Page 35 of Cross the Line
She takes another step down, making it to the next landing, and I follow. All the while, she keeps her back against the concrete wall, but her chin is lifted in defiance.
‘And you didn’t mess up,’ I say. ‘All you did was tell me how you felt.’
She scoffs. ‘Yeah, and I was drunk when I said it.’
With one more step, I’m in front of her. Toe to toe. Crowding her. ‘But does that mean it wasn’t true?’
To her credit, she meets my gaze and holds. Her lips turn down as she searches my face, though I’m not sure what she’s looking for. ‘Why do you care?’ she finally asks.
‘Because I can’t get you out of my head.’ My hands find the dip of her waist as she inhales sharply, and I drive my point home. ‘Because I can’t stop thinking about what might have happened if Oakley didn’t interrupt.’ I splay my fingers across her back, pressing gently, nudging her to me. ‘What I wanted to happen.’
‘What you—’ She cuts short, her lips parting and closing as she blinks, like she can’t believe what I’m saying. With a huff, she tucks a curl behind her ear, ignoring it when it springs forward again. ‘Are you fucking with me right now?’
The blurted curse coming from her mouth has me tempted to laugh, but the open vulnerability on her face has any inclination dying in my throat. She truly doesn’t believe me. Even with my hands on her body. Even after I told her I can’t stop thinking about her, she thinks it’s a practical joke.
‘I’m not messing with you,’ I say, my voice low, like I’m talking to a scared animal ready to bolt. ‘Maybe this seems like it’s coming out of nowhere. And maybe it is, I don’t know. But, Willow, what you said, it made me see that . . .’ Suddenly, the words dry up in my mouth, and nerves choke me. But words aren’t doing shit in this situation anyway, so maybe it’s time to shift to a new drive mode. ‘You know what? Fuck it.’
And I finally do the one thing I haven’t stopped craving for days. I sink my fingers into the silken hair that spills over her shoulders, tug her head back, and turn her face up to mine. Her lips are parted, and her eyes are wide, like she’s waiting for the other shoe to drop. But she doesn’t try to pull away as I slide my other hand around her waist again.
We’re so close that I could count each fleck of gold in the caramel sliver of her iris. I’m almost tempted. But there’s something I want more.
‘Dev,’ she murmurs, chest heaving against mine. But it’s not a warning. It’s an invitation.
The world goes hazy around the edges when our lips finally meet. I wish I could say that it didn’t, that everything about this feels wrong, that I want to pull back and wipe away this mistake of a kiss before it goes any further.
But I can’t. I can’t do anything except tug her closer and let her soft heat melt into me. I can only fist her curls in my hand and slide my tongue across the seam of her lips. I can only squeeze my eyes shut and lose myself in her.
She lets me in easily, kissing me back, letting me take what I want and say everything my words can’t express. But she must know exactly what I’m trying to tell her, because she presses her palms against my chest, then moves them upward to clutch at my shoulders, keeping me close, giving me more. I’ll gladly take it all.
My veins ignite. Fire rushes through me. And Willow fans the flames with her sweet sounds of pleasure, her stuttered breaths, and her quiet moans. It’s better than anything I could have ever dreamed of.
She gasps in surprise against my mouth when I tighten my arm around her and lift her off her feet. It prompts her to throw her legs around my waist and slide her fingers into my hair and grip hard, not letting me go. And I never want her to. She can keep me for as long as she wants.
With her back supported by the wall, I’m free to let my hands drift to her thighs, to the hem of her dress, and I roughly push it up to her waist. The heat of her core presses against my abdomen, daring me to slip my fingers higher to the edge of her cotton panties, to dip under the elastic by her hip.
I could do it. Iwantto. It would be so simple and I’m fucking desperate to feel just a little more of her. The softness of her thighs is already tempting enough, and the way she tilts her hips against me is nothing short of pure provocation.
There’s no way she can’t feel how much I want her too. But this needs to stop before it goes any further. I need to know for certain if we’re on the same page.
‘Fuck, Willow,’ I mumble, drawing back enough to suck in a breath. I press my forehead to hers, feeling like I’m being dragged out of a dream. ‘Do you get what I’m trying to say?’
She’s panting like she’s run a mile, her eyes unfocused as they linger on my lips, but she nods.
I can’t stop my hands from skimming over her hips, still under her dress. ‘You’re not the only one who feels something, all right? I’m sorry it took me this long to realize it.’
Just as she opens her mouth to respond, a door slams shut from somewhere floors below us, and it’s enough to make her startle, shocking her out of the spell she’s under. She blinks rapidly half a dozen times, then her horrified gaze settles on me.
She’s quick to snatch her hands back, to plant them on my chest again, but instead of beckoning me closer, she’s pushing me away.
As much as I don’t want to, I grasp her waist and take a step back, settling her on her feet once more.
‘You know – you know what?’ she stammers. Her fingers flit across her lower body as she smooths out her dress again. ‘I can go down to the front desk on my own.’
It takes me a few seconds to register her words. That’s . . . it? Is she really going to ignore what just happened? ‘We still need to talk about—’
She holds up a hand and closes her eyes. She takes a deep breath in and holds it for a beat before looking at me once more. ‘This shouldn’t have happened,’ she declares. The words are a knife driving into my gut. ‘And it won’t happen again. It can’t. We both know why.’
The knife twists, because I know she’s right. ‘Look, we should—’
