There’s a strange light in his eyes. It might be lust. It might be hate. Maybe it’s both.
It’s like he’s zeroing in on me, locking in on me. I’ve never had somebody watch me so intently as Kiro does; even as I stand before him, it’s as if he’s tracking me. I was always the tracker, the observer. It’s strange to be on the other end.
“Take a picture, it might last longer,” I joke, nerves skittering. I’m just so acutely aware of his heat and testosterone. Of us alone out here.
His nostrils flare.
Instinctively, I back up. One step. Another, backing along the tree trunk.
He follows. It’s as if there’s a string between us, and my retreat draws him, steadily, inexorably, eyes glued to mine.
My ass hits something—part of the downed tree. My pulse races as he continues toward me, closing in.
“Are you frightened of me, Nurse Ann?”
“A little. I don’t know, I just woke up.”
He slides two fingers down my cheek, down my neck. He reaches around and takes my hair in a fist.
Tightly.
“Ow,” I breathe.
His burning eyes fall to my lips. “Now?” he asks.
He’s manhandling me and it’s heating me up. I can’t seem to answer; all I can do is stare at his lips, his cheekbones, his wild, ferocious beauty.
He pulls me closer. “Now?”
“What are you doing?”
His lips hover over mine, air electric. My heart pounds, and I know that he hears it. I’m utterly fucking aroused, and I know that he smells it. It’s unfair that he has this inside knowledge. “What do youthinkI’m doing?” he grates out, breath hot, gaze fixed on my lips. “Tell me.”
The whole conversation is utter nonsense. He doesn’t care what I think he’s doing; he just wants to see my lips move. He enjoys seeing my lips move.
It’s so crazy. I work with words, and this guy, this hot caveman, he doesn’t give a fuck about words. I throw the sentence back at him, enunciating for maximum lip movement: “Whatdo I think you’re—”
He devours my mouth before I can finish, twisting my hair, forcing me up against him in a bruising kiss.
He holds me flush to him, chest to chest, the bulge of his erection between my legs.
I want him suddenly. I want him all over me. In me.
He pulls away.
“Kiro,” I whisper.
He kisses me again, hauling me up, this time—clear up off the dirt path.
I make a quick, unromantic calculation: I happen to know I’m clean. I’ve had a birth control shot. And Kiro’s clean. I saw his chart, his tests.
He breaks the kiss and sets me on a log on the side of the road. “You’ll watch.” He goes back to his exertions.
“What?”
“We have to make more progress than this.”
“Did you kiss me just to distract me from helping?”