He moved toward her, but she gritted out, “Don’t. I’ve got it.”
So he stepped back, calmed down, and finally noticed that she was fucking naked. His mind blanked. Was she—? Was this—?
That night in the park, she’d made the first move and said she was seducing him, slightly embarrassed but bold as brass all the same. He’d thought that was his one and only chance, the missed opportunity of a lifetime. Maybe he’d been wrong. Maybe the growing charge between them had electrified her too, and she’d decided to try again. The idea took him by the throat, his senses short-circuiting. Just like that, he was made up of precisely two elements: the words, She’s right in front of you, cycling hot and frantic through his mind, and the bittersweet pain of his instantly aching cock.
He was about to blow at the thought.
Then her voice carved through his dizzy fantasy. “For God’s sake, Zach, close your eyes.”
Understanding buried him like a pile of bricks. Ah. So, this whole thing was an accident after all, and here he was, apparently staring. In reality, he could barely see her, but he closed his eyes anyway. Didn’t help; her image was burned into his brain. She was all outlines and shadows, courtesy of the thin, tightly drawn curtains: her arm slapped over her soft, sweet breasts, the edge of one dark nipple peeking out. The rippling curve of her belly and the prim, white V of her underwear, which made his mouth run dry. Fuck.
He tried to say, “Sorry.” His voice was so rough it probably sounded like an alien language.
“What are you doing here?” she demanded, like she suspected he’d installed spy cameras and purposefully barged in as soon as she was undressed.
“I came to fetch you for dinner. It’s been five hours and you weren’t answering my texts.”
“Five hours?” She sounded shocked, then resigned. “Oh. Yes. I meant to set an alarm, but I…”
Something in her voice, the sudden flatness, made him frown. “You what? What happened?”
“Nothing,” she said. “I fell asleep.”
Maybe he should let it go, but the fact was… “You’re kind of a bad liar. Did you know that?”
She spluttered for a moment, and he grinned, imagining her outraged expression. Then she shocked the smile right off his face. “And your dick is hard. Did you know that?”
Uh, yeah. He couldn’t fucking miss it. But he’d been praying to God that she would. Christ, could this get anymore Perverted-Peeping-Tom? Prying his back teeth apart, he muttered, “Sorry. It’s not—I’m not—”
“I know,” she sighed. He heard her move around the room, felt something—a tension, a crackle in the air—that suggested she’d just walked past him. “I promise, you don’t have to say it again. You’re not attracted to me, and so on and so forth, and I really don’t know why I mentioned—”
His eyes popped open. “Wait.”
She was on the other side of the room, now, dragging a T-shirt off the back of a chair. Presumably still naked, but Zach kept his gaze on her face. Because he thought he’d just heard something unbelievable in her voice, and he wanted to read something wonderful into her words, but to be sure—really sure—he needed to see her eyes.
Right now, they were dancing away from his like butterflies.
“Rae,” he said slowly, taking a step toward her. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but I had this wild idea that you didn’t care if I was attracted to you or not.”
Her jaw shifted. “You’re right. I don’t.” But she still didn’t look at him.
“Of course not. Because, when you asked me to come home with you last month, it was purely practical. Right?” He watched her closely, because he knew her, and because his instincts urged him to push. Just this once. Please.
She finally met his eyes, chin raised, gaze defiant. “I meant what I said that night.”
Perhaps her iron tone should’ve put him in his place, but he was feeling reckless. If it gave him a chance at her, he’d be reckless forever. “What if I told you,” he said, taking another step toward her, “that I’m attracted to you?” Would you want me still? Just to help? Or the way that I want you?
She stilled. He saw her shock, and then, blissfully, the slow dawn of her pleasure. Surprised, uncertain, but unmistakably there, like the first golden rays of sunlight. “Oh,” she murmured.
“Yeah.”
She looked at the bed. It was a sudden, quickly aborted turn of the head, but he caught it, and followed—and noticed that the sheets were a tangled mess. His mind flashed back to the moment he’d first walked in, casting a curious new light on certain events. Like the way she’d leapt up so fast she’d made herself dizzy. If she hadn’t wanted him to see her naked, why had she left the sheets instead of hiding under them?
The possibilities hooked into his flesh, teasing his tortured cock until it hurt. His voice was a growl when he asked quietly, “What were you doing before I came in?”
She stepped back, toward the bed, even though he hadn’t moved. And she didn’t try to put on her clothes. “Nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“Sleeping,” she corrected.
“I told you, love. You’re a terrible liar.”
She inhaled, her eyes fluttering shut. “And what happens if I tell you the truth?” When her eyes opened again, they were gentle and hopeless at the same time. “All I can have is sex—just sex. But you’ve had enough of that. You’ve been hurt by that. I won’t hurt you, Zach, and I won’t use you. Not ever.”
His breath caught in his chest. His heart stuttered for a moment, and when it started again, it felt like it was beating for her. Those words, those eyes, the protective note in her voice—careful, she was being so careful with him.
And with herself, too. All I can have is sex, she’d said. Not, All I want.
“You don’t need to worry about me, sunshine,” he told her softly. “I want this. I want you.” When he’d made his promise—when he’d sworn never to touch anyone he didn’t honestly desire—he’d wondered how he’d know for sure that the moment was right. But he shouldn’t have worried. The feelings he had for Rae were about as easy to miss as the fucking sun. She illuminated him.
Sadly, his words didn’t do the same for her. Panic flashed over her face and she stammered “You do? But, Zach, what does that—? I adore you, I do, but I can’t—I can’t be with—”
Maybe she was going to say, I can’t be with anyone. Maybe she was going to say, I can’t be with you. Either way, he couldn’t stand to hear it, so he cut her off. Tried his best to soothe her, because seeing Rae afraid did something awful to his insides. “Don’t freak out. I’m not asking for anything you can’t give. We’re friends, remember? We care about each other. Attraction can come from friendship.” It wasn’t a lie. Attraction could come from friendship for him, and that was where his need for Rae had started.
But friendship wasn’t where it ended.
He watched as she exhaled sheer relief, as her tense shoulders relaxed and her jaw softened. Watched, and kept going. “This won’t change anything. It’s safe,” he murmured. “We’ll call this… we’ll call it a favour, okay?”
Because it was becoming painfully obvious that Rae couldn’t handle anything more than that. And he had a few infuriating ideas as to why—but right now wasn’t the time to interrogate her. Right now, all he wanted was to make her feel good. To prove that the people she cared about weren’t all just waiting to hurt her. And that daring to want things wouldn’t always end in punishment.
Maybe if he showed her often enough, she’d start to believe it.
“A favour,” she repeated under her breath, like the words were an incantation. “As friends. I can do that. We can do that. As long as you promise me—you have to promise me—do you really want this?”
Zach’s chest ached. Rae was so distrustful of tenderness that she couldn’t bear to feel it, couldn’t admit to more than basic lust—yet it was him she worried about. “I promise. Now, don’t ask me again, or I’ll start to think yo
u don’t trust me.”
She didn’t laugh at the gentle joke. Didn’t even crack a smile. She looked so lost standing there, teetering on the edge of something indefinable, something he couldn’t see. And then, in the space of a breath, she changed. Transformed. Became solid and certain again, as if she’d made a decision.
Her chin rose, and her mouth softened, and her words slid out like a delicious tease. “You want me,” she murmured, a confirmation rather than a question.
More than anything. But he couldn’t say that out loud. He was cool, calm, collected. “Yes.”
Her lips curved into a wicked smile, and it was the sexiest thing he’d ever seen in his life. Slowly, she moved closer to the bed, challenge in her gaze. An answering heat rushed through him, just like that, as if she held the key to his desire. Right now, it felt like she did.
Her voice low, she asked, “Tell me something, Zach. What do you think I was doing in our bed?”
So they were back to this. What a fucking question. And the way she said Our bed…
He released a long, shuddery breath as his mind went into overdrive. Lust shoved his words, his hopes, out into the world without an ounce of finesse. “I think you were lying there, touching yourself, thinking about me.” He paused. Deny it.
She didn’t.
“Hand in your underwear, just—” He broke off, his own hands curling into fists. He was desperate to reach for her, but resisting temptation felt just as good as taking. Better, even. “I bet you were dying to come, weren’t you? But you couldn’t. I interrupted.”
“You have such a filthy mind.” She didn’t sound unhappy about it.
Satisfaction rolled through him as he stalked across the room towards her. She backed away, as if she were cornered, but no-one who saw the look on her face would ever believe that. She let him see the need she refused to name, let him drown in it.
Which made it so easy, when the back of her thighs hit the bed, to set his filthiest thoughts free. “Sit down and spread your legs for me. I want to see you come.”
Chapter 10
The words hung between them in the shadowed quiet of the hotel room. Despite her bravado and her sheer, pulsing need, Rae knew that if she held out her hand, it would shake. This moment felt dangerous. Touching a man she cared for like this could only end in tears.
But she told herself firmly that, under these circumstances, it was safe. A simple favour between close friends, nothing more. Nothing that could burrow into her heart and soul, make itself a part of her, then disappear one day and leave her bleeding out. This was her secret moment of divine rebellion, her heart hidden safely under lock and key.
She hoped.
Zach watched her with eyes turned midnight by their blown pupils, his pale cheeks flushed and his mouth soft and sensual. The way he looked at her felt more intimate than a hand between her thighs. She sat back on the bed, but it felt a little bit like swooning. All his burning intensity was making her dizzy. He’d come to the convention as her fake boyfriend, but right now, he was so achingly real.
And safe, she reminded her barely dormant panic. No matter what, this is safe. That was his word, after all, and she was grateful for it.
Rae knew that, for Zach, desire signified a deeper connection. An emotional one. So, when he’d admitted to wanting her, she’d worried for a second: would he expect a new relationship to form between them? The kind of relationship she was too afraid to offer?
Now, she knew that worry had been ridiculous. Arrogant, even. Friendship was important to Zach, and theirs had become so deep that he’d developed an attraction. That was it. That was all. The feeling didn’t have to be romantic. It wasn’t romantic.
And if that fact had disappointed her, just a little bit—well. No-one ever had to know.
“Now,” he murmured, “are you going to give me what I want?”
I’ll give you anything you ask for as long as it doesn’t hurt.
She couldn’t quite bring herself to peel off her underwear—it felt too vulnerable too fast, even though the rest of her body was already exposed. So she left the cotton in place, leaning back on her hands, drawing up her knees and spreading her legs wide. But the action dragged her mind from emotional worries to physical ones. Sleeping with someone new for the first time could so easily go wrong.
Take now, for example: Zach probably assumed she was wet as a lubed-up porn actress, but she wasn’t. She rarely ever was. So, did she pause proceedings to explain that? Would he stop and ask her? Would this be horribly awkward with someone she hadn’t already seen naked twenty-thousand times?
Apparently, the answer to all those questions was No. When Zach saw the dry V of fabric between her legs, all he did was groan—long and low and deliciously tortured, like the sight of her physically hurt. He certainly didn’t look crestfallen or confused by the fact that she wasn’t a waterfall. In fact, he closed his eyes for a moment and bit his fist. He bit his fist.
Then, after a harsh breath, he opened his eyes and murmured, “Fuck, I like that.”
She licked her lips automatically—not nervously. “What?”
He took a step closer, his gaze trained between her legs. “Plain white fabric, so tight over your pussy. You’re all prim and soft and swollen. Show me.”
“I—I’m—” She was too breathless to get the words out, too dizzy to know what she even planned to say. I’ll do whatever you want? I’m already falling apart for you, and I wish I didn’t know why? She was thinking in nonsense circles. She was, she was, she was.
“Show me.” His voice was hypnotic, his breathing heavy. He sank to his knees at the edge of the bed, as if to get a closer look.
She hooked a finger under the edge of her knickers, pulled them aside, and showed him.
“Ah, Rae,” he breathed. “Look at you. Spread open for me like you need it.”
“Don’t,” she blurted, even as her heart pounded and desire zipped over her skin.
He tore his gaze from her pussy, arching a brow. “Don’t what?”
“Don’t… don’t say those things.” She wasn’t used to it. She couldn’t bear to hear it from that wanting mouth and in that gravel voice.
“Why not, love?”
She couldn’t answer.
“You don’t like it?”
She swallowed.
“You do. You like it.”
Too much. And what was the point of pretending she didn’t? Only, she couldn’t say it. She was mortified enough already. She just nodded.
His smile was sunshine after a storm. He slid both hands into his back pockets, which made his broad shoulders seem even broader, and said, “You should touch yourself.”
The word should caught hold of her. “Why?”
“Because you want to.”
It was difficult to argue with that kind of logic. Somehow, Rae found herself spreading her legs wider. Leaning back on one hand and slipping the other into her knickers. He couldn’t see as much anymore; she’d stopped holding them aside. But he watched the veiled motion of her fingers beneath the cotton like it was something he couldn’t bear to miss.
“Yeah,” he murmured. “Like that.” His frown was agonized. His eyes fluttered shut for a second—then he snapped them open again, like he couldn’t miss a moment. He wet his lips as she traced a finger up and down the plump folds of her labia, again and again. “Is this what you do,” he asked, “when you’re alone?”
When I’m alone I think of you.
“This is how I start,” she found herself whispering. It sounded like a shout.
He drifted closer, so close—too close. She was too hot to handle, her pussy tightening desperately, the tension in her chest leaping like a flame. The idea that he might touch her landed somewhere between panic and need—but his hands were still in his pockets, behind his back. Hidden. Contained?
“You like to tease yourself?” he murmured.
She nodded, a moan stuck in her throat.
“Then what? What’s next?” As
if this were a guided tour. A tutorial. How Rae Gets Off.
Without a word, she made the torturous path of her fingers smaller, tighter, a harsh circle centred over her clit. Even through her underwear, he seemed to know exactly what she was doing. He bit his lip, and Rae decided she’d never seen anything so fucking sexy in her life. Which was ridiculous, because she’d seen plenty of sexy things—things involving actual genitals as opposed to this guy’s fucking mouth.
But God, what a mouth.
“Do you always do it in bed?” he asked. “In the dark, when you’re half-asleep? Do you have a routine, Rae, or do you make yourself come whenever you feel like it?”
Breathless, she demanded, “Why do you want to know?”
“Why do you think?”
She couldn’t answer.
“Do you use your fingers?” he whispered. “Or something else?”
“I have a vibrator.” Now, why the fuck had she said that?
But his reaction was somewhat unexpected. If she’d considered his smile dirty before, it was absolutely filthy now.
“Yeah? Is that how you tease yourself? Do you run it all over your pussy?” Zach leaned closer, his breath hot against her inner thigh, his whisper pure decadence. “Do you hold it tight over your clit, sweetheart? Until you come? Or do you oil it up and slide it inside that pretty cunt?”
“I…” She gasped as a spark of desperate sensation ripped through her. She was too close. She should stop. Instead, she rubbed herself harder and faster and said, “I put it inside me, but I keep…”
“You keep strumming that little clit, too,” he breathed.
She meant to say Yes, but it was strangled by a moan—because he finally touched her. Nowhere indecent, nowhere scandalous. He rose up on his knees and slid an arm around her waist; that was all. He took her weight. She leaned back against the steel band of his forearm. Watched as he brought her freed hand to his mouth and sucked slowly on her first two fingers.
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