Page 11 of Micah

I slide my hands to her ass and yank her tighter to me, showing no mercy as I devour her sweet pussy.

When her legs wobble, I flex my biceps to keep her upright as I feast, determined to drink every last drop of her delicious orgasm.

When she finally collapses in a heap, I sweep her into my arms and carry her to her bedroom. She snakes a hand around my neck, pulling my mouth to hers. The passionate kiss is nearly enough to blind me to reason. I want nothing more than to slide my cock into that delicious pussy.

“You’re leaving?” she asks, surprise in her gaze as I set her down and stand back.

“Yes.”

“But why?”

“Because I know you, Avery Flanders.”

“What doesthatmean?” There’s a flash of hurt in her sharp tone.

“Tomorrow you’ll try to pretend this never happened.” I stop in the doorway. “When I come inside you, it’ll be because you’re done denying what this is between us. What it’salwaysbeen.” With those final words, I close the door behind me before I lose my nerve and pray to the fucking gods that I won’t regret this.

7

AVERY

“These are amazing!”Haley gushes as she scans through the photos on my laptop from the firefighter calendar shoot. I may or may not have locked myself in my bedroom all morning to get these edited. It had nothing to do with avoiding a certain someone down the hall and the memory of him feasting on my pussy in the middle of the night.

“I picked a top three for each month,” I explain, desperately clenching my thighs to ward off the tingle of desire that has picked a very inconvenient time to manifest. What happened in the hallway last night is Future Avery’s problem.

“You’re going to makeusnarrow it down?” Cassidy complains.

“You only have to worry about Mr. July,” Haley says to Cassidy, referring to Declan. “No way I’m picking out the sexiest photo with my brother in it.”

“Can I keep the ones of Mr. July we don’t use?” Cassidy coos.

“Sure,” I say with a laugh. Maybe I can do this. I can be totally normal and not think about how sexy Micah was on his knees, that wicked gleam in his eyes as he flicked his tongue?—

“You should pick out Mr. March,” Haley suggests, nudging me with a playful elbow.

“What?” Heat rushes through me, and I’m fairly certain I have an entire body blush going on right now.

“Henry’s your favorite, after all.”

“Right.Henry.” The dog I wish I could adopt but still can’t figure out how to make it work. Not until I’m able to solely work my photography business and give up my extra shifts at the bakery. It wouldn’t be fair to Henry or any other dog, for that matter. It suddenly becomes a little easier to calm my overheated body. Damn you Micah for toying with my emotions over Henry.

“He’s been looking a little sad since you brought him back,” Haley says.

“Please don’t do that to me,” I quietly beg.

“Look, I’m not going to twist your arm. If you don’t have time for Henry, you can’t have him. But we make time for the things that are important to us.” Haley looks up from her desk chair, the laptop screen paused on a photo that does not belong in the calendar lineup—the one I took of Micah carrying Henry out of the park the other day. “But Avery?”

“Yeah?”

“And I say this lovingly. Figure your shit out. You and Henry deserve each other.”

“Just you and Henry?” Cassidy chimes in, wriggling her eyebrows.

“Who else would there be?” But the attempted tone of innocence nearly makes me choke on my own lie.

Haley and Cassidy share a conspiratorial look before both turning their eyes on me.

“Honey, that man has been in love with you for forever,” Haley says matter-of-factly.

---