Page 45 of Necessary Roughness

“Yeah?”

“May I kiss you good night?”

“I thought that’s what you were already doing.”

He let out a chuckle. “I haven’t even started yet.”

His mouth covered hers again. His tongue slid inside, tasting and teasing. He lingered. He savored. He’d kissed her before, but this was a whole new thing. He must have studied up since the last time he’d kissed her. That was great, but this was indescribable. Her knees knocked. She reached out to grip one of his arms so she wouldn’t fall over. He tasted like the wine they’d both been drinking. She wanted to keep kissing him forever.

He pulled his mouth off hers, rested his forehead against hers, and said, “What should we do now?” If this was his idea of foreplay, she wondered what else he’d come up with next. “How do you feel about going inside the house?”

“I’m in favor of it.” She swallowed hard. “You might have to sit down. Your knee must still hurt.”

“Oh, definitely. I think it hurts so much I need to lie down.” He grinned at her. “Want to lie down with me?”

She laughed out loud. “I’ll consider it.”

“What could I say or do to help you make a decision?”

“We’ll see,” she said. She slipped her fingers through his. “Come on.”

They pulled each other into his house. He stopped kissing her long enough to put the bag of leftovers into the refrigerator, but she wrapped her arms around him again. She slid her fingers through his hair as he braced them both against the kitchen island.

“Your place or my place?” he whispered into her ear.

“I thought we were in your house already. Anyway, Sadie sleeps in my room now,” she said.

“My room. Let’s go.”

They jammed themselves into the teeny elevator. The only reason they arrived upstairs still fully dressed was because they could hardly move around. The elevator stopped, Tanner pulled the protective door open, and they pushed themselves out. He reached out for Jordan’s hand again.

“Did you ever see those old pictures where people tried to see how many people they could stuff into a phone booth?” she said. “They should try it with your elevator sometime.”

He could never be sure how they made it from the hallway into his room. If his knee was in better shape he would have picked her up and carried her. It was something to shoot for in the future. Right now, though, they backed into his room, attached at the lips. He needed to get his clothes off, but he didn’t want to stop kissing her long enough to do it.

“Tanner,” she said.

“What?”

“How about I strip for you?”

Every drop of blood in his body must have pooled below his waist. He couldn’t have formed a sentence right now if his life depended on it, and Jordan had bent down to slip off her shoes. She dangled the sexy little sandals from one finger before letting them drop to the carpet. She reached up to unhook the back of her dress. He heard the zipper moving slowly down her back. She shrugged the dress off her shoulders. It slid down the front of her and ended up in a pool on the carpet as well.

He dragged his eyes over her body. She wasn’t wearing a bra. He stared at perfectly formed high breasts with pink nipples. She wore nothing but a tiny pair of black panties. He let out a groan. God, he wanted to touch her more than he’d wanted anything in his life.

“I’ll bet you’d like me to take these off too,” she said as she hooked one finger through the side of the panties.

He made an unintelligible sound. He wasn’t sure where his sweet little Jordan was right now, but he could get used to this.

“I know it wasn’t a long striptease, but hopefully it was memorable,” she said. Her eyes sparkled. “I could put everything back on and try it again.”

“No. No. It’s great,” he said. “I—I gotta get my clothes off.”

“Maybe I could help you with that,” she said.

He started pulling his clothes off as quickly as possible. Buttons flew. His jacket ended up across the room. He kicked his shoes off, pulled his belt off, and unzipped his pants in one motion. He couldn’t take his eyes off those tiny black panties, either.

“I want to take your panties off with my teeth,” he whispered. He reached out to pull her closer to him.

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