Kiss Me (Townsend Legacy)

Chapter 8

CHAPTER 8

T ania

Home.

My heart squeezes at the mention of the word.

Taehyun places me on my feet in front of the wooden door of his wood cabin.

He carried me for nearly ten minutes, along a somewhat icy road. This resort is massive and has multiple cabins in addition to the main accommodations with its hotel-style suites.

He punches in the code, unlocking the door before wrapping an arm around my waist as if he’s afraid I’ll get away. I allow him to pull me inside of his luxurious cabin.

“Shoes,” he orders, pointing at the boots on my feet. “No shoes inside.”

I glance around as I untie the boots and then heel-toe them off.

I expected nothing less from this place, but the cabin is truly specular. It is two levels. A wooden staircase and banister spiral its way up to the second floor.

The inside of the bottom level is an open floor plan, displaying a huge fireplace for the living room, the kitchen with a massive fridge, and a separate space for dining.

While the inside of the cabin is beautiful, it’s also a bit … generic.

“Where are the decorations?”

The resort had my and Liza’s suite decked out complete with tinsel, a Christmas tree, candles, and even stockings on the fireplace. They even asked if we wanted them to set up a nativity scene in the living room.

Liza turned the offer down out of fear that, with my bad ankle, I might trip over it while walking around.

“Decoration for what?”

My eyes bulge. “What do you mean for what? It’s Christmas.”

Taehyun tilts his head to the side. “Oh, that.” He half rolls his eyes. “I’m not much of a Christmas person.”

“Excuse me,” I snap back.

“It’s just a day for greedy people to pretend like they’re not greedy,” he continues. “And for people who can’t afford stupid gifts to go into debt. At least, that’s how it is in the States. In Korea it’s mainly a day for couples. No big deal. I’ve experienced both and it’s just meh.”

He shrugs. “And I’m not part of a couple so what’s the point of decorations?”

I snap my head back. “What a dark and gloomy view of one of the best times of the year.” I shake my head, folding my arms across my chest.

A silence falls between us as I peer around his cabin again. Taehyun watches me in the space of the quiet. I feel his eyes on me as if it were his hands.

“Is that why you’re faking an injury? To spend time seated by a tree with lights on it as you pretend a fat dude in a red suit passes out gifts around the entire world in one night?”

His voice is full of cynicism, painting each word in snark and recrimination.

With a roll of my eyes, I toss a few of my braids before replying, “I don’t expect you to understand.”

I pivot away because I know the expression on my face is starting to match the heaviness in my heart, and I don’t want him to see it.

The man is nothing if persistent, though, because he circles my body to stand in front of me. He’s now between me and the door, essentially telling me I’ll have to go through him to gain my freedom.

“There’s no one here but me and you.” His gaze meets mine. “Make me understand.”

“It’s none of your business.” I take a step back.

“So you’ve told me. Tell me any damn way.”

“Why?” He’s so persistent. He’s already got what he wants. Or so I believe he has. Why does he need to know my damn secret?

“Because there’s a reason why a world-class athlete lies to everyone in her life, comes out to California with just her assistant to get away, and I believe it’s more than for some damn gingerbread cookies.”

I take another step back, feeling my eyes getting watery.

Taehyun advances another step closer. “Tell me.”

“It’s none of your business,” I try again.

“I’m making it my business.”

“ I’m none of your business.” Seriously, at this point, I’m barely hanging on from letting the tears escape. I wish he would just leave it the hell alone.

“All I wanted was peace and quiet,” I finally say.

The half-truth isn’t enough for him.

“That’s a good start. Keep going.”

“What more do you want?” I hold my arms out to my sides.

“The truth.”

“I just told you the damn truth.”

“You told me what you think would get me off of your case.” He steps closer and places a finger under my chin, making me meet his gaze. “But when it comes to getting what I want, I’m just as dogged as you in competition. Why the hell are you lying to the world?”

I slap his hand away and step back. “Why are you so fucking persistent about this?”

“Why are you so damn intent on keeping your secret?”

“Because I wanted … no, needed some damn time off,” I burst out, throwing my hands in the air. At this point, I know I must appear a little crazy, but fuck it.

He asked so now he’s getting my full truth. Since I don’t have anyone else to share it with.

“Because it’s Christmas and I can’t remember the last damn time I had a week off to celebrate the holiday. I wanted time to sleep past five-thirty in the morning, time away from constantly watching my diet because the next competition is just around the corner, and I wanted to relax in the last place my family spent together. Before my dad became my manager and when my mom was still alive to celebrate her favorite time of year.”

Now that I’ve opened my mouth, I can’t stop.

“Is it a crime that I wanted to go back, even for just a little while, to the time in my life before a damn mack truck slammed into my mom’s car, and overnight my father changed from the man who used to love tickling me awake and carrying me on his shoulders and my biggest cheerleader, to the man who runs the empire that is Tania Casey?

“Back when I was his ‘Ace’ just because it was enough for me to be his little girl, and not because I was the next ‘It’ girl in the world of snowboarding. So yeah …”

I defiantly wipe away the stupid tears that fall.

“When I took that fall at my last practice and slightly twisted my ankle, I saw my chance to embellish. And hell yeah, I paid off my doctor to tell my coaches and father that it was a bad sprain and I needed to rest for weeks in order to be ready for next month’s competition.

“Then after I did that, I booked a week-long stay in the one resort I haven’t been back to in the ten years since my mother died. The last place she and I baked cookies together and danced in front of the fireplace as we sang ‘All I Want for Christmas is You’ while my dad filmed, laughing right along with us.”

I stop, starting to pant, for some reason.

“I just …” I suck in a deep breath, doing my best to fill my lungs. “I just wanted that feeling again. To remember why I love this sport in the first place.”

I hold up my hands and move away when Taehyun tries to approach me.

“There’s your fucking truth. And when you go to the media, make sure you tell them that they all can kiss my ass.”

I head for the door, blurred vision from tears and all.

Taehyun

I don’t save things.

I’m not a man who’s moved by helpless creatures or so much even by sob stories. It’s something I’m neither proud nor ashamed of.

It just is.

Which is why it strikes me as disturbingly odd that the tears streaming down Tania’s cheeks cause something deep to move across my chest. It’s almost as if?—

No.

I won’t go there.

Instead of trying to assess my fucking feelings, I ignore them at the same time I reach for the woman heading toward the door like she’s about to leave.

She’s not.

“Let go of me,” she mumbles, but there’s no real force behind it.

And when I pull her into my arms, wrapping them around her, she only fights a little before surrendering to my embrace. Still, it takes a few more seconds before Tania completely lets go and wraps her arms around my waist.

She doesn’t make a sound for a long while.

Soon enough, though, I sense her body trembling. Tania tucks her face against my chest and the shaking of her body intensifies.

She’s crying.

This time the reason I pick her up isn’t because of a ruse to protect her identity from onlookers.

There’s no one around to witness this moment. And Tania can walk on her own. But I don’t want her to.

I lift her into my arms and proceed to the stairs because I don’t want any separation between our bodies. She must want the same thing because her arms wrap tightly around my neck.

The only drawback is that she’s still wearing her winter clothing. I move to the spacious king size bed and sit with her in my lap, simply holding onto her.

I don’t know for how long we sit this way, but I remain determined to allow her to hold onto me for as long as she needs. Even as her tears dampen the collar of my sweater, saturating the T-shirt I have on underneath.

Those tears soak through to my very soul, to a hole I hadn’t even realized existed. Not until this very moment.

Slowly, Tania pulls back, blinking at me with red, swollen eyes. Her cheeks are stained with tear tracks down them.

I wipe away the few remaining tears while she violently brushes away others. As if she’s embarrassed over becoming this emotional.

I take both of her wrists into mine, stopping her movements. Tania’s eyes meet mine, and I suspect she’s about to apologize.

“Don’t,” I tell her with a shake of my head.

She clears her throat instead, before pushing out a deep, shuddering breath.

In the silence, I undo the velcro covering of her coat’s zipper, before sliding it open. Once I peel the coat off her body, I toss it onto the chair in the corner of the room. Without giving much consideration as to why I’m taking such care with her, I undo her boots as well.

“Th-Thank you,” Tania finally says once she’s stripped down to just her indoor clothing.

“What are you thanking me for?”

“You won’t let me apologize so I figured saying thank you was the next best thing.”

A frown forms on my lips. “If your thank you is just a form of an apology, then you can keep it.”

She surprises me by laughing and ducking her head. “How do you even make a thank you into a negative thing?”

I give her a one shoulder shrug. “My father used to tell me to keep my apologies and my thank yous to myself and just fucking do better next time,” I say the second half in the stern voice that I use to imitate my father.

While the original point of my comment was meant to be a joke, it doesn’t disguise the bite of pain that lances through my chest.

“That sounds kind of cruel.”

Tania’s comment has me staring into her eyes.

Looking into them brings me out of thoughts about my father. I run a thumb down the side of her face, which causes her to suck her bottom lip in between her teeth.

“So does being in need of a break so much that you have to fake an injury to get it.”

When she goes to duck her head again, I stop her with my hand on her chin. “You don’t have anything to be ashamed of.”

She still manages to turn her head away from me. “You were right, though. I’m lying to everyone who looks up to me. Even Liza doesn’t know the truth. And I know my dad would freak out if I told him.”

“What the hell do I know? I’m an asshole. Remember?”

Her eyes widen.

“Or so someone told me,” I say, managing to pull a smile from her, which was my goal.

“You’re still an asshole,” she replies.

“A man can’t change in the span of a day,” I counter.

I capture her chin again, keeping her attention on me. “But your father, your assistant, and even the girls who look up to you aren’t here.”

I give the room a wide sweep with my arm for reference.

“It’s just the two of us right here and now. And you don’t have to keep pretending with me.”

Her eyes drop to my lips, and a stirring that I’ve been fighting all night—especially since that kiss—begins to grow.

One moment, I’m staring at her lips, knowing I would truly live up to my asshole nickname by pulling her in for a kiss the way I’m yearning to after she just had an emotional breakdown in my arms.

Yet, I am who and what I am.

This is my final thought before I do exactly that. I claim Tania’s lips the way I’ve been daydreaming about since I came face to face with her on that ski lift.

Fuck it, if I’m honest, since long before. Ever since the first moment she rejected me all of those months ago.

I’m a man with more options than I know to do with. Between my part-time home in the U.S. and in Korea, I could have a different woman every night of the week, if I wanted.

Still, I’ve craved this one for longer than I’m willing to admit out loud.

And now that I have her in my home, in my bed, in my fucking arms, I start to wonder if I ever want to let her go.

Those are the insane, and, yes, deranged, as she said earlier, thoughts that continue to stream through my mind as I lay Tania down against my bed while never breaking the kiss.

She locks her arms around my neck, obviously as affected by the kiss as I am. Her kisses taste sweet. More decadent than the lingering taste of gingerbread and hot chocolate that remains from earlier.

I move my hand underneath her sweater, touching the smooth, taut skin of her abdomen. A small moan escapes from her lips, encouraging me. She likes the touch of my hand against her skin.

Good, because I fucking love it.

I enjoy it so much, in fact, that I lift her sweater over her head, making sure to not tug too hard over her braids. She’s left in a bra, black camisole, and a pair of jeans. My hands move to the button of her jeans, pausing only momentarily as I gauge her reaction to my undressing her.

“Are you stopping?”

My lips curl into a half grin. “Someone’s anxious.”

“And someone’s taking too damn long,” she pants as she pulls the camisole over her head.

Damn, I love a woman who knows what she wants. No. Who she wants. Especially when that ‘who’ is me.

I strip her of her jeans and the boy short panties she has on underneath in record time. My mouth hungers for hers again. Before I’m able to get a good look at her nearly completely naked form, I lean down for another kiss.

She lifts her head to meet my lips. Our tongues sweep against one another, feeling each other out.

My cocks press hard against the zipper of my jeans.

But I don’t have time to undo my pants because Tania’s hands are already working.

“Shit,” I hiss when she frees me from my jeans and wraps her hand around my cock.

“You have a condom, right?” she asks in between kisses.

Wordlessly, I lean across the bed, feeling around for the top drawer of the nightstand for the box of condoms I left there. I had no intention of bringing anyone back to my cabin during my time here, but you never know.

“Not so fast,” I tell Tania when she goes to grab one of the condoms out of my hand.

I pull away from her, sitting on my knees in between her legs.

“Are you in a rush, sweetheart?”

“Yes,” she promptly responds.

I laugh at the unexpected answer. I just knew she was going to call me an asshole again.

“I’m flattered, but I plan on taking my time with you tonight.”

She starts to ask something, at least that’s my assumption. However, whatever’s on her mind gets cut off when I join our mouths again. While I’m not opposed to kissing, I rarely crave a woman’s kiss.

Yet here I am pulling Tania in for multiple kisses like I can’t get enough.

Because I can’t. I’m man enough to admit that.

I ease my hand down the ripples of Tania’s ab muscles that denote just how much time she spends training.

She gasps, arching her back when my fingers come into contact with her clitoris.

“Con-Condom,” she urges again.

This time, I oblige, ripping the damn thing open and rolling it over my erection with one hand, while stripping myself out of the rest of my clothing with the other.

Tania goes to wrap her legs around my waist, but I stop her.

“Wait.” A chuckle spills from me when she groans in obvious frustration. “I’m a man who likes to eat his dessert first.”

“Wha— ohhh,” her question dissolves into a moan as I dip my head between her legs.

I’ll be damned if the lips between her legs don’t taste just as sweet, and dare I say, even more succulent than those of her mouth.

“Oh shit, right there,” she encourages.

Her hands move to my head as if holding me in place. The thought would have me chuckling, but my mouth, especially my tongue, are a little too preoccupied at the moment.

For the first time ever with my head between a woman’s legs, I think I could become addicted. To her taste, her smell, the way her skin feels against mine.

The moment I start to spell my own damn name with my tongue against her pussy lips is the moment I realize I’m all in.

Though right now, I’m too gone to even think about how she’s driving me crazy.

“I’m coming,” she groans out, her hands tightening in my hair.

I would tell her that’s the point, but my airway’s damn near cut off when she squeezes her thighs around my head. Yes, it’s a possibly life-threatening situation considering how damn tight she squeezes.

Yet, all I give a shit about is feeling her come against my mouth. I want to taste her orgasm.

Seconds later, I get my first present of the holiday season when her thighs start to shake uncontrollably, and her hips lift off of the bed. Her entire body tightens as the orgasm moves through her in waves.

The gush of wetness that coats my tongue provides the satisfaction I need before I pull away from her body.

As I start to move up her waist, Tania surprises me when she springs up and moves so quickly that before I know it, I’m on my back and she’s straddling me.

“My turn,” she says with a naughty tone in her voice.

Soon she’s sinking that beautiful pussy of hers onto my cock. The both of us groan out loud. Relief and satisfaction flow through me. I grab her hips, squeezing her thighs as she begins to ride me.

It’s good, but not good enough.

I make quick work of discarding the pesky black, cotton bra she’s still wearing, freeing her breasts. Her brown globes begin to bounce as she rides my cocks.

“That’s better,” I say, reaching up to grab onto them with both hands. She’s not particularly top heavy but they’re the perfect fit for my hands.

Tania tosses her head back, and while this view is better than I could ever ask for, I want to see her face.

“Look at me,” I order at the same time I squeeze her nipples. “Keep your fucking eyes on me while you’re riding my cock.”

The muscles of her pussy spasm and squeeze at my words. She lowers her gaze to meet mine.

“Keep them right there,” I encourage.

I move my hands to her hips, holding them while I lift my own hips from the bed, taking over even from my position.

“No,” I growl out when Tania’s eyes start to close. I roll our bodies, so that I’m now on top. The need to feel her underneath me overwhelms me.

“Keep your eyes on me, Tania.”

She listens well. I wrap her legs around my waist and begin to hammer into her, needing to feel her come around my cock this time.

“Taehyun,” she calls my name just above a whisper.

I’m not typically the kind of guy who needs or even wants a woman to say my name while I’m fucking her. It feels too much like a claim.

My goal was never to claim any one woman.

But hearing Tania call my name brings out some sort of animal instinct I never realize existed within me because it’s almost an out-of-body experience when I hear myself demand, “Say it again.”

Her eyebrows lift in confusion, as if she doesn’t realize what she just said.

Hell no.

“My name. Say my fucking name again,” I growl out.

“Tae—”

“Say it,” I demand as I push into her.

“Taehyun,” she moans out, her heels digging into my back.

I feel her walls tighten around me and I know she’s on the verge of coming.

“Come apart for me, Tania,” I encourage.

And she does.

Fuck.

I can’t help but watch her as she tosses her head back, her lips part in a silent moan, her body going rigid as the orgasm overtakes her.

She’s fucking stunning.

I swear it’s her beauty alone that pulls my own orgasm from me. That and the clenching of her pussy around my cock.

Soon after, I fall apart as well. Tania’s arms tighten around me, holding me to her as I come.

It takes longer than I expect to breathe normally.

Once I do, I can only think of one word.

“Shit.”