Page 30 of Vacancy

“But you—you already told me no. Last week,” I reminded her. “And I knew that. So I shouldn’t have—”

She lifted her hands, cutting me off. “Seriously, Damien. It’s fine. I was feeling it too. I got swept up in the emotions just as much as you did.”

I paused. “You did?”

Did this mean I could continue? Because I kind of wanted to continue. More than I wanted my next breath.

I stepped closer. “So does that mean…?” I lifted an eyebrow, needing direction and praying she’d give me a green light.

Except she winced. “Nothing, sorry; it can’t mean anything. The timing’s all wrong. If you could just give me, like, a two-year raincheck, then I’d bebeggingyou to try that again, I swear.”

I blinked at her, not really reassured by her assurances.

“Twoyears?” I repeated, just to make sure I’d heard her right.

She bit her lip and nodded, her brown eyes imploring me to consider the idea.

But I scoffed. “Yeah, I don’t think so.” This kind of craving couldn’t handle that kind of hiatus.

So cupping the sides of her neck in my hands, I dragged her close and pressed my mouth to hers, kissing hernow.

Oaklynn muffled out a sound of surprise, and she initially stiffened against me. But barely a moment later, she sighed against my lips and capitulated.

Gripping the front of my shirt, she rose up onto her toes and kissed me back fully, openly, and hungrily, surrendering everything to me. Her breasts flattened against my chest, and my body sizzled with heat. Creeping my fingers up into her hair, I gripped the silken locks and drank deeply from her lips, drowning in them to the point that I felt drunk and dizzy-headed when I finally pulled away.

With a protesting whimper, Oaklynn swayed toward me, and her eyelashes fluttered open in confusion as she looked up at me with drugged arousal.

Feeling as if I’d proven my point, I sucked my bottom lip between my teeth, still able to taste her. Then I said, “If you still think you can wait two years after that, then you have more willpower than me. But if not…” Reaching out to touch the corner of her dew-glazed lips with my thumb, I murmured, “You know how to reach me.”

Without waiting for her to answer, I smoothed a hand gently over her hair and then turned away to jog off, leaving her there to stew onthat.

I felt pretty damn proud of myself until I returned to Bridleway and glanced back down the block toward the front of her brownstone, where I abruptly remembered—fuck.

Thalia.

I’d forgotten all about Thalia, along with the fact that Oaklynn still fully believed she was alive.

God, I was screwed. There was no way in hell this was going to end well.

7

OAKLYNN

“Oh…my God,” I gasped desperately to myself as Damien ran off, leaving me shaken and more aroused from a kiss than I could ever remember being in my life.

But what the fuck had just happened?

Spinning away, I hurried inside and shut the back door behind me before bolting and patting it lovingly. Then I slumped against the wall of the hallway next to it and sighed, pressing two fists against my stomach before blowing out a long, calming breath.

But holy baby Jesus, my girl parts throbbed, so ready for sex that I wasn’t sure if I was going to get off right there next to the back door, or not, from merely thinking about the heated exchange we’d just had.

The way he’d looked at me, though…

It had been as if he were already positioned between my thighs with his cock right there at my entrance, ready to drive it home.

God.

It was too much.

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