Page 48 of Desperate Desires

“I-I’m interested,” I confessed.

Ono hummed deep in his throat, but he didn’t smirk or talk down to me. I was half-afraid he’d use it against me and walk away.

Instead, heat filled his eyes, and his lids lowered to half-mast as he continued to take off his shirt. Watching me as he moved with effortless grace and efficiency.

My throat felt tight, and I couldn’t help but stare. He was so sexy. Movie star handsome with the body of a professional fighter.

“I like your eyes on me, Doc. Can’t wait for you to touch me,” he growled, tossing his shirt near his jacket, revealing acres of pale skin with black ink and ropes of muscle that covered his back.

He faced me once more and my gaze flicked to his wounded shoulder. I released a sigh of relief at the signs of healing I saw.

I didn’t even know I was that worried until I wasn’t. And that was troublesome. Ono shouldn’t be this important to me.

He was a stranger.

Well. Sorta.

Except for the whole his cock had already been inside me thing.

Point was, I didn’t really know him. I had no claim on him.

But I wish I did.

Just watching him felt like staring too long at something forbidden and exquisite—it made me covetous, reckless with wanting him.

I’d never believed in that ridiculous love-at-first-sight thing Micky’s mom, my honorary Aunt Sofia, wrote about in her steamy romance novels.

I mean, I liked her books. But I used to laugh at her stories, dismissing them as pure fantasy wrapped in pretty words.

Only now, as I watched him—watched him strip away every layer of pretense and reveal himself to me, moment by moment—I felt something deep inside me slide into place.

A lock.

A switch.

A pulse.

Something.

I couldn’t name it, but it felt undeniable. Like I’d spent my whole life missing some invisible, essential piece of myself.

And now, here it was. Tall, strong, and standing right in front of me.

I’d never felt anything like this before. This wild, unshakable certainty. No, I wasn’t sure exactly what it was, but I knew one thing for damn sure.

I wasn’t saying no tonight.

“I hear you breathing faster, Doc. I know this is getting you excited, but it ain’t just you. You’re not alone in this,” he told me.

“I’m not?”

“Nah, Baby. Looking at you tonight in that place without me. Made me see red.”

“What? Why?”

“Don’t want no one else looking at you.”

“That’s insane, Ono. I am not gonna live my life hiding in a closet,” I scoffed, trying not to admit his words excited me. That they pleased me.

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