Page 15 of Dangerous Devotion

“I’m not familiar with the manners on a one-night stand. Fill me in.”

“This is how it goes. First rule of the one-night stand is: don’t overthink it.”

“Are you saying I talk too much?”

“Yeah,” he says flatly. “But I like how much you talk.”

All at once, I lose my ability to say anything at all.

8

JACK

Ihave to fasten her seatbelt for her because she’s got the shakes. I can’t help smiling over that. She’s trembling and excited, her pupils blown wide, because she’s never felt this before. I love it, love that I’m the man who’s taken her this far. It doesn’t matter how many guys she’s slept with. I know this night is different.

At a stoplight, she twists in her seat, reaches for me. I don’t need much encouragement to take her mouth again. She tastes like the seaside and grape popsicles and everything I’ve ever wanted. I can’t help the groan I release into her open mouth or the way my tongue sweeps in to stroke hers. Someone behind us honks because we haven’t moved after the light is green. I don’t even bother to flip them off.

I’m not sure how I get her to the elevator after leaving my car with valet. She seems to be hanging on the brass handrail, body slumped in the corner of the private elevator to my penthouse. I step in toward her, crowd her. I wrap my hands around her sides, pick her up, lift her to lean on the brass bar. I brace one hand on the wall beside her head, kiss her cheek teasingly. She’s expecting me to really go for it, just pound her right here in an elevator.

“I’ve waited four days. I can wait another three minutes,” I say, “but if you need to take the edge off, there’s enough time for me to make you come.”

She shakes her head, more frustration than refusal. She drapes her arms over my shoulders and tips her forehead until her face is buried in my collarbone. Something in my chest twists. I rest my chin on top of her head. This silence feels unfamiliar—intimate, tender almost.

The elevator doors open. I ease her down off the rail, tuck her under my arm, her body pressed to my side, her head on my chest. Once we’re inside, she doesn’t even pause to gape at the grandeur of my penthouse with its floor to ceiling city view.

The scent of her arousal hits me. I’m not sure if I’ll survive this without going insane. Because some kind of affection scalds me like I drank boiling water, and it burns down my throat and into my chest. It feels like I’m being burned alive and the only way to survive is to have another taste of the drug.

I pick her up in one swift movement and carry her down the hall to the master bedroom. My enormous bed is on a platform, and I plan to see her spread out across it wearing nothing but the flush on her skin.

Possessiveness puts me on edge. It’s just one night. She’s already announced that I’m just a stupid thing she wants to do. To live like she’s young and wild for once. I can’t think too deeply about why it makes my throat hurt to think of her being so sad, so alone that this was all she had to hope for. One night with a man like me. That she’d settle for anything, for the counterfeit of a deep connection, for a few hours of pleasure when she deserves so much more. I wish a lot of ridiculous things in the seconds it takes to lower her onto my bed.

I wish I could make her forget everything ugly that’s happened to her.

I want to set her free.

I wish I could be man who gets to see her as she really is. No dampener on her power. No worry or fear to restrain her.

When I set my mouth on hers, our lips fuse, our tongues tangle and she looks up at me when I set her on the bed, licks her bee stung lips. I touch her face, trail my fingers down her neck, her chest and down to her belly. I ease her t-shirt up a few inches and find the gateway to paradise. Serena leans back on her elbows and reaches out for me. I shake my head at her, and my eyes and hands go to her mound instinctively. Unzipping her pants, I’m hit by the scent of her, a sweet, briny richness that makes me want to bury my face between her soft thighs forever.

I indulge without saying a word. I am intent when she lifts her hips so I can slide her jeans off. I leave her in a scrap of silky pink and lace. I nuzzle her panties, nearly drunk on the smell of her. Serena reaches down and threads her fingers into my hair.

I open my eyes and look at her face, see that her teeth are chattering. She squirms, twists her fingers in my hair just enough to hurt. I groan against her panties She arches up off the bed and grinds into my face, out of control.

In a flash I have her panties off, parting her slit, licking into her. She is so wet, so tight. I groan again, let her feel the rumble of my voice against her sex. She cries out, her thighs wrapping around my head. I drink in the musky sweet scent of her core and another shock of possession bolts straight to the marrow of my bones.

This isn’t the misguided one-and-done screw I expected. Tasting her, learning the dip and curve of her hips does nothing to satisfy me. This is making it worse.

Serena reaches for me, a graceful motion. She rolls to her feet and reaches up, frames my face with her hands. Her fevered eyes search my face, standing before me in only her t-shirt, her cheeks flushed.

“Are you okay? What’s wrong?” she asks me. She holds my face, looks right in my eyes and it feels like I’m being held there by a laser beam instead of her gaze.

I try to back up, to get away from her hands, her gaze, the curves of her body and that silken skin. I feel exposed.

I should tell her that I can’t do this. That I’m teetering on the edge of obsession here and the urge to bury myself in her tight, sweet slit is making blood pound in my ears. I should be grateful I stopped when I did, before I felt her come apart from my touch.

“For the record,” she says, her bright eyes never leaving mine, “I don’t just want someone to make me forget for a while. I want you. It’s a hell of a problem for me, a complication I didn’t ask for in the middle of all this mess, but I’m drawn to you. You’re all I think about.”

She strokes her thumb over my cheekbone once, twice. All my reasons burn away in the heat of her touch. Maybe she kisses me, or maybe I kiss her. She’s in my arms, my tongue breaching her lips, her bare legs wrapping around my hips. My shoulders hit the mattress as she unbuttons my shirt. Serena practically glows when she looks down at me from her spot astride my stomach. Parting the fabric, she sets her palms on my chest.

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