Page 21 of In Bed with Mr. Wrong

It was too much. She pushed at his shoulders, gasping in a breath when he leaned back. Instead of being relieved he gave her the space she so desperately needed, her panic got worse. He looked down at her, those blue eyes fathomless, threatening to make this into something it most definitely could not be. She couldn’t have moved if she tried, and with the entire length of Ryan’s body against her, she wasn’t sure she wanted to. She wasn’t sure of anything anymore.

She tried to turn away, but he caught her chin and tipped it up, forcing her to meet his gaze. Before those eyes, she felt her entire past, all her hopes and dreams and fears, stripped bare for him, one by one. Things he had no business seeing. Her terror over being abandoned again and again. Her love of libraries and the peace being surrounded by safe, reliable books brought her—how safe she felt there because nothing ever changed. Her hope for a dream man that she’d never quite been able to quash, no matter how many times she told herself it was a foolish thing to want. Her need for a family, for a place in life that washersand hers alone, roots. All that knowledge to do with what he pleased.

“What are you so afraid of?” he murmured.

Bri shuddered, the intimacy of the moment too much. No onesawher, not in the way he seemed to.Everything about you, she wanted to say. And the way she was already starting to crave his body against hers, like he was her favorite kind of drug. She licked her lips, all too aware of how naked she was and the fact that he still retained most of his clothing. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Her safety net. As long as she didn’t admit how deeply she felt about something, it couldn’t be taken from her. It was a lesson she’d learned the hard way when surrounded by other children in a barren dog-eat-dog world. When you had nothing, you were willing to fight for every scrap.

And the more someone else valued it, the more value it had.

“Bri, tell me.”

She swallowed. “A lot of things.” Some days it felt like she was afraid ofeverything.

Ryan smoothed her hair back. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

Liar.She was pretty sure he already had. But then he kissed her again, and Bri wasn’t all that concerned about the future or the potential pain it held. Now was all that mattered, this moment with this man. She just wanted to stop thinking andfeel.

She dug at his shirt, stripping it over his head and tossing it aside. Next she finished shoving down his jeans. God, this man was magnificent, his body corded with muscle beneath tanned skin. She reached for his growing erection, but he intercepted her and lifted her arms over her head to press her wrists against the wall. “Don’t move.”

“But—”

“Condom.”

For one wild moment, she actually considered telling him to keep going, but a thread of sanity raised its head at last moment. She nodded jerkily. “Hurry.”

“Do. Not. Move.” He took two steps backward and then turned and strode down the hallway back into the living room.

She couldn’t see him from her position, and the temptation to remove her hands from the wall and lean forward to look was nearly overwhelming. She didn’t, though, because it felt absolutely wicked to stand here, completely naked, completely vulnerable to him. It helped that she could hear him crashing around the living room, cursing under his breath, and knewshewas the one who’d driven him so out of control.

After one final crash, Ryan reappeared, already tearing open the condom. By the time he reached her, he had it on. He lifted her against the wall and Bri immediately wrapped her legs around his waist, a whimper slipping free when he nudged her entrance.

He worked his way into her with small strokes, each one spiking her pleasure higher. She tried to arch into him, but his grip on the back of her thighs held her open and helpless. He teased her, not going as deeply as she needed. And, God, she needed so much, it terrified her.

“You’re thinking too much.” He shoved into her, sheathing himself completely. The nearly overwhelming fullness had her closing her eyes and hissing out a breath even as she gripped him tighter. “Fuck.”

The word came out so harshly, and yet knowing she affected him so deeply warmed her unexpectedly. Bri nodded, trying and failing once again to lower herself and take him deeper. With him pinning her in place in so many ways, holding so still, the need for friction drove her nearly out of her mind. He didn’t move, though, and she couldn’t. “Please.Please.”

Pressure built in her, only made more intense by the barest friction of her frantic attempts. Ryan’s breath hitched. “You feel so fucking good.”

Nowhere as good as he felt inside her. She clung to him as he spread her thighs and pounded into her, each stroke driving her higher. “Right there. Oh God, right there.”

“That’s it, honey. Come for me.”

It was as if her body had been waiting for this very moment, when they were joined so closely, to finally let go.

As if she needed to be held down by Ryan in order to be free.

And nothing in her life had terrified her more.

Chapter Ten

What did this woman do to him?

Ryan sank to the floor and pulled Bri into his lap. He wanted to say something, do something, to cement this peaceful feeling soaking into him. Maybe, just maybe, they were finally getting somewhere. “Come on.”

“What?” Bri blinked up at him as he shifted her to the carpet next to him and stood. He would have liked to think that her expression was caused by the aftereffects of her orgasm, but he didn’t think so.

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