Page 98 of Dukes of Peril

“The Perilini-Bruin boys. Heartbreakers from the start.” She turns from the photo and sits on the end of the bed, eyes assessing the space. “It smells like you in here,” she says, running her hand over the quilt.

Her skirt is short enough to expose the lean line of her thigh. And the low scoop of her shirt… well, someone should have suggested a sweater. “I was just here a few weeks ago, I doubt my mother’s washed the sheets yet.”

When I left. When I hurt her.

“No.” She shakes her head, a smile flirting at the edge of her mouth. “It’s a different smell. You, but… more boyish.”

“More boyish?” I ask, stepping into the room. I like the look of her on the bed, a million teenage fantasies colliding.

She hums thoughtfully. “Yeah, kind of a mix of sweat, hormones, and cheap body spray.”

“Aside from the body spray, how is that different from now?” Birthdays always make me ruminate on the fact I don’t feel any differently, but this one especially. I’m still a jumble of exposed nerves and hormones when I’m around this woman. My cock incessantly hard.Painfullyhard at the moment.

She stands, never breaking my gaze as she closes the gap between us. Hands flat on my stomach, she pushes up on her toes, pressing her nose into the crook of my neck. “Now you smell like a man,” she whispers, inhaling.

If I thought it was hard to keep my hands off Lavinia before, actually sinking my cock into her has made it substantially worse. I clench down on a surge of instant, consuming lust, but can’t fight the impulse to grab her hips, turning to catch a whiff of her hair. “I’ve worked a lot on my self-control the last few months, but you keep sniffing me like that and I’m going to come in my pants.”

“Or you could come insideme.” She slides her hand lower, cupping my erection. “We can be quick.”

I give a strained laugh at the lie. The truth is, sex between the two of us might never be quick. There will always be prep work and patience. It’s odd to think there was a time that reality would have brought a sense of bitter disappointment. Now, I imagine spending an hour working up to getting my dick inside of Lavinia and shudder at the prospect.

The ache in my balls is already returning. “Two things will happen if we’re not downstairs when my mother calls us for dinner.”

Her hand gives a torturous squeeze, lips brushing against my jaw. “Oh yeah?”

Struggling to find my voice, I rumble, “First, she’ll send someone up here to find us. Second, it’ll be Nick, and he will lose his goddamn mind if he thinks I’m fucking you in my childhood bedroom before he does.”

She pulls back, eyes growing wide. “Oh my god, you’re right. He’llhoundme.”

“Like a dog.”

“Fine,” she says, but even though her lips turn down, I can tell she’s trying not to laugh. “We’ll go eat.”

This is how I end up sitting through an entire dinner, surrounded by my family, with a throbbing boner.

“Granted,” Remy is saying, recounting the events of last night’s fight, “this Prince was built like a bus ticket–”

“Aren’t they all?” Dad says, laughing. Remy laughs along, but Nick and I share a look.

The Princes are getting bigger and stronger as the years roll by.

Remy goes on, “So Nick absolutely mollywhops this guy, right in the jaw. And you know Nick. He’s boasting the crowd up like he does, pretending like he’s above it all.”

Lazily, Nick cuts in, “I am above it all,” and Lavinia rolls her eyes.

“Please, you love the attention,” she says.

“Speaking of,” Nick says, pushing back his cleared plate, “any heads up on this alumni poker game Saul has directed us to host?”

There’s no missing the look exchanged between our parents. Abruptly, the whole vibe around the table sours.

In a not so subtle way, Pop rests his hand on mom’s and squeezes it. “How about you two ladies—sorry,Duchesses—take a break.” He gestures to the messy table. “We’ve got this.”

“Thank you, honey.” Mom stands and gives both of her husbands a kiss on the cheek. She looks to Lavinia and says, “Let’s get out of here before they change their minds.”

“Grab the plates,” Dad says, reaching for the empty platter and starting for the kitchen.

“We don’t keep things from her.” I follow, carrying my plate and my mother’s. “Whatever you have to say to us, you can say to her.”

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