I downed the water, then set the glass on the counter before walking over to her. Crossing my arms against my chest, I stared down at her. “You want to go over it from the beginning?”
When she nodded, I spun her around and didn’t give her warning before I went at her the same way I had in her house. We replayed everything, exactly the way it’d happened. Her walking away, me grabbing her arm, and the ensuing struggle. And every time, just like at her house, I had her pressed up against the wall in under a minute.
This time, though, we had the heat of unmistakable chemistry bubbling between us instead of just the fear I knew Evie had been consumed with that night. Feeling her against me every time I pinned her, the curve of her ass pressed against the dick I was barely managing to keep at half-mast from sheer will alone, wasn’t helping the situation. Neither was the fire in Evie’s eyes every time she got bested. Seeing her hatred of being dominated made me want to do exactly that, but with far less clothing between us. And seeing her determination every time she spat “Again” didn’t douse the fire. She was sexy as hell like this, all worked up and frustrated, slick with sweat and smelling like pure, undiluted Evie.
I wanted to pin her like this, shove down those tiny fucking shorts, and see if she was slick everywhere.
Giving her a wide berth to get into position, I couldn’t help taunting her. “You gonna get out of it this time?”
“Shut up and start.” She spun around, turning away from me and presenting me with her back. Her hands hung loosely at her sides, but I could see the tension in her shoulders.
Stepping up right behind her, I leaned in close, the dampness of her shoulders brushing against my chest as I pressed my lips to her ear. “You’re all bark and no bite, baby. You think you can boss the bad guys around until they walk away?”
“Fuck off and—”
I cut off her rant by grabbing her arm, just like I had every other time before. And just like every other time, she spun and came at me with a kick—one I easily dodged—and then I had her on the defensive instead of on the offensive like she needed to be. She was too busy blocking my movements, not worrying about me herding her toward the wall.
And as much as I loved sparring with her like this, getting out the sexual frustration I’d felt since I’d seen her again in the only way I could, I wanted her to be able to do this on her own. “Think, Evie. How can you get out of this? Use my strength against me.”
She didn’t acknowledge me, just continued to respond to my strikes with more of her own. But soon, the wall was inching closer and closer, and she didn’t have anywhere else to go. With one hand, I gripped one of her wrists and pulled her arm around, spinning her to face the wall as I captured her other wrist and held them both easily in one hand while I pressed her into the wall with the force of my body.
“Goddammit!” She was red faced and breathing hard, her body trapped between mine and the brick wall. Her arms had been in a slightly different position each time I’d pinned her, as she tried different things on me. Stretched over her head. Flush against her sides. With how I had her now, both wrists encased in one of my hands and pressed into the base of her spine, it forced her to arch her back. My other arm lay flush between her breasts, my hand wrapped around her neck, tight enough to make her think twice about allowing herself to be put in this position but not hard enough to hurt. Her breathing was harsh, the rise and fall of her chest pronounced, the position she was in doing nothing to hide it.
And I couldn’t bring myself to look away.
“Let me go.” Her voice was hard, her words low and controlled.
I pressed against her a little harder, pushing her limits, doing exactly what I knew I shouldn’t. And when her hands twitched in my grasp, the side of her palm brushing lightly against my ever-growing cock, I cursed under my breath and let up, allowing her to push free.
I blew out a breath and walked in a circle, needing to get myself under control. If I was going to help her get out of this, truly help her figure this out, I needed to get my goddamn dick under control.
She paced in the open space, her jaw clenched. Frustration bled into her voice when she snapped, “Why the hell can’t I get this?”
“Because you’re thinking too much.”
She turned to me, her face bright red, her eyes hard. “Knowing what moves I need to make is the only way I’m going to get out of this.”
I was shaking my head before she’d even finished. “No. Knowing the right moves helps you, but sometimes you have to go with what feels right. You have to break the rules and do something you think might not work. Sometimes you have to take a gamble. See what happens if you let me get a little closer before you go on the defensive.” I stepped closer to her, ready to try again, forcing myself to ignore the labored rise and fall of her breasts, the sheen of sweat over her shoulders trailing down her chest into the shadow of cleavage at the top of her tank. Forcing myself to ignore everything but helping her figure this out, despite what my dick wanted. “If you’re gonna gamble, at least gamble with me. You know I’m not going to hurt you. You know you’re safe with me.”
EVIE
His words shot straight to my heart, sparking it in a way it hadn’t been for so long. Every word made me crave him even more than I already did.
Made me crave him a hundred times more than I ever should’ve.
And with the need … the want currently coursing through my body, it was a bad combination. Bad, but one I didn’t want to stop. After blocking off my emotions for so long, it was a rush to actually feel again.
“Ready?” he asked, his voice pitched low.
I nodded, looking up into his eyes, and then he reached toward me, gripping my shoulders and spinning me around again, repeating the same movements as every other time. Even though we’d done this nearly a dozen times, it didn’t stop the bolt of awareness I felt at his hands on me. That heavy warmth that settled low in my belly when his large hands cradled nearly every inch of my shoulders within his grasp. His strength was apparent in the grip he had on me … as was his restraint. I wasn’t unaware of the fact that if he wanted to, he could have me pressed against any surface in this apartment in fifteen seconds flat. And that pissed me off, making me want to fight that much harder.
His thumb ran lightly down my spine as he pulled away, a contradiction to the harsh grip his hands had had on my shoulders, and I tried. I did. I tried hard to ignore the shiver that worked its way through my body, but it was no use. My nipples pulled taut against my damp tank top, goose bumps popping up along every inch of my skin, and I was helpless to stop it.
I wasn’t even sure anymore if I wanted to stop it.
Forcing myself to block out thoughts of what he felt like against me, what it felt like being under his hands again, I moved on autopilot. I got into position, shifting away from him and closing my eyes. He reached out, his hand connecting with my arm, and as hard as it was, I pushed down my first instinct to kick back, instead breathing, just breathing, and for once, giving myself permission to screw up. Giving myself permission to trust my instincts instead of everything I knew to be right. Because sometimes right just didn’t work.
I allowed him to pull me close, his hand gripped around my arm. He didn’t stop until I was pressed back against him, his forearm across my chest, my shoulder clutched in his hand as he held me tightly to him. I could feel every hard-muscled inch of him towering over me from behind, could feel the power thrumming under those hands anchoring me to him. His chest rose and fell against my back, the matching rhythm in the puffs of air from his mouth hitting my cheek, running down the bare expanse of my chest above my tank top.
And as much as I wanted to revel in the feel of him, I shoved all awareness of him away and forced myself to just breathe. Forced myself to focus on the act of what we were doing instead of how he set every nerve ending in my body on fire. I took a moment to close my eyes and concentrate on what I needed to do, knowing I could get out of this. Knowing it.
&
nbsp; And I did. I took three deep breaths and dropped my weight, forcing him off balance. And then I sprang into action, my teeth clamping down on the arm he had across my chest at the same time my heel came down hard on his foot and my elbow shot back, jabbing him in the stomach. Though I didn’t put as much force into any of them as I would have if this had been a real attack, it’d been enough to startle him, make him drop his arms to protect himself, and then I spun toward him and did what I needed to in order to get away.
In the end, when he was on the ground breathing hard, and I was still standing in front of him, my eyes wide and crazed, adrenaline coursing through my veins, he gave a nod of approval and didn’t even try to disguise the heat blazing in his eyes as he said, “Again.”
Chapter Twelve
Each time we replayed it, I did something slightly different than I had the time before, always keeping Riley on his toes. And though I hadn’t been able to get out of his hold every single time, I’d gotten out more times than not. And that was thrilling. Not just the fact that I’d actually escaped, but that I’d done so by following my instincts instead of the path I was supposed to traverse.
Breathing hard, we took another quick break, each gulping some water, before we met back in the middle of the room to go through it one final time.
“Ready?” he asked.
Shaking my head, I said, “Don’t ask, just do.”
He cocked an eyebrow, then his gaze dropped to take in every inch of me. I felt it as sure as if it’d been his hands doing the caressing—along my shoulders, down my bare arms, whispering against my breasts and thighs, trailing over my stomach, taut with excitement. And that low hum of awareness that had been buzzing through my veins the entire time we’d been doing this sparked brightly. When he lifted his eyes to meet mine, his lids were heavy, the soft, pale blue of his irises eaten up by his dark pupils. He looked hungry, and it didn’t take a genius to figure out what, exactly, he was hungry for.
Without saying a word, I turned my back to him, closing my eyes and letting myself be vulnerable. It went against every instinct I had, everything I’d taught myself, everything I’d put into practice since I was fifteen. But I did. With him, I did.
I tried to slow my breathing as I waited what seemed like forever for him to come up behind me. And when he did, when I finally felt the heat of him there, I couldn’t hold in the shiver that ran up my spine. His fingers blazed a trail up the sensitive skin of my inner arm, starting at my wrist and not stopping until he got to my elbow. Gripping it lightly, he held on to it and then stepped closer, so close, until he could wrap his other arm around me, going around my chest and cupping my opposite shoulder. The heat of his skin burned into my back, the hard planes of his chest brushing my shoulders, the fronts of his legs flush against the backs of mine. And when he pressed closer, there was no mistaking the hard bulge digging into my lower back.
My breathing quickened, my nipples tightening, excitement bubbling in my veins, and God help me, I didn’t want to stop this. Despite what my life looked like, despite what Riley thought I had waiting for me at home, I didn’t want him to stop. I wanted to see what he was going to do next, if this was just another sequence, or if it was more.
It felt like something so much more.
When he lowered his head, the air from his lungs sweeping down my neck and across my shoulder, I knew I’d been right. Because three breaths later, his lips pressed against my skin, and that was it. I exhaled a noise that could only be called a whimper, though I couldn’t remember ever making a sound like that before, and dropped my head back against his shoulder.
It’d only been only a day, one measly day, and this heat between us had already reached a crescendo. And I didn’t want to be responsible. For the first time since I’d left Chicago, I wanted to let go and not think about every possible outcome. Not worry about the consequences. I didn’t want to do the right thing.
I wanted to feel him—under me, around me, inside me. Wanted to see if it was as good as I remembered.
Riley kept kissing me, the hand that was clutching my elbow moving to my hip, squeezing and then sliding around to press flat against my stomach, tugging me back into him. He was hard, so fucking hard against my back, and I wanted to reach behind me and feel him. I wanted to tug his shorts down, slip my hand into his boxers, and wrap my fingers around his cock. Feel the heat and smoothness of him, feel the steel that I knew was a direct result of me. I wanted to push him down onto the couch, tug my boy shorts to the side, sink down on him, and ride him until he couldn’t think.
Until neither of us could think.
Before I could put my thoughts into action, Riley lowered the arm he had across my chest and palmed my breast, his thumb strumming the hardened peak as he breathed my name, and that was it.
I snapped.
Whipping around, I grabbed his face and tugged him down to me, meeting his lips in a bruising kiss. It was all teeth and tongue, his sweeping into my mouth until we both groaned. He gripped my face and walked us backward until I felt the harsh bricks of the wall against my back. Cradling my head in his hands, he pressed his thumbs under my chin so he could tilt my face the way he wanted it, and I let him play for a minute. I let him think he had control of this before I pressed forward, my hands against his chest, and flipped our positions so he was against the wall.
I tugged on the hem of his tank top, pushing it up as my hands ran along the contours of his body. Holy God, this man’s body was remarkable. He was etched like stone, the ridges of his abdomen hard under my wandering fingers. When I’d pushed it up as far as I could, he reached back and tugged at the neck of his tank before he whipped it off and tossed it to the side.
And I stared. Gawked, actually. His shoulders were broad, muscles sculpting their perfect curves, the barest whispers of black ink peeking over from his back, and I wanted to see them, know them, the designs he’d had stamped on him forever. At one time, I’d known his body intimately, and now it was like looking at a totally different person.
He reached for me, his arms flexing as he tugged me by the hips until I was pressed against the front of him. I couldn’t stop myself and ran my hands over his skin, tracing those glimpses of ink … the dips of his sculpted muscles … Feeling under my fingers the body I’d dreamed about for so long.
If I hadn’t been touching him with my own hands, I wouldn’t have believed it was happening. After five years, after countless dreams, he was standing in front of me, a different man from the one he’d been, absolutely. And yet even with all those differences, he was still Riley.
Suddenly, he reached for my tank top, tugging it up and off, and I didn’t have time to blink before he bent down and captured a nipple in his mouth. He sucked hard before he pulled back, swirling his tongue around the peak, then repeating it all over again. And I wanted to cry and scream and praise every deity in the world that he’d remembered what turned me on, what got me off. After all these years, he’d remembered exactly what I liked.
He gripped my other breast in his hand, taking turns pinching my nipple and swirling his thumb around it. And then he switched positions, placing his mouth where his hand was, and went to work on my breasts in reverse. I gripped his hair, loving that I finally had something to hold on to while he was doing this to me, something to keep him exactly where I wanted him.
When his teeth scraped against me, and he captured my nipple between them and tugged, I moaned. “God, Riley.”
The look he shot me—one part arrogance, one part satisfaction, all parts man—nearly sent me to my knees. He pulled back long enough to say, “I remember what you like, baby. You wanna see?”
I could only nod, my lips parted and breaths heavy. He dropped to his knees, tugging my underwear down my legs until I could kick them off and to the side. Then his mouth was right against the place I was aching for it, his breaths sweeping across where I was wet and needy for him, and I couldn’t breathe.
He pulled away and tapped his fingers on my inner
thighs. “If you want this, you gotta spread these legs more. C’mon, let me see that pretty pussy again.”
I breathed out a moan and leaned forward, resting my hands against the harsh bricks of the wall, my forehead pressed against the back of my hand. And then I watched. Riley was sitting with his back to the wall, his legs extended out on the floor between mine, and I couldn’t look away as he gripped my ass and tugged me forward to his mouth.
He licked a line up where my thigh met my body, then he moved in, sweeping against my outer lips. The brushes of his tongue were light, feathery … nothing like what I needed right then. He was teasing, taunting, and it was everything I hated.
“Thought you remembered what I liked,” I said between panting breaths. “Teasing isn’t it.”
I felt his chuckle against me in puffs of air, and then his thumbs were holding me apart, baring me to him completely, and there wasn’t any teasing at all. He licked up the length of my slit, his tongue flicking against my clit, before he sucked it into his mouth with a moan of approval, and I almost shot off right there. I breathed out a curse, and Riley lifted his eyes to connect with mine, hunger and determination in his gaze, and I had to close my eyes to block it out. Stop looking at him, because if I didn’t, if I kept staring into those ocean eyes, I’d come, and I wanted to ride this out. I wanted to bask in the feeling of his lips on me, his tongue stroking me, because it’d been so long. So long since I’d felt this connection with anyone. Too long.
If I could, I’d make this last all night.
Riley had other plans, though, and didn’t let me draw it out as long as I’d wanted to. He swept one hand down my slit, playing, touching me everywhere while his tongue was relentless against my clit. And then he slid two fingers into me, curling them toward where his tongue was and stroking the place inside me that got me off immediately every single time. This was no different, and I clamped down on his fingers, nonsense falling from my lips as he threw me off the cliff, giving me my first non-self-induced orgasm in over a year.
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