Best Friends With Benefits (Most Likely To) (5 page)

She didn’t lose his gaze as she removed it, though she was doing her best to keep her shivers in check as he inspected her.

“Those are some great fucking tits,” he said. “I can’t wait until they’re putty in my hands while you ride my cock.”

Her eyes widened.

It was what he would have said to a woman he was fucking, but the minute he saw her full B’s, creamy as vanilla ice cream, with perky little nipples like cherries on top, taut and tight and waiting for him, he couldn’t help picturing just that. Valerie on top of him on this bed, taking him deep, her hands clutching the headboard as he slid inside her again and again.

“Thanks, I grew them myself,” she joked.

He smiled, but not in amusement. “Just thought of another rule. You need to treat me like a guy you’re just fucking. Would you say that to a guy you’re just fucking?”

Her breath caught. “I’ve never just fucked anyone.”

He knew it was true, knew why this decision had been so hard for both of them to come to, but he wasn’t about to get caught up in that, now that he was so close.

“Tell me to suck on them.”

Her eyes were hooded.

“You want me to, right?” He pressed into her soft flesh, and her head lolled back in a gasp. His heartbeat hammered in time with his cock. Fuck, the way her body responded was sexy. It knew him as well as she did—each breath, each whimper exactly what he needed to hear.

She nodded. Her tongue darted out to wet her lips.

“You wanted it last night, too, didn’t you? Wanted me to take your nipple into my mouth, circle my tongue around it slowly, and squeeze it between my lips. Give you a preview of what I’d do when I went to work on your clit.”

Her mouth opened, but nothing came, no words, no breath. Though he knew she was locked not in fear but desire.

Greedy lust shot into his cock. He had her. “That’s the best part about just fucking someone. You can tell him exactly what you want. So what do you want?”

…

Valerie’s mind sparked like an engine that had been jumped. Tell him what she wanted. The only word she could focus on in that moment was
more
. Showing her exactly what he would do as his lips and tongue made their way down her body. Down to the place that was wet and waiting for him, again.

He was her best friend; she could tell him. “Not my breasts,” she managed. “Lower.” Her pulse battered in her ears as she waited for his response.

She tried to forget she was practically naked in front of him. That he was seeing her body, seeing all of her. She pushed away her usual insecurities.

Alec’s head cocked. “You want me working that clit already?”

That was exactly what she wanted, but she was glad he was saying it so she didn’t have to. She nodded, afraid if she said yes, it would come out like a scream. She’d never wanted anything more in her life.

He slid down the length of her body and lapped at her stomach, flicking his tongue along the waistband of her boy shorts, lathing it over her belly button, teasing like it was his only purpose in life.

“Should I keep going?” His breath sizzled against her abdomen.

She stared at the top of his sleep-scuffed head, the carved muscles of his back as he continued to torment her with his mouth. His lips explored from one side of her to the other, the heat of his gasps building like her need. Her body was so ready for him to go lower. Her want was like a color she could see. He dragged his tongue along her waistline again, gearing up to undo her. That is, if she could ask for it.

“I could taste your stomach all day, Dirty Girl, but I don’t think that’s what you want, is it?”

She shook her head.

“You want me to taste you, don’t you? You want me to rip your panties off and fuck you with my tongue, don’t you? Suck on that clit of yours like it’s a lollipop.”

“Yes,” she breathed. “Fuck.” The word tumbled out. “Yes.”

“Now we’re talking, Dirty Girl.” He grabbed her ass and pulled her to him. “Take your shorts off, but leave the panties on.”

She had no idea her hands could move that fast. In seconds, her shorts were on the floor with her discarded tank top.

His eyes went dark, possessive. “Look at you, breathing wild and half naked waiting for me to make you come.”

She felt those words all the way down to her toes. Why had no one ever talked to her like this? Why had she never known how much she would like it?

He angled his mouth against the dripping lace fabric of her panties. “You’ll get what you want.” His voice rumbled against the wet warmth of her. “But you’re not ready yet. I want you so soaked and swollen that the minute my tongue touches your begging clit, you explode in my mouth.”

He was getting her there. He breathed against her as he rubbed two fingers at the fabric right above…
Oh my God
, it felt so good she couldn’t help but buck against him.

“Harder, Dirty Girl? You want it harder?”

She opened her mouth but she couldn’t form words; all that came out was a low moan.

“Of course you do, you don’t have to answer. Your body is begging me for it.”

She considered asking him to fuck her. Hard, now, the headboard smacking against the top of her head, but the teasing delighted her. Having a man do exactly what she wanted him to wasn’t something she was going to waste.

His fingers went at her relentlessly, hitting a rhythm like she was a guitar and he was playing the most exquisite solo. She was going to lose her mind if she wasn’t in his mouth soon. It was so close, panting pure want into her core.

“Lick me.” The words hung in the air for a moment until she realized she’d said them.

Alec glanced up at her, his expression teeming with want, his lips full and ready to take her. “Don’t like being kept waiting, Dirty Girl?”

She was breathing so hard she hiccupped, but nothing inside her body was attached anymore. Alec’s words were a sledgehammer splintering her organs and sending them flying off into the deepest reaches of desire.

He ran one finger down the length of her thigh. “Say that again while I can see your face, and I’ll obey.”

A burning bloomed in her stomach. “Lick me,” she repeated.

His eyes sparked deep brown, turning almost red. “Time to take care of rule number one.” He slipped her underwear to the side. “I’ll save the unveiling until I get to be inside you.” His breath was white-hot against the steam of her and, when his tongue made contact with her throbbing center, her whole body coiled, contracted.
Oh God,
she was going to orgasm from just one flick of his tongue. The foreplay of last night and this morning converged and began to untwist the knot at her core.

“You’re about to come for me, aren’t you, Dirty Girl?”

About to?
No, she was, the rush overflowing as he slid two fingers inside her and continued to lavish her with his tongue. Liquid pleasure assaulted Valerie’s every sense, streaking in luscious, fiery waves over her skin. She bucked against him, her insides contracting in pings of electric shock, doused by sweet release. Alec sucked at her, lapping up every last gasp.

He sat up, his lips shiny with her, the tattoos on his shoulders beating as hard as his heart must have been. “
Now
I’ll shower.”

“You don’t have to. We can…” she started. Even though she had just been satisfied, her only thought became
put
what I felt against my thigh inside me
now
. But she couldn’t say it. He’d given her permission. He’d demanded it. But without his hands on her, without his mouth on her, she didn’t have the courage to ask.

“You want another orgasm already? Don’t be greedy. I haven’t even had one yet.”

Before she could respond, Alec rose from the bed, stepped into the bathroom, and closed the door. She heard him brushing his teeth. A minute later, the shower turned on. Should she join him in there?

She fisted the sheets. If she’d told him they weren’t allowed to kiss because of the intimacy, showering together was out of the question.

She could already feel the trickle of hot water running over her head, the way Alec’s chest would harden under her hands as she slicked him with soap, how he would pin her into the corner and ease inside her, the marble tile cold against her back. Aside from the intimacy, that would also mean he would see her naked, standing in the bright light of the bathroom. The same bathroom that held the mirror that had made her terrible nickname repeat in her mind last night.

Even if she could gather the courage, she didn’t think she could stand. He’d melted her from the inside out. Her bones were white lava. And she still had actually having sex with him to look forward to.

She needed to let people just fuck her more often.

Chapter Five

“You better tell me what the hell is going on,” Cynthia screeched, her blue eyes dancing.

Valerie sat with her at one of the twenty picnic tables set up on the grounds of the hotel, next to what looked like the makings of a track meet. Reece Freedland yelled over a megaphone at the front of the festivities, her blond hair in a tight braid and a whistle around her neck.

Valerie and Alec had already gotten the eye from Reece for missing breakfast. They’d gone for tongue service and room service instead, and she didn’t think talking during the rundown of the rest of the day’s activities—lawn games, a barbecue lunch, cocktails, and late night mini golf—was going to be tolerated.

Were they at a reunion, on a cruise, or in hell?

She’d thought the way Reece used to treat her in high school might fill her with enough remorse to leave her alone, but maybe only Valerie remembered the taunts. Maybe like she should have been able to, Reece had moved on.

“Nothing,” Valerie said out of the side of her mouth, ironically using the skills she’d learned in high school for talking while under the scrutiny of a boring authoritarian to respond to Cynthia.

Her eyes squinted in disbelief. “It didn’t look like nothing last night. It didn’t sound like it, either.” She giggled.

Valerie remembered the noises, the words Alec brought out of her just that morning, and her skin boiled.

“It’s that or we talk about who got fat. Your gossip is way more fun,” Cynthia pressed, leaning toward Valerie.

Valerie wondered if people were gossiping about her and Alec. How they may have belonged together in high school, but they were not even close to being equals now.
Barking
didn’t belong with beautiful.

“We’re just friends,” she said, even as she recalled the rip of his two fingers slicing into her, the complete hypnosis of his tongue.

“You’ve been saying that for years,” Cynthia dismissed with a wave.

Unlike with Alec, Valerie hadn’t spoken to Cynthia very much at all since high school. They’d kept in touch a bit through college, they were friends on Facebook, but she didn’t have actual proof that Valerie
had
been saying that for years. Even though, of course, it was true.

In high school she’d said it to the other people in band, in college to her junior-year roommate, up until a few months ago to Charles whenever he got jealous of their late night phone calls. She understood now how
just friends
sounded like a lie.

She repeated
just friends
in her mind as she glanced over and found Alec whispering to a guy at the table next to them. Who would Alec have been talking to so familiarly? She studied him, the broad heft of his shoulders under a polo shirt, angular features punctuated by tortoise-shell frames. Oh—Gideon.

Holy crap, is that Gideon?

Like Alec, the years had been good to him. It was like the two of them had been dough in high school and now they were hard, golden, delicious sugar cookies fresh from the oven.

She stole another glance at Alec. He’d showered but hadn’t shaved, stubble dusting his jaw and shadowing the curve of his lips. Her mouth watered.
Just friends
, she repeated, even though all she wanted in that moment was to take a huge, mouth-filling bite.

It was what she should have repeated in her head this morning, instead of allowing him to sexually short-circuit her and replace that safe barrier with one word: “more
.
”

“You’re seriously not going to tell me?” Cynthia pulled at the hem of her tomato-red T-shirt.

What are he and Gideon whispering about?
Hopefully he was keeping the secret that Cynthia was working on getting out of her.

God, did she want to admit it. Maybe it would take some of the taboo away. It might be smart to do something to make it less illicit, less hot, because if she didn’t, she was never going to be able to follow her own rules.

If she didn’t say the words but just nodded, would that be okay?

Besides, she was desperate for someone to know. Just look at him. She still was, the way his tattoos turned oil black in the sun and his mouth was swollen from her. She couldn’t stop.

“Listen, I’m divorced,” Cynthia tried again. “I haven’t had sex”—she lingered on the word—“in almost a year. Give me something.”

“I’m not allowed to talk about it.”

Cynthia slapped the table, bringing a look of rage from Reece. “Which means,” she whispered when Reece’s eyes moved on, “there is something to talk about.”

Val nodded, thousands of tiny sparks tingling in her abdomen.

“Oh my God,” Cynthia said, “I knew it. I knew it before we got here.”

Valerie shook her head.

“Nothing before we got here?” She stuck a manicured finger to her lips.

Valerie shook her head harder.

“Whatever, just keep telling yourself that.” She threw her hands up. “Your foreplay has lasted fourteen years.”

Those words hit Valerie in the gut, the sparks in her stomach doused in ice water.
Has it?
Because that would mean she’d wanted this for a very long time. It wasn’t like she had a date stamp on their relationship.
Before Fucking
, she thought, smiling at the words in her head, and
After Fucking
. Like Alec was her sexual messiah.

No, she felt exactly how she’d always felt about Alec. The only difference now was that she wanted him to feel her, all over, everywhere. Wanted him to do what he’d done that morning again and again and again. She wanted everyone here but the two of them to disappear so he could take her on one of these picnic tables. Screw the splinters…

Cynthia snapped her fingers. “Hey, all that stuff you’re reliving, you better remember that I’m getting it out of you at some point this weekend.”

Val smiled. She knew that regardless of her rule, Cynthia probably would.

She knocked her knee against Val’s under the table. “I can’t believe it. It must have been amazing. Just look at him.”

And Val did yet again, the heft of his shoulders accentuated by a tight black T-shirt. The exchange between her and Cynthia was so familiar. It was like they were back in the cafeteria, and Alec was a guy she had a crush on.

But this was Alec. She couldn’t have a crush on him. At least
Before Fucking
Valerie couldn’t.

“So,” Cynthia gushed, “are you guys together now?”

Val shook her head.

Cynthia’s face twisted in confusion. “You two have always been your own thing.”

She supposed that was true, but Cynthia didn’t know the whole story. Valerie had never told her about the day Alec tried to turn their friendship into everything. The day after graduation, he’d come to her house with his life strapped to his back asking her to gamble on his future, what he said could be their future, rather than go after her own.

She wanted to be able to say yes, but she knew back then that Alec couldn’t be her savior when he still needed one so badly. He’d played off her rejection that day, but they hadn’t spoken for almost two years. It took almost five more to repair what had broken, to get their friendship back on solid ground, and now they were playing roulette yet again.

“Here,” Cynthia said, reaching into her pocket and sliding something shiny across the table.

“A condom?” Val shout-whispered, hiding it in her pocket before anyone could see.

“I brought a bunch of them. After last night I thought you might need one.”

Val hadn’t even thought of it. She definitely hadn’t brought some. In all her rules that morning, she hadn’t even talked to Alec about safe sex. Of course, if she knew him like she did, he’d brought a bunch of them, too.

“Thanks,” Val said, even as uncertainty boomed and cracked through her. She and Alec were going to have sex.

She and Alec were going to
have sex.

“Oh my God.” Cynthia put her hand to her mouth and whispered between her fingers, “He’s coming over here.”

“Don’t say anything,” Val scolded, once again remembering this same scene played out inside the walls of their high school.

Back then, Alec had even been there sometimes sitting next to Cynthia in silence, his coffee brown eyes watching Valerie as the boy she liked hit their cafeteria table. But now he stood above them in a tight black T-shirt and tighter black jeans, a studded belt around his waist, his tattoos shadows in the sun—a rock star at a picnic.

“You want to be on my team for this crap?” The same eyes that had watched her orgasm into his mouth that morning were on her now.

“Team?” Val asked.

“For the obstacle course. You guys haven’t been listening, have you?” A roguish sneer flashed on his lips.

“No, we were listening.” Cynthia spoke fast. “She just felt bad because I don’t have a partner. But I’m not participating anyway. I have a bad…” She paused, her save almost perfect. “Foot,” she finished, wearing a cantaloupe slice of a smile.

“Sure, I’ll be on your team.” The words came out breathy. Not at all in the casual way they should have when she responded to Alec about such a simple question.

“Okay,” he drawled like he’d noted it, too, “let’s get set up, then.”

She rose and walked with him to where the other teams were waiting. A potato sack lay on the ground in front of them. Their paired-off classmates gathered in front of their own potato sacks. She glanced down the line and saw Gideon on a team with Georgia Cahill—past head cheerleader, always jerk—the girl leader of the group who’d called her
Barking
.

Was she thinking that word now?

Her blond hair was up in a high ponytail. She wore napkin-sized white shorts and a red halter top, her body all tan and curves. Gideon’s looks had caught up to hers, that was for sure, but what the hell were they doing on the same team?

Why did she care? She had her own awkward pairing to worry about.

Gideon noticed her, smiled, and waved.

She responded in kind, but something about his smile, the way it curled up on only one side, made it seem like he knew something. The same thing Cynthia now knew.

“You didn’t tell him, did you?” Valerie had no right to ask, but standing in silence seemed worse.

“What, and break one of your rules?” he whispered into her ear. “No, Dirty Girl, I kept my mouth shut about your fabulous pussy.”

She swallowed a blistering breath. Apparently that nickname was sticking, as were his abdomen-twisting words. She would have told him to stop, if she could get her lips to move. But something about the way he spoke, about being known that way to someone, sent prickles of steamy electricity between her trembling legs.

“What about you—you and Cynthia get up to your old tricks?”

“No,” she replied quickly, “I didn’t say anything.” She hadn’t, not literally anyway.

“Gideon has his own stuff going on.”

Valerie leaned in closer. “Does it involve Georgia?”

“Secrets are secrets for a reason,” he said, laying his pointer finger on her lips.

That finger. She remembered where it had been earlier, where she couldn’t wait for it to be again. He pulled it away, put his hands in his back pockets.

“You have secrets, too.” His eyes roamed over her face. He was so much taller now that she had sneakers on instead of her heels. If he pulled her into an embrace, her head would hit right at the center of his chest, that mouthwateringly taut chest. She never would have thought of it
B.F
. but now their closeness made her want more closeness, made her crave it like an addict.

She forced herself to look away. God did she ever have secrets. Number one was that she’d never come close to experiencing anything like what had happened between them, and Cock-fucius help her, she couldn’t wait for it to happen again.