Page 47 of Cadence
Exhaling hard, he swallows. “I wanted you. I still do. But this could destroy everything. And you know it.”
My lungs pull tighter with every single word he says, somehow our argument turns from animosity to something charged, something heated, standing on the precipice of giving in.
And fuck do I want him to give in.
“And yet you’re still here,” I whisper, eyes searching his. “So what does that tell you?”
He moves silently, his thumb brushing down my cheek, then my jaw, soft enough to steal my breath and shatter me.
“You’d let me ruin you, wouldn’t you?” he murmurs, his thumb trailing lower, past my throat, grazing skin that lights up under his touch. “You’d let me crawl inside and wreck every part of you.”
Yes.
God, yes.
My breath catches. Not from what he says, but from how much I ache for it. How much I want to be wrecked by him, undone in a way I won’t recover from.
It’s not logical, it’s not smart, but it’s blisteringly true.
My fingers curl against the edge of the desk behind me, the only thing keeping me upright when everything else threatens to spiral. His other hand slides to my waist, fingers grazing the strip of bare skin where my shirt’s risen. I ignite, every nerve at full alert, screaming for more. Goosebumps scatter across my arms, and I shiver as he keeps moving.
“This is stupid,” he mutters, almost to himself, his fingers stilling on my waist. “So fucking stupid.”
His grip tightens, his forehead brushing mine. I stop breathing, afraid even air will shatter the moment and make him realize what he’s doing.
“You don’t mess around with bandmates,” he says low, like he’s repeating a rule he’s already broken inside his head. “It ruins everything.”
“It won’t,” I whisper as my spine brushes the edge of the desk behind me. “Just once. Get it out of our systems.”
He lets out a breath, a laugh that’s empty, hollow. “Nothing about you feels like something I could ever get out of my system.”
His fingers tease the waistband of my jeans, back and forth, like he’s testing how hard he can push. I squeeze my thighs together, dizzy with want, heat pooling so fast I can barely breathe.
“The guys—”
“Are gone.”
He flicks the button open with maddening precision, like he’s done this a thousand times before, like he knows exactly how close he can get without falling over the edge.
I glance toward the window, wanting to check, but his hand snaps to my jaw, tilting my face back to his with firm, possessive fingers.
“Keep your eyes where they belong,” he says, voice like sin, the glow from the monitors painting his silhouette in pale blue, everything else hidden in a low, dense shadow. “You lose focus. I’ll stop.”
“Maddox,” I whisper as he slides my zipper down. “What—”
The word dies in my throat as his head dips, lips brushing just above mine.
“Relax,” he says, “I’m not going to fuck you.”
I sway forward anyway. Because I want him to, because I need something to fill the ache he’s carved into me. He doesn’t kiss me, just hovers there, and somehow not touching makes that ache worse.
“…yet.”
And then his hand moves lower, hot and slow and devastating.
And I don’t know how much it’ll cost me to survive it.
But I think I’m already paying.
