Under an Endless Moon (Moonlit Ridge, #2)

by A.L. Jackson

“Just like you’ve always been mine.”

“Yeah, darlin’. You’ve always had me enchanted.”

“This is gonna change everything.”

“The second you touched me last night, it already did.” “And now that you have me, there’s no going back.”

I whimpered and rocked myself against his abdomen. “Please.” “There will be no begging tonight, Raven. Gonna give you everything you need.”

“You have any idea, Raven? What it feels like to have you like this? A needy ball in the middle of my bed, waiting for me to take you? Consume you?”

“Going to possess you the way you’ve been possessin’ me.” A scoff of a tease gusted out of my lungs. “You think I’m the one who’s been possessing you? I already told you that you are my every fantasy. The face of every desire I’ve ever had.”

“You sure this is what you want? You sure you want to be mine?” It sounded almost of a threat. “I already am.”

“Gonna fuck you in these heels, and I’m going to do it soon, but tonight, I need you completely bare.” A tremor rocked through me. “Yes, please.”

My legs spread to make him room, and he crawled up to hover over me. On his knees, he planted his hands on either side of my head. His gaze traced my face. My expression. Searching for my fears. For my belief. For my trust. I reached up and scratched my fingers through the stubble on his jaw. “I love you.” It was the one thing he needed to know. The one thing that had the power to erase every doubt and reservation. He traced the pad of his thumb down the curve of my cheek. “My moonflower. Can’t wait to watch you glow. To see you fully bloom in the middle of the darkness.”

Otto moaned and dropped down a fraction, letting his heat burn through my body as he kissed me into a puddle. A needy, helpless puddle. “Otto.” “I know, baby, I know.” He pushed up high on one hand and let the other glide up my outer thigh until he was gripping my hip. I felt his fingers tremble. Felt his nerves. The concern he forever held for me as he pulled back, breaths heaving from his lungs as he studied me. “You say, Raven. If you get scared or anxious or just fuckin’ change your mind, you say.” “I promise.”

“You have no idea, do you? What it’s like seeing you this way?”

“Goddess. How’s it I’m touching a goddess like this?” My nails raked his chest, coasting all the way down until I was tugging at the button of his jeans. “And how is it that I’m finally getting to experience this fantasy with you?” A ridge of cockiness rode the edge of his mouth. “Going to make sure you get to experience it again and again. In every way that you’ve imagined.”

Otto hissed. “Fuck me. Never have I seen something so beautiful. This fuckin’ gorgeous body laid out on my sheets. You said I was every fantasy you’ve ever had, Raven. But you are my only dream. The one wish I’d never dared to make. And now I have it in the palm of my hand.”

“Can I have you like this, Raven? Bare?” he rumbled, like he had direct access to my thoughts. “Promise you, I’ve never been with anyone else like this.” “I know,” I murmured because I did. I knew this was different. I knew neither of us had experienced anything like this before. Maybe he’d been touched a million times, had a million other women, but he’d never had me. And still, caution filled his gaze as he swept his fingers through my center before he slowly pressed two inside. Gauging me as he drew them in and out. Making sure I was ready. No question since I was soaked. Then he gathered me up, took one of my hands and threaded our fingers together, and curled me fully into the safety of his arms. Nose to nose and breath to breath. I could feel the blunt head of his cock perched at my center, and the air locked in my lungs.

“Are you sure, Moonflower? Last chance before I make this body mine.” My nod was frantic, and my heart beat wild. Something that wasn’t quite fear fluttered beneath the surface of my skin.

“Take it.” Every part of him darkened as he slowly started to nudge himself inside me. Lines were carved deep into the harsh angles of his face, muscles flexing taut, his nostrils flaring with the care he took. All while my breaths turned short and choppy as he slowly, slowly spread me. Fire licked a path up my spine and flamed through my being. I struggled to adjust to the size of him. The stretch blissfully painful.

My nails sank into his shoulder, and I gasped and clawed at him as he broke me apart and filled me full. Otto kept watching me. Carefully. Tenderly beneath all the brawn that rippled and pulsed. “Fuck,” he grunted, the single word a rasp as he seated himself completely inside me.

“You okay?” he asked, voice strained, expression tight. My nails were burrowed deep in his shoulder as I whispered, “I’ve never felt anything as right as you.”

“Was terrified of believing it…that you were meant for me,” he murmured as he lifted my hand that was still twined with his and brushed his lips over my knuckles. “But you were, Raven.” He eased back a fraction before he edged back in, a little deeper that time, stealing the oxygen all over again. “You were meant for me. Do you feel it?” he grunted. I could barely nod, trying for a tease but unable to find it. “The only thing I feel is you.” “That’s right, Moonflower. That’s the way it’s supposed to be. My cock buried so deep inside you that you can’t process anything else except for me. When you can’t think about anything else but the pleasure I’m going to bring you.” He brushed the thumb of his hand still entwined with mine along my jaw, voice gruff and raw. “Nothing as perfect as this. Your pussy hugging me tight. You in my arms. This heart beating against mine.” “Nothing,” I told him. “Nothing could be better than this.” A smirk hitched on his delicious mouth. “Oh, I think it’s going to get better, darlin’. I haven’t even begun with you yet.”

“Then you’d better start.” It was close to a chuckle that rolled through his chest. “Needy girl.”

“Look at that, my cock possessing you.” His tone hardened in potency. He pulled back then drove back in. The thrust was powerful and hard, and my back arched from the bed at the sublime intrusion. “Otto.” “That’s right, Raven. That’s exactly what I want to hear. My name on that sweet little tongue. Going to have you chanting it forever.” A gasp ripped out of me as he drew back out then drove back in deep. He began to move in firm, measured strokes. Each one of them sent flames licking up my spine and lapping at my insides. A beautiful burn that gathered strength with each rock of his hips.

“Fuck, Raven. So good. The way your cunt feels wrapped around my cock. So tight. So fuckin’ tight and perfect. Never have felt anything as good as this. Nothing can compare. Gonna do me in.”

He curled a big arm around the top of my head, covering me whole as he surged down to capture my mouth in a kiss that nearly sent me sailing. At the same time, he wound his other hand between us and circled his fingertips around my clit. Fire flashed. A wave of heat that blistered beneath the surface of my skin. “Oh God…please…yes…harder.” Otto groaned. “You don’t know what you’re askin’ for, Moonflower.”

“I want everything you could ever give me.” He looped an arm under my thigh so he could spread me wider and shifted the angle. The fat head of his cock hit that sensitive spot inside me as he took me again and again. I started gasping, jutting up in desperation as the pleasure grew and bound. Gathering strength with each slam of his body.

“I can feel you gettin’ ready to split. Let me see you glow, Moonflower. Let me see you come alive beneath me.” He lifted my hips from the bed and rocked into me as he swirled his thumb around my clit. It cracked me wide open, and a rush of ecstasy tore through my body.

He thrust two more times before a shout burst from him, and he clutched me so tight there was nothing to separate us as he jerked and spasmed and groaned my name. “Raven.” He grunted as he poured into me. I could feel every twitch and pulse of his cock, and my pleasure fluttered around it, capturing him the same way as he’d captured me. He held us there for the longest time. In this rapture that could only belong to us. We both knew it then. Knew it in the way our gazes were locked as we let go. As we gave ourselves over. As every wall and brick that had been built around us was toppled to the ground.

Searching my face as if they could get all the way down into my soul. He let his fingertips trace the edge of my jaw. My lips. Before they were brushing along my brow. “You good?” I snuggled into him, resting my cheek on his biceps as I let my own fingertips play along the intricate designs he’d tattooed there. “I knew there would be nothing like you, but I wasn’t prepared for how good it was going to be.” Cockiness laced his words. “Good to hear, darlin’, because you’re about to have a whole lot more of me.” Then his lips were at my temple, his words seeping deep into my spirit. “You’re mine now, and I have every intention of making good on it.”

“Don’t move,” in that rumbly, powerful voice. “I don’t think I could move from this bed if the house was on fire.”

“Don’t worry, gorgeous, house catches fire, and you’ll be over my shoulder so fast you won’t know what hit you.” “I already know what hit me,” I said, words laden with a tease and wonder. His chuckle scraped across my overheated skin, and he squeezed a little tighter. “That was me goin’ easy on you, Raven. You don’t have the first clue what I have in store for you.”

“You say that like I might object. Bring it, Burly Bear.”

Otto laughed a little harder, though his tone went predatory as he leaned in closer to my face. “You think you can handle me, do you?” “I was made to handle you, Otto Hudson.” “Ah, my little moonflower really is ready to bloom.” “I’ve been waiting for half my life.” His features softened, tenderness and something that resembled regret. He stroked his thumb over the freckle at the side of my upper lip. “Didn’t mean to make you wait, Raven. Didn’t mean to keep you from what you needed. Just didn’t think I could ever be worthy of holding something as beautiful as you.” I set my palm on the stubble of his cheek. “Everyone deserves to be loved, Otto. No matter what you’ve done. But you? You deserve it more than anyone else I know.” He flinched. “Nah, baby, I’m just the lucky bastard who somehow is fortunate enough to get someone like you to look at me the way you do.” “It’s not just looking. It’s seeing, Otto. I see you. I see you for who you are.”

“One day, I’ll let you see all of it, Raven, then you might change your mind.”

“If I could only paint you like that, Raven Tayte. Capture the absolute splendor that you are. Woman lying there in my bed like a portrait. Fuckin’ stunning. Stealing my breath and my mind. Stealing my heart.” “It seems only fair since you’ve always had mine.”

“Want to keep you right there, just like that, for the rest of my days.” “I wouldn’t mind. All except for the fact that I’d need you over here in this bed with me.”

“I intend on taking you right back to my bed, but I think I need to feed you first. You’re going to need your energy.”

“On your back and spread your knees.”

“You sore?” he asked, voice low. My nod was tentative. “A little. But I like it.” “You like feeling how I marked you? How I claimed you?” That time, my nod was erratic. “Yes.”

“Gonna write myself on every inch of you.” My teeth clamped down on my bottom lip. “That’s where I want you. Everywhere. In every way. Forever.”

“What are you doing, Otto Hudson?” “Told you I needed to feed you.” She edged back, arching a brow, her face so goddamn striking in the wisping light. “I think you forgot something important.” “What’s that?” I asked as I started to carry her from the bedroom. Her brow arched higher. “My panties.” “You aren’t gonna need those.”

“Is that so?” she challenged, playing along. “That’s right,” I told her as I ambled down into the main part of the house. I strode right into the kitchen and perched her on the edge of the island. “Want that sweetness ripe and ready for me.” A shiver rocked her, and she gripped the counter, wiggling in the spot. She looked like a temptress there, a siren sitting beneath the hazy rays of light that danced in through the windows that overlooked the lake beyond.

My favorite fuckin’ cake from my favorite fuckin’ girl.

It was exactly what we needed. Chocolate and carbs. I pulled out the platter and set it beside her on the island. “We’re having chocolate cake for dinner? And here I always thought you were a steak kind of guy.” I wedged myself between her legs that dangled from the counter, and I tipped my face up to hers. “Turns out, I’m a Raven Tayte kind of guy.” Her fingers sifted through the longer pieces of my hair. “I think you were always a Raven Tayte kind of guy.”

“Yeah, think you’re right.” Raven eyes stared down at me. “Did you then? Did you want me?”

“Think I knew it the moment I got released from prison. When I walked in and you were standing in the middle of the room. The way you looked at me right then…”

Still, I took her palm that’d been against my lips and splayed it over the boom that clanged in the middle of my chest. “It’s always been yours.”

I pulled back and watched as she chewed, then I reached out and wiped away a glob of chocolate that had gotten stuck to her lip with the pad of my thumb. I moved real slow when I drew my thumb into my mouth, sucking it, watching Raven’s stare flare with her own lust. “No fair, Otto Hudson.” “What’s not fair?” She rolled those pretty eyes. “Don’t act like you don’t know what you’re doing to me.” “And what am I doin’ to you, darlin’?” I played it innocent, a tease, loving the lightness that flitted between us. “You know exactly what…making me all squirmy and needy.” She whispered the last like it was a secret. “Looks like you caught me. That was the whole plan.” I leaned in close, and that time, I licked the bit of chocolate remaining from her lip, voice lowering to a rasp. “Only thing I want is you squirming and needy.”

“You don’t have to be afraid of loving me,” she murmured. Wistfulness filled the shake of my head. “Since there is a very real chance that your brother is going to kill me when he finds out, there’s probably going to be a little pain.”

“He won’t.” We swayed, and my thumb traced the freckle on the edge of her lip. “He might, but I promise you, any second I get to spend with you is worth it.” “He doesn’t need to know. What is between us is between us.”

“I’ll figure out a way to tell him. Just gonna need some time, and I need to be the one to do it.”