Late Nights & Love Lines (Single Dad Hotline #2)

16. Todays and tomorrows and broken huggers

16

TODAYS AND TOMORROWS AND brOKEN HUGGERS

ROWAN

S ebastian’s body weight sinks onto me, pressing me deeper into the blanket on the sand, and the noise that always fills my mind becomes silent.

Gone are the voices telling me to run.

Gone are the memories reminding me why I can’t stay.

Gone are the fears of what will happen if I care too much.

It’s just…quiet.

Closing my eyes, I focus on the sounds of life that are normally drowned out by my fears. The ocean licks the shore, and far off, the tree branches whisper in the breeze. These are the sounds of freedom.

“I think I’ve been waiting for you my entire life,” Sebastian vows, and I open my eyes to stare at him.

His cock rubs torturously slowly along my seam, pausing to pump against my clit. It’s not nearly enough friction to get me off, only enough to keep me on edge.

He’s in control here. I wait for the panic to come, but it never does. My body submits to him as though it was always meant to be his.

What the heck did he do to me? Even on my own, I’ve never experienced an orgasm like the one he just gave me.

I actually blacked out.

“Please,” I sigh when the blunt head of his dick presses against my entrance. He lifts his weight off me, and we both look down at where we connect.

He’s big. Thick and long and veiny. I’m not sure what I was expecting, but it wasn’t this porn-sized cock.

I’m not na?ve—I know he’ll fit inside me because even if I don’t repeat his words, my body understands that I’ve waited my entire life for this moment and God wouldn’t be so cruel.

His head slips inside, a physical representation of the connection our souls innately understand, and I memorize how Sebastian’s body tenses. The muscles in his neck cord with the strain of holding back until he hooks one of my knees over his arm and he sinks in deeper.

My moan vibrates throughout my body.

I’ve never been so wet, so lubrication isn’t the issue. If I wasn’t so embarrassed, I’d have confirmed that he made me squirt, but instead, I’m ignoring that for the moment. I didn’t even know I could do that, but when it happened, the deep growl in the back of his throat confirmed my suspicion—he loved every moment of it. Right now though, the sheer size of him is new. Nothing this big has ever come close to me.

“You’re so goddamn fucking perfect,” he says through clenched teeth as he attempts to wedge himself deeper.

His body rocks in tiny motions. In and out. In and out until his dick glistens from root to tip.

We’re both mesmerized by the point of contact. It’s the most erotic thing I’ve ever witnessed.

Then his gaze jumps to mine. He’s wild, untamed, and free. I’ve never seen him this way.

“Are you ready?” he snaps. The vein in his neck throbs with each word. He’s straining to hold back, but that’s the last thing I want him to do.

“Yes. I need…”

My words are stolen when he slams into me, then grinds his pelvis into my clit.

He fills me to the point of pain before my pussy pulsates around him and the pain gives way to unimaginable pleasure.

“Perfect,” he hisses. “You’re fucking perfect, and just for me.”

He pulls back before I can respond, and when he slams home this time, he doesn’t stop.

My tits bounce with each thrust. The air is forced from my lungs when he lifts my other leg and holds them both against his chest.

He ruts into me as though he’s claiming me, marking me, and it’s that thought that makes my body seize around him.

I want to be claimed by him. My heart shatters because I can never allow it to happen.

“Fuck,” he roars as my walls contract around him. Shaking away my intrusive thoughts, I wrap my arms and legs around his body like a sex-drugged koala bear.

Shooting stars light up the sky, or maybe that’s my vision, but when he thrusts up while buried to the hilt, everything flashes white-hot and life-altering.

I’m in a full-body tremor that lifts my back from the sand as if I’m experiencing an exorcism. And maybe I am. Maybe Sebastian is exorcising my demons one orgasm at a time.

“I’m going to come,” he groans. “If you don’t want me to come inside of you, say it fucking now.”

My vocal cords don’t work. Instead, I hold his body tightly to mine, clawing at his back and tightening my clasped ankles.

He comes with a chorus of curse words and promises he shouldn’t be making, but I allow them into my heart, and I cling to them, pretending I deserve them—if only for a moment.

When his body stops spasming, he drops with his forearms on either side of my face.

“I don’t know what the fuck just passed between us, but for the love of God, please tell me we’ll do it again.”

He lowers his face and places a gentle kiss on my forehead. I shouldn’t melt when he does that, but I’m too shaken not to. Then he slowly slips out of me. His cum slides down my legs, and he pulls back to watch it with carnal pride on his face.

I’m too scared to ask what it means. After a while, his gaze returns to mine.

“I don’t like to cuddle,” I blurt as I sit up and move quickly to drop my dress back over my head.

He doesn’t get angry. He laughs, then falls down beside me, causing a surprised squeak to escape when he tugs me into his side.

“I literally just said I don’t like to cuddle,” I tell him as he wraps himself around my body.

“But I do, so we’ll compromise like the adults we are. I’ll give you an end time. How long can you handle?”

“How long has it been?” I snip.

His laughter melds with the ocean sounds into a harmonious symphony in my mind. “Let’s start with five minutes. Think you can handle five minutes of my body holding yours?”

The truth is, I don’t know.

“Try, for me,” he whispers.

His quiet words weave through my mind, pulling the anxiety from me as I sink into his touch. I’m painfully aware of every connection our bodies make. How his chin rests on the top of my head. His arm, hanging heavy but strong as concrete across my belly—his hand a vice on my sternum. How his legs curl into the bend of mine and our ankles tangle together.

My mind screams at me to pull away. I’ve spent years lying to myself, telling myself I don’t desire affection, that I don’t need it, so it doesn’t hurt as much when I hold myself at night. But with his arms around me, the pins and needles poking at my skin slowly fade to a full-body hum.

Five minutes. I can do it. I can handle anything for five minutes.

“Relax,” he says quietly into my ear. “I’ve got you. I’ve always got you.”

I frown and force my eyes open as I settle into something soft.

“Seb?”

“Shh, go back to sleep. You’re in your bed. As much as I wanted to carry you to mine, I’m afraid we won’t wake up before the kids. But don’t, for one minute, allow that mind of yours to think that I don’t want you lying beside me.”

He kisses my forehead, and that quiet peacefulness slowly relaxes my muscles. A genuine smile tugs at my lips while my lashes flutter closed and darkness takes me under.

Incessant buzzing near my head has me swatting away the fly before I even open my eyes.

Oh. Not a fly. It’s my phone.

What the hell? Am I hungover? How did I get here?

My pelvis aches with the delicious memory of what made me sore, but before that vision can turn into a nightmare in my mind, my phone buzzes again, and I answer it blindly.

“Single Dad Hotline, I’m your helper. How can I help you?” I rasp.

“You are alive.” Seb’s voice is silky and smooth, and it makes the hair on my arms stand at attention.

It also makes my clit pulse with memories, but I won’t allow those thoughts into my mind right now.

“What?” I glance down at my phone. Nine in the morning! What the hell? I’m always up by seven in case the kids need me. “Shit, I’m sorry. I’ll be right down.”

“Stop.” His command does unthinkable things to my body.

“We’re fine. The kids are all still sleeping.”

“Then…why are you calling me? This number is for the hotline.”

“And you’re still assigned as my helper.” His smile sounds through the phone.

“Is that right? Then what’s up? What do you need help with?” I ask, pressing myself back into my pillow.

“Right now, I’m in bed with a raging hard-on, remembering how you came around my cock last night. Every.” He groans, and I imagine him stroking himself. “Single. Thing.”

My hand slips closer to my pussy.

I can’t do this.

I shouldn’t do this.

Maybe just once?

“Sebastian,” I scold. “This is a hotline for daddy help. You’re so lucky these calls aren’t recorded.”

“If it eases your mind to call me daddy that’s fine by me, and I’d listen to this recording over and over again, Peach. Imagine how fucking sexy that would be.”

My body goes up in freaking flames, and my fingers tap an uneven rhythm at the top of my mound.

“That’s not…can I help you with something?” I ask, attempting to keep this professional, which is already idiotic considering what we did last night.

“Your hand would feel a hell of a lot better than mine. Your mouth might ruin me.”

My hand moves on its own and circles my clit. I can’t contain the gasp that escapes on contact.

“Fuck, sweetheart. Are you touching yourself?”

“Hotline,” I say in a near sob.

I attack my clit the same way he did last night. I had no idea I wanted it so hard, so rough, so…everything. How the hell did he read my body better than I have in a matter of minutes when I’ve been with it for over thirty years? It seems completely unfair, if you ask me.

“I can still taste you on my lips.” He growls. His words are choppy, and relief makes my shoulders sag into the mattress. I’m not the only one losing their mind here.

“Seb.” Apparently, I’m now reduced to one-syllable words.

“Do you wish it were my tongue on you right now? Do you want it to be my hands that make you come undone?”

The sounds of him jacking off spur me on, and before I can process what I’m doing, the world around me flashes white and my mind falls silent. I vaguely hear his muffled curses. Even after I remove my hand, everything is so oversensitive that the thin material of my dress is threatening to make me come again.

“Shit.” Sebastian’s words are loud, and then he chuckles. That’s when I hear it. The knocking.

“Daddy. Your door’s locked. Let me in. I’m hungry.”

“Oh my God,” I gasp.

“Sweetheart.” There’s rustling in the background, and I picture him jumping around his room so he can open his door. “I really fucking love your job.”

“ No ,” I shout. “We cannot do that again.”

“Oh, Peach. We can, and we will. Today and tomorrow, remember?”

“I remember but…no, that’s not right. Tomorrow is today. Now you only have today.”

He laughs, and then I hear Kade squealing with carefree happiness. He must have opened his door. “No, sweetheart. You promised me today and tomorrow, that’s what I’ll have. Your todays and your tomorrows. Take a shower and come down for breakfast.”

He hangs up. Sebastian Walker hung up on me. And I think he tricked me into giving him all my days.

Mortification.

Idiocy.

Embarrassment.

Orgasms.

What? No. Focus on being mortified, Rowan Melody Ellis. That way when you enter that kitchen, every blissfully sinful thing you’ve done in the last twelve hours won’t be reflected on your face.

Gah. Why am I so bad at giving myself pep talks?

“Are you going to stand there and hover all day, or are you going to join us?” Seb’s teasing voice filters down the hall.

How the heck did he know I’m standing out here? I’m plastered to the wall and haven’t made a sound.

Little feet thwap against the hardwood, and Kade slides to a stop in front of me with a toothy grin. “Row-Row. Seren just went to sing her songs. You missed her,” he squeals with arms held high. Everything this kid does is done with the careless energy of a circus clown, and the overwhelming compassion he inherited from his father.

Even though my breathing hitches and sweat dots my upper lip, I pick him up and hold him on my hip but arch away from him a bit. This kid might be part spider monkey.

I’ve been this way around kids since my last long-term nanny position with a little girl named Lucy—she nearly killed me when I had to leave. I’d known I was becoming attached, but leaving her affected me as though I’d cut off my own arm. I vowed to never feel that way again. Before her, I’d only have a visceral reaction to affection around adult men, or the occasional overly huggy female.

“Your huggers are broken,” Kade says, staring at the gap between his body and mine.

Sebastian drops his spatula, and it bounces off the pan in front of him with a clatter. “Kade,” he scolds. “That’s not a kind thing to say.”

“But look,” he says, pointing to the space I’ve created between our bodies.

“Kade,” Miles whispers, trying to tug on his leg to pull him down. “Not everyone’s huggers are the same. It’s not nice to say that.”

The mortification I felt not three minutes ago is quickly overridden by a six-year-old’s blunt observation.

Sebastian is quick to my side, attempting to pull Kade away, but there’s a big thorny pit in my throat, and the pain of it makes me cling to Kade. I shake off Sebastian and stiffly carry Kade to the table and place him on the wraparound bench of the kitchen nook that overlooks the ocean.

“Maybe my huggers are broken,” I say sadly, sliding in beside Kade.

“Rowan,” Pappy says from across the table. I attempt a small smile for him, but it’s forced as hell, so I angle my body toward Kade.

“Want me to teach ya?” Kade says, flapping his hands together in front of him like a seal waving its flippers.

“What made you think my huggers are broken?” I ask him. And unfortunately, I really want the answer. I thought I’d been doing so well hiding those pieces of myself.

Kade grins wide, then stands up on the bench. “Because, silly. When you hug, you’re supposed to do this.” He wraps his arms around himself and jerks around with the grace of a wacky waving inflatable tube man at a car dealership. “But when you hug, you do this.” The kid holds his hands out in a half O-shape and is as still as a freaking statue.

Intuitive little shit, isn’t he?

He pats my head, then sits beside me. Squished up against me, not leaving a centimeter of space between us. “Don’t worry, Row. Daddy’s the best hugger ever. We’ll teach ya.”

The way his eyes crinkle when he’s happy is the spitting image of his father.

Kade holds up his hand. “But we can still high-five if ya want, too.”

Sebastian drops a plate of pancakes a little too forcefully onto the table, then slides them over to his youngest son.

He uses the gentle scraping sound, and the appearance of leaning over the table to whisper, “He’s six.”

I nod, but it’s evident that everyone in this room has had the same thoughts as Kade.

“Gram wasn’t a hugger,” Pappy says after a sip of coffee.

I frown but drop my gaze to Kade’s plate and busy myself cutting his pancakes.

“She really wasn’t,” Sebastian chuckles. “She was a cheek pincher.” He reaches over me again and playfully pinches Kade’s cheeks. It’s made easier because Kade still has a little of the baby chub in his cheeks that he’s sure to outgrow soon.

A wave of sadness hits me when I realize I may not see him outgrow his baby face, and I focus on the pancakes again.

“I don’t remember that,” I grumble. Miles stands at my side, silently asking me to scoot down the bench, so I slide Kade over, then myself, and Miles slips in next to me.

Sebastian and Pappy continue discussing Gram’s “spunky” side. They make her sound grumpy, but that’s not how I remember her. She was always so…perfect.

Miles ducks his head away from the table and into my space to whisper, “Your huggers are not broken, Rowan. Daddy said being different isn’t the same thing as being bad, and I don’t think being different means you’re broken either.” He smiles, and it’s not the practiced one he wears all damn day.

This is the smile of a little boy who isn’t hiding or making sure everyone else is okay.

His little fist raises, and he gives me a fist bump that might just be the catalyst for my undoing.

Sebastian eyes me curiously, sandwiched between his two sons who both managed to obliterate my walls in under five minutes. “You okay?” he mouths over Pappy’s head.

My fake grin is as shaky as my thoughts, but I nod, then remain a silent observer as this family goes about their morning as though they’ve done it a million times before while my heart and mind go to war. Again.

Todays and tomorrows and broken huggers. What the hell is happening to me?