He moves so fast, all I have time to do is gasp. Damn. For such a big man, he’s quick. His hand snakes out, wrapping around the nape of my neck and dragging me forward, so close our foreheads bump and our breath mingles, mates.
“Don’t stop now. Give it to me,” I sneer, the effect slightly ruined by my soft, rapid pants of breath.
I’m shamelessly goading him to… what? Give me the truth? His kiss? His cock? With lust sizzling through my veins and eating me up in great, gulping bites, I can’t honestly pinpoint what I want. What I’m inciting him to do.
“Shut up,” he softy orders, but there’s no mistaking or missing the filaments of steel that knit through it.
“I don’t have to—”
“Shut. The fuck. Up.” His grip on my nape tightens. Not hard enough to hurt—Asa would never cause me pain, at least not physically—but enough to startle me into doing what he ordered. Shut the fuck up. “Do you want to know why I got up and left? Why I walked away? Because it was either that or stay there and punch the man I consider closer than a brother in the goddamn face if he continued to stare at you like he was remembering every time he was inside you. Like he was hearing the little whimper you make when you’re hot and wet. Like he wanted to hear it again while being balls-deep inside you… again.”
He rolls his forehead against mine, his eyes squeezing shut for a moment before opening and burning into mine. Even in spite of the shock seizing me in its icy hold, a thick, humid heat swamps me. I’m fire and ice. Numb and a mass of overly exposed nerves.
“I couldn’t sit there another moment and stare into that face, knowing he’s imagining what I can only dream about. What torments me every goddamn night. What has me waking up, fucking the hell out of my fist. He’s had this pussy.” He doesn’t roll his hips forward. Hell no. He punches them against me so I’m branded by his dick, even through our clothes. That big, thick length propels the breath from my body as if he’s thrust deep inside me and bumped my damn lungs. “He’s had this mouth.” His lifts his free hand, presses the pad of his thumb to the middle of my bottom lip and tugs. Then pushes his thumb inside my mouth, gliding it over my tongue where it sits, heavy and tantalizing like a threat… and a promise. “He knows the feel of this.” He slowly thrusts the digit back and forth over between my lips, and I can’t help but suck, taste the sandalwood-and-earth scent that clings to him from his skin. His growl relays his approval. His need. The flick of my tongue conveys mine. “He’s had it all. Wants it again, and part of me almost fucking hates him for it.”
Lust mingles with hurt, bitterness, and yes, God help me, triumph, to hear him admit that he resents his friend because of me. I’m not proud of it. Dammit, I’m not. It makes me petty and a fool. Because in the end, I harbor no doubts who would win in the tug of war between me and Jessie. Hell, there’s no competition, because it’s a stacked fight. Jessie would win every time. There’s a bond there between them that’s unbreakable, and Asa wouldn’t allow me to come between them. He’d never choose me.
Yet, knowing he wanted to go to battle over me…
This is what this man did to me. Had me turning in my Fight the patriarchy! T-shirt for a white, flowing peplos, while some man with a Medusa head fought a Titan on my behalf. Damn damsel in distress.
Self-disgust streaks through me, temporarily capsizing the hunger still lapping at me, and I wrench my head back. His hold on my nape tightens, controlling the movement, but at least he isn’t penetrating my mouth any longer. Though, the phantom weight of him still lingers on my tongue. And the flavor of him remains behind, a delicious aftertaste I wish I could banish.
Lie.
Wedging my hands between our bodies, I curl my fingers against the rock-hard wall of his chest. He’s elemental—earth and flame. Stone and fire. He burns my palms, my fingers, even as he provides a firm, unyielding foundation for them. What would it be like to curl up against him, to lie across him and have those big, heavy arms close around me?
Nothing could touch me in his bed.
Nothing would dare.
I would be utterly safe under him. Over him.
And that safety is just as addictive as the thought of him driving deep and branding me with that wide, big cock.
“Why are you really here?” I rasp, panic thickening my voice. Panic and desperation. And their origin story is the same. Drive him away before he can hurt me. Change me. Persuade me to capitulate the very small remaining distance into this insane need that threatens to swamp me with every breath, every heartbeat.
“India,” Asa breathes, his grey gaze roaming my face.
His signature frown starts to lower his brows again, but I shake my head. Yes, probably too hard.
“No, I heard you. But tell me why you’re really here. Be honest about why you came into my house hot. You want to use anger as a reason to kiss me? To fuck me? So afterward, you can blame it on the anger and absolve yourself from guilt by convincing yourself you slipped again? You weren’t in control? Well, sorry. Go get your fix and absolution somewhere else.”
My chest rises and falls on jagged pants, mimicking the breaths that careen out of him. He stares at me, his storm-heavy scrutiny a weight on my face—one I can’t escape.
Slowly, he straightens, lifting his head and releasing his hand from the back of my neck. Then he shifts backward. One step. Then another. And one more.
I wanted space. And he gives it to me. But now, I sink my teeth into the tender skin of the inside of my bottom lip to keep myself from begging him to come back. To touch me again. To let me inhale his rich, dark scent again. To taste him again.
“I shouldn’t be here,” he says, and the rumble in his voice is sensory foreplay. I wrap my arms around myself in a flimsy offering of protection against it. “If I were any kind of friend, I wouldn’t be,” he adds, and there’s no mistaking or missing the self-loathing there. “But that didn’t—couldn’t—keep me away from your doorstep. You want me to be honest, India? You, who run away each time any situation gets too hot, too difficult? Okay, baby girl. I’ll be honest.”
A knot of unease pulls taut in my stomach and I tighten my arms around me. Part of me wants to order him to shut up, to not speak. That I rescind my demand for honesty. Because honesty costs—and not just from the one telling it. There’s a price exacted from the hearer, too. But I didn’t think about that before I got reckless with my mouth.
Yet, the other half of me remains silent, waiting to hear his truth. Hungry to hear it. No matter the consequences.
“Yeah, I showed up here angry. For the reason I already told you. But also because of what I saw at that bar. You, with some random guy, his arm around you, not two days after my mouth had been on you and I can still feel your nipple on my tongue. Do I have a right to want to grab him up and tell him to keep his fucking hands to himself? No. But that didn’t stop me from wanting it. Didn’t stop me from having to talk myself down from asking you who he was and why was he touching you.”
His frown has become fierce again, those eyes glittering like polished steel. He slightly leans forward, and though it’s impossible, I swear I can feel the heat emanating from his big body.