I’m not about to spill my guts and confess to crossing that line.As much as I did my job and delivered a phenomenal feature on the racing champion turned hometown hero—Toby’s words, not mine—he’d never understand or accept that I was able to separate the man from the story.It had been a near-impossible feat, one I never want to repeat, but I did it.
“Getting away gave me a perspective I never would’ve found in LA, or it would’ve taken me years to get there.As much as I love writing and righting wrongs, that wasn’t my fight.And I don’t want to live like that anymore.”
“Buchanan, you fucking live for justice.What the hell are you talking about?”His frustration bleeds through the line, and I know what I need to do—Toby needs time, and he won’t find it on this call.
“You’re right, I do.But I can find justice in other ways.”My exhale is long and slow.“Toby, I’ve got to go, but I’ll send my written resignation before the end of the day, and I’ll come by the office to clear out my things after the new year.”
“Fuck, Buchanan.”
“Merry Christmas, Ackerman.”I end the call.
Maddox blows out a slow breath, studying me with those storm-gray eyes, and I can tell he’s looking for cracks, for any flicker of doubt.“You okay?”
“More than.”I pocket my phone and wrap my arms around his neck.“I’m glad it’s done.The proper thing would’ve been face to face, but I figured Toby wouldn’t wait—that man has never been patient a day in his life.And the sooner I did that, the sooner we could move forward with our lives.”
His lips spread into a slow, sunlit smile.“Our lives.I fucking like the sound of that.”
“Uh-huh.”My lips brush his.“Me, too.”
His mouth finds mine before the last word can form, unhurried at first—a slow, devastating pressure that turns urgent the moment my fingers curl into his shirt.
My back meets the wall with a soft thud, knocking the breath from my lungs and replacing it with him.His hand curves around my jaw, tilting me up to meet him, and his heady kiss travels to my knees, my stomach, the hollow of my throat.
My fingers find the hem of his shirt, and he makes a low, rough approving sound against my mouth.Then his shirt is gone, and my hands cover warm skin and hard muscle.He peels my shirt over my head and takes a moment—just one—his eyes dragging over me slowly before finding mine again, gaze boring into me like I’m something he cannot believe is his.
Quickly divesting me of the rest of my clothes, he drops to his knees, swinging one of my legs over his shoulder, then the other, using the wall at my back as leverage.I have exactly one second to process how thoroughly I am at his mercy before his mouth licks my sex, and every coherent thought I have left ceases to exist.
A long, slow stroke of his tongue through my folds pulls a gasp from somewhere deep in my chest.He buries his face between my thighs—licking, kissing, sucking—thorough and languid and absolutely relentless.
My fingers dive into his hair, hips rolling against his mouth.Every drag of his tongue coaxes my sighs.Every flick against my clit invites my shudders.And when he seals his lips around my swollen bundle of nerves, I cry out, head falling back against the wall.
His tongue slips inside me, and he fucks me with it, slow, deep strokes that make my legs tremble and my back arch off the wall.I shamelessly grind against his face, fingers tightening in his hair, holding him exactly where I need him.He groans his approval against my flesh, the vibration of it threading through me like electricity, and when he adds a finger and begins circling my clit in slow, devastating passes, I stop breathing entirely.
“Mad—” His name fractures on my lips.
My thighs shake, and the tension coiling low in my belly winds impossibly tight and snaps.I come apart against his mouth—clenching and trembling and crying out in the narrow hallway of his house.I grind down against him as wave after wave rolls through me, my body wringing every second of pleasure from his tongue.
When he finally pulls back and lowers my legs carefully to the floor, I quiver, legs barely holding.The sight of my arousal covering his face pulls a helpless sound from my throat.
I reach for his jeans before I’ve fully caught my breath, and he helps me shuck them fast.Then he’s bare and pressing inside me in one slow, consuming stroke that steals every bit of air I just managed to recover.We hold for a single suspended second, adjusting to the unbearable perfection of it.
“Fuck.”The word tears out of him, rough and reverent, teeth grazing my neck.
He moves, shallow at first, hips rolling in slow, torturous circles that make me clutch at his shoulders and drag him closer.I pull his mouth to mine, desperate for the taste of him, of myself on him, and he kisses me deep and dirty while he finds his rhythm.
The shallow rolls become thrusts, steady then urgent, and my moans climb higher with every stroke until they’re spilling out of me without restraint, echoing off the walls.
“Goddamn, you feel so fucking good.”His voice is wrecked against my jaw, hips driving into me with a merciless, measured pace that leaves me no room to think, no room to be anything but this—open and undone and entirely his.
His head dips to my breast, and he pulls one hard peak into his mouth, sucking deep, then grazing his teeth over it.And the sharp bite of pleasure-pain punches a hiss from my lips that makes him chuckle low against my skin, proud and a little wicked.He does it again because he can.Because he knows exactly what it does to me.
I feel myself beginning to flutter around him, that deep, involuntary clenching that signals the edge rushing up fast, and he feels it, too.He shifts his angle, tilting his hips so he catches my clit on every thrust inward, and pulls my other nipple into his mouth, sucking hard.
That’s all it takes to make me shatter.My body clamps down around him, a broken cry tearing free, and his control goes with it.His movements lose their precision, becoming urgent and raw and desperate as he chases me over the edge.
Maddox buries himself deep and groans my name against my shoulder, spilling into me in long, shuddering waves, his whole body shaking with the force of it.
He slows to deep, languid strokes, wringing out every tremor from both of us, and then he gathers me against him, still buried inside me, one hand cradling the back of my head like I’m something precious.His thumb traces slow circles against my hip like he’s signing his name somewhere only he can read it.