Page 50 of Thornhill Road

“Chances are high I pass out if you don’t stop touching me like that,” I warned him. Though, hoping he wouldn’t stop, I added, “Unless you keep me talking.”

His knuckles continued their journey back and forth across my skin.

“Why are all the walls in your house painted a different color?” he asked.

My body shook with my laughter. “It came like that when I bought it.” A yawn interrupted me before I went on to tell him, “I moved in a couple years ago with all these grand plans of remodeling it. I have the cans of paint in the garage andeverything. I got as far as my bedroom and then was too tired or busy to keep going.”

He didn’t miss a beat before he replied, “Tell me what color in what room. Brothers and I’ll come finish the job one day while you’re at work.”

I frowned, taken aback by the offer. “I—I couldn’t ask you to do that.”

“You’re not askin’, I’m tellin’. You got a man now, sugar, which means you don’t have to live in a place resembling a box of skittles.”

This time, I knew I was not delirious.

I propped myself up on my elbow, and my eyes caught hazel-blue as I blurted, “I’ve got a man?”

“Yeah, Tess. You’re lookin’ at him,” he told me matter-of-factly.

My eyebrows shot up my forehead. “Mustang, you—”

He didn’t let me finish. Instead, he said, “Tess, I like where this is goin’. I swear, if you spout some shit about how I don’t know you, I’ll spank your ass. I know enough. I know the thought of someone else’s hands on you—or worse, you on the back of some other fucker’s bike—pisses me right the hell off. So, yeah, you got a man. Not ten minutes ago, he came in your mouth, and you came in his.”

My mouth fell open but no words came out, all of them stuck in my throat. I then watched as Mustang’s gaze drifted down to my lips and a thrill raced up and down my spine.

I shut my mouth, forced a swallow, then found my words.

“What I was going to say is—you can’t say stuff like that to a woman like me. I fall hard and fast. Every time. Too hard and too fast,every time, Mustang. And every time, I’m the one who gets hurt because I come on too strong too soon. I—I can’t help it.

“I spend all day protecting my heart. When I leave my patients and their families, I no longer have the capacity to do that in any other area of my life. If you say stuff like that to me—”

He cut me off, again, rolling toward me and pinning me beneath his body as he said, “Sugar, you fall as fast and as hard as you’re going to. Rate we’re goin’? I’ll be there at the bottom to break your fall.”

My breath caught, and my chest felt heavy as my eyes grew glassy with tears.

I was in so, so, so much trouble.

“Mustang…” I barely managed on a whisper.

“Done talkin’ about it, baby,” he said.

Then he kissed me.

I let go and began my free fall.

He explored my mouth with his tongue and my body with his hands until he was hard again. He then diligently sought after my last orgasm of the night and enjoyed my body until he was spent.

When he left me in bed to go dispose of his condom, I passed out before he even reached the hallway.

I didn’t hear it when my man came back.

I didn’t feel it when he crawled into bed with me.

But I slept all night wrapped in my man’s arms.

And that’s who Mustang was.

Mine.

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