Page 226 of Tell Me Something True

“Instead, I want to replace their touch with my own,” he murmured, his gaze trailing over her features, as if committing them to memory. “I want to erase theirs from your memory until all you can remember is mine. My hands. My mouth. My tongue.”

She shivered, a full body tremble that originated low in her belly. Tugged between her legs. Shaking her head, she pressed back even farther, as if she could escape the pull of his words, the neediness they created inside her by becoming one with the wall. “No.”

But, this time, it was barely a whisper.

He edged in closer. Lifted his hand to her face, his scabbed over knuckles proof of how powerful he was. How dangerous he could be. But when he trailed his fingertips from her temple down her cheek, his touch was unbelievably gentle. Almost… reverent.

And so all-consuming she almost didn’t notice when his other hand settled on her hip, his fingers immediately sliding beneath the hem of her sweatshirt.

Almost.

But now that it was there, her focus narrowed in on the press of his fingertips against her skin. The roughness of them. The way they moved back and forth, as if, now that he’d given himself permission to touch her, he couldn’t get enough of her. How they were slowly, slowly drawing her closer and closer to him.

It was that realization that had her lifting her hands to his chest. He immediately stilled, his fingers at her hip curling around her waist. His hand on her face drifting to her bare shoulder, the tips of his fingers wrapping around the strap of her tank top. Holding on.

Waiting for her to push him away.

She meant to. She really did. But the moment she touched his bare chest, her thoughts went wobbly. Her intentions dissolved. His skin was hot and smooth. The muscles of his pecs hard.

But it was the quick, unsteady beat of his heart that had her flattening her hand against him. Absorbing that beat into her palm.

Knowing it matched her own.

He exhaled, a soft, relieved breath, that hand on her hip once more drawing her closer. “You’re in my head,” he told her, his voice a low, warm rumble that stroked across her skin. “All the time. Every fucking day. Every goddamn night.” He unwound his fingers from her tank top strap. Slid that hand to cup her throat, the pad of his thumb brushing the rapidly beating pulse under her jaw. “I dream about you, princess.”

She shut her eyes against his whispered words.

His most dangerous confession of all.

Her blood surged through her, hot and heavy. But it was all a lie. Oh, she didn’t doubt he wanted her. The pull between them was obvious.

Obvious and completely physical.

No, what she didn’t believe was everything else.

Refused to believe after everything he’d said before it.

After what he did.

Opening her eyes, she dropped her hands from his chest. “So, you don’t want any other boy to touch me? I’m just supposed to sit around, keeping my virginity firmly intact until you decide that I’m worth your time and attention after all? Oh, and while I’m waiting and pining for you, living like a nun, it’s okay for you to hook up with as many other girls as you like? Do I have that right?”

He frowned. Shook his head. “No.”

She snorted. “I know you were with McKenna. At the lake. She posted a picture of you two on Instagram. I told you I liked you and the next night you screwed someone else.”

His head went back, that guilty flush returning, brighter than before.

When he stayed silent, she shrugged his hand off her shoulder. Twisted her hip out of his hold. “Tell me, did you do it to prove how much you didn’t want me? Or just to hurt me?”

His mouth thinned, but his gaze stayed on hers, watchful and steady and full of something she refused to believe was shame.

Or remorse.

“You can’t keep doing this.” And oh, how she hated the way her voice shook. That he was seeing exactly how much he’d hurt her. “You can’t keep tugging me toward you only to push me away when I get too close. And I can’t keep letting you.”

He blew out a breath, one that seemed as unsteady as her voice had been. “Princess,” he said, low and gravely and in an entreating, tender tone he’d never, not once before, used when calling her that, “I—”

“Verity!” Urban called, pounding on the door.

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