Ignited (33 page)

Ruth moaned as he cupped her. She tried to unknot his tie, but her hands felt dumb and useless. Every ounce of her attention was preoccupied with the delicious things he was doing to her body.

After several tries, she gave up, using the tie to pull him forward and bring his mouth to hers. He pressed closer, his hard body against her, and she ran her hands down the plane of his chest. Ruth tugged at the buttons on his white shirt just as a finger dipped inside her core, and she abruptly abandoned all attempts at undressing him, leaning back against the wall and moaning. The handrail cut into the small of her back, but she couldn’t find it within herself to care. She looked ridiculous, she knew. She was nearly naked, standing on the steps in front of a fully dressed man, groaning as his fingers slipped in and out of her at a slow, maddening pace.

Despite that, she didn’t
feel
ridiculous. She felt sexy. She felt wanted and desired and loved, and she wanted more of that—more of the tightening inside of her, more of his eyes on her, more of him touching her.

She willed her hands to obey, and she began to work at his buttons again. His fingers abandoned her, and she let out a pitchy whine.

“Shh,” he said, laughing, but not unkindly. “I’m just trying to help.”

He started to unbutton his shirt at the bottom, and she started at the top. They met in the middle and soon it was on the floor next to her slip. She ran her fingers over the newly revealed skin, scraping ever-so-lightly with her nails. They fell to his belt buckle.

Henry grabbed her hands and they made it up a few more steps before she stopped him and went on her tiptoes to kiss him. His tongue touched her own, curling around it, and she threw her arms around his neck, trying to get closer, so close that there were no longer two people but one—

“Come on,” he said, barely pulling away and panting heavily against her mouth. “Bedroom.”

“No,” Ruth moaned. “Here.”

Henry’s mouth was hot against hers, his tongue searching. His arms wrapped around her, and they stumbled up another step. Ruth felt blindly behind her for the lip of the next step and shimmied up to it so she sat, knees splayed. She tilted back on her elbows and watched Henry step out of his trousers. He kneeled between her legs and kissed her again, sweetly.

Ruth took hold of the elastic of his boxers. “Stand up,” she said against his lips. “I want to ….”

Henry stood, and Ruth dragged his underwear down as he did. He looked down at her with a mixture of desire of confusion.

“I want to try something, but,” Ruth hesitated, trying to find a way to shape the words. She grasped him, let her hand slide up and down, just once in each direction, and marveled at the way it made Henry’s breath hitch. “I’m not entirely sure what I’m doing.”

“So far, your instincts are spot on.” He looked down at her with a grin, and she felt the nervousness inside of her ease. 

She nodded, smiling up at him. He returned it, and she felt her heart beat harder in her chest. She had never loved anyone like this before. It was overwhelming and wonderful. She wanted to show him just how much he made her feel.

Feeling more comfortable acting on her desires, Ruth scooted up one more step so she was on the carpeted hallway landing and leaned forward so Henry’s erection bobbed just inches in front of her mouth.

Ruth giggled and looked up to catch his eye. 

He grinned and covered his face with his hands. “It’s not like I can help what it decides to do!”

“I’m not complaining,” she told him, still laughing. She reached up and ran her fingers down its length, marveling at the silky smoothness of the skin. She let her hand circle it more firmly and gave a distinct pull.

Henry groaned. “
Ruth
—”

Hearing her name like that made her shiver, and so she slid her hand up and down him again and again and again, gaining speed as she went. A patch of wetness formed at the head, and she touched it, spreading it down as she went.

Ruth bit her lip. She wanted to try, but ….

“Can I—?” she began, only to be cut off immediately.

“Yes. Whatever you’re about to say, the answer is
yes
.”

The butterflies in her stomach began to flutter madly as she slowly leaned forward and licked just the end of his hardness.

“Holy
shit
,” he muttered above her. He was staring at her, eyes wide. “You don’t have to—”

“I want to,” she said.

She circled her mouth around the tip, making sure her lips covered her teeth, and bobbed her head once. 

Henry gave a shaky sounding laugh. “Ruth, you are so—”

“Shh,” muttered, her mouth still full of him when she glanced up. She had never seen Henry make a more beautiful face than when he’d stared down at her in shock and arousal.

She leaned forward and took him deep into her mouth again, wrapping her hand around what she couldn’t reach with her lips and tongue. Henry’s hands were twisting through her hair, gripping her tightly as she controlled the motion, the urgency of his sounds music to her ears. She sucked in as she pulled off, her lips making a popping sound.

“Oh my God,” Henry said. He kneeled on the step before her, his hands running up the inside of her thighs. Ruth hooked her legs around his hips and pulled him tight against her. His lips attacked hers, his mouth open and hungry. She wanted to kiss him, but she also wanted to finish what she started. Their bodies were pressed together, and she could feel his cock hot and hard against her belly, his hips moving and seeking friction even as he kissed her.

It wasn’t something she was able to dwell on for long. He pulled back and gave her a wicked smile before pressing a kiss right under her jaw, on her neck, in the middle of her chest, on her breast. Henry’s fingers slid under the band of her panties, and Ruth tilted her hips so he could pull them off. Then Henry gently pushed at her shoulders until she lay back on the carpeted hallway, her legs still spread wide on the stairs below.

Henry lowered himself between her knees, his head dipping low. Ruth was finally getting used to the idea of Henry
down there.
He had done it several times in the last week, and every time it got better and better. It was strange, to think of someone’s mouth on her, but he seemed to enjoy it. 

And now, she thought she knew why. She had felt powerful and generous when she had taken him into her mouth. Next time, she vowed, she would give him the same kind of satisfaction he gave to her. 

Then his mouth was on her, and she stopped thinking.

She could hear herself keening in pleasure, and she reveled in the sound. It was too much, too good—his tongue circling her sensitive nub again and again. His fingers migrated away from her side and began to pump in and out of her, and she felt herself getting closer and closer, the tide building inside of her—

He pulled away, and Ruth outright moaned. She lifted her head off the carpet and looked down at him as he stood tall on his knees, sure that the betrayal was bright on her face.

Still kneeling on the stairs below her, Henry moved up her body, stopping to suck on her nipples until they were peaked. She sat up and hauled him close by his shoulders, kissing him with everything she had.

“You stopped too soon!” Ruth could hear the pout in her accusation, but she didn’t care. The too-tight, too-hot feeling was everywhere, and she
needed
that release.

His hand disappeared, and she felt the tip of his cock nudge her entrance. She spread her knees and nodded as he pushed inside her.

“Oh my God,” he said, his voice strained. “You’re so warm—are you?”

Ruth could feel the fire beneath her skin, churning and burning, but it didn’t feel dangerous. She thought she maybe nodded, and then trailed her hands down his back, grasping him by the hips. She pulled him so he thrust and thrust until finally, everything inside of her was shattered and then put back together.

Henry groaned above her, and then collapsed beside her on the landing a moment later. He kissed her shoulder; she could feel him smiling against her skin.

“I’ll have you know,” he said. “This was not what I imagined our evening would be like.”

She turned her head and caught his eye. “Well, I guess it’s good that I have better ideas, isn’t it?”

CHAPTER THIRTY

Henry

“Got an interesting visit from your mother last night,” Dr. Pinkerton said, too casually. He leaned into Henry’s office.

Henry looked up from his paperwork. He only had fifteen more minutes until his next appointment, and he’d been trying to spend it productively. Thoughts of Ruth kept intercepting, but he needed to get everything done if he was going to go ring shopping after work.

The thought made him want to grin like a fool. He just barely managed to hold himself together.

“Did you?” he asked.

Dr. Pinkerton closed the door to Henry’s office, shutting the pair of them inside. He sat down, and it seemed to cost him more effort than usual. He clutched at his arm, and then let it go with a sigh.

“The way she tells it, you and Ruth stormed in, yelled at her, and left.”

He hated talking about Louise with his grandfather. It didn’t give him any joy to talk about the flaws in Dr. Pinkerton’s only child, or to point out how they did not get along. It had always been easier to keep his mouth shut, let the conversation pass.

Not anymore. He had a life to live, and it was with Ruth.

“She invited us for dinner, and when we arrived, she insulted us, so we left.” Henry shrugged. “That’s all there is to it.”

Dr. Pinkerton frowned thoughtfully. “She was very upset, Henry. I think if you went to visit her, talked it out, you two would finally be—”

“Granddad.”

His grandfather stopped talking.

“I’m grateful for everything you’ve tried to do for me, and I know how important it is to you that Mom and I get along, but it’s just … never going to happen.” Saying the words was like chewing on concrete. But the more he spoke, the easier it became, and the lighter he felt. “She’s sorry for now, but imagine her at the wedding, or with a grandchild of her own, or ….” He sighed. “I’m done waiting for her to forgive me for something I didn’t do, and I’m done putting up with her for your sake.”

The silence filled the air between them, thick and heavy, cluttered with years of words left unsaid.

“I’m sorry,” Henry added, and he was. He had tried for as long as he could.

“No, don’t be sorry.”

Dr. Pinkerton smiled, a sad thing that only reached one corner of his mouth.

“Henry, lad. I love my Louise very much, but I know she hasn’t been a good mother to you.” His face twisted. “I kept hoping that it would all come together one day, and the past would be forgotten, and we’d be the family I thought we could be. I’m sorry I held onto that dream too long, and that it hurt you.” He went quiet and shook his head. “The older you get, the more you realize how truly complicated love can be—how you can see someone do something you don’t approve of and still love them so much more than you knew was possible.”

Henry took in his grandfather’s pale face, his grim, determined expression. “Thank you, Granddad. That means a lot to me.”

“Before I forget, I have something for you.” Dr. Pinkerton rooted through his jacket pocket before he pulled out something Henry had never expected to see: a long delicate chain with a diamond ring hanging from it.

The Porter ring.

“She insisted I had to give it to you,” his grandfather said, holding it out to Henry.

It looked beautiful, sparkling as it turned back and forth, back and forth. Henry watched it, mesmerized, but he did not take it.

“You should give it back to her,” he said.

Dr. Pinkerton frowned. “Henry, don’t let your pride—”

“It’s not pride,” Henry cut in. “But she loves that ring. I don’t want to take it from her. Ruth and I will form our own traditions.”

Even though he shook his head, his grandfather smiled. “I’m proud of you, Henry.”

The words were so sincere, Henry felt them in his bones. “Thank you.”

“Why don’t you take off for the rest of the day? I’ll take your appointments. You go buy something nice for that girl of yours.”

Part of Henry wanted to jump up and run for the door, but the more logical part kept him rooted in his seat. “I can’t leave you here by yourself. What if we get busy, or—”

“You seem to forget that I worked forty years worth of shifts without you,” Dr. Pinkerton groused. He’d been saying all the opposite things just the other day, but this time, it worked in Henry’s favor. It was hard to turn down an afternoon of sunshine and Ruth.

He shooed Henry out of the office and followed him toward the front door. “Get on out of here. Buy your ring, spend your time with your girl. Go on.”

The warm weather and his grandfather’s reassurances swayed him, and he headed home, steadfastly ignoring the part of himself that insisted he ought to stay.

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Ruth

“Ouch!”

Ruth stuck her finger in her mouth, sucking on the end of it. That was what she got for not using her thimble, she supposed.

Sewing supplies sat in a circle around Ruth as she worked from the living room couch. Some of them, like the needles, she’d found around the house, others she’d bought at the general store or borrowed from June. Her shears sat next to her on the coffee table, the red fabric in a neat pile beside her. Her thimble was on the ground next to her bare feet, and she regretted not picking it up as soon as she’d dropped it.

Hand-sewing had never been her greatest talent. She’d used an old sewing machine and dress form when she’d lived with her father, relics her mother had left behind when she disappeared. Neither of them had been especially good, but having spent all her spare time the past few days trying to sew by hand
without
a form, she now longed for them.