Page 70 of Beyond the Cottage

Ansel was hallucinating. Nothing else explained Gretta’s legs wrapped around his waist or why she was pulling him on top of her. When he followed her to the floor, she wrapped her legs tighter and resumed grinding.

It left the wires in his brain crossed, his neurons misfiring. He wanted to unleash his desire for her as badly as he wanted to protect her from it.

For days, he’d reminded himself they used to be friends, that he shouldn’t notice what lay under her flimsy camisole or how splendidly her trousers clung to her hips. But he could no longer deny reality. She wasn’t a girl anymore, and he wanted her in every way a man could.

He seized all she gave, taking her mouth like he was starved for it. He’d thought himself indifferent to kissing, had always found it a strange and unnecessary convention. Now he didn’t know how he’d make it through a day without tasting her.

She clawed at his shirt, and he whipped it off. Her hands roamed his bare chest, easing the sting from her previous reaction to it.

Did she want him to touch her, too?

“Touch me,” she exhaled. “I’m already close.”

Her words made his cock jerk. They also brought clarity. She wanted release, nothing more. While he couldn’t fathom why she’d turn to him for it, he’d gladly indulge her in any way she wanted.

He pushed his hand up her ribcage, and his thumb brushed the underside of her breast. “Here?”

She arched into him. “Yes.”

“Like a villain would?”

“Yes.”

He palmed her breast firmly and sucked the nipple through her silk top. She moaned, grinding on him. He thrust back once, twice, a third time, a fourth. Panting, he stopped. He was already spinning out of control. As her tempo sped up, he grabbed her ass, holding it in place.

“Slow down, Gret,” he rasped.

Her teeth latched on his neck. Her throat made sexy, indecipherable noises, and he closed his eyes, trying to tune them out.

Picture Libretti’s formula. Think about chemistry.

But thiswaschemistry—two unstable elements colliding toward a detonation. He was hydrogen, and she was a goddamn bonfire.

How would he survive it?

When she resumed thrusting, all care for survival evaporated. He’d give her what she wanted, even if it killed him. Pressing his forehead to hers, he grabbed her hips, dragging his cock between her legs, tip to base, in a long, slow stroke.

“Again,” she gasped.

He continued sliding himself along her pants, wincing in pleasure. The tip was too sensitive, so he ground the base where she’d feel it most.

“Don’t stop,” she said.

He went harder, simulating intercourse, fucking her without fucking her.

He was going toexplode.

“Tell me when you’re there,” he grated.

“Almost!” She lifted her thighs to his waist. Fabric rasped as he rode her. “Almost…there.” Her body stiffened, and her lips parted on a soundless moan.

Ansel wasn’t nearly so quiet.

“Fuck!” he cried against her neck. His lower body jerked, still thrusting, as he released in agonized pulses. It was every culmination he’d ever experienced, combined into one, multiplied by ten.

When it finally abated, he fell on her, raggedly breathing into her hair. He shifted to take his weight off without letting her go. She didn’t try to move.

Ansel’s thoughts fired chaotically before condensing into a single idea he hardly recognized as truth: Gretta had let him make her come.

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