Page 30 of The Villain Edit

Our noses brush, his hand tightening on the back of my neck. The tiny bit of pain feels damn good, but not as good as the little hitch of anticipation that fills the pause.

“Where do you think you’re going?” he whispers against my lips, his breath minty.

“To the car.” My lips brush his as I whisper back. I’m not going to back down, even as I’m inexplicably falling apart the longer we exist in this near-kiss.

His hand at my side moves up until his thumb brushes the side of my boob. “This okay?” he asks roughly. The cameras will be able to see this little PG-13 touch, or he wouldn’t be doing it. What’s not okay is how hard my nipples get or how wet I am.

I hate how horny this man has me, all from five stupid fingers digging into my neck and one thumb brushing side boob. He’s not unaffected either. He’s hard against my stomach and my hand remembers the thick feel of his cock.

“I told you,” I say, desperate to get on top again. “You can fuck me right here.”

“I thought we were saving that for a dive bar,” he chides. I think I see the corners of his lips turn up, but I’m losing my mind, so what do I know?

I fist his shirt. “Are you going to kiss me or not?” I can’t breathe much longer without this kiss. Lust is shorting out my brain.

He turns us until his back is blocking the cameras. His lips brush the corner of my mouth. “No.” It lingers on my cheek and I deflate as he releases my neck and steps away from me.

My gasp for air at the sudden space between us is involuntary. It brings a twitch to his lips.

“Asshole,” I mutter before the cameras are back in view. Stupid actors and their camera angles. My lips feel betrayed and I am going to make him pay for this.

I have no idea how though.

I spend the entire day doing the little seductive things that should draw his attention. Like putting my feet on the dashboard to show off my legs. I get his attention, all right. He snaps at me to keep my feet off the dash. I toy with the three tiny buttons—all undone—on the low neck of my pink tank top. He doesn’t glance my way.

At a gas station, I wash the windscreen of his car, making sure I’m bent over in my short denim shorts when he walks out. A guy staring at my tits rear-ends the car in front of him, but Gabe just thanks me. I touch his arm, his leg, and the side of his face once when I’m desperate, but he only tenses and brushes me away.

He does let me take control of our social media presence. Throughout the day, we stage little photos. His hand covering mine wrapped around the gear stick, in black and white. The two of us cozied up in a leather booth at a diner in a college town, him feeding me a fry. Unfortunately, other people were also filming us, so we had to stay cuddled up the whole time, which at least allowed us to trade whispered insults. We take a few extras at generic locations or in his car—stuff we can post later. My favorite is when we’re in the car, and I lean over and plant a kiss on his cheek. The scrunch of his face is adorable.

After, he adjusts the mirror and looks at the kissed cheek.

“No lipstick?” he asks.

Of course, I’m wearing lipstick. Today it’s a sexy little pink shade, slightly darker than my tank top. I pull it out of my handbag and make a show of touching it up.

Gabe rubs his face and frowns at the mirror before starting the car. The roar of the engine revs up my blood, but while I convince Gabe to let me take a picture of my hand on his thigh, and his hand on my thigh, he appears unaffected while I…am not.

Bringing Gabriel Sinclair to the brink of seduction is exhausting, but I’m going to break him if it’s the last thing I do.

Chapter nine

Gabe

Ashfinallyfallsasleepand I can breathe again.

Her perfume still saturates my car, but at least she’s not resting her foot on the dash and tempting me to find out how much of her I can see in those tiny shorts.

I know what she’s doing. She was more affected by that almost-kiss in front of the cameras than she’d like to be. It was in her eyes, the way her breath hitched when my lips brushed the corner of hers. I made her vulnerable, so she’s paying me back.

Unfortunately, it’s working. Hiding it is getting hard, but I’m not going to crack. There’s no point in imagining all the ways I could make her scream my name because it can’t happen. I can’t have her. Dating Ashley Foley for real would be a disaster for my reputation in the long run, and having a fling would have god-only-knows-what consequences.

My reputation is more important than getting my dick wet, however inviting the pool may be, so this fake relationship has to stay fake. But I can’t stop picturing her sitting in that bed, her armor off, watching my interview with Leo Wallace to find out what I like on my pizza.

I want to know more about this woman who doesn’t share her bed, can’t swim, and doesn’t like looking back at the decisions she’d made. I want to know what her skin tastes like and what gets her off. Driving this boring stretch of interstate doesn’t distract me enough to keep me from imagining.

She’s a handful now—if that translates to the bedroom, she’d be demanding. Into games and intense foreplay. Hard to satisfy on a deeper level than a handful of orgasms. I doubt anyone has ever been enough for her.

We arrive at our hotel in Nashville and I wake her up, touching her higher on the thigh than before. She shifts under my touch before she fully wakes up. Her fingers slide over mine and she squeezes her legs together.

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