Page 22 of Crash and Burn

“You starting to regret your bullshit act of bravado yet, Sullivan?” Slowly, Axel starts toward me. Step-shuffle-thud-squeak, and repeat. “You said some shit about sucking my dick and fucking me till the house fell down.”

“Chandelier.” Anxious, I cough to clear my throat. “I, uh…” Forced to glanceupas he comes closer to stand over me, I clarify, “I think I said the chandeliers would be destroyed.”

Smug, he stops just an inch from my chest and brings his free hand up to cup my jaw. Since I think he’s going for this tender, gentle, loving caress, I gasp when he shoves my head back and I get a view of my ceiling instead.

“You don’t have chandeliers, Sullivan.” He comes impossibly closer, so his chest touches mine, and his face looms until our eyes meet. “What the fuck do you think you’re gonna break, if not the chandeliers?”

“Hearts, maybe?” Stupidly brave, I set my palms on his trim hips and swallow when he takes my jaw in his fingers. “My hymen, preferably.”

His brows pull close as my words register in his mind. “Your…” Considering. Confused. Then he takes a step back so my chest collapses inward from my loss of his proximity. “You’re a virgin, Hannah? What the fuck?”

“Well… no.” An awkward laugh flitters along my throat and leaves me red-faced. “Not since I was sixteen and drinking at Joey St. James’ party. Can’t say it was all that fun at the time, but considering the look on your face right now,”pale, horrified, “I’m pretty glad I got that mess over with way back then, and have been practicing ever since. Ya know, so you’re not getting a total newb.”

“Practicing…” Coming closer again, his voice turns dangerously low. “How often? And with who?”

I choke out a panicky laugh and set the bag of ice cream on the coffee table.Free up your hands, Hannah. All the better for touching his dick and pretending you have this under control.“Enough to not make things weird.” I slide the tips of my fingers into the waistband of his shorts. Testing. Trying my luck to see how far he’ll let me proceed. “Not so much that you’re gonna get mad about it.”

“I’m mad all the time.” He grabs my hands and pulls them out of his shorts, stealing the sensation of his coarse pubic hair brushing the backs of my knuckles. “Just thinking about you makes me mad. Because I wanna keep you all for myself.”

“So do it!” I’m tempted to wrap my arms over his shoulders. Lean into him, and maybe taste his tongue on mine for the second time today. But I create space instead, and take his hand in mine. Then I turn toward the hall.

His leg is broken, which means we’re on the clock. If I don’t have him seated and comfortable soon, neither of us will get to send ourselves insane with lust and want.

“I’m offering myself to you, Axel.” Our progression is slow. Shuffling. We pass Viv’s bedroom door, and continue along to mine at the end of the hall. “I don’t know how else to say that.” I lead him through my door, my blood sizzling beneath my skin as, upon entering, Axel turns his nose up into the air. Not to snub my space, but to smell it. To inhale my world into his lungs, and savor every last morsel.

Like a hound on a hunt, he’s locked onto my scent. His pupils grow larger, and his hands flex until his knuckles turn white.

It only increases my determination to bring us from where we’ve always been into something more. Somewhere we’ve never allowed ourselves to go. So I lead him to the end of my bed and nudge him down until he’s comfortably sitting, then I rush back to my door and slam it closed.

On the other side, the living room lights remain on. As do the kitchen lights. Ice cream melts on my coffee table, and across town, a massive, historic hotel burns to the ground.

But in here, in this room, none of that exists. I lock my door and flip the light off to bathe us both in near-darkness. A salt lamp glows in the corner, casting an ethereal orange light and demanding my vision adjust to the new colors.

“One night, right?” I lift my shirt up and over my head. Not necessarily to seduce the man, but because this is what we do in the dark: peel away those barriers and lie down together so our skin can touch. So our hearts can sync.

“No forevers.” My voice breaks as I come to a stop between his legs and lower to my knees like I did at the shop. But this time, I slip my hands beneath the fabric of his shorts. My palms sliding along his muscular thighs, my fingertips thrilling at the sensation of his coarse leg hair under my touch. “No relationship,” I continue. “I don’t want a commitment right now. I just want tonight.”

“Right.” He scoots to the very edge of the bed and reaches down to cup my face. “And it always works out that way, huh? Nothing could go wrong. We just have to get this out of our systems.”

I snicker, though the sound comes out rough and anxious. “It’ll be fine.”

“And no man in history ever screwed up a perfectly good friendship by agreeing to such a bullshit offer. Because friends—best friends, even—can fuck once, and everything goes back to normal the next day?”

“Well…” I swallow the lump of nerves in my throat and practically vibrate when he reaches back and gently tugs the scrunchy from my hair. My long locks, far past due for a trim, fall free and tickle the small of my naked back. “Weare not best friends,” I lie. “Viv is my best friend, so whatever you and I do…”

“You’re playing a game of chicken you can’t win, Sullivan.” Sliding his fingers into the back of my hair, he closes them tight and fists my locks until I sit taller on my knees and gasp. “You’re mad at me for saying no, so you thought you’d make me an offer I couldn’t refuse. But you’re afraid.” He folds his back and brings his face closer to mine. Closer, until I feel his breath on my tongue. “You’re a proud woman, and you have it in your head that you wanna be withme. Maybe because you’re a natural flirt and I never told you no back when it began. Or maybe because I’m just too sexy for my own good.”

I burst out laughing, only to hiss when his hand tightens and tugs at my scalp. “Arrogant,” I rasp.

“Maybe it’s because you get off on the challenge, but only when you know the answer is no. It’s a game to you.Tease Axel until he’s forced to go home and take an icy cold fucking shower, and still he can’t sleep until he pulls his dick and works through the ache of Hannah Freyde Sullivan.”

“Frustration makes you refer to yourself in the third person.” I slide my hands higher beneath his shorts and moan when my thumb brushes the side of his thick cock. Hard for me, despite his mood. “If you already make yourself cum thinking of me, how is doing it with the real person crossing any lines?”

“Because you’re here.” He tugs me higher until my neck arches painfully and my breath comes short. “Because once I start touching you, we’ve crossed a line we may never come back from. And then what?” He feathers his lips across mine until my lungs quake. “I dispose of you tomorrow, like my dirty little secret whore?”

My panties slick with moisture, surprising me more than his stiff cock.Talk dirty to me, Axel Feeney. Turns out I like it.

“Th-that’s the deal,” I exhale. “One night. No one has to know. You get to relieve a little of the pressure building inside your gut with the real-life version of me, instead of a tube sock and a bottle of hand lotion, and I get to live out my fantasies of fucking the guy who makes me wet on sight. Then life goes back to normal.” Bravely, I twist my hand and open it wide to cup his cock. Intentional with my touch, rather than shy and uncertain. “We both know you want it. That’s why you came here, isn’t it?”

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