Page 103 of Just a Heartbeat Away

His lips were the next thing to touch the tattoo, followed by his tongue along her hip bone.

“This was here the entire time,” he muttered, almost to himself. “Your trim little pantsuits. Classy gold studs. Perfect hair, polite little face. And the whole time a tattoo on this fuckable little hip. Jesus.”

He kissed his way across her stomach to her other hip, pressing his stubble into her softness. Via tried to open her legs; she wanted to wrap herself around him. But he firmly kept her knees together.

“Dark chocolate, Via,” he reminded her, biting her hip bone and making her jolt.

She let out a long breath. “Right. Yeah. Okay. Dark chocolate.”

She gasped when he planted his hands at her hips and flipped her over onto her stomach. “I can’t look at that tattoo anymore or I’m going to have us both naked in about six seconds.”

But he didn’t stop either. Seb kissed his way up her spine, pushing her shirt out of the way as he went. She couldn’t stop tightening and flexing as his stubble scraped her everywhere. She made a breathy, desperate sound when she felt his teeth close over the clasp of her bra. He lifted it up off her back and pressed it back down. She could swear he was smelling her, rubbing his face into the smooth skin of her back.

And then—there was a God—he laid his weight down over her. Via tipped her head to one side, her cheek flat on the mattress as she felt his hardness press into her ass. She was completely covered by him, pressed down flat on the bed. Her lungs struggled to get in air, and she loved it. She completely loved it.

Seb rolled off of her and breathed hard, scraping his hands over his face. Via let her eyes wander down his gorgeous body, long and wide. She could practically see the heat squigglies rising up off of him like in the cartoons. Her eyes stuttered to a stop when she saw the ridge in his jeans.

The view was impeded by the jeans and the shadowy lighting. But Lord. She forgot about breathing. Who cared about it? It was a waste of time anyway. She watched her own hand creep across the bedspread. She marveled at her own boldness, and at how tiny she felt next to his big body.

Seb, his hands still pressing into his eyes, had no idea she was coming for him. She passed her hand over the ridge in his pants, and he hissed, like he was in pain, immediately leaning up onto his elbows. His eyes were on her, bright and wide. She didn’t look up from what she was doing.

She outlined him through his pants. Up one side, pausing at the head and making him curse again, and then back down the other side. She laid the heat of her palm flat against him and then, finally, met his gaze.

“Violetta,” he said, and she wasn’t sure if it was a warning or a plea.

She let her hand drift to his hip as she lifted herself, crawling over him.

It was an hour before they tore themselves away from one another. They were both unbuttoned and hot. Messy and breathing very hard. Via felt like a high schooler, all fired up and nowhere to go. Touching and kissing Seb was pretty much the hottest thing to ever happen to her, but they both seemed to tacitly agree that it wasn’t the time to get naked together yet. Their sweaty makeout on top of Seb’s covers was enough.

“I have to put you in a cab,” Seb growled into the palm of his hand, his eyes, lionlike, on hers.

“Okay,” Via agreed shakily. Matty was down the hall. This was getting out of hand. “I have Uber on my phone.”

Seb shook his head, pulled out his own phone and dialed a number. “Hi, Rico, it’s Sebastian Dorner. I need a cab at my house. All right. Just around the corner—she’s in Bensonhurst, too.” Seb’s eyes shot up to Via’s. “Yes, she’s a she. Five minutes? Great. Just charge it to the card I have on file.”

He was paying for her cab home. And he knew his car service dispatcher by name. Ugh. She really did have to get out of here before she did something insane like take a nap in his dirty laundry like the lunatic she was beginning to suspect she was.

Seb dragged her up from the bed and bustled her down the hall, like having her in the bedroom was too dang dangerous. When he got her to the front door, he sat her down on the stairs that led to the second floor of his house. He grabbed one boot and then the other, shoved her feet inside them. Next came her coat. He paused halfway through zipping it and pressed a kiss, over her shirt, to the plumpest part of her breast. He’d never done that before, and it had her jumping, her legs spreading at the knee. He pushed her knees back together and zipped her the rest of the way. Next, he found her hat and mittens in the pockets of her coat and put those on, too. Her messenger bag from school was slung across one of her shoulders before he brought her to standing and dragged her forward.

“I’ll miss you when I’m in White Plains,” he told her, leaning down.

“I’ll miss you, too. Eat something green for me.”

He smiled against her mouth. “I really will miss you, Via. I wish we weren’t going for the whole week.”

“It’ll be good for Matty to be with his grandparents. And you and I can talk on the phone. And when you get back, it’ll just be the best.”

And she would try very, very hard, not to make her loneliness his problem while he was gone. A week did seem like a very long time when it stretched out, imminent and ominous.

He kissed her again and walked her out to the cab that was idling in his driveway. Seb leaned down, sized up the driver and apparently deemed him acceptable. One more kiss and then she was in the cab, waving bye and trying not to be a baby.

“IFYOUSIGHone more time, I’m going to send you out in the backyard with your son.”

Muriel’s voice snapped Seb out of his reverie.

“And you’ve promised that you’d stop moping.”

“Right. Sorry, Muriel.”

---