Page 41 of Only in Your Dreams
My eyes widen involuntarily, and I spin around to examine the room once more. I guess I missed a few things. An old gaming console sitting beneath the TV, the black cords wrapped tidily around the gray machine. A single picture frame on the dresser, containing a photo of Grey and Holden with their arms slung over each other’s shoulders. I’m not sure when it was taken, but it must have been one summer at the lake, since they’re both golden brown and dressed in swim trunks, their hair damp. I trace my finger over it, smiling to myself. This had to have been at the height of my crush on Grey. If only the me of back then could see present-day me now.
“Why is it so…?” I struggle to find a word that doesn’t feel judgmental.
“Bland?” he fills in, his lips twitching with amusement.
I nod, and he shrugs, one shoulder lifting.
“I didn’t spend much time here,” he says. “I mean, when I was home, I spent almost all my time in here, but I was rarely home.”
My eyes flit around the room, searching for signs of life, personality. “There has to be something in here.”
“If you open the closet, there’s a poster that I found at a thrift store of Pamela Anderson in herBaywatchswimsuit on the inside of the door.”
This makes a laugh rocket out of me, and the heaviness in my chest that’s been growing since we walked through the door eases.
His eyes crinkle at the sides as he smiles, and he appears lighter than he did when we walked in here.
“Pamela Anderson, huh?”
He shrugs again, shoulder rising against the back of the door. “I’ve always had a thing for blondes.”
My face heats in increments, and Grey’s gaze heats right along with it. He pushes off the door, moving closer to where I’m standing beside the dresser. His hands find my hips, landing heavily on them, and before I know what’s happening, I’m being lifted, settled on top of the dresser. He moves into the space between my thighs, his palms never leaving their spots at my sides.
“Blondes, huh?” I ask, pleased that my voice doesn’t sound as breathless as I feel. “I’ve never known you to discriminate.”
“I don’t,” Grey says, his face falling into the crook of my neck, breath hot on my throat as he speaks. “But that doesn’t mean I don’t have favorites.”
“And blond is your favorite?”
He nods, his lips sliding against the sensitive skin of my neck, making goose bumps prick along my skin.
“And if I were a brunette?”
“Then brunette would be my favorite.”
He says it so easily that it almost feels like a line. But I don’t think it is. I think he’s telling the truth, and it makes me feel heady. I pull back to look at him, my eyes searching his face. I’m not sure what I’m looking for, but I just know that I want to look. That I want to memorize this moment so I can examine it when I’m alone and my mind doesn’t feel so fuzzy. When my body doesn’t feel like it’s thrumming, pulsing with want and need and desire.
He doesn’t allow me any time to look, however, because his lips find mine. The kiss is slow, electric. The kind that feels like savoring. The first bite of decadent chocolate cake or the last few minutes of sleep before the snooze is up on your alarm clock.
His lips part mine, his tongue slipping into my mouth, and my mind goes hazy. My hands leave the spots they found on his shoulders, sliding up into his hair and tugging. I feel his groan against my lips, and it makes my head spin.
Want settles in all the places we’re touching, all the places we’re not. I want to consume him. I want him to feel loved and wanted for the first time in this house. I want him to feel like he matters to someone. I want him to feel how I feel right now—cherished, important, necessary, desired.
His hands slide beneath the hem of my sundress, palms hot on my thighs. They squeeze hard enough to leave faint bruises. I know I’ll hike up this dress later and examine my skin for evidence that this really happened, that this wasn’t all in my head. That Grey Sutton was as desperate for me as I was for him.
He’s whispering words into my skin, too quiet and muffled for me to understand, but I know he’s saying my name. I hear the wordsbeautiful, perfect, everything, you.You, he says over and over again.Finley, he whispers, and it’s enough to undo me, to make me want to say screw taking it slow, that I’m ready for all of him, everything he can give me.
“Grey, dinner’s ready.” Mrs. Sutton’s voice pierces the moment, and he pulls back from me, eyes wide. He looks like he forgot that we’re in his childhood bedroom, in his parents’ home. On earth, if I’m being honest. He looks like he’s disappeared into his own mind, dragging me with him into a place no one else has ever been before.
I swallow at the intensity of that gaze, around the lump that’s formed in my throat, making it too thick to speak. With what looks like tremendous effort, he slips his hands from beneath mydress, palms sliding down the length of my thighs, leaving goose bumps trailing in their wake.
He looks disheveled, mussed, thoroughly kissed, and I must too, because he smooths his hands over my dress, tugs up the neckline that must have slid around when his mouth was on my neck. I run my fingers through the hair at his nape, and he shudders at the contact. I’ve never felt so powerful in my life. I think if I asked, he’d lock this door and make his parents wait. Climb out the second-story window and carry me home.
He looks as if he’s read my mind, his expression becoming more and more reluctant with each swipe of his hands over my skin. He hasn’t stopped touching me, and I like it. I like that I feel necessary to him.
“We could always leave,” he says hopefully.
It makes a smile twist my lips. “We better stay.”
