“Jesus.” He inhaled a long breath, then blew it out. She’d heard from Abi that he was a master of control, both around the bag at first and in the batting box. Though she hadn’t had a chance to see any of his games, she knew she was witnessing that control firsthand. “Okay,” he finally said, “but only if you’re naked first.”
It was a bargain she was happy to make, especially when she knew just how good he made every inch of her nakedness feel.
“Take off your clothes, Serena.”
He’d always stripped her bare before now, and surprise at his sudden request had her hesitating for a split second. Because oh my God it was sexy when he gave her a sensual command. To buy herself time to try to get her bearings back, at least a little bit, she said, “What do you want me to take off first?”
His slow smile held as much heat as happiness. “How about we go from the bottom up this time?”
Maybe the thought of being naked from the waist down while still covered up on top shouldn’t have been so wickedly, crazily sexy...but it was. So insanely sexy.
The first thing she did was toe off her tennis shoes, but she needed to sit up and bend over to reach her socks. And even with all of her clothes on, the way Sean looked at her while she slid the cotton from her feet was so freaking hot that she practically came right then and there.
She’d only just dropped her socks onto the floor beside his bed when he took one of her bare feet into his hands and ran his thumb up her arch with the perfect pressure to make her moan from the pleasure of the impromptu massage. By the time he did the same to her other foot, she was shocked to realize that every single way he touched her only aroused her more.
“What are you going to do with those amazingly talented hands once I take my jeans off?”
His grin grew wider...and wickeder. “Take them off and I’ll show you.”
Fumbling now to find out exactly what he had planned, she yanked open the button and zipper of her jeans and shoved them off. But he didn’t seem to care about her non-striptease because his eyes were trained on her underwear.
When she looked down, she saw why: the pink fabric was clearly damp...and getting wetter by the second.
“My God, Serena,” he said in a raw tone, “you blow my mind.”
Wanting so badly for him to touch her again, any way he wanted to, any way at all, she slid the thin layer of cotton off. She’d never had any experience with seducing anyone before, but it was suddenly the most natural thing in the world for her to say, “What about now?”
He answered her with a kiss, but not on her mouth. Between her legs.
Obviously guessing that she would be equal parts nervous and excited by what he was doing to her, his hands were soothing as he took hers in his and laid them together over her hip bones. Once more, he pressed a soft kiss to the damp flesh between her thighs, before lifting his head and meeting her gaze. “If you want me to stop—”
“No.” God no! “It feels so g—”
Her final word was lost on a gasp of pleasure as his tongue slicked over her. All of her. Again and again he laved her with his tongue, and she spun out further and further as pleasure took over every last inch of her. She knew she was gripping his hands tightly, too tightly, but as he took her higher and higher, she desperately needed something to hold on to, some way to try to keep it together when she was going to split apart into a million little pieces any second. At the same time, somewhere in the back of her head she couldn’t help but be frightened by how intimate this was...and that somehow in her stupid inexperience she might be doing something wrong.
She’d just started to tense up when Sean shifted over her, just enough to say, “Let go, Serena.” His breath was warm over her sensitive skin, his lips brushing over her with each word he spoke. “Let go for me.”
And in the end, it was knowing that he could read her innermost thoughts almost before she could that made it not only possible for her to let go as he swept his tongue, his lips, even the edges of his teeth over her, but also to know that it was okay for her to break apart into a million pieces.
Because he’d be right there to help put her back together, even stronger, and better, on the other side.
* * *
“Was that okay?”
Sean hadn’t been planning to take things so far, so fast tonight. Sure, he’d wanted to, but he’d promised they’d go slow. Only, when she’d said she wanted to touch him...well, his brain had basically shut down and he’d acted without being able to think it through. Apart from that one moment when he’d asked her if she needed him to stop.
Thank God she hadn’t.
“Better than okay.” She made a happy little sound. “Perfect.” But then she amended that to, “Almost perfect. Because there’s still that small matter of my doing the exact same thing to you.”
Hell, he thought, that was nearly the end of it for him as he twitched hard against his zipper from nothing but the thought of her mouth on him.
“Clothes.” The one word was strangled, and he had to struggle to string it into a sentence. “You still have clothes on.”
She huffed out a breath. “Fine. I’ll take off the rest of my clothes first, but you’d better not distract me this time.”
He’d been ridiculously attracted to Serena when she was shy and uncertain and just trying to feel her way around their kisses and his hands on her curves. But now that she was starting to own her sexuality?
Luckiest. Guy. Ever.
“Me? Distract you?”
She laughed softly, but he was the one currently being distracted by the way she was now lifting her T-shirt over her head. After tossing it on the floor on top of her other clothes, she said, “You love distracting me.”
Before she could lower her hands to the clasp of her bra, he grabbed her wrists. “You’re right,” he agreed. “I do. I love it.” He bent his head so that his lips were barely a breath from hers. “And you. I love you, Serena.” He swallowed her echo of his words with his kiss.
A long while later, when he knew he wasn’t being fair, he finally let her up for air. “Okay, no more distractions.”
Her eyes were cloudy with arousal, and he liked seeing how long it took for them to clear to the point where she could actually form the word, “Okay,” and then a few beats later, “You’d better not.”
Of course, when she took off her bra, he was hard-pressed to stick to his promise. Fortunately, the next thing he knew, she was pushing him back down on the bed and levering herself over him so that the only reasonable place for him to put his hands was over her br**sts. Not because he was trying to distract her, of course.