Megan Hart - Captivated - Letting Go / Seize the Night

“So fucking good.” His voice broke, rough and rasping. “Fuck, Colleen. You feel like heaven.”

She slipped a hand between them to stroke her clit while she fucked him. Her pleasure spiraled higher and higher, everything coiling and twisting and tangling as she rocked on his erection. She was lost in the ecstasy, urged on by the look in his eyes and the grim press of his lips. The sweat on his forehead. He groaned again, and she almost came from the sound of his pleasure.

They moved together, faster, in perfect time. Her climax teased her, just out of reach. She wasn’t going to make it, and anxiety pierced her again, making her want to move more desperately—if only to get him off so she could pretend she had.

And then she looked again at his linked fingers. The bulge of his muscles in his arms and the tendons of his wrists showed his struggle to keep his hands together. And why? Because she’d told him to.

Then she was coming, no holding it back, and the rush and push of her orgasm stole her breath. She wept with it, though she didn’t want to. She dug her nails into him, and Jesse bucked beneath her. They finished together, and Colleen let herself fall forward to rest on his chest, her face buried against the side of his neck. They stayed that way, breathing hard, until his arms went around her, holding her close. And even though she hadn’t told him it was okay, Colleen discovered it was the perfect thing for him to do.

Chapter Five

“I’ve never eaten here.” Jesse pointed with his chin toward the front door of the Blue Moon Cafe, one of Fell’s Point’s most popular breakfast spots. “The lines are insane.”

Colleen, that glorious hair tucked under a ridiculous knit cap, grinned and kicked the snow off her boots against the concrete steps. “Tourist.”

“Hey!” he protested as he followed her into the tiny restaurant, furnished with an eclectic array of mismatched tables and chairs. “Unfair.”

She laughed at him over her shoulder and waved at the waitress behind the counter. “Hey, Sheila. Wasn’t sure you’d be open. But I had a craving for the French toast that just wouldn’t quit.”

“Mike made it in, so I did, too. But you might be the only customers.” Sheila waved at the empty tables. “Take your pick. Might be the only time you ever see it this empty.”

“There will be others,” Colleen said. “Bad weather doesn’t mean people won’t need to eat.”

The snow had fallen all night and halfway into the morning, tapering off but starting up again as they’d ventured out. They’d get another few inches, Jesse figured, not caring about being stranded because...damn. If you had to get snowed in, what better way to spend the weekend than with a sexy moon-haired goddess?

And she was a goddess, he thought, watching her surreptitiously as she looked over the menu. Last night had been incredible. Amazing. Thinking of it now, his dick tried to stir. There’d been a few moments when he’d been unsure that she really wanted him, or that she was enjoying it, but then wow. Something had triggered in her, and the way she’d taken charge had been incredible.

It had made him want to do anything to please her.

They both ordered the house specialty, Cap’n Crunch French toast, along with bacon and hash browns and coffee that Sheila brought in heavy-duty white mugs before going to the front door to look out at the snow.

“It’s just not stopping,” she said. “If I didn’t live close enough to walk, I’d never have made it in.”

“We’ll get out of here as soon as we finish,” Colleen told her. “Let you get home.”

Sheila laughed and looked at Jesse. “Take your time. Hey, aren’t you the bartender over at The Fallen Angel?”

“Yep.” Jesse lifted his mug.

“Think you’ll open later, when I want to get a drink? Kidding,” Sheila said at the look on his face. “Totally kidding!”

Colleen leaned close to him when Sheila went into the kitchen. “She wasn’t kidding.”

“I wasn’t scheduled to work this weekend anyway,” he told her. He wanted to kiss her. He would have, if he thought she wanted it, but despite last night, this morning Colleen had been a little distant. Friendly. Flirtier, sure, than she’d ever been on a Thursday night. But not the way she’d been the night before.

“Do you think you’ll try to get home?” She spun her mug around and around, not looking at him.

It wasn’t what he’d expected her to say. It sure as hell wasn’t what he wanted her to say. Before he could answer, Colleen spoke again.

“I don’t even know where you live. You probably can’t get home, huh? Certainly not if you have to drive. You should just...stay. With me.” She looked at him then, her gray eyes faintly shadowed. “I mean, if you want to.”

“If you want me to,” he started, but went quiet when Sheila brought out their food. He waited until she’d settled everything for them before he said in a low voice, “I don’t want you to feel like you have to invite me.”

“Where else would you go?”

“I could crash at the Angel,” Jesse said. “There’s a bunk in the back room.”

She stared at him for a heartbeat.

“I can’t just leave you stranded.” Colleen cut her French toast into precise squares and gave a nod, as though she’d made a decision and there was no changing her mind.

Not that he wanted to. But he didn’t want to be a pain in the ass, either. “Look, really, I can hole up in the Angel if I have to. I don’t want you to feel obligated just because we...because of last night.”

She frowned. “Do you feel obligated because of last night?”

It wasn’t the word he’d have chosen. Hopeful would’ve been a better choice. But he didn’t want her to think he was just another horny asshole taking advantage of the situation, though. So all he said was, “Of course not.”

Then the check came, along with Sheila’s unspoken urging for them to finish their food and get the hell out of there so she and Mike could get home. Jesse grabbed it before Colleen could, holding it out of the way when she protested. He laughed when she tried to grab it, but she didn’t.

“My treat,” he told her. “For keeping me warm.”

It came out wrong, he saw that at once when her frown deepened. She sat back in her chair. Her chin lifted.

They finished their meal in near silence after that. On the street, the snow was up to the bumpers of parked cars. The footprints they’d made on their way here had disappeared, not even a dimple in the white fluffy expanse to show anyone had been there at all.

“It’s so quiet.” Colleen’s breath blew out in front of her in frosty plumes, and she gave him a sideways look. “And beautiful.”

She was beautiful. And melancholy. The deadliest combination, as far as Jesse was concerned. It made him want to take care of her, which was going to be trouble, he knew it. He’d been burned before, such a sucker for the damsel in distress. He also knew it didn’t matter. He’d get burned again.

Back in her town house, one of the really nice refurbished ones, he admired the gas fireplace in the living room. He hadn’t noticed it the night before. Hell, he hadn’t noticed anything but her.

“It doesn’t work,” she told him. “I mean, it probably works, but I haven’t figured out how to do it.”

He looked it over. “It’s probably just the pilot light. I can start it for you. It might be nice to have a fire, huh?”

“Oh, I don’t need—”

But he was already kneeling in front of the glass to twist the knobs and check the pilot light and the valve for the gas supply, both of which had indeed been turned off. It only took a few seconds of fiddling to get them both working and then turn on the fireplace. He grinned over his shoulder at her.