Page 39 of Every Breath

Jeffrey thought he could get in the way, too. Rodney had been eight when Jeffrey had come along, stealing all of their mother’s love and affection for himself. Until then it had always been him and his mother. There had been the occasional boyfriend, but nothing that Rodney couldn’t handle. It seemed that his mother’s boyfriends always took a dislike to him. It wasn’t his fault that his mother loved him best.

Unfortunately, his mother’s last boyfriend had left her with a souvenir: little Jeffrey. After three months of watching the pudgy little creature eat, sleep, and shit, Rodney smothered him. It felt so good.

How convenient that Jeffrey’s death had been attributed to SIDS. His mother’s love was all his again after the little bastard kicked the bucket. But then, not long after Jeffrey’s death, his mother was killed in an automobile accident. He’d bounced through the system from one foster home after another until he turned eighteen. Some of the homes he had been placed in were living hells, while others weren’t so bad. A couple of his foster moms even treated him affectionately, but Rodney had never loved a woman as strongly as his mother until he met Brandi.

After he had taken care of the Thornton situation, his adrenaline had been pumping; he needed to see his woman, only to find she wasn’t home. To get inside, he used the key he copied a while ago. He’d thought he could collect something else of hers before she returned from wherever it was, she went.

He’d been looking around when he caught sight of a family portrait of Brandi, her children, and Damon. How he hated seeing Damon’s smiling face staring at him, mocking him. Something had taken over him and he’d gotten a little carried away.

When he realized what he had done, he’d thought it best to take a drive to cool off and maybe by the time he returned, Brandi would turn to him for some comfort, like she had in the last two years.

The sheer rage he felt to see that someone was there before him had set him off and he had slipped up again. He knew he had frightened her, but he couldn’t help himself. How could she treat him that way when he loved her so much? If Brandi thought she was done with him by giving his ring back, she was sadly mistaken.

She was his and he had no intention of letting her go. No one would stop him, not her boyfriend and not even Brandi.

He worked too damn hard to win her to just let things fall apart at this late stage. No one else would have her!

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Mason groaned. “Brandi, you’re going to get us into an accident.” She kept her hand on his thigh, slowly inching it upward until it met his cock. He felt so large. The car swerved and she pulled her hand away.

“I can’t concentrate when you do that.” His breathing was ragged.

Good. She wanted him to be as aware of her as she was of him. The night certainly hadn’t begun as she thought it would, but that didn’t mean it couldn’t end that way.

When Mason was in her basement, she sat in the dark by the lit candle and thought hard about why she was fighting her attraction to him. In the beginning she’d been cautious because she’d been engaged and she had never been with a man outside of her race, but after spending time with him and feeling so at ease with him, she didn’t know what she had been so worried about in the first place. They were both adults, and he wanted her and she wanted him. She’d decided it was time to throw caution to the wind.

Now there was no more Rodney, the kids were with her parents, and her hormones were raging. “I can’t seem to keep my hands off you.”

“Please try, at least while I’m behind the wheel.”

She pouted. “You’re a spoilsport, Mason. Is this the same man who had me pressed against the counter in the dentist’s office? You were so hard I’m surprised your pants didn’t split.”

Suddenly, he pulled over to the side of the road and turned off the engine. “Unbuckle your seatbelt,” he said through clenched teeth.

“What?”

“Unbuckle your seatbelt.”

What was he doing? Was he going to kick her out of the car? Had she offended him? “Look, Mason, I thought?—”

“If you don’t unbuckle your seatbelt, I will do it for you.”

Brandi looked at him in confusion and did as he asked. She let out a yelp when he leaned over and crushed her mouth with his. She was too surprised to react at first, but when his tongue thrust past her parted lips, her arms went around his neck and she surrendered to the sweet sensation of his kiss.

His mouth was hard and hungry against hers. She groaned into his mouth as his tongue circled hers. Mason tasted so good. God, she wanted him. Brandi squirmed as her pussy throbbed. She longed to have him touch her there.

She stroked his silky hair as he deepened the kiss, thrusting his tongue further into her mouth and boldly tasting her as though she belonged to him. The scent of him filled her nostrils, a mixture of his aftershave and his unique smell, titillating her senses.

Mason lifted his head to lightly trace the outline of her lips with the tip of his tongue with slow, seductive precision. “You taste so good. I think I could kiss you forever and never get tired of it.” He captured her bottom lip with his teeth and gently tugged.

Brandi couldn’t remember the last time a kiss made her feel like this. Mason released her lip and pressed his mouth against hers once more. He moaned in obvious pleasure. Brandi’s tongue darted out to greet his as she felt it touch the seam of her lips.

The kiss lasted for several moments before he pushed her back against the seat. Mason unbuttoned her blouse, and she shivered when his fingers gently grazed her skin as he exposed it to his hungry gaze.

When her blouse was completely open, he rested his hands over the tops of her breasts. She looked down at his pale skin against her ebony flesh. It was such a wonderfully erotic contrast.

“You have such beautiful skin, Brandi. You have no idea how many nights I’ve dreamed of doing this,” he whispered, leaning over to kiss her on the collarbone. He pressed another kiss between the valley of her breasts.

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