Page 85 of Her Greatest Adventure

The studio isclean and organized and smells like paint. I shouldn’t have expected it any other way. There’s a wall of easels, a blank white canvas hung on the wall, a couch, and shelves upon shelves of paint and pencils and brushes. I stare at it all in a state of wonder.

“It’s a lot,” he says behind me.

“It’s amazing. You use all of this stuff?”

He brushes against my back, setting his hands on my shoulders before moving them down my arms and back up again. I press into him, letting my muscles go loose.

“Yes.”

“And clearly, painting is your favourite form of art.”

“It is. It’s like carving out a bit of my soul and leaving it on a canvas. My mind expands in a different way when I pick up a brush, like there’s no real end to it. It goes on forever.”

“That sounds special.”

His breath fans my neck as he kisses my thumping pulse. “Painting is my adrenaline rush. My free fall from an airplane.”

“Your sex on the beach,” I murmur.

“My days with you.”

My chest grows tight, emotion racing through me. “Cooper.”

Shaking his head, he leaves a lingering kiss on my throat and, too slowly, brings his hand to the front of my dress. He presses his palm between my breasts. “I know. I feel it too.”

I close my eyes, fighting against the burn behind them. There’s too much going on inside of me. An explosion of emotions that turn me inside out. But there’s one that burns brighter than the others. A month ago, I wouldn’t have believed that I would experience this feeling for the first time in my brother’s best friend’s paint studio. But there’s no denying it now. No second-guessing.

I love this man. Husband or not, he’s mine. Simple as that.

“Your heart is pounding.”

A choked laugh. “It feels like it’s going to explode.”

I feel his smile on my skin. “Mine too.”

“You’re just nervous because I’m expecting to be painted tonight.”

“I’ve never been calmer when it comes to painting someone, love. I could paint you from memory.”

“What’s making your heart pound, then?”

“Not yet” is all he says before grabbing my hand and leading me toward the couch. I sit and wait for him to join me, only to watch him lower himself to his knees instead. He touches my thighs and slowly spreads them apart. “Can I taste you, Adalyn?”

I try to get past how seeing him on his knees for me makes it hard to breathe and say, “Yes. Please do that.”

He leans forward, lips brushing my inner thigh as he drags them up, pushing the hem of my dress along the way. Once it rests on my hips, exposing me, he blows out a harsh breath.

“I could spend hours right here,” he rasps, parting my wet flesh with his tongue. Wet velvet strokes me from bottom to top before circling my entrance.

There’s no need to tease anymore. The ride home was enough foreplay.

My mind goes blank when he sinks a finger deep inside my walls, curling it just right. I whimper, shifting my hips, trying to get him even deeper. Sensing my desperation, he adds a second finger, fluttering his tongue over my clit.

I’ve never had a man go down on me with such enthusiasm before. Like he’s doing it because he loves to, not because he knows I do. That in and of itself has my orgasm gathering strength, lightning zipping through my veins.

“I can feel you gripping me, baby. So desperate to come, aren’t you?”

My tongue feels swollen in my mouth. I tangle my fingers in his hair and pull, needing to feel some sort of control as he picks up tempo. He releases a growled noise against my core and drives his fingers into me harder.

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