Page 34 of Single Mom's Daddies
It’s not delicate. It’s teeth and breath and heat.
Her hands grip my T-shirt like she’s trying to hold on through a storm. I press her back against the counter, one arm wrapping around her waist, the other bracing the surface beside her head. She meets me with everything—open, aching, full of fight and fire and something else I don’t have a name for.
I kiss her like she’s air, and I’ve been suffocating for five years.
She opens to me—mouth, hands, body—and suddenly we’re not standing anymore. We’re moving. She hikes one thigh around my waist and pulls me in closer, like she’s tired of pretending this isn’t happening. Like sheneedsit as much as I do.
She moans into my mouth and the sound makes my brain go blank. My hand slides under her shirt, up her ribs, fingers splayed like I’m trying to memorize the shape of her.
She’s hot to the touch. Breathless.
I kiss down her neck, bite gently at the spot beneath her ear. Her fingers slide into my hair, pull—hard—and I groan into her skin. She gasps. I reach down, grip her ass, and lift her onto the counter. She wraps both legs around me instantly.
Her mouth is back on mine, rougher now. She tastes like desperation and tea and something I don’t ever want to forget. “Nikolai,” she breathes.
It wrecks me. I press against her. Hard. She whimpers and rocks against me and God—I could fuck her right here. Right now. Against the marble, bare feet and sleepy house be damned.
I slide one hand up her thigh, under the hem of her shirt. She moans again.
Then freezes. A sharp inhale. The slow stiffening of her spine. Her lips break from mine. Her breath hitches—but not from arousal this time. From fear.
“Saffron?”
She presses her palms to my chest. “Wait,” she whispers.
I stop instantly. Hands off. I step back, just enough to give her space.
She’s panting. Her hands tremble as they fall to her lap. Her thighs are still wrapped around me, but there’s no more pull in them—just tension. “I—” she starts, then shakes her head like she’s trying to knock herself back into her body. “I can’t.”
“It’s okay.”
“No. It’s not. It’s not okay. I wanted it. Istillwant it.” Her hands press to her face. Her voice cracks. “I don’t know what the hell I’m doing.”
I take another step back.
She slides off the counter and holds the edge like it’s the only stable thing in the room. “I kissed you,” she says. “I practically jumped you.”
“I was there,” I say softly.
“I’m not supposed to want this.”
“Why not?”
She looks at me, eyes glassy. “Because I live in your house. Because I work for your family. Because my daughter’s in a hospital bed right now and I should be thinking about her, not about how good it felt when you?—”
She stops. Swallows. “I’m a mess, and I’m making bad choices.”
“You’re human.”
She shakes her head again. “You don’t get it.”
“Ido.”
Her gaze sharpens. “No. You have money. You get to make any choice you want. My whole life is survival and planning and not fucking up.” She turns away, arms crossed, shoulders tight.
I step forward, slow. “Saffron.”
She doesn’t answer.
