He pulled back, slowly, slowly. “There,” he whispered.

“More,” she told him.

“Know what I’d do with you, if you were in my bed?” His voice was gravel and bittersweet longing. “Kiss you until I couldn’t taste myself anymore. Just fruit tea and too much mouth. Put my hands on every inch of you. So soft, Chlo.” He swept his thumb over her skin. “How do you do that?” His voice cracked as if she’d ruined his life by moisturizing after she showered. He shook his head and laughed, apparently at himself. “I want to make you cry. I bet you get like that, don’t you? When it’s too much. When it feels too good.”

She’d been wrong about his lack of telepathy. He was an excellent mind reader. “Maybe. Sometimes.”

He groaned. The thumb stroking her cheek moved lower, parting her lips. She bit him back. He swallowed so hard she heard it. She sucked his thumb into her mouth. He groaned again. Then he ruined everything. “Tell me why you stopped me. Before.”

She hesitated, uncertainty draining most of her pleasure. She couldn’t tell him, not without revealing too much of herself. What was she supposed to say? That she already liked him far too much? That he made it too easy to be intimate, to be honest, to be weak in a way that felt so good but also left her open to so much hurt?

She didn’t want to have that conversation, to admit how she’d worried then, or how she wanted him too badly to worry now. She could see how easy it would be to fall for this man. She could see the phantoms of all the feelings she could develop for him, like premonitions. And she could see him throwing those feelings in her face, the way people always did.

Her body was vulnerable enough without her heart following suit.

So she reminded him gently, “You said you wouldn’t make this complicated.” Please don’t make this complicated. I really want to put my mouth on you.

He gave her a rueful smile and murmured, “I did, didn’t I?”

“Your rules, Mr. Morgan. Please abide by them.”

As she’d hoped, her crisp, mocking tones widened his smile. “Shut up. Come here.” Her stomach dipped as he lifted her, then put her between his spread thighs. Her back was against his chest. He leaned against the stone pillar of the monument they were absolutely not about to defile. From his position behind her, he murmured in her ear, “Comfortable?” His breath shivered over her skin. She felt his voice rumble in his chest, pleasure zipping down her spine.

“Yes,” she breathed.

“Are you cold?”

“No.” Because he’d wrapped his arms around her, shielding her from the night air with his big, warm body. And because all she could feel at this moment was a painful mix of pleasure and frustration.

“Good,” he said. His lips brushed her frantic pulse. “Let’s play I want.”

She settled against him, put her hands on his thick forearms as if she could stop him from letting go. “I want? As in, I want to trace the tattoos on your chest with my tongue?”

A long breath shuddered out of him. “Yeah. Like that.”

The fact that he was turned on by something as simple as her words made her brave. Reckless. Wild, for a woman like her. “As in …” She thought for a moment, flicking through fantasies she’d never let herself fully acknowledge. “I want to lie naked with you just to know what your skin feels like against mine?”

“You’re good at this.” He shifted behind her. The hard jut of his erection hit the base of her spine.

“I want to see your cock,” she blurted, then bit her lip.

He groaned. Pressed his face against the back of her neck. “My turn.”

“Tell me.”

“I want to see you. Right now, in the light. I want to see how you look when you’re so turned on it’s making you shake.”

He was right, she realized; she was shaking. “Oh.”

“I want to put my hand under your skirt and feel how hot your pretty cunt is. But I bet you wouldn’t let me do that in public.”

She sucked down a gulp of cold air to stop herself from burning up inside. “Certainly not,” she lied.

“I want to know how wet you are right now.”

“Very,” she whispered.

He put a hand on top of hers, laced their fingers together. “Touch yourself, if I can’t. Will you do that in public?”

When she slid her hand under her skirt, his came along for the ride. But she didn’t lead for long. He took over, as if he couldn’t help himself, all firm, easy strength. Slowly, he trailed their interwoven fingertips over her inner thigh. Chloe swallowed a gasp. “This is cheating,” she breathed.

“Nope,” he said softly. “Ain’t this what they call creative problem solving?”

She couldn’t speak. She had no oxygen left; the hypnotic circles he made, the sensations he sent dancing over her skin, had stolen every last breath from her lungs. There was too much blood in her veins, too much need pulsing through her clit. Her belly was tense and trembling, her body rigid, every muscle taut. She was on the verge of overloading in the best way possible.

The uneven click of stumbling heels floated to her ears. Happy shrieks, too-loud chatter: a group of drunken women walking by, just up the street. Friends, probably, out having fun. On any other day she’d feel a pang of jealousy; irritation at herself for holding back from that; annoyance at the world for flinching away from her. Today, though, all she felt was frustration because Red’s slow, addictive circles over her thigh had stopped.

She tried to tug his hand back into motion, and he laughed. “You always surprise me, Chloe.”

“They can’t see us.”

“You’re bad tonight.” His voice was all gravel. “Don’t know why I’m trying to behave.”

“Feel free to stop trying.” She was done pretending to be demure.

He caught her earlobe between his teeth and an arrow of sensation flashed through her. “All right.” Rough, wicked words. A switch had been flicked. Beneath her skirt, his hand disentangled from hers. He was bolder without her. He squeezed her thigh and whispered hot against her cheek, “I want to hold you open like this when you take my cock.”

When she closed her eyes she could see it: him kneeling over her, forcing her legs apart, fucking deeper and deeper. She whimpered and the sound seemed to spur him on. He pressed his palm against her pussy, cupping her possessively over her underwear, and the same moan shuddered through both of them at once.

“You’re soaked. You’re fucking—Chloe—”

“Please,” she gasped, her hips jerking forward. “Please.” The heel of his hand was a delicious pressure against her swollen clit. How did he know where to touch, how to touch? He was some kind of vaginal magician. When he hooked one thick finger under the edge of her knickers she wanted to scream. Bit her lip hard. Shook with the effort of keeping quiet.

Supposedly, Chloe felt more than other people did. Chronic pain literally rewired brain pathways until you were more conscious of your own body than you should be, until you hurt more intensely than was healthy. An inescapable cycle. Only now did she see a potential upside: she must feel more pleasure than normal, too. She must. Because surely this wasn’t ordinary. Lungs tight, ears ringing, heart shaking instead of beating, and her pussy slick and swollen—this couldn’t be ordinary.