Page 95 of Beg, Borrow, or Steal

I love him.That thought sweeps through me again as recklessly as a storm. I love him and it feels so natural that I’m wondering if part of me has always loved him. He must feel the way that question extends itself through my body, because his mouth slows and he pulls back enough to look between my eyes. “Everything okay?”

I nod and touch his lower lip with my thumb. Amazed that I can. “I was just thinking. Back in college…did you stay as late as me in the library because you were studying?”

He goes completely still for a beat, then takes my hand in his, winding our fingers together between our faces. He looks at my red nails and then kisses them one by one. “No. I stayed because I didn’t like the idea of you walking alone to your car after dark. I might’ve hated you, but I also wanted to keep you safe.”

I look in his eyes as a hurricane of emotions tears through me. “Oh god—I was afraid you were going to say that.”

“Is that a bad thing?”

“Yes. Because…now I regret hating you for so long. Now I really want to go back in time and laugh when you spill coffee onme and come sit at your table in the library and ask you if you’d like to be a writer one day. I want to start over.”

“Absolutely not,” he says, tugging his shirt off his body and then peeling mine off next. He reaches behind me and unhooks my bra. He reverently pulls the straps off my shoulders and then tosses my bra completely out of the truck. The moon softly illuminates his face enough for me to see him look absolutely destroyed with desire at the site of my naked chest before seemingly remembering what he was going say. He pulls me down onto him so we’re blissfully skin to skin. “I don’t know about you, but I needed those years of feuding. I don’t think I’d feel as close to you as I am now without them.” He pauses and laughs lightly. “Which probably means I need a ton of therapy but whatever.” He lifts his head and kisses me once—and it’s so damn hot the worddirtycrosses my mind. “Let’s not regret anything. Let’s enjoy where we’re at.”

I smile down at him. “Easy to do when we’re both half naked in the bed of my truck.”

“Yes, which reminds me.” Jack reaches between us to unbuckle my shorts and I do the same with his trousers. We both share an uncoordinated moment of shimmying out of our pants and scooting up onto the pillows, but it’s not awkward. It’s wonderful.

He turns us, taking such care to hold the back of my head so I don’t bump the hard floor of the truck as he lays me down. He adjusts up to his knees, hooking his fingers into the band of my underwear so he can pull them off me, sliding them gently down my thighs and over my feet. He tosses them up into the corner of the truck bed instead of flinging them off the side like he did my bra.A gentleman, this one.

I’m lying completely naked under the stars for Jackson Bennett, and the way he looks at me and touches me and sighs over my skin like he’s finally somewhere he was always meant to be, it feels like capturing the sun. I’m a kaleidoscope of love and sensation, alltwisting and shifting to create the most wonderful moment I’ve ever experienced.

And now I tug at the band of his underwear, eager to have all of him like he has all of me. A beat later, he’s naked too and I have never witnessed a more perfect man. But then he takes his glasses between his fingers like he’s going to take them off. I put my hand on his tattooed forearms. “Don’t you dare take those off.”

“They get in the way sometimes,” he says with a touch of self-consciousness.

“Good,” I say. “I like knowing they’re there.”

Need nearly chokes me as Jack lowers himself between my legs, his necklace brushing my chest as he lets me have his full weight. His mouth takes mine in a kiss so deep and exploring that my legs move with a mind of their own to wind firmly around his hips, spurring the moment into a frenzy of wanting. My nerves are electric, sharpening that delicious pressure building in my core. We’re both taking and taking and giving and giving. It’s a tangle of limbs and moonlight. It’s hot skin and sweat-slicked bodies. It’s the crinkle of a foil wrapper and then groans and gasps of pleasure as Jack finally rocks inside me.

“God,” he says, head falling to the side of mine, hand gripping the bunched-up blanket beneath us as I raise my hips and meet him movement for movement. He can’t decide where to touch me so he’s everywhere—savoring me inch by inch. I want to sink my teeth into the curve of his shoulder and then kiss it like the sweet breeze blowing over our bodies. I do both of these things and it sends Jack spiraling closer to his release.

His hand moves between us once again to touch me exactly where I need so that I can fall with him. Jack goes first, and the sound he makes sweeps me away too. We grip each other tightly as our bodies pulse and flex, and the first thought that strikes mewhen my soul reenters my body is not one I’ve ever thought before.I’d really like to snuggle with this man.

Jack goes up onto his forearms, his candy necklace dangling between us as he looks down at me with that ridiculously sexy, lazy smile of his. He presses his mouth to my throat again. “This is the best night of my life.”

June 23

Jack (12:07 AM):Did you get scared and leave your house? I can go back to my own bed if you’re uncomfortable with this. I swear it’s fine if you need more time to adjust.

Emily (12:08 AM):Settle down there, Ranger. I’m just getting us waters and a snack.

Jack (12:08 AM):Oh. Thank you.

Jack (12:08 AM):But also…you’re not actually going to start calling me that, right?

Emily (12:09 AM):Oh, Ranger, it’s like you don’t even know me.

Jack (12:09 AM):Fine, but not in bed.

Emily (12:09 AM):ESPECIALLY in bed.

Chapter Thirty-Three

Emily

I wake up in my perfect bed next to Jackson’s perfect body and I breathe the same perfect air he’s breathing and for the first time in a long time, it goes right into my lungs and zips into my bloodstream. It doesn’t have to get through the elephant that’s usually blocking my airways. I don’t know what the future holds, and maybe I’m starting to sort-of-kind-of be okay with that concept. Because I’m okay with the idea that for today, I’m happy.

I open my eyes and breathe him in. That glorious man-skin smell. It’s salty like a kettle chip and warm like a dinner roll.Am I hungry?I’m hungry for more of Jack.

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