Best Friends With Benefits (Most Likely To) (13 page)

“V—” he started, but caught himself. Though he wanted to whisper her name, her real name while she stood naked and willing in front of him, that was a line he would never be able to uncross. “Dirty Girl, you are spectacular.”

Her skin flushed the softest pink. “It feels weird to have you studying me.”

“Just me?” He twirled a tendril of her hair around his finger. “Or any man?”

Her mouth lifted in invitation.

“You deserve to be studied.” He shifted even closer. “Admired, worshipped,” he continued, his hands finally connecting with her skin. It was hot, hotter than he’d expected, but goose bumps multiplied below his fingers as they journeyed from her clavicle to her tits. He fingered her nipples, and her back arched.

“You look so hot when you do that,” he whispered. “When you show me how bad you want it.”

She blinked, her mouth tightening.

“Remember, Dirty Girl, you can tell me anything.”

“I’m craving more than that,” she admitted, her skin going pinker.

A bell tolled in his gut.
Oh damn
, so was he. “Lay back,” he instructed.

…

She dropped to the couch and waited, so ready for him. He stood above her and wrestled out of his jeans. The pronounced muscles of his abdomen gleamed with a sheen of sweat and his tattoos seemed to sparkle in the sunshine. Her mind was buzzing and her body was annihilated before his first thrust. They’d done all that sober. She’d done and said all that sober.

But it was because of what Alec was doing to her. Lust might have started the fire between them, but everything he’d shared at breakfast and their first sweet, tentative kiss had ignited a coal burning low in her heart. Warmth burrowed deep into the one place where she wasn’t supposed to feel anything.

Her rules, created to keep her safe, seemed as flimsy as the bikini Alec had gotten her out of. They were no match for him and no match for the woman she became when she was with him.

With him.
The words scared her for how familiar they were starting to sound.

“No bathing suit for you?” she asked, indicating the pin-striped boxers left in the wake of his jeans.

He slipped them off. “I don’t swim, I skinny dip.”

He moved to the couch and lay on top of her, her softness drowning in his hardness. His body lashed against hers as he attacked with deep, numbing kisses. With every stroke of their lips, need knotted tighter and tighter, a rope twisting and pulling her insides tauter, until she was afraid they might break. The ember of warmth glowing in her heart slid all the way down to her toes.

She was thankful she didn’t have to say the words lodged in her throat. She could kiss her feelings into him, lie with him against leather and not say what she should not at all be feeling.

“That was a stupid rule,” he admitted with a gasp. He kissed her again, more intensely, showing her just how stupid. His lips claimed hers, kissing ten years into ten seconds.

The room went blurry and her focus became savage
.
She pressed herself into his thigh, desperate for any attention. She needed something to keep her from saying the words that filled her like smoke when his lips touched hers:
I want this, I want you, for more than this second, for more than this weekend.

“I’m neglecting you, aren’t I?” he purred, sliding his hand to the spot she’d been angling for. His finger circled her and she moaned. “That won’t happen again.”

She spread her legs wider, opening herself to him. It was what she wanted, what she needed, to be so full of him her only attention would be on the satisfaction he could provide.

“Do you want me to fuck you now, Dirty Girl?”

She had to root herself in the words, because without them she would get lost in him. Maybe she already had. “Yes, fuck me now,” she breathed.

“Your shiny, wet pussy is telling me it can’t wait to take me deep.” He riffled around on the floor for his pants and produced a condom. He ripped at the wrapper and set his gaze back on her.

“Wait!” she exclaimed. An idea sparked. To be in control of her uncontrollable thoughts, perhaps she needed to be in control of him. “I want
you
naked against leather.”

“Dirty Girl…” His smile curved to meet the suggestive angle of her body.

“Sit,” she commanded, indicating the other end of the couch with her chin. Shivers fluttered on top of her goose bumps as she waited for his response.

His smile melted as he accepted her command and sat on the buttery leather completely naked, condom still in his hand.

She managed to keep her trembling in check as she sauntered down the length of the couch, grabbed the condom wrapper, opened it, and rolled it over the length of him. He was so hard, it made her shudder.

She clasped his shoulder and spread her fingers like the feathers of his wing tattoo. She straddled him. She was ready to fly higher and higher, further away from her mind and deeper into the realm of her body. The one place that was safe, the one place she could show him how much she wanted him. She ran her breasts along the skin of his face and her core against what was hard and ready for her. A fever thundered through every nerve ending.

“You’re teasing me,” he whispered into her hair as she continued to taunt him. “I need to be inside you,” he murmured, his breath sizzling against her nipple, “now.”

“You want to fuck me?” Her question rocked the purr between her legs into a hungry tiger. It was the only place that could scream for him, that could admit what her mind had finally come to. She wanted to be with Alec. With the one man she knew could not be kept. “Say the word.”

“I want you to fuck me.” His breath was tight and his body was completely under her command. “I want you to ride me like the dirty girl you are.”

…

He was ready to enter her with the force of an earthquake, leaving her body shattered and ruined, a fracture of passion with his name in its wake
.
Finally, mercifully, she lowered onto his lap and eased him inside. She was tight and slick and slowly she found her rhythm, their rhythm. He was close to coming—discharging his whole being into her waiting pussy—this morning becoming too much. He forced himself to hold back, to wait for her, his Dirty Girl, his Val.

She rode him harder, deeper, his hands holding onto her ass for dear life, his mouth finding one of her nipples and sliding his tongue in insistent circles. Her breathing increased, her sighs soared into moans.

“I can’t barely last five minutes with you when you’re hungry like this. Come all over my cock, Dirty Girl, while I squeeze your sweet ass.”

Unexpectedly, her lips went for his, supplying devouring kisses that matched the power of her thrusts. Her mouth lit him on fire almost as much as pounding her pussy. She jerked, her body convulsing around him as he knew her wave was about to burst. He tumbled down with her, let his orgasm start its burning, searing, orchestral rise. His cock punched deeper, deeper as the syrupy relief washed over him in a core-smashing surge.

She worked to catch her breath above him, sweat slicking her skin. He was a mirror below, laying small kisses against her shoulder, along her neck.

The only word in his mind was her name,
Valerie,
repeating fast and slow, loud and quiet, insistent and like a sigh. The only question: how would he ever be able to survive back in L.A. without her when this weekend was over?

Chapter Thirteen

Valerie and Alec rushed to the trailhead. Their classmates were clumped in varying states of disinterest as Reece stood in front of them listing off dos and don’ts for the hike. They were dressed like Val was in shorts, sneakers, and T-shirts. Reece’s outfit included a fisherman’s hat and a backpack.

Alec was back in his rock star uniform of jeans and a black T-shirt. Valerie couldn’t decide if she preferred him like this, rugged, antagonistic, and indifferent, or naked. Who was she kidding? The answer was naked.

“She looks like Dora the Explorer,” Alec said.

Val laughed, thankful to get the magnificent image of Alec’s naked body out of her head, along with the echoes of the words she’d been trying to cover up with it. “She does, but at least she’s more prepared than you. Doesn’t your stylist ever let you show a little leg?”

He nudged in close, his lips inches from her lobe. “I save that for special occasions.” There was no doubt what he meant by that.

He could go from having her laughing to having her worked up and wet in one line—in one hot whisper against the sensitive skin of her ear. She managed a glance at the midnight blue lake beside the trail where they would picnic later and wished she could jump in now just to douse the flames licking at her thighs.

Alec had more than satiated her that morning, but she was realizing with Alec her need might never end. She was just about to respond in kind, when Reece trained her booming voice at them.

“Nice of you to finally join us,” she yelled out above the heads of the rest of their classmates.

There were a few laughs.

“Are we late?” Alec asked, glancing at his naked wrist.

There were more than a few laughs.

Valerie beamed at Alec’s small victory over Commander Reece. Of course, she should have known that people like Reece didn’t tolerate back talk and hated being laughed at even more.

“Yes, actually, you are,” Reece replied, her face as severe as a storm warning. She held up her cell, open to the clock app for everyone to see. “Twelve minutes to be exact,” she added. “We were about to leave without you.”

“Wouldn’t that have been a shame,” Valerie shot back softly, her voice low enough she thought only Alec could hear.

Reece smiled wider than necessary. “Quiet, Valerie, no one cared what you had to say back in high school and no one cares now.”

The rest of her classmates all turned to look
,
waited to see how and if Valerie would respond. Her skin chilled and her throat burned. Reece had clearly not forgotten the way she used to taunt Valerie in high school and must have thought she deserved a public dose. Valerie had no response. How did you reply to a statement you believed to be true in the darkest parts of yourself? In the parts you prayed no one would keep prying open?

Seeing she had Val, that her long-ago-established Achilles’ heel was still raw, Reece continued. “In fact, I think people care less now than they did then. At least then people cared enough to make fun of you.”

There was a collective,
ooooh
as in
burn
, from her classmates.

Barking
, someone whispered from behind her, or was it her imagination? It didn’t matter; if Reece remembered, everyone did. The nickname she’d hated echoed through the pine trees above, shot back down like a bird attacking. It was so stupid. She should have been ten years beyond that nickname now.

But she wasn’t. Alec might have brought out a different side of her, showed her she wasn’t the same Valerie she had been, but Reece only fueled what she knew. She was the same dorky, knock-kneed, stringy-haired Valerie. No matter how many standing ovations she heard or times Alec called her
Dirty Girl
and blew her mind, she was still reduced to the way other people viewed her.

Maybe Alec saw her the same way. Maybe that was why he’d agreed to sleep with her once, so he never had to again. But he
had
done it again…

“I care,” Alec announced, loud enough for everyone to hear. He stood up taller, a sliver of a feather from his tattoo visible as he spread his broad shoulders even wider. She wished she could fly away with him on that wing.

“Oh, isn’t that a surprise,” Reece cackled. “Maybe if Valerie fluttered her eyelashes and drooled at me all day long, I would, too.”

Cynthia caught Valerie’s eye. “Screw her,” she mouthed.

“Do you have anything else to say?” Reece inquired with a smile as sharp as a knife, “or may I continue?”

“Please,” Alec said.

Val bit back more fire in her throat. She’d hoped Alec would continue to come to her rescue, but that was silly. No matter what things were like when they were alone, no matter where her mind went since they’d kissed, they weren’t together. They were just friends. Why did she have to keep reminding herself?

“Okay, thanks to Alec and Valerie, I’ll have to start again. Stay on the trail at all times…”

Everyone groaned as Reece droned on.

“She’s a fucking bitch,” Alec said out the side of his mouth as he glanced at the itinerary, his hair as glossy as tar in the sunshine.

“Should we just leave? I don’t think I can take much more of her today.” Valerie didn’t want to admit defeat, but she really couldn’t. What if Reece decided she was walking too slowly, or her knees weren’t lifting high enough off the ground? What would she say then? What dark hollow would she force Valerie back to?

“No.” The spark of his mischievous smile became a fire. “I say we put her in her place. She’s been asking for it all weekend, but what she just said to you…she crossed the line.”

Val considered the razor-sharp outrage in Alec’s eyes. He seemed truly offended for her. She wanted to kiss him, hard. Instead she pressed her lips together.

“If she wants to act like we’re still in high school,” Alec continued, “we’ll treat her that way.”

Val’s smile grew as large as a watermelon slice. “What are you thinking?”

“Well…” He stood back on his heels. “We have the empty side of this paper,” he said, shaking the itinerary. “Maybe we hang a little something to Dora the Explorer’s backpack.”

“What, KICK ME?” she bantered. Her embarrassment melted away into camaraderie—the slow buzz that started in your stomach and traveled up and out when you were planning something you should not be planning with someone you couldn’t wait to plan it with.

“That would be good.” He considered. “I think everyone here would like to take a turn putting their foot up her bony ass, but she deserves something a lot worse. You got a pen?”

Val’s pockets were empty but for her wallet and phone. She looked around and noticed a bag marked
Picnic Supplies
next to the trailhead. She rushed over and rummaged through. It was filled with paper plates, cups, and napkins but there were also markers, tape, scissors, and construction paper.
Is Reece planning to make us draw our own food?

She pulled a red marker from the bag and put the tape in her pocket.

“Perfect,” Alec replied, pulling the cap off with his teeth.

He flipped to the back of the itinerary and held it horizontally. He paused in thought for a moment before he wrote,
I’m only such a bitch b/c I need a good lay
, in large block letters along the center of the paper.

Val couldn’t stop laughing. It was so juvenile, but it was also one of the most chivalrous things anyone had ever done for her.

“Masterpiece.” He held it out and appraised his work.

“One more thing.” Val reached for the paper. What Alec had was good, but she had a better idea. She remembered that Reece had printed her cell number across the top of the itinerary.

Val wielded the marker and beneath what Alec had written she added Reece’s cell number and the words
Send Dick Pics
.

Alec’s laugh was triumphant. “Damn Val, this hike just got a hell of a lot more interesting.”

“For Reece especially,” Val teased.

As they were preparing to leave, Cynthia hung the sign from Reece’s backpack while she and Alec distracted her with fake apologies. It was almost too easy, Reece’s ego lapping up every fake
I’m sorry
and
you were right
they fed her. For good measure, they continued far past when Cynthia gave the thumbs-up that the sign was in place.

Reece turned toward the trail. “Okay,” she yelled over her shoulder. “Let’s move out.”

Cynthia had done great. The sign was affixed right to the top of Reece’s backpack. The classmates on either sides of Alec and Valerie tittered as they took in the words and request. A few of them snapped photos of the sign.

Reece spun to face them. “What?”

“Sorry, I told a joke. It won’t happen again,” Alec said through laugh-clenched teeth.

“Whatever.” Reece stepped onto the trail. “I said move out.” She hiked like they were about to climb Everest.

“Guys,” Alec whispered to their closest classmates, “you’d better do what she says.” He pointed his thumb at the sign. “Also, those of you considering it, Instagram is great, but pass it along to everyone behind you via text first.”

Laughter scattered through the group.

His boots pounded and her sneakers slapped the trail as they hurried to catch up to Reece. The anticipation was as strong as anything Val had ever experienced, buzzing and high in her throat. “This might be the best thing we’ve ever done together.”

“It’s pretty good,” he said, moving his hand to the base of her spine, “but I’d pick a few other things for best.” He squeezed his fingers into the soft flesh above her ass, giving her no doubt what
other things
he meant.

Wow, did she ever agree.

“Depending on how frisky the guys are feeling…” Alec pulled his hand away and put both out in front of him director-style. “It could actually be epic.”

Val turned to check. Several of the guys from their class were stepping to the side of the trail to shove their phones down their pants.

“It’s about to get epic,” she squealed.

He rubbed his hands together villainously. “I can’t wait.”

“Are you going to join in?”

“Only if you are.” His brows flickered.

She stuck her tongue out in mock disgust. “No one needs a picture of that.”

His gaze dripped down to her fly. “I’d frame a picture of that.”

She followed his eyes. Her zipper was shiny gold in the sunlight peeking through the canopy of maples and elms above them. An alarm clock seemed to go off between her legs, buzzing away with no snooze button in sight. She considered finding a bush to shove him into to give him his own private showing when Reece’s phone tinged.

Valerie could barely contain herself. Laughter started filling her like air, and if she couldn’t let it out it might take her up into the sky like a balloon.

“This better be from Gideon or Georgia; they’re almost as bad as you two,” Reece said, glancing back at them. She continued to hike as she pulled out her phone. She clicked into it and gasped, dropping it on the trail floor and stopping everyone behind her.

“Everything okay?” Alec asked.

“Yeah.” Reece’s face was white. “Fine.” She picked up her phone and stuffed it back in her pocket. “Let’s keep moving—we have a lot of ground to cover before lunch.” Her voice was shaky.

When the next text rang out, Reece ignored it. Alec turned to Valerie and lifted his eyebrow. Another text hit a minute later, but Reece kept trudging. She didn’t even move to put it on vibrate. It had to be because she
would not
,
could not
act like anything was wrong. Their stupid perfect hike had to stay perfect, even though her phone was like a Chippendale’s audition.

Soon the tings were coming as insistently as the birds chirping above them: another and another and another and another.

Val couldn’t help but feel a sense of pride in her classmates. They were totally coming through—with dicks.

“Your cell phone is ruining my hiking experience,” Alec said, flat faced, but Valerie could tell he was trying not to laugh. She could barely hold it in herself. She bit her lip so hard she tasted metal.

Reece’s hands trembled as she took her phone from her pocket. She clicked into it with her eyes closed. When she opened them and glanced at her notifications, she let out a blood-curdling scream.

“We’re definitely not going to see the wildlife promised if you keep making so much noise,” Alec pressed.

Reece’s face was as red as a tomato; her eyes watered in anger. She wheeled around and pointed at the space between them. “I don’t know what’s going on, but I know you’re involved.”

“What are you talking about?” Val managed, even though each word had a laugh around it.

The rest of her classmates gathered behind them, trying their best to keep their laughing in check, too. Cynthia was doing a terrible job, laughs escaping her lips like wheezes.

Reece’s phone exploded with more texts, more of her classmates’ dicks on her display.
Talk about a yearbook.

“I see you!” Reece jabbed her finger into the crowd. “All of you. This is a federal offense.”

“What are you talking about? What’s on your phone, Reece?” Alec asked, finally gaining his composure.

“This,” she hissed, spinning it, “all their penises.” She flicked her chin at the crowd.

“But why would they be sending them to you?” Valerie asked.

Reece’s mouth was open in an
O
. She was stumped. For all her planning this weekend she never could have expected this.

“Maybe there’s a best dick contest or something. Is that on the itinerary?” Alec asked.

Her classmates’ decorum shattered at that, laughter spilling around the group like a dam had broken. Comments shot at Reece from all directions.

“I’d win!”

“What about best balls?”

“Longest pubes, right here!”

Reece fixed her bloodshot eyes on Alec and Valerie. “You’re ruining everything.” Her phone exploded in even more texts.

“I’d say things are going perfectly,” Alec replied, crossing his arms.

“My dick is too big for your phone.”