Page 22 of One Weekend in London

“Not even close.” His scent continues to assail me as his grip on my throat remains steady, making me want to bury my face in the crook of his neck and just breathe him in. “I was rather... distracted after our call.” He smirks. “Couldn’t stop picturing the way you’d looked at me, just begging for and needing my touch.”

A thrill races through me. “Is that so?”

He dips his chin in affirmation. “I don’t suppose”—his voice lowers impossibly deeper, becoming a toe-curling rasp—“you dreamt of me? Of my hands on your tanned skin, my mouth licking and sucking your pert nipples...”

I’m half convinced he’s trying to kill me.

The sultry words paint a vivid picture in my mind, and my breathing hitches, my body alight with unchecked want. “Actually, I did.”

His pupils dilate, eclipsing his hazel irises. “Tell me.”

Fueled by the naked desire on his face, I let my eyes drift shut. “I dreamed of kissing you. Of feeling your lips owning mine, your tongue delving deep into my mouth, our tastes mixing, becoming one.”

An unintelligible, gravelly curse.

It leaves Rhys’s mouth as he releases my throat and cups my jaw, tilting my head back gently, his thumb sweeping across my cheek in a breathlessly tender gesture.

“I haven’t stopped thinking about your lips from the moment you walked away last night,” he confesses roughly. “Your taste and feel, your cries of pleasure as I play your sweet body like a fiddle. Christ, I crave it all. More than my next sodding breath.”

Well, that makes two of us.

“Rhys...” Heart lodged high in my tightening throat, his name rolls off my tongue in the form of a mere whisper. Now I know for sure no one’s ever desired me like this, with such all-consuming want and need.

It’s terrifying and thrilling in equal measure.

Leaning in until his lips hover a hair’s breadth from mine, he pins me with a searing look. “I’m going to kiss you now, love. Going to bloody consume you until you’re trembling. Until the only thing falling from those decadent lips is my name.”

If he keeps this up, it’ll be me who faints.

“Stop talking,” I sass, “and start doing.”

His head swoops down and I rise on my toes to meet him. But just as I breathe in his exhale and he inhales mine...

CHAPTER 9

Sadie

A loud gasp rings out.

“No way! You’re Rhys flipping Kensington!”

I jerk back, tearing myself from Rhys’s hold as if scalded, my chest heaving. To our right, ten feet away, stands a teenage girl, her bedazzled iPhone held aloft, her grin triumphant and slightly smug.

It’s obvious she snapped a photo mid-almost-kiss.

I’m half-tempted to ask her to text me a copy.

Gaze ping-ponging between us, she laughs to herself before settling her focus on me. “Bagging Britain’s hottest billionaire?” She shoots me an exaggerated wink, reminding me of Tasha. These two would be best friends, I swear. “Well done, girl!”

Hang on now. What did she just say?

Shock keeps me silent, heat flooding every inch of my face. Billionaire? Just how rich is Rhys? It’s none of my business, but questions still ricochet in my already spinning head.

In front of me, he mutters something dark about the “bloody British rags” as he takes my hand and firmly tugs me into the elevator, away from prying eyes.

“Mark, handle it. We’ll meet you downstairs.”

Following Rhys’s snapped words, the doors quickly close behind us with a soft whoosh, giving me only a peek at his security approaching the young lady who’d intruded on what I suspect would’ve been one heck of a panty-melting kiss.

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