Page 59 of Unforgettable

“And I…” She laughs again. “I don’t think I’ve ever found it so difficult to get anything out, but I wanted to try after we had such a good night last—”

She drops her head in her hands, her hair all swooshing forward.

“Ughhhh,” she says, groaning, her voice muffled. “I’m sorry I’ve been so mad. I haven’t been fair to you at all. I believed you when you say you didn’t know it was me when we met and I never really hated you at all and—”

“Scarlett?” I say, moving to stand in front of her.

She peeks through one of her hands and I move her fingers enough to expose one eye, as her other hand falls to the side.

Her scent is intoxicating and a flood of too many things to identify, one minute I think it’s cotton candy and lemons, the next peach or jasmine.

I tilt her chin up and we stare at each other, my clock’stick, tick, tick, the only sound in the room.

“This is hard for me too,” I tell her. “And completely new. I…don’t know what to do with all these feelings and also be respectful of what you want.”

“What do you want?” she asks.

“I want you.” The words rush out of me and the act of saying them out loud underlines them in a way I haven’t been able to fully admit even to myself before now.

“I want you too,” she whispers.

We crash into each other, our lips frantic. Her hands go in my hair and mine are on her face, her hair, down her back, and then on her waist, where I tug her as close as I can get.

She moans into my mouth, her soft, full lips and sweet tongue my decimation.

Our kiss is savage, all the pent-up tension from the past few weeks taking control, our bodies remembering all the favorite hot spots from our night together.

I thrust against her and she moans, her head falling back and my hand slides between us, cupping her between her legs. She looks at me, eyes glazed over, and I drop my hand, taking a step back, breathing hard.

“We can go slow. I don’t want you to regret any of this later,” I tell her, my chest heaving.

“I don’t think we’re capable of slow,” she says. “Part of thisfrustrationhas been that my body remembers how you make me feel and…trying to shut that off has been—” She shakes her head, eyes wild.

I loosen my tie and unbutton the top buttons of my shirt before undoing the knot and taking my tie off.

“Go sit on my desk,” I tell her.

So much for wooing. I’ll have to do that later. We’ve gone about this backwards from day one.

Her eyes widen, but she doesn’t waste time moving into place. She sits, back-to-back with my laptop, and after I lock my office door, I stalk toward her, moving her hands behind her back. She gasps when I wrap my tie around her wrists and knot it.

I smirk like the devil I’m feeling. “You want me to stop, just say the word. Do you have the word?”

“No, I won’t need a word,” she says, her voice raspy.

I lean in, my nose against her neck, inhaling her before lifting up to kiss her, this time so slow that she starts squirming.

“How much time do you have?” I whisper.

“A-an hour before my first meeting. And my friend April is walking the dogs until around that time too.”

“Good.”

“I want to touch you,” she whimpers.

“Next time.” I kiss down her jawline and down her neck, stopping to bury my face in the dip that was driving me crazy just a few minutes ago.

“You’re killing me,” I say against her skin.

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