Page 28 of American Sweethearts

I opened my eyes slowly, as I started to move. My hips undulating in sync with his movements. Those brown eyes—the ones that had seen me naked in every way, that could see in my heart and my soul like no one else—focused on me.

“You still with me, ma?” That was said while he licked his thumb before circling it on my clit.

“Asi, Juan.” The way he was moving, with his hands on me, was like lightning crackling through my body. Soon we were moving against each other hard and fast. The sounds of our bodies coming together and our ragged breaths the only sounds in the room.

“I’m close,” he said through gritted teeth, as he pushed into me.

He kept rubbing my clit and I tightened around him as he bucked into me. “Fuuuuck.” I felt the first spasm of his orgasm, right as my own was crashing into me.

He pressed me tight to him, our skin clammy with perspiration. The exertions of the last hour had wrung us out. And when I was finally coming down falling into the bed in Juan Pablo’s arms, still too blissed out to say a word, I thought to myself again,This is what I needed.

I kept my eyes closed and rested my head on J’s chest as he kicked his sweats all the way off. Once he was settled in, his arms tight around me, I could feel the tension of the question he was afraid to ask. But J had never been a coward either.

“How are you doing?” That wasn’t any kind of simple question, but the answer came easier than I thought.

“I don’t want to think about the long game with this.” I dug my nails into his chest, surprised with everything I was feeling. “Or how it’s going to end badly or how we can make this last. This is good for now.”

He tightened his arms around me, a deep sigh rumbling on his chest. “If you’re good. I’m good. We can figure out the rest later.” The gentle kiss he planted on my forehead made the last of my reservation seep out of my body and I settled in.

“Okay. Later.”

chapter nineteen

juan pablo

“You know what’s wild?” Priscilla asked, as she cut off a piece of the omelet I’d made for her. Spinach and feta, her favorite.

“I’m sure you’ll tell me.” I teased as I wiped down my granite countertops trying to keep my cheesy grin under control. I was feeling pretty fucking good.

We’d laid in bed, messing around and talking until her stomach growled, making us both laugh. She was always starving after sex, and that usually meant I cooked while she kept me company. I was sort of blown away by how not freaked out she was. I almost didn’t want to tempt fate by getting too deep. But this felt good. To have her here like this. Not just making love—although that had been great—but opening up to each other after so much hurt. I wanted to keep this going forever.

“I don’t even believe in soulmates.” She lifted a shoulder and shook her head, still clearly baffled by this fact. “I’m one hundred percent sure there are hundreds of people out there I could be happy with. That I could have hot-as-fuck sex with and feel satisfied by in real ways.”

Okay that’s not where I thought she was going, but I tried hard not to scowl. She knew me too well not to know what was going through my head.

She held a hand up with a grin on her face, as I stood there confused. “It’s just…they’re notyou, and that’s why I’ve stayed away.” That was said with her looking at the plate and fiddling with the sleeve of one of my hoodies she was now wearing.

I nodded again, a sharp brisk movement, and really tried to figure out why she’d told me that. Why now? Did she want me to know that what happened tonight was a one-off? Did she feel compelled to stress the point that this hadn’t mattered to her as much as it had for me?

I’d been working hard at not making assumptions, so I would take what she was saying like I thought she meant it. That things with us were never simple. That we had hurt each other a lot over the years, so it was best not to tempt fate.

She was right about all of it, and I had to tell her I knew that.

“I’m not going to say I never meant to hurt you, because that’s not true. I’ve done it too many times to not take responsibility for it.” I ran a hand over my mouth and pulled on my beard, hard. Looking for words that could work right now. Words that could allow me to tell her I’d discovered that losing her was the one thing in my life there was no safety net for.

That the Priscilla-sized void stayed empty and aching no matter how hard I worked on filling it back up.

“I talked to my therapist about this.” My mouth always did me dirty at the most critical moments.

Her eyes went comically huge. “Your therapist?”

“I have a therapist.” I wasn’t going to make a big deal out of it, but a little sense of pride puffed up in my chest at how surprised she seemed.

She leaned back, her arms crossed over her chest, and grinned. Okay so that fun fact landed better than I thought it would.

Her smile was devilish and I had to remind my dick that this was not the time. That motherfucker never learned.

“So after all those years of you shutting me down, you finally started going to a therapist. I’m gagged that you finally got your stubborn ass to find one.”