Page 24 of Autumn With The Grumpy Mountain Man

I was going to lose my mind.

I took the hem of her sweater and lifted it over her head before she could do anything else.

She had paint there too. A smear of orange along her collarbone where the collar had been pulled loose, and a fingerprint on her shoulder that had to be mine. I traced the line across her collarbone with my thumb. Her skin was warm and soft and faintly flushed, and she shivered under my hand.

“You’ve got paint everywhere,” I said.

“Whose fault is that?”

“Yours. You started it.”

She laughed, and I put my mouth on her collarbone right over the paint. It tasted bitter and faintly chemical, and I didn’t care at all. She stopped laughing. Her breath caught, and her fingers slid into my hair.

I kissed my way up the side of her neck slowly. I found the spot below her ear that had made her gasp on the stairs, and I took my time there, kissing and sucking gently until she was squirming and tugging at my hair. Her pulse was racing under my lips. She smelled like vanilla and cinnamon and acrylic paint, and I breathed her in.

I reached around her and found the clasp of her bra. It took me two tries.

“Out of practice?” she whispered.

“Give me a minute.”

She was laughing when it came loose. The laugh caught in her throat when I drew the straps down her arms and the lace fell away.

I sat back on my heels and looked at her.

She was beautiful. Full and soft and curved, her skin golden in the lamplight, her nipples tight and rosy. She started to lift her arms to cover herself, and I caught her wrists gently and put them back down at her sides.

“Let me look at you,” I said.

She let me. Her cheeks went pink, and the flush spread down her throat to her chest, and I watched it go. Then I cupped one breast in my hand. It filled my palm, heavy and warm. I brushed my thumb slowly across her nipple, and she arched into my hand with a soft, broken sound.

I leaned in and took her nipple into my mouth.

She cried out. Her hands flew to my head and held me there. I circled her with my tongue, then sucked gently, then harder, and she made a sound I felt all the way down my spine. Her skin was so soft. I moved to her other breast and gave it the same attention while I rolled the first nipple between my fingers. She was panting now, her thighs pressing together, her hips moving restlessly on the edge of the bed.

“Shepherd.” My name was barely a breath. “Please.”

“Please what?”

“I don’t know.” She laughed, desperate. “Anything. Everything.”

I eased her back onto the bed. She went down onto the quilt with her hair spread out around her and her chest heaving, and I followed her, kissing my way down her body. Down her ribs, one at a time, the way I’d stroked them that night behind my truck. Across the soft curve of her stomach. She trembled under my mouth. I could feel her muscles jump every time my stubble scraped her skin.

I unbuttoned her jeans. She lifted her hips to help me, and I pulled them down her legs slowly, along with her underwear, and dropped them on the floor.

Then she was bare in front of me, all of her, golden and flushed, and for a second I forgot how to breathe.

“Come here,” she whispered, reaching for me.

“Not yet.”

I put my hands on her knees and eased them apart. She was already wet. I could see her glistening in the lamplight, and I could smell her, warm and sweet, and every muscle in my body went tight.

I kissed the inside of her knee. Then her inner thigh, a little higher. Then higher. I took my time, the way I’d promised, until she was squirming and lifting her hips toward my mouth and making small, desperate sounds that went straight through me.

Then I put my mouth on her.

She cried out. Her hips came up off the bed, and I wrapped my arms around her thighs and held her there. I licked her slowly, one long stroke from bottom to top, and she shuddered all over. She tasted like heaven. Sweet and salty and warm. I did it again, and again, slower each time, until she was gripping the quilt in both fists and saying my name over and over.