“You made a lot of them lately. What’s one more?”

He was right. What was one more? Especially when it looked like him, when it smelled sleepy and expensive like he did, when it felt hot and hard pressed up against me. What was one more awful choice when it came with lips that were firm and demanding as they landed against mine? What was one more impending disaster, when it was attached to rough hands that brushed along my exposed rib cage and paused under the achy swell of my breast? What was one more bad decision on top of all of the other ones that had led this particular mammoth-sized bad decision to my door?

I had plenty of time, tomorrow, to do the right thing, but now I was going to enjoy the hell out of the wrong thing as he pressed his mouth more insistently into mine, taking the choice of which came first—the kiss or the story—out of my hands. Maybe that was why I was so drawn to him, so attracted to everything there was about him. He didn’t give me the room or the chance to make any kind of choice, good or bad. He decided and I followed his lead towards victory or towards ruin … and this kiss felt like it had both of those things threaded throughout it.

It was the first time in my life that a bad idea felt like the best idea I had ever had.

CHAPTER 8

Quaid

I shouldn’t have my mouth on her.

I shouldn’t have my hands on her.

My dick definitely shouldn’t be hard and pressing painfully against my zipper as she whimpered into my mouth, as her tongue curled around mine.

None of this should be happening, but neither my brain nor my libido seemed inclined to put a stop to it. As my hand wandered even farther up her side and under the hem of her tiny top only to encounter softer¸ naked skin and the heavy swell of a plump breast, I couldn’t be happier that my common sense decided to take the night off. She felt like a dream. Like a dirty, sexy dream that woke me up in the middle of the night hard and hurting. She felt like a dream that made me sweat and shake as I chased down something I couldn’t describe, and that I was sure I had never felt before. She felt like the dream that I was lost in and aching from right before she called me and woke me up.

Any kind of logic and rationale had vaporized the instant I saw her number on my phone, and it didn’t stand a chance in hell of making an appearance after I heard the nervous tremor in her voice when she told me she felt like she was being watched. I should have told her to call the police, let them handle whatever new kind of trouble that had inevitably found its way to her, but all the things I should do where this woman was concerned got buried under the burning and pressing need to do all the things to her and with her that I shouldn’t do. Including running into the night to make sure she was safe and sound. For some reason, I needed to make sure she was okay with my own two eyes, and I needed to be a part of making sure she stayed that way.

I’d been dreaming about her—the way she would feel and taste—when she called me, the panic and passion blended together in a complex mix of emotion that I couldn’t untangle or unwind. I knew there was no way in hell I was going back to my industrial-cold loft with its massive, empty bed without knowing, and without taking. She made me careless and greedy. She made me want things that I knew I could never give her back. And with all of that swirling in my blood, I told myself that I had to know if the reality of her was better than the dream.

It was.

Reality was so, so much better. She was sweet. She was soft. She was responsive as hell, and I wanted to devour her in one bite, instead of savoring her like the honeyed treat that she was. She was dressed like she was about to do yard work or maybe like she was going to go work on a car. Her outfit, messy hair, and makeup-free face should have served as a reminder that she was young, that we came from two very different places, but all I could see was the fact that she didn’t have a bra on under the bib of the baggy overalls and the hint of lacy pink at her hips. It was all making my blood heat up and my mouth water. She was teasingly tempting and I wanted to take her up on all the things I wasn’t even sure she knew she was offering.

I pressed more fully into her, careful of her bare feet and small frame. I towered over her, but the way she made me feel—breathless and weak with need … I wasn’t foolish enough to think I was the one with the upper hand in this situation. I had her backed into the door and she had to stretch up on the very tips of her toes to get her arms around my neck. I had to bend down a bit to get our mouths lined up, but even that made the way she bowed and arched to reach for me a tantalizing caress. She was stretched taut all along the front of my body and every dip and curve of her lush little body was there for me to explore and memorize. I liked that she had tempting curves to wrap my hands around everywhere I grabbed her.

I was so used to women that were hard. Hard bodies, hard minds, hard hearts, and unyielding souls. They pinged and bounced off my ever present armor, unaffected and uninterested in the man that lay beneath. Nothing about them ever gave.

But here with this woman, and with my hands full of soft skin and generous curves, I realized that every single part of Avett Walker was giving. I liked that she was soft and pliable against my questing fingers. I liked the way she whimpered into my mouth and moved closer to me. I liked the way her fingers pulled at the short hair on the back of my head, letting me know I wasn’t the only one that was greedy and looking to take. And I really fucking liked the fact that she didn’t have a bra on, so that when I breached the hem of her crop top my hand was immediately filled with warm and willing flesh. I liked it so much that I dropped all pretense of keeping this a simple kiss that was going to be over before I started it, and curled my hand around the plump weight until her pert little nipple was stabbing me in the center of my palm.

I wanted to see her. I wanted to know if the velvet point was pretty and rosy like her hair. I wanted it in my mouth. I wanted the little nub rolling across my tongue as she gasped my name. I wanted to get my hands inside those hot-pink panties she had on, and feel if she was as turned on as I was. There was no hiding the way my body was reacting to her. I didn’t bother to try. As I kissed her more fully, settled into her so that not an inch of her wasn’t covered by me, my throbbing cock found a perfect resting place against her stomach. I wanted the rough denim that separated us out of the way so my turgid and overheated flesh could rub against her supple skin.

I never considered myself the kind of guy that had a quick trigger, but her mouth against mine, the heft of her breast in my hand, and the glide of her nipple across my palm, the way she strained to get closer … I knew if my aroused dick got to touch any part of her, there was a pretty good chance that that was all it was going to take for me to get off. I hadn’t been that responsive or that reactive to a woman since I started having sex back in high school. The way she panted lightly against my lips, the way she tugged me closer so she could kiss me back. All of it was infinitely more potent than any of the one-night stands I had been wasting my time with as of late.