Page 85 of Forget Me Not

“No,” I bite, jerking my hand out of his grasp. “I lost someone, yes, but I’m old enough to understand it and I can damn sure make my own decisions. I’m so sick and tired of everyone thinking they know what’s best for me when no one has stopped to consider that I have a fucking brain in my head and I don’t need to be controlled. I dealt with that for four years and I’m done.”

My chest heaves with my anger, and my vision grows spotty from the adrenaline rushing through me. It feels good to finally say that out loud.

Maybe he was right. I need to start standing up for myself where it counts. Right now seems like the perfect opportunity to start.

Reid’s eyes flare with a heat that sends a chill up my spine. Like he’ll devour me whole if I’m locked in a room with him.

He once warned me he’s a monster, ready to take, and right now . . . I believe him.

“What do you want?”

What do I want?

My heart beats rapidly in my chest, body warm from the tension and that look in his eyes.

He hates this. He doesn’t want to give this up, but he’s forcing himself to.

Screw that.

“I want you to fuck me.”

I’m just as surprised as he is when it leaves my mouth.

A deadly silence makes my ears ring. The darkness in his eyes makes my pulse flutter.

So, I repeat myself.

“I want you to fuck me, Reid,” I murmur, taking a step toward him. He doesn’t move—doesn’t step back even as I stop just an inch away from him.

“Don’t say shit like that,” he rumbles, voice so quiet I can barely hear him. He stares down at me as if he hates me. Like I am the single worst thing that’s ever happened to him.

Maybe that’s a good thing. Seeing love, acceptance . . . devotion, would make this something we’ve both decided it’s not.

At this proximity, I can feel the heat radiating off him, warming me in the chill of the night air. Heat gathers at the base of my spine, slipping down my stomach until it pools at my core.

Gingerly, I press a hand to the muscles of his abdomen and raise up on my tiptoes until my lips are inches from him. I’m playing with fire right now, but I’ve never wanted to be burned more.

“Nova,” he mutters, voice laced with venom and fire and everything that makes my body hum with danger I’m not accustomed to. “Last chance.”

“I want you to fuck me, Reid,” I whisper, lips brushing his. “I don’t want your love. I want your body.”

My words hang in the air between us, lost in the wind, and I’m just about to give up when abruptly, he reaches up, gripping my chin roughly and jerking me to him until his lips meet mine. The subtle bite of pain from his grip on my skin is nothing if it’s not an aphrodisiac.

Who am I?

Gripping me around the waist, he hoists me up until I can straddle him before he breaks the kiss with a deep feral groan.

“You have no idea what you just asked for, sweetheart.”

Maybe this is what I’ve been missing. The raw, animalistic feel of another person desperate to touch me. Desperate for me to touch them.

Perhaps that’s where the real line in the sand between Jack and Reid is. Where Jack was soft and gentle, loving and sweet, Reid is strong and fierce, pushing me past my limits and making me question my sanity because it’s not enough.

It’s never enough.

“Fuck, Nova,” Reid rasps, pressing me back into the wall of the dark kitchen. His hands are everywhere. Cupping my ass, running up my back, over my shoulders. “You better tell me right fucking now if this is what you really want, because once I get you in bed we aren’t stopping until your legs are shaking and you can’t take anymore.”

Holy shit.

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