Page 75 of Play Dirty (Brooklyn Dawn 1)

Instead, I held out mine. She uncapped it and drank deeply, her long throat rippling. It shouldn’t have been sexy. Except everything she did was. Even breathing. Even looking at me with that look in her eye while she caught her breath and drops of water clung to her lush lower lip.

I couldn’t help myself. I leaned in and licked them away, taking in her shocked inward breath like oxygen straight into my bloodstream.

Without analyzing, I slipped my hand along the back of her neck, cupping her head as I covered her mouth with my own.

“Let’s try this again,” I said between kisses, keeping my eyes open and on hers. “Good morning.”

Distrust entered her gaze even as she kissed me back. She leaned forward and slid her hands up my chest, her pinky nail lightly scraping over scar tissue. I hissed out a breath and her touch gentled, at least above the waist. But her torment hadn’t ended yet.

When she casually let her hand drift over the growing bulge in my sweats, she said against my lips, “Sure is a good morning.”

I drew my thumb along one of the sweat-soaked strands of hair clinging to her neck. “So, you’re one of those early birds, huh?”

“Usually. I’m not the best sleeper. Always keep expecting the phone to ring. Either Oz’s broken his hand or Coop’s harness snapped and he’s laid up somewhere. Or Jamie—” She broke off.

“Jamie’s your best friend,” I prompted.

“Yes. How do you know that?”

“I never let my subscription to Music Life lapse and the two of you are its darlings. Everyone’s darlings.” I touched her hair again, winding it around my finger. “Light and dark.”

“Sounds like you and me.”

“You chase the darkness. Always thinking you can pull back before it sucks you in.”

“Yet you live there. Willingly.” She yanked her hand away from my groin and I grabbed it, turning her fingers under so I could kiss her knuckles.

“I’m not fit for human consumption. You’ve seen that. I say shit that hurts people. I do shit that hurts people. I can’t stop it either. There’s no off button, no hidden sunshine I can call on to make the memories fade. This is who I am.”

When she didn’t speak, I dropped her hand and turned away.

She spoke before I’d taken three steps. “Alex, don’t go.”

Alex. Not Nash. So few people called me by my first name. It was too personal. Too friendly when I was known as a rigid perfectionist. An asshole who wore that badge proudly.

My favorite shield.

I shut my eyes, knowing full well my back was even worse than my front. I didn’t need to tell her what I’d lived through because she could see so much of it. Could feel it under her hands when she touched me.

Yet somehow she wasn’t shying away.

She moved closer. I expected for her to rub my arm or to offer some other form of support. I would’ve brushed that off. Instead, she pressed her cheek to my bare back, over the place where the ruined flesh was uneven and thick and unattractive.

I simply didn’t have any defense against it.

Against her.

She linked her arms around my waist and gave the scar tissue a light kiss. “By the way, my singing is worth far more than three dollars, you cheapskate.”

The sound I made wasn’t quite a laugh. Close enough.

I stroked the back of her hand and clutched my water bottle in a grip that buckled the plastic. She didn’t comment on it or make a big deal out of the fact that I was so fucking flawed.

I wore all of my sins on the outside. There was no hiding or pretending otherwise.

And she was so achingly perfect. Whole, sweet, and decent. She had every reason to tell me to go to hell. I didn’t deserve to even breathe her air.

That same crunch of leaves I’d heard before made me whip my head around, scanning in all directions. If some damn photog had found his way out here to intrude on our private moment, I would snap his camer

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