Discovering Delilah (Harborside Nights, Book 2) (12 page)

I’m not sure how I remain standing or how my legs carry me as she leads me into the living room. With shaky hands she unclasps my bra and watches it fall to the floor. She glances
over my shoulder at the sheers blowing in the wind.

“Can people see inside?” Her voice is shaky, too.

“Not with the lights out. We can go to the bedroom.”

She shakes her head and crosses the room, turns off the lights, then returns to me.

“I love the way you look right here.” She settles a shaky hand on my hip. “With the breeze brushing your hair and the moonlight coming in through
the curtains.”

I love artistic Delilah, too.

She touches the sides of my underwear with her fingertips and looks me in the eye. “I apologize ahead of time if I suck at this. I’ve never done it before.”

Now I’m the one shaking. I just fell a little harder for her. She’s telling me she didn’t do this with Janessa.
This is ours
. I’m her first. I seal my lips over hers and kiss her as
she lowers me to the couch. I’ve thought about what Delilah’s body would feel like beneath me, on top of me, beside me, a million times, but nothing compares to this first time of feeling the weight of her on me as we kiss. Her hips press to mine, and her hands slide beneath my back and she holds me close. My legs naturally wrap around her. I’d climb inside her if I could. I want to be her everything.
I want to be the breath she breathes, the words she says, the blood that pumps through her heart.

She rises up on her palms and looks down at me. Her hair curtains our faces, creating our own private world.

“You’re playing my favorite songs.”

I nod, because my heart is beating so hard it’s swallowed my voice. She smiles and kisses my collarbone, my shoulder. She runs one fingertip
down the center of my body so lightly that it tickles and excites me at once. How can one fingertip send so much heat through my body? She follows that finger with her tongue, stopping every few seconds to lavish my heated flesh with an openmouthed kiss. Every time I feel her mouth settle over my skin, it sends a shiver of anticipation right through me. When she gets to my underwear, she kisses each
of my hips and splays her hands on my thighs as she runs her tongue along the crease beside my sex. First up one side, then the other.

My body is on fire
.

She looks at me through her lashes, then closes her eyes and runs her tongue between my legs. I’m so wet that I can feel the heat of her tongue through the damp material, and it’s about the most erotic sensation I’ve ever felt. She does
it again, and I close my eyes. She repeats it again, and again, and just when I think I’ll tear a hole in my couch cushion with my fingernails if she doesn’t put her tongue on
me
, she pulls down my underwear. The breeze sweeps across my wet skin as she tosses them to the ground and comes back up so we’re eye to eye. She claims me with a deep, possessive kiss that takes me by surprise and draws
me further in to her. I’m pulling at her thong, pressing my hips to her thigh, about to crawl out of my skin.

She smiles against my lips, and her eyes go as dark as the center of the ocean. My heart’s beating so hard my chest feels like it’s going to explode. She takes my breast in her mouth and drives me out of my freaking mind.

“Delilah,” I plead.

She sucks and licks and moves to
my other breast, giving it the same lavish attention as the first as her fingers trail south.

Yes, yes, yes
.

I’m already so close to the edge I know it won’t take long, but she parts me and teases me with one finger. Languid, torturous strokes that make my insides feel like they’re clawing their way out.

“More. I need more.” I push her shoulders, urging her down. I know I probably
shouldn’t rush her, but I can’t help it. When her lips curve up in a coy smile and she shifts lower with greater speed than I’ve ever seen her move, I know she doesn’t mind.

And then her mouth is on me and—
yes, yes, yes
—she totally knows what to do. I writhe beneath her, moaning and pleading and making noises I’ve never heard myself make. She uses her mouth, her tongue, her teeth, and her
hand.
Oh God, her hand
. My thighs flex and my toes curl under. Pinpricks explode up my limbs and my body bucks and thrusts uncontrollably. She holds my hips down as she strokes and teases, prolonging my climax until I’m sure I’ll die right here on the couch.

“Delil—”

She moves up in record time and captures my plea in her mouth. I taste myself, but the taste of her mouth overpowers it,
and I reach between her legs. She’s so wet, so ready. She rocks against my hand, and I know she’s as close as I was when she took me. I push my hand inside her thong and take her right over the edge, swallowing her moans and taking every shudder of her body as a plea for more. My muscles are fatigued, but after the glorious attention she’s just given my body, I want to give her the same pleasure.
I wrap my arm around her and shift her beneath me, then make quick work of ridding her sleek, hot body of that pesky thong. I want to kiss her breasts—I love her breasts—but I’m too anxious to get to the rest of her, and she’s pressing on my shoulders. Urging me lower. She doesn’t need to urge. I’m there, and there’s no place else I’d rather be. I spread her thighs and don’t even try to slow my desire.
I take her like it’s a race and I’m the winner, and when my name comes off her lips and her body rocks with pleasure, I take her in my arms and hold her like I’m never going to let her go. And hope I never have to.

~Delilah~

“I DEFINITELY DID not come over here expecting to attack you.” Ashley and I are lying on the couch beneath a blanket she grabbed from her bedroom. There’s a breeze whisking over our damp skin. We’re facing each other, and I’m glad she’s got an arm around me, holding my body against hers, because I’m so relaxed that my limbs feel like spaghetti.

Ashley
smiles and kisses the tip of my nose. I love lying in her arms. It feels so right.

“I thought
I
was the one who attacked
you
. I was about to apologize.”

“Oh good. Then it was a mutual mauling.”

We both laugh.

The music is still playing, and as our pulses calm, she brushes my hair from my shoulder and presses her lips to mine.

“I’m glad you came over.” She kisses me again. “I
missed you today.”

“I couldn’t stop thinking about you, either. I was so worried that you’d wake up this morning and decide I wasn’t worth the headache.”

Her eyes narrow, and as a breeze sails through the room, she pulls the blanket up over my arm.

“You’re worth waiting for, Delilah. But I’m not good at keeping my emotions hidden, and I’ve already had to hide them for the past two
months.” She sits up, and the energy between us shifts and cools. “Let’s get dressed and sit on the balcony.”

As we retrieve our clothes from the floor, I watch her carefully, unsure if I’ve said something that caused her to separate so quickly. She steps into her shorts and smiles over at me, but it feels forced.

“Did I just say something that upset you?”

She walks slowly toward me
as she pulls her shirt over her head. Then she gathers me in her arms and touches her forehead to mine.

“No, you didn’t upset me. It’s hard for me, Dee. But I can deal with it. I just want to talk for a while, make sure we’re both in the same place.” 

She rubs her hands down my arms, warming me from the breeze. “Let me get you a sweatshirt.” She presses her lips to mine, then disappears
into her bedroom while I retrieve my shorts from the foyer.

 I like being in Ashley’s apartment because it’s
hers
. I can feel her presence in every room through her taste in furniture—comfortable and not showy, with pastel colors and wooden accents. She painted several of the pictures hanging on the walls. I recognize the one of the pier that she painted during the first few weeks after we
met. On the wall outside her kitchen there are three small paintings. A scene of the shoreline, a painting of a boat, and another of the dunes. The one of the dunes wasn’t there last week when we were here watching movies.

She hands me a sweatshirt.

“Thank you.” I inhale as I pull it over my head. It smells like her, and I’m already planning to take it home with me. I watch her as she
walks into the kitchen, evaluating every step, every glance, and hoping she’s not going to change her mind about me being worth waiting for.

“Do you want something to drink?”

“Sure. Hot chocolate?”

“I love that you’re not a big drinker.” She pulls me closer by the pockets of the sweatshirt and kisses me again. “I like you way too much, Delilah Armstrong.”

Delilah Armstrong
.

She makes my name sound special, and she probably has no clue that she’s just helped alleviate my worry.

“I’m going to take that as a golden nugget, and when you get mad at me for something, I’m going to pull it out and say,
Remember that day you said you liked me way too much?
”

She laughs as she heats up the water.

“When did you paint this picture of the dunes?”

She shrugs. “I’ve
been working on it the mornings that we don’t meet and sometimes in the evenings. Do you like it?”

“I love it. It amazes me that you can make every blade of grass look as though it’s moving with the wind.”

“You do the same thing with hair when you sketch,” she points out as she fixes our hot chocolate.

“Yeah, but that’s not using a paintbrush. I have much more control with a pencil.”

“Come on, let’s sit outside and argue about control.” She takes my hand and squeezes it with the tease, then leads me onto the balcony, where we sit on mismatched chairs and listen to the sounds of the ocean, the noises of people in the distance.

The mugs we’re drinking from are made of pottery, and they don’t match, either. I like that Ashley’s taste is eclectic more than conservative.
My beach house was decorated by my parents, and I think it would be nice to have my own place. I love living with Wyatt and Cassidy, and Tristan and Brandon, but I’ve never lived on my own, and I think that I should.

Baby steps
.

I steal a glance at Ashley and catch her staring at me. She smiles, but she doesn’t look away. Everything about her intrigues me. I blush just knowing she’s staring
at me, and she’s not at all embarrassed.

“Have you had many girlfriends?” I’m not sure where the question comes from, but once it’s out, I want to know her answer.

“Enough.” She sips her hot chocolate, holding my gaze.

“Enough? Girlfriends aren’t like ice cream cake.” I make my voice an octave higher and mock sarcasm. “I think I’ve had enough, thank you. Oh, no, not yet. I need a little
more.”

She laughs and looks out at the water. “No, they’re not, are they? I said
enough
because I’ve had enough girlfriends to know how special you are.”

“Aw, Ash.” I reach for her hand, and she brings it to her lips and kisses it. She’s so much more romantic than any guy has ever been with me. I have the urge to ask her all the things we’ve never talked about. I want to know as much as
I can about her.

“Have you ever been in love?”

“No, but I thought I was headed there once.”

She’s still holding my hand, and I wait for her to say more. When she doesn’t, I push a little.

“What happened?”

She releases my hand and looks down at her mug. When she looks up again, she scoots her chair over so she’s facing me, and our knees touch. She looks right at me, and it makes
me nervous, like she’s going to tell me something bad.

“I want to tell you the truth, but you have to promise me you won’t assume the worst, because…well, because that will be easy to do, given what I’m about to say.”

My stomach lurches.

“Maybe you shouldn’t tell me.”

She smiled, still holding my gaze. “I want to.”

I swallow my fear and nod. “Okay.”

“I dated a girl named
Sandy for a few months, and I thought we were happy together, but like you, she hadn’t come out yet. She kept telling me she was going to but she wasn’t ready, so I didn’t push her. We only saw each other at my place, never hers. And I started putting things together, like how she only saw me before ten at night and never on the weekends. We had a class together, but in public she didn’t acknowledge
me as anything other than a friend, so it was awkward in that class and around our friends.”

She pauses, sips her hot chocolate, while I’m clinging to every second. I feel like she’s describing me.
She hadn’t come out yet...In public she didn’t acknowledge me as anything other than a friend. 
I can’t help but wonder what she’s doing with me.

“Anyway, after a while I couldn’t take hiding
our relationship anymore. I told her I needed more, and she wasn’t willing, so I ended the relationship.”

Ended the relationship.

No. No, no, no
.

“I was heartbroken, and she…Well, she acted like it didn’t matter. Like I didn’t matter. I found out shortly afterward that she had a boyfriend and was living with him in an apartment near campus. I wasn’t the first girl she’d had a fling
with.” She looks away and says softly, “She used me. I was falling for her, and she was using me.”

“Ashley, I’m so sorry. Do you ever hear from her?”

She nods. “Sometimes she’ll send a random text, but I usually don’t respond.”

She leans back in her chair and pulls her knees up to her chest, then wraps her arms around them. “I promised myself that I would never again date someone who
wasn’t
out
or pretend in public not to have feelings for someone I cared about.”

She lifts one shoulder almost imperceptibly. “And then came you.”

“Ashley…” I’m staring at her, but she’s not looking at me, and when she does, it’s with a pained look in her eyes.

“I asked you not to jump to conclusions.”

“Ash. How can I not? Why would you take a chance on me? I mean, you know I’m
not seeing anyone else, but I don’t know how long it will take me to be comfortable in public. It could be tomorrow, but it could be weeks.” I don’t say,
or months
, which is what worries me most, because I don’t really know how to get past the hurdles I’m facing.