Total pages in book: 144
Estimated words: 138522 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 693(@200wpm)___ 554(@250wpm)___ 462(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 138522 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 693(@200wpm)___ 554(@250wpm)___ 462(@300wpm)
“It is,” she says. “It’s fucking and don’t call it anything else. I don’t need to call it anything else.”
“Oh we’re fucking, baby, but there are different degrees of fucking. There’s the kind that’s just done and over and then you barely know who fucked you. And then there’s the kind you remember. The kind you crave more of and can’t get enough of. The kind where you know exactly who made you come, and exactly who you need to make you come again. And you’re going to remember this and so am I.” My gaze lowers over her puckered nipples and high breasts before it returns to her face. “You’re so damn beautiful.”
Her lashes lower, her expression affected in all the ways I want her affected. I lean in and press my cheek to hers, brushing my lips over her delicate skin, inhaling that sweet scent of her even as I nuzzle her neck. “I want you in a bad way, woman. I brought you here. That’s more control than you realize it is.” I pull back to look at her. “Don’t move your hands. Do what I say. It’s all about pleasure. It’s all about the moment.” I don’t force her to respond. I lean in and brush my lips over hers. “It’s just you and me, and we’re on top of the dark waters of that ocean behind you, where no one can reach us. Don’t move,” I say again.
This time I release her hands and I step away from her, just far enough to appreciate how damn hot she is leaning against that railing, the ocean and the Statue of Liberty behind her. Her in nothing but thigh highs and a tiny pair of panties. “Now what?” she challenges, her chin lifting in defiance, as if she refuses to cower under my inspection, which makes me wonder if the man before me wanted that. If he wanted her to cower.
“This,” I say, reaching for my shirt. Unbuttoning just enough to pull it over my head. I toss it, letting it float down to hit the hardwood floor while her eyes rake over my body, landing where I expect them to land: my tattoo, the half sleeve I got when I was struggling with loss.
Her eyes go from it to me. “You have a lion on your arm and its eyes are blue like yours.”
“Like my mother’s,” I say when I would normally say nothing else.
“She’s gone,” she whispers. “She’s gone, right?”
I feel that question with the same pain I always feel, a biting, deep, pain that I don’t like exposed but she’s exposed herself in ways I don’t think she intended: she’s naked now, with a man she wanted to hire, that she wanted to help her, and that means I need to give her something, I need to make her feel that I’m exposed as well.
I close the small space between us, my hands settling on her narrow waist. “It’s about faith and strength, two things she valued.”
Her hand goes to the lion. “She’s gone.”
“Yes. She’s gone, but I’m right here.” I press her hand back to the railing. “Right here, one hundred percent with you and just you.” I cup her face. “Where I choose to be.”
“You really confuse me,” she whispers.
“Don’t be confused,” I say. “Let me be clear to erase any doubt you have. I want you like I have not wanted in a very long time.” And with that, I close my mouth down on hers, licking past her teeth, tasting her, and holy hell, she tastes like everything I have ever wanted, everything I have denied I needed. I tell myself to resist that idea but she moans this soft, sweet moan that undoes me.
I cup her head and deepen the kiss, my fingers finding her nipple, my need to undo her the way she undoes me driving me now. And she responds as I want, all but going limp against me, her knees swaying, while the angle of her body forces her hands to stay on that railing. I tear my mouth from hers and breathe with her. “I’m going to make you come now,” I promise. “And then I’m going to do it again.”
“What about you?”
“That’s later. This is now.” I lower myself to one knee, my hands on her hips, my gaze meeting hers, her teeth scratching her bottom lip.
“Gabe, I—”
“You what?” I ask, pressing my lips to her belly and licking the soft skin there, her muscles trembling with the touch. I look up at her and prod, “You what?”
“I—can’t seem to remember.”
“You want? You need?”
“Yes,” she whispers. “Those things.”
I reach for her panties, and close my hand around them, ripping them from her body. She yelps and I scrape my teeth over her hip, laving the offended skin with my tongue, licking my way back to her center. I linger there and my gaze lifts to hers. “I really want to touch you,” she pleads.