Page 48 of Her Maine Risk

Pulling back, he tilts my chin up, forcing me to look at him.

“Can you let me down?” I ask, my voice small.

Staring at me for a long few seconds, he must see something in my eyes that answers his unasked questions because he takes a step back. Looking away, my feet hit the ground, but he keeps his hands on my hips to steady me until my legs are able to hold my weight again.

“Mel, look at me.”

Taking a deep breath, I muster the courage to meet his emerald eyes, and they immediately suck me in.

“Don’t let Shelby get in your head. I know you’re smart, and you’ve probably already guessed that I’ve slept with her.” He watches me to see how I’ll react, but I don’t. I keep my face emotionless. “I did. It was one night, a few years ago, and she read more into it than it was. It was a mistake.”

A mistake. Right.

How many mistakes will I be confronted with if I give in to this – to him.

I don’t want to be his next discarded mistake. I also don’t want to be the subject of every other discarded woman’s rage.

“I should get back inside.”

He must see that I really don’t want to talk about this, and he sighs, stepping back.

I take in the first lungful of air not tainted by his spicy, smoky scent, and instead, am greeted by the sweet scent of pine trees and the bitter decay of autumn leaves.

I run my hands through my hair and then smooth them down my sides, making sure my shirt is still tucked in and everything’s in place before walking back around.

“Mel,” he says, stopping me.

“Don’t worry about it, Alex. I know the deal with you. I shouldn’t have gotten so caught up in the moment.”

“The deal with me?”

“Yeah. Being confronted by the women you’ve left in your wake.”

“Come on, that’s not fair. You don’t know me.”

“Really? What’s not to know? You flirt with every woman you talk to, and by that display of anger from Shelby, I’d say you sleep with most of them, too. You snap your fingers and women strip for you.”

“And yet you still want me to lift you back up against the wall and fuck you senseless.”

My lungs constrict, and my mouth hangs open in stunned silence, because I hate that I do want that.

The sensible Melanie is never around when I need her. Alex makes her obsolete. And in her place, stands a woman who wants nothing more than to strip her clothes off for the man in front of her and let him have his way.

“I see it in your eyes, gorgeous. You want me just as much as I want you.”

“That’s not the point,” I whisper, feeling like I’m rapidly losing this battle.

“It is the point. Stop worrying about the women I’ve slept with before this moment. They don’t matter. None of them mattered.”

“And you’re saying I do?” I ask incredulously.

“Yes.”

He’s so full of shit.

“You say I don’t know you. Well, you don’t know me.”

“I know enough,” he says.

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