Besotted: An Enemies-to-Lovers Small-town Romance (Carmel Cove Book 3)

by Dr. Rebecca Sharp

  She was a goddess. A fountain of forever.

  “What the hell are you doing?” I growled, trying to ignore the way her legs cinched together like it could hide her from me.

  Part of me wished it could. Then breathing would be easier.

  But the water had soaked through her white thong and, even at dusk, I could see the slit of her pussy through the fabric.

  Her mouth gaped open for another second before she answered, slowly drifting back into deeper waters. “Just going for a swim. After class.” She glanced over to where Kona was digging in the sand several yards away from the shore. “Do you know whose dog that is? He sort of stole my clothes.”

  “Mine.”

  Her eyes widened. “Yours?” she repeated in disbelief. “You have a dog? Since when?”

  I nodded. “Josie gave him to me. His name is Kona… and he’s a puppy with a very twisted sense of humor,” I grumbled, unsure if I should be cursing or thanking my new best friend. “You shouldn’t be out here swimming alone without any damn clothes on.”

  Anger flared in her eyes. “You mean like you did?”

  My attempt to scold her backfired. Not because of her words, but the way her folded arms pushed her tits up to the point where the edges of my vision started to disintegrate from lust.

  I never should’ve kissed her that night. I never should’ve even looked at her. Because now, she was in my blood. Not like poison, but like oxygen. Not killing me from the inside out, but making me realize just how impossible it was to live without her.

  And after a failed fuck last weekend and an entire week of work that left me with only the thought of her and my hand to ease the ache, I was weak.

  No, I was desperate.

  “That’s different,” I growled. “I wasn’t in danger of bein’ taken advantage of.”

  She threw back her head and laughed.

  I should’ve been confused or annoyed or any-fucking-thing besides mesmerized by the slender column of her throat. I wanted to kiss my way down it, kiss down along her pulse until I got to her tits, and then lower. I wanted to suck the water out of her panties and off her pussy because my tongue was the only thing allowed to make her wet.

  My fingers gripped into the rock to hold me steady as the damn woman began to walk toward me. Later… tomorrow… when I regained my sanity, I could come back and find my fingerprints tattooed in the stone.

  Still holding her breasts, she moved out of the water, like a mermaid having grown legs and walking right into my fuckin’ fantasy, and stopped about a foot in front of me.

  “Well,” she replied tartly. “It’s a good thing then that you’ve informed me in no uncertain terms, in several unmistakable ways, that I’m in no danger of being taken advantage of by you.”

  She spun away from me, giving me a view of the smooth skin of her toned back all the way down to her perfect ass, framed by the white elastic of her thong, as she yelled, “Kona! Come here, boy!”

  If lust was gasoline, anger was the fire.

  Growling, I shoved myself off the rock and reached for her arm, spinning her back to face me and enjoying the gasp of surprise it pulled from her smart mouth.

  The pounding of my heart drowned out the wash of the ocean in the background. The heat between us drove every ounce of cold from the air.

  I tried to stay away.

  It would have been easier to not fucking breathe.

  “You have no idea just how in danger you are, Evie,” I warned with a low voice, my face inches from hers.

  Now, it was my turn to laugh—if the short, harsh sound that escaped my lips could even be called that.

  “Why?” she murmured, her face falling.

  Again, I was gut-punched with the way she wore her truth in every goddamn expression. No lies. No guile. Not even a thought to her own embarrassment.

  “You told me you don’t want me, Miles. And, judging by the woman you took home the other night, I get that I’m not your type.” She wetted her lower lip and my jaw clenched, wanting to bite it—wanting her to bite back the lies I’d made her believe.

  The mention of the bar jarred me and, grasping at any straw to avoid the quicksand of desire, I demanded with a low voice, “Why are you working at the Pub?”

  I had no right to ask. And she was under no obligation to tell me. But, I needed to know.

  My eyes narrowed on her face, watching as her breaths became shallower and her pulse settled into a steady, racing rhythm as she murmured, “Not because I’m following you.”

  My present self had never wanted to punch my past self so badly before.

  I was still holding her arm, but my grip was nothing if she’d wanted to pull away. Yet, she didn’t. We shared the same space—the same air—as my other hand reached up and cupped the side of her face, my thumb rubbing over her plump lower lip, feeling it still wet from where she’d licked it.

  “Tell me why,” I urged.

  I needed to know why she was invading my life… my thoughts… I needed to find a way to stop it before it was too late—before she invaded my hollow heart.

  Her eyes downcast, she replied, “Because I need to find my own place. Addy needs my room at Blooms; they have too many applicants, and I can’t bear to make her turn them away. I know how much a safe place means for them.” When she looked back up to me there was nothing but solid determination sharpening her stare. “So, I need to make more money… so I can get my own apartment.”

  Christ.

  This woman couldn’t wear her heart on her sleeve—it was too damn big for that.

  “That’s why I took the job,” she spoke before I could even find the right words to say. “Not because I’m following you.”

  I watched her throat bob, each moment making it harder and harder for me to find any words to excuse how I’d treated her.

  Mick was right.

  Of course, he was.

  Eve was the very best of people in this world. Honest. Kind. Loving.

  I groaned. “You shouldn’t be out here alone. You shouldn’t be fucking swimming alone.”

  She sighed, and I don’t think she realized what the movement did to her chest, raising her breasts until I swore I saw the shadowed hint of her nipple before it disappeared.

  “I didn’t realize you were out here again. Trust me,” she blurted out with a pitiful laugh. “I already know your opinion of me. I’m sure you think I’m just running around out here naked hoping you’ll show up, but I’m really not. And I’m really not working at the bar because of you. Benny offered me the position randomly last week, and I don’t have much time—”

  “Eve,” I growled, bringing her disarrayed monologue to a halt.

  “No!” she insisted and my eyes flicked wide in surprise. “Look, Jules is my friend and Mick is your brother. I don’t want to keep going down this road where you think I want things that I don’t. I’m not trying to trick you—”

  “Eve, I know. I don’t—”

  “I know you don’t want me,” she cut in, her gaze equal measures honesty and pain.

  If I wasn’t so damn on the edge of promising her any and everything she wanted just so I could worship her body right now, I would’ve found her blunt ramblings endearing; I would’ve savored the way whatever thought crossed her mind she just let loose.

  But I couldn’t.

  And even the night around us seemed to still into a state of paralysis, waiting to see if my restraint would be enough.

  A long groan tore from my chest and I gripped her chin, tipping her head up to mine.

  “You have no damn idea.”

  “No, I mean, I think I do,” she blurted out. “I think you made it pretty damn clear just how uninterested you are in me, and that you think I’m just stalking y—”

  I silenced her the only way I knew how—by covering her mouth with mine, silencing the fallacies I’d planted inside her head.

  If there was ever a woman that tasted like forbidden fruit of forever, it was Eve. And I was the poor so
ul tasting the knowledge of it, the knowledge that it was warm and sweet and everything that would be worth the fall.

  Later, I would curse myself for the sin I’d committed. Later, I would realize knowledge was a double-edged sword, the sweet surrender of tasting her tempered with the sharp slice of having to live with only the memory for the rest of my life.

  But later wasn’t now. And I’d already fallen for her temptation.

  Eve melted against me, her arms crushed between our chests as my hand slid back and lodged itself in her braid. Angling her head, I groaned as my tongue slid inside her warmth.

  Christ. Even her desire was honest.

  She didn’t fight it. She didn’t hide it. And she didn’t try to use it as a weapon. She just gave and gave and gave. And fuck if I wasn’t the asshole who wanted to keep taking, knowing I had nothing to give in return.

  “Eve,” I rasped against her mouth, needing to stop kissing her but unable to. “I can’t give you forever. I can’t give you what you need.”

  Moaning, I drove my tongue back inside her mouth, searching for another taste of hers as my other hand reached for her waist and pulled her closer to me.

  She was like my own personal truth serum.

  One time. One taste. And now, I couldn’t lie to myself about how much I wanted her. I couldn’t lie about how much I wanted to believe there was still more for me, that there was more for me to find with her.

  I felt the sand crumble and tumble under my feet like the world itself was shifting.

  I knew for sure that mine was.

  Our panting harmonized with the swells of the ocean, equally persistent, equally demanding.

  Wide crystal eyes blinked open at me. “But I just want you, Miles.”

  I swore underneath my breath, teasing her lips as mine betrayed me.

  “One taste,” I offered.

  I felt the wave of goose bumps rush down her skin at the single promise. “W-What?” Her swollen lips moved clumsily over the singular word.

  “I’m not goin’ to fuck you,” I swore, even though not doing so might kill me in the end. “I’m not because you deserve better than that… better than me. You deserve your fairy tale, Evie.” My thumbs brushed over her cheeks, angling her face up to mine. “But I am goin’ to taste you because I can go forever without a lot of things, but I don’t think tastin’ you is one of them.”

  I watched the color in her cheeks deepen, her glasses making the desire in her eyes so damn crisp and clear.

  “Do you trust me, Evie?” I rasped, every cell in my body feeling like it was rubbed raw with how badly I wanted her. “Will you let me give you just this?”

  She nodded and, sealing my fate and my fall from grace, I crushed my lips to hers.

  She tasted like honesty and caramel—slightly salty and far too sweet.

  This next kiss built like the tide, slow and firm and steady until it was too powerful to reign in. My hand held her head steady so I could devour her mouth and whatever I gave, she returned.

  Her hips rolled into mine, and I felt the moment she realized it was her own arms in front of her chest that kept her from me.

  I groaned, feeling her timid touch snake up around my neck, crushing her perfect breasts against my chest. My shirt absorbed what droplets of water remained on her skin—my skin.

  Sliding both hands down the soft slope of her back, my fingers sunk into the flesh of her ass and lifted. Even though I tasted her gasp, she responded out of instinct—out of need—and wrapped her legs around my waist.

  The heat from her pussy burned through the front of my shorts to where my cock was rock solid, and my pulse faltered. I’d wanted her for too long. Too much for too long.

  I bit and sucked on her tongue, her weapon of truth—and the thing that captivated me about her.

  “Miles…” she whimpered, grinding her hips and rubbing herself along my dick.

  A groan tore from my chest, my blood pounding like a fucking freight train through my veins.

  It had to be because I’d fantasized about this moment for so long. It had to be because I’d been jacking off for months now to the thought of her and now, she was in my arms, her ass in my hands. And fuck she was so much better than my fantasy—than all my fantasies.

  I had to taste her.

  Every salty, sweet inch.

  I turned and the world around us fell away, leaving us on an island of sea and sand, in a cove of only this moment. No past. No future. Nothing but us.

  Turning, I slowly lowered us until my knees were in the sand and laid Eve back along one of the flat rocks I’d climbed over to get here.

  Pulling my lips back just an inch from hers, afraid she’d disappear if I moved too far, I rasped, “You sure you want this, Evie?”

  Now was the time. Even if I wasn’t goin’ to fuck her, she had to know there were still rules about what I was willing—what I was able to give. “Even if this is it?”

  Bright eyes that shone even in the darkening night captured mine as she gave a small nod and murmured, “Yes.”

  I think it was the only time I got a one-word answer from her.

  Capturing her lips once more, I roughly locked in the word until her hips rolled against mine to the point of insanity. Sliding kisses along her jaw, I bit along the line of her pulse in her neck before sucking on the patch were the beat felt the strongest.

  It was mine, that beat. I laved over it and let the rhythm coat my tongue, causing a wave of possessiveness I’d never felt before to burn through my body.

  I wanted that beat to only ever be mine.

  I pulled my lips from her skin with a slight pop and slowly, I pushed myself up so I could look at her. My sea-nymph. My forbidden fruit.

  She was sprawled on the rock, her long hair partially dry and loosened from her braid. Her full, kissed-pink lips slightly parted as her breaths came in small, delectable pants. My eyes slid down along the trail my lips left down to her tits, heavy and red-tipped, tempting me for a taste as they rose and fell unsteadily, and my own heart gave way.

  She looked like a mermaid.

  “Anyone ever tasted these, Evie?” I grunted, letting one finger spiral in a light circle around her breast until it reached the top, brushing back and forth over my nipple.

  She tried to push up into my hand. “No… but I’d like you to.”

  The wind rushed out of me like I’d been punched, and my dick throbbed at her tantalizing truth.

  I bent forward in the arc of a bow, cupping one perfect mound to feed myself the peak. Salty and sweet. Just like I’d imagined but a thousand times more addicting.

  She arched against me, whimpering until I gave her more. Nipping and sucking on one, my thumb rolled over her other nipple until she cried out my name as her body begged for release.

  And for myself, my own body had ceased to exist some time ago. The need to give her this completely obliterated the need to bury myself inside her for my own satisfaction.

  Pulling myself away from her breasts, I pressed open-mouthed kisses over the flat plane of her trembling stomach. Fighting for each breath, I demanded, “Has anyone ever tasted this?”

  Her body jerked up off the rock as I traced down the line of her slit I could see through her underwear.

  She shook her head, and I wasn’t sure I was going to even get one word from her but then I heard the soft murmur. “Only you.”

  Only fucking me was right.

  In this moment, I would let myself be possessive.

  I peeled her underwear from her body, my mouth going dry at the sight of her untouched pussy swollen and wet for me. All for me.

  I spread her knees wider for my shoulders, but drank in the sight of her. My arms wrapped underneath her legs, gripping onto the tops of her thighs to lock them wide open.

  “Only me,” I rasped with reverence because I didn’t fucking deserve this; I didn’t fucking deserve her.

  But somehow, all she wanted was me.

  And I’d be damned if I wasn’
t willing to give her whatever tiny broken pieces were left.

  One swipe of my tongue from her entrance to her clit was all it took to destroy her. Her gasp echoed off of every wall in the cove as her hands buried themselves in my hair, pulling it loose from its tie.

  Salty and sweet.

  Locking her legs wide, I couldn’t stop myself from feasting on her delicious pussy like it wasn’t her first time.

  I should’ve gone slower. I should’ve introduced her to every feeling, every place my tongue wanted to go, slowly and steadily. But I fucking couldn’t.

  I licked and sucked every inch of her sex like it was the fountain of fucking youth that would let me stay with her forever.

  She tried to move underneath me—to arch and roll to ease the ache inside her—but I wouldn’t let her. I pinned her down with my body, wanting to torture her with her pleasure almost as much as I wanted to give it to her.

  There was no doubt in my mind she deserved a better man, but she wanted me. And this was me.

  When I did something, I gave my all. My every fucking inch and my every fucking breath.

  And that was why, when someone took advantage of that and destroyed my all, there was nothing else for me to give. Nothing but this.

  “Oh my God, Miles,” she cried, and I felt her shake underneath my hands as I drove my tongue inside her, knowing it was the only part of me that would ever feel that side of heaven. “I can’t… I’m going to…”

  “You can, Evie,” I growled into her slick heat, licking up every drop of her orgasm that was about to crash. “You can come for me. I’ll catch you.”

  My tongue rolled over her tiny bud until I felt her body stop shaking and go completely taut. “I promise, I won’t let you fall.”

  My lips closed over her sweet little needy clit and I sucked hard.

  Eve screamed my name into the complete silence of the cove, falling apart under my touch.

  A second later, Kona howled in the background.

  The unmatched, unsteady gasps that spilled from us were partially masked by my giant goof of a dog who kept howling and barking into the night.

  I pressed a kiss to the top of her sex, and then another on her stomach when I felt it—her body shuddering underneath me.