Page 4 of Illicit Illustration

“Don’t judge me. Sometimes I need something in my mouth. The wood… The pencilwood. I put it in my mouth, so I don’t lose it. Every time I set one down, it suddenly disappears.”

Or I don’t remember where I put it down and spend more time trying to find it than I should, and then I get distracted and forget what I was looking for in the first place.

Reid’s lips quirked at the side in amusement, and I opened my mouth to clarify, but he nodded, interrupting me. “I do the same thing sometimes. All my pen caps have marks in the middle from my teeth.”

I’d like to have marks on my middle from your teeth.

But what I really said was, “Nice to know it’s a common trait in artists to identify as a beaver.”

He cracked up laughing and my eyes widened as I realized what I said.

“Love beavers, but I identify more with the wood they gnaw on.”

“Sounds painful,” I giggled. Again, I pushed down the impulse to think about Reid’s wood. It was hard. Cue random giggles that had him smiling in a way that made my stomach twist and my wayward vagin…

Nevermind.

I stopped the thoughts of Reid and being hard in the same context from taking over.

“You gonna share what’s making you giggle with the class?” he asked, turning his attention to my sketchbook. His nimble fingers cradled my pencil as it danced across the page. “Why are you drawing arms, anyway? Is this for one of your figure drawing commissions?”

“No…not exactly.” There was no way in hell I was telling him that the arm he had been refining was his own. “Just a self-development exercise. Never hurts to practice drawing something that catches your attention.”

“And forearms catch your attention?” he asked before the tip of his tongue traced along his top lip.

“Sometimes.” I glanced toward the door, hoping Charley would show up and rescue me from this conversation.

“Any reason?”

The words escaped my mouth before I could let my faulty brain to mouth filter take a crack at them. “Because they’re sexy.”

“I can think of sexier things,” he murmured, his gaze briefly flitting to mine before it returned to the paper.

“Like what?” I’d always wondered what someone like Reid found sexy.

“Eyelashes. The way they flutter when a woman is aroused. How they make their eyes look when they glance up at me through them.”

“Mm hmm,” I hummed, swallowing hard; my gaze suddenly focused on my hands. I felt his eyes on me, but I couldn’t look at him. One flutter of my eyelashes and he’d know I was aroused around him.

“That little dip above a woman’s collarbone, and the way she squirms when I ghost my lips across it.”

My mouth went dry, all the moisture pooling in other places as he cleared his throat. I looked up, noticing the way he shifted in the chair, widening his legs.

“The curve of a woman’s hip. It’s one of my favorite places to ink. So feminine and soft, but also strong.”

Goosebumps prickled my skin as his sensuous voice dropped, and I drew in a shaky breath as his gaze lifted to meet mine.

“Have you ever wanted any ink, Haz?”

Clearing my throat, I decided to tease him, or I would have confessed all the places I wanted his big hands to trace my skin. The places I wanted him to mark me. “What makes you think I don’t have any?”

“You better be fucking joking, Haz. If you’ve let someone else touch that pristine skin, I’m going to…”

“Going to what, Reid?” Charley asked, leaning against the doorframe. My cheeks flamed as I looked toward my best friend, her eyes flitting between the man who sat on the other side of the desk and me.

“Tell them to back the fuck off,” he growled, and my eyes widened, my nipples a lost cause against the material attempting to conceal them. “If anyone is touching Hazel’s skin with a needle, it’s me.”

“What if Hazel wants someone else to touch her?” Leave it to Charley to draw even more attention to the fact I was thirsty for my brother’s best friend.So…damn…thirsty…

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