Page 226 of Branded
Beth blew on and then buffed her knuckles on her shoulder. “I think that glare and your question both speak of insecurity.” A beat, lips turning up. “Mostly because I’m doing a better job.”
Smitty growled, but then he surprised me and Beth, too—seemingly—by pressing a kiss to her cheek and straightening. “All right gents and ladies, Cheese Night Extravaganza is on me this time.”
“Smitty—” Beth began. “You don’t?—”
“On me,” he repeated, rounding the table, and slinging an arm around Kailey’s shoulder. “Now, all of you beat it so that I can pick up my woman in a bar.”
Kailey blushed but just leaned back against Smitty, added, “One of you guys can get next time.”
Quiet where he was loud.
But smart, strong, and with a steel backbone. We all knew she battled social anxiety, so her speaking up now was something we weren’t going to ignore.
“Okay, Kay,” Hazel said in her usual gentle tone, looping her arm through Oliver’s and leaning on him slightly in a way that told me she might have had one too many beers.
Pru was doing the same to Marcel.
But my Bethie, obviously, was sober.
She still leaned her body against mine, though, and I might not know all of her yet, but I knew enough, felt enough. “Come on, love,” she murmured, yawning, before rising on tiptoe. “Let’s go home and give Smitty his time for his reconnaissance.”
Love.
I smiled.
“Let’s go home.”
Her ass was pressing into my cock.
And I was trying to be good.
But it was pressing, rocking and rolling against my pelvis…and I was hard, growing harder by the second.
So, I was thinking about stats and not the soft sounds that were coming out of Beth’s parted lips.
Not the fact that she was dreaming about me, and that dream was hot.
How did I know this?
Because she’d also been talking in her sleep.
And some of the things she’d said included my name and a plea for me to fuck her.
Christ.
“Raph,” she moaned, head falling back against my shoulder, hips pressing hard, and?—
I couldn’t help it.
I thrust forward, one hand gripping the curve of her hip, drawing me into her, and I couldn’t stifle my groan.
But it had barely crossed my lips before Beth went still.
Fuck.
“Shh, honey. Sleep.”
Her back arched, ass rubbing against me, and?—
