Tame the Beast : Small Beach Town, Single Mom Romance

“What? It is impressive!”

“Don’t bother, Zoe, you and I will never be able to speak Loverly Cave men. It’s a special dialect for stupidly hot idiots, who us smart women tend to fall for.”

Matteo and Jacob both look at her, squinting.

“I’m one hundred percent confident she just insulted us, but after she called us stupidly hot, I stopped listening.” Jacob purses his lips. “But just in case, justice needs to be served nonetheless,” he adds and starts tickling my grumpy friend who breaks out in giggles, trying to fight him off.

“Jacob! Stop it! If you make my water break at the beach, I’m going to kill you,” she says but it’s all muffled by her laughs.

I am so entertained by my friends, I don’t notice Matteo leaning into me, his lips right at the shell of my ear, teasing me with his hot breath as his arms tighten around my waist. Instantly, the scene in front of me is long forgotten and my skin breaks out in wild goosebumps. “You know, unlike Jacob, I heard the whole comment,” he whispers. “The very last part of it too.”

I try to search my brain for what was it that Joy had said. Something about the men in LC being stupidly hot. Well, he knew that part already, that’s hardly surprising.

Wait…my whole body freezes.

Didn’t she also say something about falling for those men?

“Don’t worry, Beastie, this stupidly hot idiot is falling for this very smart and beautiful woman too,” Matteo says, making my heart race like a wild horse while his lips are trailing over the column of my neck.

He’s falling for me? That’s what he said, right? That wasn’t me hallucinating things because I’m clearly lacking a lot of oxygen at the moment with his body so close to mine.

“Mm-hmm,” he murmurs into my neck. “You heard me right.”

Oh my God, did he just read my mind or did I say that out loud? But Matteo doesn’t let me ponder it anymore because he starts nibbling on that soft skin of my neck, and I can’t fight the small moan coming out of me.

“Hey, lovebirds. Mind rejoining the party over here,” Joy calls out to us, and I jolt awake from my lust-dream, Matteo’s lips disappearing from my body, and I let out an involuntary groan.

“Um, are you okay, Zo?” Hope asks me.

No, not really. But it’s not like I will grace you all with how high my sexual frustration is so, I blurt out, “Yep, just my boobs killing me. Mellie hasn’t woken up for a while now and I really need to feed her.”

Which is not really a lie, my boobs do hurt, but I’m not sure if it’s from them having too much milk or not enough Matteo.

“Zo, that’s not good.” Jacob says, very seriously. “If you don’t get that milk out of there, you can get clogged ducts.”

And just like that, all eyes are on Jacob and Joy slowly turns her half frowning, half what-the-fuck type of face toward him.

“What?” Jacob asks with innocence. “Why are you all looking at me like that? You know what a clogged duct can do? It will hurt.” He nods toward Joy with big, bulging eyes who is still frowning at him. “Yeah, Wildflower. I read about it.” Jacob turns his gaze back to us. “You gotta help Zoe out, my man. Gotta suck that milk before it’s too late. I bet it tastes good,” he muses to himself.

Many things happen at once.

Luke spits out the beer he was drinking, breaking out in a coughing fit.

Alec looks at his friend like he is taking notes for the future.

Grace and Hope are gaping at him with their jaws hanging low.

Joy squints at her husband, running her tongue over her teeth.

And then there is us. Matteo, chuckling quietly into my hair and me, who is thanking the evening hour for the low visibility of my very heated cheeks.

“What do you say, Zo?” Matteo’s low, husky voice trails over my body once again. “Want to give that a try? Want me to suck on those pretty little nipples? Just to make sure there are no clogged ducts, you know.”

Oh, I can just imagine that smug face of his right now. The way he bites his lower lip when he’s up to no good.

“Matteo?” I whisper back.

“Yeah?”