He didn’t say anything for long moments, and I felt the air thicken as my words hung between us.
“I’m sorry.” The empathy and genuine sincerity in his words went right to my heart.
I actually found myself raising my hand to rub my chest. I’d never felt something so strong just from someone’s words.
“It’s the mating,” he said as if he’d read my mind. Maddix leaned forward and held the bottom of his beer bottle between his hands, his focus still on me. “When you find your mate everything is heightened, more profound.” He reached out and took my palm in his, smoothing his thumb along the back of my hand. “And with each passing day, the longer we’re together, the more intense it will be for us.”
I swore it got hotter in here, as if his words were an accelerant.
I didn’t know what to say, how to respond to his comment. So instead of saying anything and looking like a fool, I stood and busied myself. I picked up my plate and headed to the sink, feeling awkward all of a sudden.
I wanted to throw myself in his arms, just let the world, all the troubles, all the shit, melt away as I gave myself over to him. My dancing career had made my life so isolated, in a sense. I had no family anywhere close to the city, and if I were being honest, I hardly saw them.
But when I’d met Maddix, even though I’d stabbed him, he’d made me feel like I wasn’t alone anymore.
And as I set the dishes down, I felt Maddix standing right behind me, his body heat moving into me, around me. I turned around and leaned against the counter, tipping my head back to look at him. He didn’t speak, and instead lifted his hand and brushed my hair off my shoulder, his fingers gently moving along the expanse of my throat.
I felt my entire body shiver in response.
As I looked into his face there wasn’t anything I wanted to do more than to kiss him. It was like this powerful surge inside of me, pulling me closer, demanding I do this and more. There was no way I could adequately explain what I wanted him to do to me, how I felt, what this all meant, to someone not experiencing it.
This was special, personal. It was all for me. For us.
“Maddix.” I said his name on a breath. “This is crazy.” He took a step closer to me and closed his eyes for a second, his nostrils flaring slightly.
“It’s absolute fucking perfection.” He opened his eyes again and lowered his gaze to my mouth.
For a moment he didn’t speak, and in that time, I don’t think I breathed. I was in this trance, mesmerized by the size of him, the spicy, masculine scent of him. Every single part of Maddix drew me in like a moth to a flame, driving my arousal higher, causing me to question my sanity.
“Ali, baby, I want to kiss you really fucking badly.” He lifted his gaze to my face. “Will you let me? Will you let my bear taste those sweet lips of yours?”
I felt like a magnet was pulling my eyes down, and as I gave in to the need to stare at his chest, then down to his abdomen that looked like he was hiding paint rollers under his shirt, and lower still until I could get a good look at what he sported behind the fly of his jeans.
Hard.
Long.
Looking like another limb.
Maddix was the epitome of what the word male meant.
His erection pressed against the denim, so massive that my throat tightened and I actually contemplated if that would even fit inside of me when we fucked.
And yes, I was already thinking about that because it would happen.
He erased the space separating us, pressed his chest right up against mine, and the air left me in a rush. “Let me kiss you, mate. Let me taste you.”
God, he was just so big, and even though that was obvious at first glance, actually feeling him right up against me, making me feel so small and feminine, really cemented the fact that Maddix was a big fucking beast.
He lifted his hands slowly, placed them on the counter right beside my hips, and leaned his face in close to mine. “Come on, baby. Say you want my kiss.” He pressed his hard dick into my belly, and I couldn’t stop myself from moaning in pleasure.
It felt like he was hiding a steel pipe between his legs.
Another gush of wetness slipped out of me, making my panties even wetter. Then this deep groan rumbled from him. His mouth was so close to mine, and I knew the only thing that could have moved between us was the very air we shared. He kept his gaze trained right on my lips and I found myself licking them.
“Kiss me,” I finally said, ending the torment I was putting us through by denying this very natural thing from happening.
He had his mouth on mine instantly. Maddix ran his tongue along my bottom lip, and then did the same to my top. I could hear him dig his nails against the metal of the sink, like some kind of crazed animal unable to control himself.