Page 62 of The Reunion

He’s got me, hook, line and sinker.

I crash my lips back down against his and his hand tangles in my hair, pins tumbling out and strands falling loose.

‘Iced, extra shot of espresso, and caramel syrup. Lots of it.’

Ryan kisses a path down my neck, tongue and teeth scraping against the sensitive skin, making me grip his shoulders helplessly.

‘I rewatch episodes of comedy shows. Friends and Always Sunny, or Ted Lasso.’

His hand slides beneath my top, fumbling for the hooks of my bra, and I tug his stupid old school tie loose to get to his shirt buttons.

‘I never poked my tongue out.’

A laugh rumbles against my neck, and he licks a stripe up the column of my throat. I shiver. ‘Yes, you did. So, yes, you still do.’

I’d argue, if he weren’t thrusting his hips up against mine and pushing the hard length of his erection so deliciously between my legs. I just angle my hips better against him instead.

‘I still like eighties rock, but not in that pretentious way I used to, when I liked it just because it made me feel better than people like you who listened solely to what was in the charts.’

‘You wanna know a secret?’ Ryan’s teeth catch my earlobe. ‘You got me into liking it, too, I was always just too proud to tell you.’

His hand finds its way inside my trousers, inside my underwear, while I’m still lifted up with my legs around him and my back against the door. My head sinks onto his shoulder as I rock against his fingers, and Ryan mutters curses like he’s the one being made to see stars when I fall apart against him. I take his face in my hands to kiss him again, deeply, both of us fighting for dominance, and my legs drop back down, feet planting unsteadily on the floor. My hands travel the hard planes of his chest, beneath and on top of his half-unbuttoned shirt, and I sink to my knees, palms feeling the contours of his muscled thighs before I undo his trousers and take him in my hands and mouth. I moan when his fingers grip my hair in desperation; my stomach swoops when he throws a hand flat against the door and gives a stuttering groan, fighting to keep his composure as he pulls away from me.

I stand back up, my body brushing the entire length of his.

‘Told you,’ I say, kissing the edge of his jaw. ‘You couldn’t handle it.’

‘You wanna bet?’ Ryan growls, and it’s all teeth and tongues and hands and skin, and the scatter of clothes landing on furniture or the floor or being pushed aside in our haste, the tear of a condom packet taken from his wallet, and I’m laid out flat on one of the benches with Ryan over me, inside me, my arms and legs tangled around his, and it’s all so fucking good that I don’t know why we ever bothered to put up a fight and pretend like this wasn’t always going to happen.

It wasn’t. Obviously. And this is … unprecedented. Unforeseen.

And I do not want to be anywhere else, except locked in this dark classroom in the middle of the night with Ryan Lawal, while he mutters pure filth in my ear and thrusts into me, and gets that insufferably smug look on his face when he makes me shatter against him for a second time and I beg him in breathy, needy pants until I can only say his name while he’s saying things like, ‘Oh, God, just like that,’ and, ‘Fuck, yeah, let me hear you scream.’

I wouldn’t normally give him the satisfaction.

Except, you know. Normally, I wouldn’t be in this situation at all, or even contemplating a reality in which it might exist. And normally, I wouldn’t be quite this satisfied.

It’s a battle with Ryan I am more than happy to lose, if this is what losing entails.

So I arch into him, draw him in deeper and closer with my thighs and knees and feet while my fingers dig into the hard, smooth muscle of his biceps, and his lips do something to the tender skin of my neck at just the same time his fingers touch me and he angles his hips to hit just the right spot – and I do it, just for him, just because he asked. I cry out in wordless pleasure, a keening noise I’ve never heard myself make before as my whole body bucks against Ryan. His grip bites into my hips and his rhythm stutters and he groans my name in the most deliciously intoxicating sound I’ve ever heard.

I don’t worry if anybody might overhear, because we’re drowned out by the sudden wailing of the school fire alarm.

The sprinklers overhead immediately kick on, drenching us both.

Ryan is still inside me, has barely come down off his orgasm, and blinks, stunned, as water pounds against his back and drips off him, onto me. I stare back, biting my lip until I can’t hold it in any longer. A giggle bursts out of me, and Ryan gives a short, stunned chuckle, and the fire alarm continues to blare and the sprinklers keep soaking us, and we both collapse against the bench, unable to stop laughing.

Which is, if you’d asked me, definitely not how I thought sex with Ryan Lawal was going to end.

Chapter Thirty-One

Bryony

‘Most Likely to Become Famous’

This is one giant, colossal, cosmic joke. God is well and truly giving me the middle finger tonight, and I can just tell she’s laughing as she does it.

I don’t exactly have time to dwell on that, though, because after frantically flipping several more switches in the fuse box in blind panic, then finally toppling over and losing my balance on the spinny chair and, okay, yes, maybe Hayden was right because I totally would’ve broken a bone if he hadn’t been there to catch me, steady me, and help me down …

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