Wicked Sexy

23

He flattens his hand over my rib cage, just under my breast. His palm feels as if it’s scorching my skin. I wonder if he can feel my heartbeat, the wild hummingbird thrum of it, rising to a crescendo beneath his hand.

The sirens grow closer. Voices murmur nearby. People. People are close.

People can go f**k themselves.

The slow, upward drifting glide of his hand. The heat of it. The strength of it. The way he’s in no hurry, the way his lips feel, fire and satin, oh God this is good this is so, so good.

He stills for a moment, waiting.

Number. What number? I mumble, “Seven.”

Connor moves to the other side of my neck, repeating the process of slow kisses, nibbles, gentle bites, but leaving his hand just below my breast, unmoving. Everything inside me is aching, clenching, surging. All my nerve endings are firing at once. My arms tangle around his neck. My head drops back against the wall.

“Eight,” I whisper, and adjust my body so the weight of my breast rests in his hand.

Because I hate them, I’m not wearing a bra.

Connor exhales softly. From somewhere very far off, I think it sounds like my name.

His mouth glides up my neck. His fingers slide together. He pinches my hard n****e between two calloused fingers, and I softly cry out. Into my ear, he says gruffly, “I want this in my mouth,” and flicks his thumb over the small silver stud pierced through it.

I like how verbal he is, how explicit. I wonder if he’d be this explicit during s*x, talking in that low, rough voice about how I feel, how I taste, what he’s going to do next.

Between my legs, I’m drenched. The ache has turned into an insistent throb. I can’t concentrate on anything else. There’s only his mouth, his hand, and my body, reacting to both. Connor says, “Nine, beautiful girl.” In response I simply moan.

His thumb circles my taut n****e, over and over, sending shockwaves through my body. His erection presses insistently against my lower belly.

“Say it and you’ll get a reward.” His voice is a husky, wicked whisper. His breath is hot at my ear.

“N-nine.”

He dips his head, slides my shirt up, exposing my bare breast, and takes my rigid n****e into his hot mouth.

The noise that comes out of me doesn’t sound human.

Then a fire engine comes to a screeching, rubber-burning stop not thirty feet away, driving right up over the parking lot curb and onto the grass. When my body goes stiff, Connor pulls away, throws a glance over his shoulder at the fire truck and the men in yellow gear and hats hopping out of it, and mutters a curse.

Flushed and trembling, I scramble to pull my shirt down. By the time Connor turns back to me, my arms are crossed over my chest and I’m shaking my head in disbelief at what I just allowed to happen.

Looking at my expression, he says flatly, “Ten.”

When I wordlessly turn and run away, Connor doesn’t follow.

10

CONNOR

I

gnoring the fire alarm and the fact that the hotel might soon be engulfed in flames, I trudge back up the stairs to the bar, willing my feet to climb instead of running after Tabby like they want to.

She needs space, not pressure. Though I’m almost positive I could convince her body to push past the constraints of her mind, it’s obvious that would only serve me in the short run.

I’d probably wake up tomorrow morning with a hatchet buried in my skull.

If I woke up at all. Can a man die from too much pleasure? Because if the little taste of Tabitha West I just got is any indication, climaxing inside her might send me straight into cardiac arrest.

Sweet. Everything about her is sweet. Beyond that thorny wall she hides behind is the f*****g Garden of Eden.

I want her so much, it’s like holding your breath for too long under water and needing a big gulp of air. That desperate ache. That painful demand. I want to apologize to my c**k for what he’s going through, but it seems my heart is first in line for any mea culpas, because you could drive the Hummer through the hole in my chest.

The horror on Tabby’s face when she broke away from me was like…a grenade. Right in the heart.

So my plan now is to finish my scotch, take a shower—if my room isn’t on fire—and get some shut-eye. Tomorrow we can both pretend nothing ever happened. And after the job is finished and we return to New York, I’ll try again. Only maybe with a little less waving my hard d**k in the poor girl’s face like it’s a trophy for best in show.

Finesse, right?

The bar is deserted except for an old Native American janitor sweeping the floor. He has a gray braid that reaches his waist, tied at the end with a thin piece of leather. I make my way to the table where Tabby and I were sitting and down the glass of scotch I’d left behind.

“Kid at the pool pulled the alarm,” says the janitor, his eyes on his broom. His voice is smooth and smoky, like good whiskey. “Third time it’s happened this year. There’s no fire, in case you were wondering.”