Hot Finish (9 page)

Her. He wanted her. Gripping her cheeks, he stopped her. “Take your pants off, babe.”

Even in the dark, he could see her smile over his cock. “Good idea.”

Suzanne sat up, and while she unzipped and wiggled out of her jeans, Ryder shoved his own down to his knees, both of their movements impatient and desperate. After several precious seconds were lost to her battling the denim off over her ankles, he said, “Forget it, just come here.” Her panties, turtleneck, and puffy vest were still in place, but he didn’t care.

To prove his point, he ran his hand over her thigh, slipped under her panties and drove his finger straight inside her.

She froze in the process of fussing with her pants at her feet and let out a groan. “Damn, Ryder, give a girl some warning.”

The slick reception his finger was receiving left no question Suzanne was as ready as he was. “Okay. I’m warning you that I’m going to pull you over here and onto me.”

Her hips started to move, rocking her into his finger, and he let her, for about three heartbeats, then pulled out of her. She gave a groan of frustration, but Ryder just grabbed her by the hips and yanked her toward him.

Suzanne gave a yelp of surprise, but once she realized his intent, she grabbed the back of his seat and helped him maneuver her body toward his. It was awkward, it was frustrating, but lust prevailed. After clearing the gearshift, Suzanne fell onto Ryder with a soft oomph, her warm thighs delicious on his own bare legs. They were both fully dressed from the waist up, her nylon vest making a soft scratching sound as it rubbed against his sweatshirt.

He debated wrestling her out of the ridiculous piece of clothing but decided it was a waste of energy. He wanted to focus on kissing her instead. Which he did, with more urgency, more passion, more desperation than he thought he’d ever felt in his whole life. As their lips melded together, their hips rocked in unison, his cock pressing against the front of her panties with each soft collision.

Suzanne was trying to both kiss him and push her panties down. Ryder helped her out, shoving the silky fabric down, his hands skimming the warm flesh of her tight, firm ass. She had to lean forward onto him, straightening her legs, so the panties could make clearance past her hips and knees, and her hair fell out of its bun with their jerky movements. The scent of her hair, the perfume she’d worn for years, the tang of her arousal, all flooded his senses, and Ryder closed his eyes for a brief second to take it in.

This was what he had missed, and damn, she felt so good. Even better clasped around his cock.

So he picked up her hips and guided her down onto his erection with one smooth motion. When her soft, slick heat enclosed him, Ryder moaned, all thoughts gone from his head, nothing but him and her, and the need to take, to own, to drive it hard and finish their mutual pleasure.

“Suzanne,” he said through his clenched teeth.

Her response was to lift her hips, pulling herself slightly back, then driving down onto him, their bodies as close together, him as deep inside her as was possible. Ryder swore, using her hips to brace himself as he took over the rhythm, thrusting up into her, their urgent breathing filling the front seat.

Ryder watched her, her hair tumbling loose, her eyes glazed before they drifted closed, her cheeks blooming pink from exertion. Frantic bursts of air came out of her mouth, punctuating each push of him up inside her.

Then she stilled, her eyes flying open, her fingers squeezing into his shoulders. Suzanne’s breathing paused, her inner muscles contracting over him, and Ryder felt his own arousal spike in response. She was so amazing, so sensual, so damn hot, that he heard his own voice get louder as hers disappeared. He was thrusting and moaning and she was absolutely silent as her orgasm burst, her head snapping back, thighs clenching, fingers pinching. Her mouth was open, but Ryder knew her throat was closed off. Suzanne held off her breath when she came hard, and she was doing that right now.

That sent him over the edge, knowing he had made her come so soon and so hard, and Ryder let go of his own control and joined her. Her eyes had opened and he stared into them, the amber depths darker than normal, a rawness of passion in them that he was sure was reflected in his own as he pulsed inside her.

At the first feel of his orgasm, she let her breath go in a huge exhalation, and the warm burst of air over his face pleased him, made him want to swallow her whole, be back with this woman in body, mind, soul.

God, he loved her, but as his orgasm burst before tapering out, he clamped his lips shut so he wouldn’t blurt that sentiment to her. He knew Suzanne. Dusting off the L word now would just send her scrabbling away from him, both literally and figuratively.

As their bodies quieted down, she collapsed against him, kissing the side of his jaw in a way he found ridiculously sweet before she dropped her head onto his shoulder. “Good Lord. We just went at it like a couple of high school kids,” she murmured into his sweatshirt, but she didn’t sound remorseful.

Ryder loosened his grip on her hips. He wasn’t sure what to say, not when over-the-top flowery emotions were at risk for leaping off his tongue at any given second. So he just said gruffly, “Sex happens.”

Suzanne laughed and pulled back to look at him. “It does. But at least we know what we’re doing, unlike teenagers.”

There was a compliment buried in there, and he was going to take it. Knowing it might send them into dangerous territory, he still said, “It works between us. It always did.”

She didn’t agree, but she didn’t get defensive either, which he took as a positive step.

Pushing her hair off her forehead, she wiggled a little, still on him, their bodies warm and moist. “I’m hotter than two rabbits screwing in a wool sock. This vest has to go.”

Ryder laughed. He loved the way Suzanne used metaphors. He loved her. God, it was so obvious, so right there still in his heart, so like the past two years were a bad dream and they could be together again, as they were meant to be.

“You are the hottest thing I’ve ever met,” he told her, nuzzling into her neck. “Let me go home with you tonight and we can do this again, in a soft bed with cool sheets.”

“No gearshift in my thigh? No vest around my ears?” Suzanne clenched her inner muscles onto his cock, making him start to swell again. “That sounds like a plan, my friend.”

Friend was not the label he was going for.

Ryder wanted to be Suzanne’s husband again, not just on paper because he was a bonehead and forgot to sign something, but because she wanted to be with him, in his house and in his heart.

It was crazy. It was dangerous, foolhardy, arrogant, and blind.

They hadn’t worked for a reason. Probably for more than one reason.

But Ryder was starting to think that maybe their paperwork not being filed properly wasn’t just happenstance, that maybe it was fate. Maybe it was saying that yes, they’d had problems, but they were still meant to be.

They were still legally married and he wanted another shot at making that legit.

Tonight was as good a night as any to start persuading Suzanne that maybe they should hit pause before they headed to court and signed a damn thing.

CHAPTER
EIGHT

SUZANNE
was sweating in places sweat should never be, her hair was stuck to her lip, her thighs were burning from the awkward position, and her panties had cut off circulation to her ankles, but she wasn’t complaining.

She had needed that orgasm desperately. Tension had been building up in her for weeks, and the last five minutes had gone a long way toward relieving that.

It had probably been stupid as hell to have sex with her ex, but at the moment, she didn’t care in the slightest. She’d done it, it had been hot and frantic and satisfying, and she was about to do it again.

“I guess we should move,” Ryder murmured lazily into her neck.

Suzanne knew he was right, but it was relaxing lying against him, the familiar smell of his cologne enveloping her, his touch light on her bare hips. It was odd that it didn’t feel more wrong, that she wasn’t freaking out and worrying about the ramifications. It just felt . . . pleasant. Not completely comfortable, but satisfying.

Maybe it was like putting on the jeans you’d worn at your thinnest. They weren’t a great fit anymore, but it made you feel good to try them on and get them over your hips. A turning back of the clock.

Suzanne peeled herself off of Ryder and smiled at him. “You owe me oral sex.” With that, she separated their bodies and flopped half on her seat, half on his, trying to figure out how to right her twisted panties and get them back into place.

“I’ll give you all the oral sex you want,” he said, tucking his semi-erection back into his jeans and zipping up. “I’ll oral sex you to death.”

Leg muscles protesting, Suzanne paused in her panty pursuit and laughed. “Is that a threat or a promise?”

“I’m saying I’ll go until you can’t take it anymore.”

That sounded promising. But she wasn’t about to let him know about the shiver of anticipation that danced across her flesh. “But until I’m dead?”

“If that’s what happens, so be it.”

Suzanne laughed. Very few men could amuse her, but Ryder had always been able to catch her off guard and make her laugh with his nonchalant wit. “Yeah, but if you kill me, you’ll have to finish planning Nikki and Jonas’s wedding.”

His lip curled. “Shit, I’d better be careful then. I don’t want to get stuck with that hot mess.”

“But you are the best man, after all. How’s that going for you?” Suzanne managed to get her underwear up to approximately where they should be. The puffy vest was still driving her nuts, so she stripped it off and flung it in the backseat. That made getting ahold of her jeans at her ankles a bit easier.

“Well, it’s not that bad, really. It mostly just involves listening to Jonas do Elvis imitations.”

Suzanne suddenly realized the reason she was so overheated had only partially to do with Ryder. As she shifted to haul the denim over her butt, a blast of scorching air hit her in the arm. “Shit, I left the car running this whole time. No wonder I’m burning up. And what a waste of gas.”

But Ryder raised his hands, tilted his head, and curled his lip. Jesus, he was about to do an Elvis imitation, she could feel it coming on. Like a cold sore.

“Stop right there.” Holding her hand out, she said, “I’m begging you. I can’t have any more faux Elvis in my life. I’m up to my eyeballs in kitsch and memorabilia trying to put together a reception that makes Nikki happy. If you imitate the King, we may wind up with you back on my windshield.”

Not that she meant it. And he knew that.

Ryder laughed and leaned over and gave her a big, smacking kiss. “Whatever you say, gorgeous. Tonight is all about you. And by the way, we should switch seats so I can drive. You’ve had a long week and you should just relax.”

“Okay,” she said readily enough. She was tired. She was relaxed and lazy and postorgasmic blissful. She was giggly and enjoying herself more than she had in weeks. It was nice to have someone at her back, wanting to help her out.

Dangerous, too, but she’d worry about that later. For now, she was just going to enjoy the moment with Ryder.

They got out of the car and moved around the hood to change seats, and Ryder stopped her by blocking her path, like she knew he would. Like she wanted him to. He moved up nice and close, his chest against hers, his hands encircling her waist and sliding under her sweater to the small of her back. That confident smile was one she was familiar with, one that had been turning her on since the first night they’d met at that wedding over six years ago.

“You want something?” she asked him, licking her bottom lip slowly.

“I want a kiss.” His fingers had moved below her waist and were skimming the top of her backside inside her jeans, and his mouth was mere inches from hers, but he hovered, waited for permission.

Why make it easy for him? “Say please.”

Ryder gave a soft laugh. “Please.”

Then without waiting for her answer, he took her mouth with his and owned the kiss. Suzanne could only hang on to his arms and spread her lips for him, letting him work his magic. God, the jerk could kiss, all the right pressure, the right rhythm, the right angle, to make her hot and wet and incoherent all over again. Just when she was beginning to maneuver her body closer to his, seeking his erection, and contemplating sex on the hood of her car, it was over.

As fast as he was on her, he pulled away. “Thanks,” he said mildly and moved on past her to the driver’s side of her car.

Suzanne took a deep breath and shivered in the cool night air. “You’d better watch it, Jefferson, or you’ll get yours.”

“I’m not afraid of you.” Ryder closed the door behind him to prove the point.

Left standing there horny, Suzanne had no choice but to get into the passenger side, contemplating smacking him upside the head with her puffy vest. But it was too far to reach it in the backseat, so she settled for considering ways to sexually torture him all night.

“Oh, and feel free to give me a blow job while I’m driving,” he said, grinning as he threw the car into reverse.

Subtle. “Why are we going backward?” she asked, well aware he wasn’t serious about the oral sex request. Which would be the perfect way to get back at him. Once he started driving, she was so going down on him. The man drove nearly two hundred miles an hour on a looping track with forty plus other cars in close contact with him. He could handle driving her SUV at forty miles an hour with her mouth on his cock.

“Getting my duffle bag. I dropped it somewhere back there.”

“Sorry about that,” she said, grinning.

“No, you’re not.”

He knew her so well. “No. I’m not.”

Ryder stopped the car, hopped out, retrieved his bag, and tossed it in the backseat. Suzanne let him get settled and let him start down the road in companionable silence for a few minutes before she shifted in her seat.

When she bent over his lap and undid his zipper Ryder gave an audible groan and the car lurched a little. “Careful,” she told him, reaching in to stroke his warm flesh.

“You’re not really going to . . .”

She popped him free from his jeans and closed her mouth over him.

“Shit, yes, you are.”

Pulling back, she glanced up at him. “You told me feel free.”

“But you never do anything I suggest.”

Suzanne laughed. “True that. But then again, I never thought I’d be having sex with you again either.”

“Which makes it a good night all around.” The car came to a halt when she flicked her tongue up and down the length of him.

“Keep driving. It’s more fun that way.”

“I’m going to hit a tree.”

“You are not. You’re a professional driver.” Then Suzanne was done with talking. She closed her mouth over his cock and slid up and down, enjoying the feel of him hardening under her touch. He swelled fully erect in a matter of seconds and she felt her own arousal increase as he filled her.

It was delicious, to drive him wild while he was driving her car, to take him deep into her mouth over and over, her fingers cupping his testicles through his jeans. There was something so freeing and powerful about it, her rhythm steady and controlled. The sounds he made pleased her, his low steady moans a testament to how he was enjoying her touch, and how he was fighting to maintain control.

“We’re coming up on the main road,” he told her.

“So?” Suzanne paused and tried to look up at him, but she could only see his chest.

“So, I’m going to pause before I pull out onto the road, and come in your mouth.”

Oooh, she liked the way he thought. Ryder braked, threw the car into park and buried his hands in her hair, helping her pick up the pace of her strokes.

Suzanne briefly worried about his ability to get it up again later, but then figured it didn’t matter. She was just going to lie back and receive oral sex until death as he’d already indicated. So Suzanne added her hand to the slide of her mouth, squeezing a little at the base of his cock, his skin slick from her tongue.

His fingers paused in her hair, then he exploded, filling her with his salty, hot taste. He was the only man she ever let do this, the only man that she actually took a certain amount of satisfaction in having him finish while still in her mouth. It struck her suddenly that even after two years apart, during which time she’d never let another man even come close to this, that she hadn’t even hesitated with Ryder.

Pulling back, she wiped her lips and tried to slow her suddenly pounding heart. Those feelings, the ones she’d convinced herself were dead, were swelling in her chest, and she wasn’t sure what to do with them. She just knew she wanted to grin like a fool, laugh like a hyena, and swear like a sailor.

She still loved the bastard.

Which was just so wrong. As was the fact that it took a blow job to get her to realize it.

But there it was. She still loved him.

Which meant that she needed to make sure he understood that this was it, just one night. Any more than that, she seriously couldn’t handle because nothing that had been wrong before had changed.

But tonight, she wasn’t going to worry about any of that; she intended to just enjoy herself.

“That was . . .” His words tapered off.

“What?” Suzanne sat up and adjusted her seat belt. She gave him a very sly smile. “Fast?”

He let out a crack of laughter as he rezipped. “Yes, you sexy bitch. I have no control when you’re doing that.”

That was a compliment she’d take.

And he’d used to call her sexy bitch all the time. It was a term of endearment some women might not like, but she loved it. It had told her that Ryder got her and her sense of humor, and he’d always said it with a grin, a satisfied smile, or an indulgent exasperation. Tonight it was a satisfied smile.

“Good.” Suzanne stared at Ryder’s profile in the dim light. She knew every inch of his face, his body. There had been so many times in the past two years where she had wanted to reach out and touch him, just a hand on the arm, her head on his shoulder, a quick kiss like she had always done, only to remember that she no longer had the right to do any of those things.

Leaving him and their marriage had not been an easy decision, and there had been a thousand little things that had all piled up like bricks day in, day out, until the wall between them was so high that the sense of comfort, ease, love had been gone, replaced by tension and accusations. While they could never go back, tonight it felt like they had taken a jigsaw and carved a little window in the wall.

So she reached out and ran her fingers through his dark hair as he pulled out onto the main road, loving the feel of the soft bristle-short strands, before wandering down to his neck and massaging him. If he was surprised, he didn’t show it, he just gave a low grunt of approval.

“That feels awesome,” he said. “But I think you’re the one who deserves a neck rub after all the maneuvering around this car you’ve been doing.”

“I’m not going to argue with that.” Ryder had amazing hands that really dug into her muscles and worked them loose. “Should you text Ty and let him know you left with me?”

“I think he can figure it out, and by now he’s probably getting busy in his tent with Imogen.”

“So the guys’ weekend turned into a sex-fest from the looks of it.”

“Indeed. I think we actually all owe Nikki a giant thank-you.” Ryder glanced over at her, but she couldn’t see his eyes in the dark. “Hopefully you thought it was worth having to put up with Nikki on the drive.”

“So far so good.” No reason to swell the man’s head. He still had all night to disappoint her.

Not that he would. She knew that. In the bedroom was never where she and Ryder had disappointed each other.

That was everywhere else in their lives, their marriage.

But damn if she was going to think or worry about that at the moment.

That reality belonged in the past and for tomorrow.

Right now she was going to live in the present. Naked.

AS
they got closer to town, Ryder asked Suzanne, “Your place or mine?” He was thinking his place was closer, but then again, they had lived in his house together for four years. It had memories, good and bad. It had been the house they had picked out together, where he had carried her over the threshold, where they had planned out a nursery, and where Suzanne had packed a bag and walked out the front door the day she’d left him.

Ryder had offered the house to Suzanne, but she had bought her condo instead, a fresh start he had imagined. He had thought about selling, but he hadn’t ever gotten around to it. Two years had taken some of the emptiness out of the place, and he had gradually replaced blankets and dishes she had taken with his own choices, and he had taken over the master bathroom entirely.

Maybe he didn’t want Suzanne in his place either now that he thought about it. Awkward.

“My place, if you don’t mind. I need my pillow.”

It could mean simply that Suzanne liked her pillow, or there could be a larger meaning behind what she’d said, and suddenly it felt like there was a giant elephant sitting on the gearshift between them.

“Sure, not a problem.”