Total pages in book: 210
Estimated words: 203847 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1019(@200wpm)___ 815(@250wpm)___ 679(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 203847 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1019(@200wpm)___ 815(@250wpm)___ 679(@300wpm)
A smile stretches across my face. “See you Monday. Thanks, Sheila!”
I hang up and drop the phone back into my purse. I love it when she calls with good news.
“Good news?” Tyler asks, pulling into the parking lot of the bar.
“Yes!” I unclip my belt and shift in my seat to face him. “I’m looking over my photos from, um, our shoot on Monday, and she has another lined up for me.”
His lips curve at both sides, and he rests his arm on the top of the steering wheel. “They were incredible photos. I’m glad she insisted on picking her favorites because I never would have been able to.”
I study his face for any sign of teasing, and finding none, I feel my cheeks flush. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” He reaches out and pushes some hair from my face. I smile and bend to grab my purse. “Liv?”
“Hmm?” I sit up straight.
His face moves toward mine before I can stop him, and the tantalizing brush of his lips against mine makes me freeze. His fingers, curved under my jaw, hold my face steady as he tastes every inch of my lips in a slow kiss that curls my insides.
I wrap my fingers around his neck as my body instinctively moves toward him despite the voice in my head telling me to stop. This is too gentle, too soft, too warm. But I can’t stop. He has the control and he’s exploring the curve of my mouth with a thousand deep kisses and light nibbles.
I drop my hand as he pulls away, breaking the contact, and look at him, dazed. He brushes his thumb over my cheek.
“You’ll be late for work.”
Work. Right. Yep.
I turn away from him and open my door, pausing for a moment to say, “Thanks for the ride,” before I get out and slam it behind me.
But I still hear his, “You’re welcome,” reply as I run across the parking lot in the pouring rain.
I duck inside the back door and peer through to the bar. My lips feel swollen and achy from that kiss, and a hundred feelings are swirling throughout my body. Ones I don’t want to feel. Ones I have no place feeling.
Ones that are fucking dangerous for me to feel.
My gaze sweeps across the bar, and for the first time in my life, I’m glad to see Old Dill with an empty pint glass.
I think my vibrator is broken.
It must be. I’m not willing to admit the alternative—that my orgasm is maybe a little broken.
At least I have my orgasm, I rationalize while pouring a cup of coffee. It’s lackluster and the spark seems to have disappeared somewhat, but it’s there. It’s enough to get rid of the sexual frustration.
Of course, I know how to fix it. All I have to do is think about a certain British man and wheeee! There she is. But that is not a smart move.
I’m beginning to crave a man I barely know.
The sound of his voice, the brush of his fingertips across my palm, the darkness of his gaze. Every minute I spend with him only adds fuel to the fire. I’m wanting him in a way that’s forbidden, if only by myself. I want him in a way that’s oh so tempting.
Want and crave are different. Want is safe. You can be on a diet and want a chocolate bar, but it doesn’t mean you’ll give in. If you’re on that diet and you crave a chocolate bar, you can bet your ass you’ll have that chocolate. And when you crave, you’ll rationalize it. You’ll give yourself a thousand good reasons why it’s okay to have that one little chocolate bar. It won’t hurt. It’s just one.
My body tingles with the very thought of having Tyler inside me once more. All it will take for the want to turn to a craving is perhaps something as simple as a single touch from him. Then I could have him, have his body, just one more time.
And I could rationalize that it’ll be okay because one more time won’t hurt. One more time of having his lips across my skin, my breast in his hand, his tongue across my clit, my hips tilted as he drives his cock deep inside me… It wouldn’t hurt.
But it would. It would sear into my skin. Burn me. Consume me. Possess me.
I know my limits. I know my boundaries. And Tyler Stone breaks every single one of them.
I sip my coffee slowly, absently scratching under Angus’s chin. His purrs echo through my silent apartment, the low thrum of it relaxing to me.
What am I doing, really?
How can I realistically expect Tyler to stay away from me when I can’t accomplish the same thing? How can I expect him not to touch me when I don’t push him away? How can I expect him not to kiss me when, whenever he does, I respond as enthusiastically as he does?