Page 50 of Cruel Lies

He smiled against my skin, his lips teasing me as a hot ball of lust built in my stomach, heating me up, lighting the fire I’d banked for so long. "I’ve wanted to do this since the moment another man took what should have been mine."

His hands curled around my waist and yanked me against him, his lips moving across my jaw to capture mine in a heated, passionate kiss.

To say that Rowan Blackwood could kiss was an injustice to his skill and raw talent. He moved with such grace, it left me reeling. His hands crept up my back and curled around myshoulders as he slid a knee between mine and parted my legs around his waist, putting us closer than we’d ever been before. I could feel the imprint of his cock against my core, and my lips parted on a gasp, granting him access that he took advantage of in a heartbeat.

His tongue teased the inside of my mouth, dragging along the edge of my teeth, teasing me as he finally gave me what I wanted and tangled it with mine. I arched into his embrace, moaning wantonly as his fingers danced over my spine and trailed down, teasing the waistband of my shorts.

"Fuck, Harper, tell me you want this," he panted, coming up for air for a brief second. His forehead leaned against mine, and those eyes flicked open, staring straight into my fucking soul as he waited for confirmation.

For permission to ravish me.

"You wanna know my secret?" I whispered, teasing the edge of his lips with my tongue. "I’ve known what you looked like when you come since we were eighteen. And it’s lived rent-free in my head ever since."

"Fuck," he swore, his hands tangling in my hair as he yanked my lips back to his, and this time, I let myself indulge in him. I rested my weight on one hand as he tilted me back just a bit, and the other hand moved under his shirt, skimming the smooth, ridged, iron-hard abs that he must do a million crunches a day to maintain.

"Yes," I panted, my hand shaking as he yanked it from his torso and bent me back over the table all the way, pinning my hands above me with a little growl of impatience. "Oh,fuck,Ro." The curse slipped out as his lips moved to my collarbone, tongue and teeth dancing over me, nipping sensitive skin, then soothing the hurt with the wet heat of his mouth.

"Do you like this shirt?"

"Why?"

"Because I’m about to ruin it."

That silky voice rumbled over my shoulder as his nose buried itself in the soft fabric of my t-shirt, and for the life of me, I couldn’t form a fucking coherent thought one to tell him I didn’t give ashitabout the stupid secondhand vintage band tee I’d swiped off my last short-term fling.

"Harper," he growled, and like that, I nearly fucking came on the spot.

"Fuck, Ro, just get rid of the damn thing," I barked, needing to feel his hands on my skin more than I needed air to breathe.

Time wasn’t wasted as his hands gripped either side of my collar and tore it straight down the middle, andholy shit, I don’t think I’ve ever been so fucking thankful I didn’t wear a bra before in my life?—

His lips were on my nipple in a heartbeat, a single hand holding my arms above me as his free hand rolled the other nipple between two fingers. Boy, I knew his hands were skilled, but I had no fuckingcluethey could light a fire like this. I didn’t know I could burn this hot for one person.

The realization scared me.

All at once, the fear started to creep back in, the fear of being a hit-it-and-quit-it, especially to him, but I was too wound up in this passion and want and need to back out now. His lips moved south, distracting me from the worries traveling through my mind like a couple on vacation trying to cross everything off their bucket list.

It was too much and not enough all at once.

"Ro," I whined, my hips rising off the table as his tongue trailed to my navel, dipping in it to drag another gasp of shock from me before he released my hands and moved both his to my hips, dragging my sleep shorts from my waist, down past my thighs, over my knees, and let them fall from the tips of my toes.

"Shit, Harper, you’re beautiful."

His hands reverently trailed over my legs, caressing every inch of me like he wanted to carve the imprint of my body in hismind for eternity. Fingers on the curve of my ankle, moving up my calf, past my knee, until they drew circles on the insides of my thighs. Those eyes hadn’t moved from the juncture of my thighs since he eliminated the second to last obstacle to baring me to his view.

If he stared at me for much longer, I might’ve fucking melted into the tabletop, though.

"Ro, please fucking touch me." I was past caring how much of a whore I sounded like. How brazen my words were. All I wanted was more of him—his lips, his hands, his, fuck,fuck, his cock?—

"I don’t want our first time to be on this table," he groaned, shifting from one leg to the other. "Fuck, you deserve better than this?—"

"Rowan Blackwood, we could be fucking on the floor and I wouldn’t give a shit. As long as youmove,dammit." I rolled my hips pointedly, my hands at my sides, gripping the edge of the table for dear life. "Please," I added, feigning sweetness suddenly.

"God dammit, Harper, I—" he patted his pockets, a sudden realization sweeping over him as his face fell. "Shit. I don’t have any condoms."

I sat up and grabbed his cock through his pants, needing proof that he was just as eager for this as I was. "I’m on birth control. Now for fuck’s sake, either put up or shut up."

TWENTY-FOUR

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