Page 7 of Say You're Mine

Eros stops, putting a finger to his lips. I nod, but I don’t hear anything. He tugs on my hand, pulling me closer to him before he starts moving again. I can't help but smile right now. I can’t recall the last time I had this much fun.

We head through an industrial-size kitchen and down another corridor. Eros pauses again before he steps back and points in another direction. With each step, my excitement builds.

Bingo,he mouths. How can he know what is behind that door? He opens it to reveal stairs, but you can only see down a few of them because the stone wall turns.

“Is that a stone spiral staircase to the basement?!” I whisper-yell because that is so freaking cool.

“Wish I could say I put it here just for you.” He tugs me into him, my body colliding with his. My hands go to his chest. Those striking blue eyes of his lock with mine.

I wet my bottom lip because I can’t help it. I’m pretty sure he’s about to kiss me. He starts to lean down as I rise on my tiptoes, my eyes falling closed.

“Shit,” Eros mutters. My eyes snap open as my feet lift off the ground. Eros has lifted me up. He steps through the doorway asI hear voices, letting the door fall closed behind us, shrouding us in darkness.

My heart races, and I'm uncertain if it's due to the near kiss, us almost getting our asses busted, or the eerie, haunted basement.

I wiggle in Eros’s hold. I think my feet are hanging a foot off the ground. I’m not sure why he doesn’t put me down. He lets out a small grunt, and I freeze. Did I hurt him? No way. He is three times my size. I don’t think I could if I tried.

“Sorry,” he whispers.

“I’m the one that got us into this mess,” I whisper back.

“That wasn’t what I was talking about.” It takes me a second to understand what he means or, well, feel what he means pressing into me. Holy crap. Eros is bigallover.

6

EROS

“Oh,” Lev whispers. Her fingers grip the front of my shirt. “It’s okay; it’s normal, right?” I don’t fight my smile because she can’t see me. “Men get, ah, you know, hard when a woman is on them or whatever.” She stumbles over a few of her words.

Fuck me. Lev is far more innocent than she’d ever let anyone believe. I love seeing a more vulnerable side of her. I want all of them.

“I’m not a boy, Lev; I can control myself.” I mean, she’s testing my resolve just by breathing, but I’m holding on.

“Right,” she blurts out loudly. I glance in the direction of the door. I honestly don’t give a shit if we are busted, but this is about the thrill of it for Lev. “But wait.” She goes back to whispering. “You’re hard now.” Lev gives a small wiggle. Is she checking to make sure she's right? What she is about to do is unman me. I have been hard all night, and I'm dying for a release.

"If a random woman presses against me for any reason, I won't get hard. You’re different.”

“I’m different,” she repeats.

“Very different, darling.” Lev’s fingers play with the collar of my shirt. I could put her down, but I don’t want to. I love the way she feels in my arms.

“I kind of love it when you call me darling.” It's still a whisper, but it's a truth. One I doubt she would have shared with me without the darkness.

“Good.”

“Good?” She laughs. “You know you have this way of being so sure of yourself without being cocky.”

“I don’t ever mean to be cocky.”

“I know. You seem to be one of the good ones.” Guilt starts to fill me because I haven’t fully told her who I am, but I know I would never have gotten this far with her if I had. I stuff it down because there is no going back. I wouldn’t change a thing.

I want Lev to keep thinking of me as one of the good ones. I get a sense she doesn’t have too many of those in her life when it comes to the opposite sex. I always try to do the right thing. Not be an asshole when there is no need. It doesn’t hurt to give people a smile or say please or thank you. Hold a few doors. But I think for Lev I’d do a whole lot of bad things to keep her.

My dad was right. He always told me when I found the one, I’d know. She’d be different. That Mom had stood out to him in a crowd, too. Only he had to do a whole lot of chasing because Dad had been a bit of a ladies’ man, and Mom was new in town. Onceshe became aware of his reputation, it took him more than a year to convince her to date him.

“I’d always be good to you, Lev.”

“Promise?”

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