Page 42 of The Love of My Next Life
So his daughter’s passion reminds him of his dead wife? So the fuck what.
She’s dead. Lennon is here.
“You shouldn’t have to sacrifice what you love for someone else,” I say firmly, and her soft eyes harden.
“It’s not a sacrifice. I love him, and when you love people, you’re glad to do things for them,” she argues. “You don’t want to cause them pain.”
Her words hammer at my chest. Every syllable an accusation. I read between the lines.
She doesn’t think I care about my family. She thinks I don’t care that all I do is hurt them. She told me so in the bathroom at that party. I’m a selfish, miserable asshole.
And I can’t even defend myself. She’s right.
The way the muscles tense in her jaw and neck tells me she’s prepped for a fight. She won’t get one. Of all the ways I’m selfish, she’s the most damning.
Without taking my eyes off her, I bring her braid over her shoulder and pull the ribbon off the end, then I shove it in my pocket with the picture I stole.
“I hate this fucking braid,” I grind out, using my fingers to undo the strands.
She doesn’t move, but the way her eyes flutter shut when I reach her nape spurs me on. Gently, I thread my fingers through her hair. When her lips part on a sigh, I give in to impulse and make a fist, tugging her hair at the root. She gasps and her eyes fly open, one hand coming up to grip my wrist. I walk her back slowly until she is pressed against her bedroom door, then I push my body into hers.
She opens her mouth to speak, but nothing comes out. I wait as she licks her lips. Takes a breath and clears her throat. Then she tries again.
“Why do you keep pinning me to doors?”
Her voice is the sexiest rasp, and I have to bite back a groan. I smirk instead and bring my lips to the shell of her ear.
“Maybe I need to make sure you stay where I want you,” I say, then bite down lightly on her earlobe. She arches her body into mine, and I blow out a slow sigh through my nose. Holding back. Waiting. “You gonna run,Astrea?”
She brings the fisted hand at her side up and grips my shirt, then tightens her other hand around my wrist, but her words stay locked up.
“You know I like to hear that pretty voice,” I taunt, pressing into her just enough so she feels my hard dick. “Give me that big girl voice.”
She swallows and licks her lips again before saying, “I won’t run.”
There she is. The words are difficult for her, laced with frustration, but she says them. Forces them out. I can’t tell if she’s nervous or if she hates herself a little for wanting me. I want to bristle, want to feel offended, but I’m used to being the guy girls want in secret. Only Sam’s ever flaunted me, and that’s less pride and more spite. Some fucked-up, mommy-daddy issues rebellion.
I can’t waste time being upset about the inevitable.
“Tell me to leave, and I’ll go,” I tell her.
It’s honest. I’ve never been more honest. My heart thunders in my chest. I hold my breath until she answers.
“Stay,” she whispers.
My mouth is on her instantly, my tongue impatient to war with her tongue. My lips desperate for her lips.
She’s an addiction.
My worst fucking addiction.
I recognize it in the way my fingers tingle, the way my brain fixates. The way I want her is a compulsion, a craving. I don’t care about the consequences the moment my hands are on her. I clamp my eyes shut against the guilt and let my hands push her skirt to her waist so I can dig my fingers into the soft flesh of her thighs and ass. I groan again and pull her harder into my body.
Lennon doesn’t miss a beat before her hands are in my hair, tugging and scratching her fingernails against my scalp.
I knew she liked my hair long. Those scowls and scoffs are because she hates liking it.
I push that thought out of my head with the rest of them, then spin us around and walk backward, until I’m sitting in the purple bowl chair in the corner of her room and she’s straddling me. Our lips never break. These violent, angry kisses are just as relieving as they are punishing.
