Page 19 of Things We Burn

The horn of the impatient cab driver ended the kiss. Cab drivers in New York didn’t care about life-altering moments. I was sure they were immune to couples thinking they were main characters in some love story by now.

Kane smiled against my lips. “I don’t think the cab driver will take lightly to me fucking you against the hood of this car like I’m tempted to, so I’m gonna have to let you go.”

My body sailed with lust at the mere mention of such an act. For anyone else, it would be nothing but a ridiculous comment. For Kane, I wouldn’t be surprised if he was into that kind of thing.

Iwasn’t into that kind of thing, I reminded myself.

I put on my mask of indifference, trying to step back from Kane, but he held fast.

He cupped my face. “I’ll be seeing you, Avery Hart.”

It sounded like a promise.

But it was just another line. We didn’t exchange numbers, make plans. He was being polite.

“I’ll be seeing you, Kane ‘The Devil’ Rhodes,” I replied back with a flippancy in my tone I was proud of.

He held me a beat longer before opening the door to the cab. I all but fell into it, forcing myself not to look at Kane again as he closed the door then banged the top of the car.

My body sank into the faded leather of the seat.

I wouldn’t be seeing Kane again.

A good thing. Since he was the antithesis of everything I was. A near miss. That’s what that was. A brush with a meteor that very well could’ve leveled me. I closed my eyes, sinking back, inhaling the smokey smell of the cab while running through my day. I forced Kane from my mind, promising myself I wouldn’t think of him again.

KANE

I hadn’t wanted Avery to leave. Watching her get dressed, walking downstairs and hailing her a cab had gone against all of my better instincts.

Not that I thought I had better instincts.

The sheets smelled of her. My mouth tasted of her. As soon as she left, I felt the urge, the fucking hunger to chase her down the street and fuck her against a brownstone. Fuck who was watching.

In fact, the thought of doing it, doing her in the street, had my cock standing at attention. Not that it wasn’t already painfully hard from her walking around naked, apparently not feeling the need to cover up. If I had it my way, that woman would not wear a thing to hide the perfection that was her body. Her curves.

Except the thought of another man glimpsing the dark pink of her nipples or the hair covering her pussy had me clenching a fist. I was not jealous. Not by a long shot. All of my relationships—if you could call them that—had been open. I wasn’t intochaining a woman to me, and I sure as fuck didn’t want chains. It didn’t bother me that the women I was with were also with other men—sometimes other women. It comforted me. I didn’t want the pressure of being their one and only. Much too dangerous.

But the thought of another man, or woman, touching Avery, tasting her, even fucking holding her hand… I shuddered with fury.

A shower. A cold fucking shower was what I needed. Giving in to the fury licking at my throat would do nothing for me. Would ruin years of work.

The cold shower did little to help. I made myself come against the spray thinking of Avery. Not of her tits nor her ass nor her cunt. But to that half-smile of hers that I got the sense people didn’t see often. I felt possessive over that smile.

“You’re late,” Julian, my publicist informed me when I called him.

He was on the set of the fucking photoshoot I’d regretted agreeing to since I woke up with Avery’s body in my arms this morning.

“I need you to get me into a restaurant,” I said in reply.

“And I need you to get to 450 West Thirty-One Street five minutes ago. Have you even left yet?”

I’d closed the door to the brownstone just seconds before he posed the question. I had the urge to buy it off of Kris now that I had the memories of fucking Avery in the entryway.

I’d have to pay over market because the fuck liked to make money, and he’d sniff out that it was personal. But I didn’t give a fuck. I wanted to halt all renovations on my penthouse, sell it and move into the place where I’d first tasted, first owned, Avery Hart.

“It’s called Inferno,” I said, jogging the few feet to my bike.

My cock twitched at the memory of her behind me last night, her heat pressing into me. I’d been sure I’d have to ease her intothe ride; she was uptight—in a way that made me desperate to unwind her. Classy. She was not someone who looked used to being on the back of a bike. She’d surprised and delighted the fuck out of me when she’d demanded I’d go fast.

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