Page 25

We hold hands across the inside of my car and listen to the radio in the dark. He tells me he started playing guitar and writing songs when he was about eight or nine years old and how his older brother introduced him to weed right around the same time. He explains how the words came easier when he was high, and it took him almost ten years to realize he couldn’t keep smoking weed every day. He admits he dropped out of high school during his junior year.

I listen intently as he tells me about the other drugs he then started to use—most I don’t even recognize the names of. While rubbing his thumb along the inside of my palm, he tells me how it took him another four years, a stay in rehab, and threats from his family and friends for him to get off the harder drugs. I’ve only smoked pot a few times and didn’t like how it made me feel or all the coughing it made me do, so I can’t truly understand his addictions. But it’s clear from the emotion in his voice that he had a very strong love/hate experience with drugs and alcohol.

“Living straight and sober made me feel restless. That’s when I left and started living like this. Being free became a new high.” He lifts my hand to his lips, and my breath hitches when he kisses the tiny ladybug tattoo on my wrist.

“Now you’re my addiction.” His low, gravelly tone sends ripples through my stomach.

Letting go of my hand, he leans across the small car and kisses me. I open my mouth for his tongue, welcoming the familiar minty-smoky taste of him. As he kisses me, he reaches across my body, finds the seat lever, and pulls it while pushing the headrest with his other hand until I’m leaning all the way back. Acorn quickly scooches over to the other side of the back seat to make room for the sudden invasion.

He leans over me in the front seat, still kissing me hungrily. When I reach up to put my arms around him, he slowly moves his lips down the side of my throat, sucking and biting a tantalizing path to the V-neck of my sweater, pulling the fabric down to expose the pink silk push-up bra cradling my breasts. I send up a silent thank you to Victoria’s Secret for designing a bra that makes even my small breasts look good.

He drags his tongue into my cleavage, stopping at the front clasp and undoing it with his teeth. God, there really is something to be said about a man who knows what he’s doing. Bracing one arm on the seat next to my head, he moves his lips slowly up the slight curve of my breast, pushing the fabric to the side until I’m completely uncovered. He lets out a deep sigh that makes my heart pound even harder as he circles my nipple with his tongue, sucking it between his lips until it aches for more. I moan softly and arch my body up into him with my fingers gripping his shoulders. The metal of his tongue piercing flicks over my taut nipple, sending hot tingles down my thighs and deep into the center of my core.

He moves his hand down my body and he unbuttons and unzips my jeans in a flash. I wiggle beneath the steering wheel, helping him push my pants down. Breathlessly, I tug his shirt up, needing to feel his warm flesh beneath my fingertips. He slides his hand under my saturated panties, cupping all of me in his hand, his palm pressing against my already-throbbing clit. His mouth comes back down on mine, hard and desperate as he touches my wet lips, spreading me open with two fingers and entering me with a third. Gasping, I dig my nails into his shoulders and kiss him back just as wildly, unable to stop myself from moving my hips in rhythm with his finger-fucking.

I want to cry and beg when he pulls his lips from mine. I’m convinced I can’t survive a moment without his mouth, his breath, and his taste. But he proves me wrong when he slides another finger into my tight, wet depths, and the metal of his silver skull ring rims my entrance, heightening the pleasure. Eyes closed in ecstasy, I try to tug him back to my lips, but instead, he bows his head to my breasts again, licking one, then the other, sucking and nibbling my aching nipples until my entire body is in a frenzy.

I want all of him, everywhere. There’s not a part of me that I don’t want him to own. I tangle my fingers in his long hair, holding him to me as I arch up into his mouth and thrusting fingers. My gasps and cries fill the car as I come, but I can’t hold back or hush myself. He’s taken away all my self-control with his lips, fingers, and scent.