn’t like anyone had ever offered to feed it to her before now. Not specifically. She’d glanced at it on menus but nothing more than that.

He brought a hand up and let his fingers skim across her jaw, hot and feather light against her skin. “You keep tipping your chin up like that when you argue and someone’s gonna take it as an invitation to clock you in that pretty face of yours. You've got a fighter’s spirit and your mama should have taught you not to square up to people like that.”

“People don’t hit others over minor disagreements in the neighborhood where I grew up.” It came out as a whisper and she fought against the urge to lean into his hand the way she had seen Winston do when he wanted more affection.

“Lucky you.” His eyes were locked on her face and she didn’t remember moving so close to him.

She coughed a little and stepped back, warnings racing through her head. She tried to fill her mind with images of blueberry scones to remind her of her bet with Sarah. She and Ethan were just friends, nothing more. “So, about that gumbo.”

He let her change the subject without mentioning her sudden flustered tone. “I guess it’s not your fault you’ve never had it,” he conceded, turning away and setting out the contents of the bag on her table while she watched from a safe distance. “Your friends talk like they’re from around here so they should have been feeding you.”

“It’s not their job to feed me—” she began but he shook his head.

“It’s hospitality,” he explained. “You moved from somewhere up north,” he said it like a dirty word, “where they don’t know anything about cooking or comfort and when you move down here it’s our duty to teach you how to eat grits and greens and gumbo.”

“Well, that doesn’t make sense.” She sniffed the air and crept a little closer when he took his first bite and didn’t immediately fall over dead. “I ate perfectly fine growing up.”

“Mmm hmm,” he hummed. It seemed deliberately neutral, a polite void instead of an opinion. “Open up.”

He waited patiently, eyes locked on hers as she weighed her choices. Her trust in him pitted against the unfamiliarity of what he was offering. He smiled when she stepped closer and parted her lips slightly, eyes twinkling with triumph as she accepted the smallest bite possible.

“It’s … good.”

He laughed at her surprise and leaned down to give her a quick kiss on the cheek. The absentminded press of his mouth was enough to make her heart skip, to stop completely and then thump madly in her chest. Heat shot through her from her lips to her fingertips as she leaned into him, unconsciously chasing his warmth. It had been thoughtless, a brief burst of affection that seemed utterly fitting for a man with his effortless charm, but it nearly knocked her off of her feet.

The smile on his face vanished and she watched, breath suspended, as he seemed to catch the change in her expression and paused, eyes going dark, before he lowered his head again. This time his mouth caught hers, warm and soft, with none of the rush and the roughness she’d been anticipating. His thumb brushed over her cheek, light and reassuring, and she stepped closer until she was molded to his chest. She fit against him like she belonged there, and a tremble ran through both of them at the contact.

Thoughts of bets and blueberry scones and just friends were incinerated in a rush of hot desire. Shaky and adrift on the feel of him, she didn’t hesitate when the silken slide of his tongue along the seam of her lips asked her another silent question. She answered with her mouth, opening to his exploration as she let her hands roam up his chest. One found the steady beat of his heart and the other the soft curling ends of his hair where it lay against the nape of his neck.

He made a low, desperate sound that skated over her skin and set off an answering echo inside her. A thrill rushed beneath her skin, a potent mix of fear and heady confidence. It was intoxicating to be wanted with such intensity.

The breath whooshed out of her when he scooped her up, broad hands cupping the backs of her thighs as he pressed her against him. “Wha?—"

“We’re just going in here,” he explained, already carrying her to the living room as her head found its spot against his neck. He maneuvered her easily as he sat down on the couch and settled her on his lap. “Comfortable?”

She shouldn’t be, with one knee on each side of his thighs and chest heaving just in front of his eyes, she should be over exposed and vulnerable, but there was no room in her mind for the sharp edges of her usual fears. She’d forgotten them and her determination to keep him at arm’s length. “Yes.”

“Good.” He kept his eyes on hers as his hands began to wander, tracing the tops of her thighs and the lace edges of her underwear, following the silken lines of her robe up her stomach and over her chest, leaving a trail of scorched skin behind him.

She was the one that leaned in, offering her mouth and pressing herself against him, breasts rubbing his chest and hips shifting to get closer as he tangled his fingers in her hair. He was still slow and methodical, stripping her of her inhibitions with his tongue and his lips and the gentle scrape of his teeth. She’d been kissed before but nothing like this. Never this thoroughly or erotically or with as much naked and undisguised enthusiasm.

She let him kiss her until she was writhing on his lap, grinding against the hard bulge of his arousal like a hormone crazed teenager, before she pulled away for a shuddering breath. He turned his attention immediately to the curve of her neck, lips moving down the column of her throat and scrambling her thoughts. “Ethan.”

He froze, pausing for the space of only a few heartbeats before pulling back to meet her eyes. “Do you want me to stop?”

She didn’t, not really, but she knew she’d regret it if they went any further. “I’m sorry,” she said quietly. It was difficult to shift off his lap without making the whole situation more awkward than it already was and she wasn’t convinced she’d pulled it off as she settled onto the cushion beside him.

“No reason to be sorry,” he said and the hand he put on her knee was soft and reassuring. “I didn’t plan any of this when I came over tonight.” He took a steadying breath, fingers working absently as he softly stroked her leg.

“I know,” she said after a moment of silent contemplation. “It’s just … Intimacy, physical or otherwise, is not something I take lightly.”

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