Page 25 of Traitorous Lies
“Let me carry your baby for a while. I hear water up ahead. When we get to it, we’ll stop and rest for a bit.” With the way she’d snuggled the little animal to her chest as they slept last night and kept it on her lap every time they stopped, Jax was pretty sure that was about as long as she’d let him keep possession of her newest baby anyway.
There was slight hesitation before she nodded and passed the bundle over. “He is getting kind of heavy.”
“Yeah,getting,” he scoffed. They both knew the little guy had been too much for her to carry for more than the first hour or so after they found him. Still, if the young fox made her happy, and it was clear it did, then he wasn't going to take that away from her.
Surprisingly, Monique had calmed the fox easily yesterday, and ever since, it had been docile as though it had been raised a pet surrounded by people all its little life, instead of a wild animal. While it eyed him a little suspiciously, the fox then quickly settled down into his arms and closed its eyes.
“Is Cinderella going to like having a little brother?” he asked as they walked side by side.
Monique laughed, and the sound was prettier than any music he’d ever heard before. “I’m not sure. She’s kind of spoiled and used to getting all my attention when I come home at night.”
“Of course she’s spoiled. I bet every single animal in your rescue is.”
“They deserve it, you know? They’d already been hurt or traumatized, taken out of their natural environment, and trying to adjust. I want them to know that they’re loved and cared about.”
There was no mistaking the wistfulness in her tone.
What she was really saying was she never wanted an animal to feel like she had growing up. Unloved and uncared for.
As much as Jax wanted to push to learn what she’d meant when she told him she’d already survived hell once before and could do it again, he’d been respectful of her desire to hold onto her secrets. It was bad enough he’d met her under false pretenses, he at least owed her respect for her privacy.
“I hate you grew up feeling that way,” he said softly.
“I hate that you grew up feeling that way, too,” she told him.
Once again, he heard the words she didn't say aloud.
Together, they could make sure that neither of them ever felt that way again.
It was so tempting. He’d fallen hard and fast for the woman he was only supposed to spend a couple of hours with, and a huge part of himwould love to ask her out on a date when they got home. To keep getting to know her, and maybe one day fall in love with her.
But he was lying to her, and when she found out, the spell would be broken, and he’d lose her.
“Here’s the river,” he said as they stepped through the trees and it came into sight. It wasn't what he wanted to say, but every time he felt emotions building too strongly between them he had to take a step back.
Not wanted to,hadto.
“Give your little guy a drink,” he ordered as he passed the creature back into her arms.
“He’s sleeping,” she said, dropping to her knees and tucking her bundle onto the ground at the base of a tree.
Then she looked up at him with the sweetest pair of eyes, and he knew that he’d be powerless to say no to her.
“Sit with me for a bit?” she asked, and since he couldn’t see the harm in that, he nodded and took a seat on the hard ground beside her.
As soon as he sat, he realized his mistake.
Because Monique shifted immediately to straddle his thighs. Even through the layers of clothes separating them, he could feel the heat of her center drawing him in, almost making him lose his ability to cling to rational thought.
When her lips crashed into his, that last thread of rationality fled.
All he could do was feel.
The tip of her tongue brushed against his lips and opening them to her felt far too natural. Their tongues danced together, and her hands, which had been resting on his shoulders, drifted lower.
Trailing a path down his chest, her fingertips seemed to be everywhere at once as though she wanted to memorize how he felt beneath her.
Of their own accord, his hands gripped her hips and ground her down against his growing erection. Monique moaned into his mouth, and it sent every last drop of blood in his body south, and he grew almost impossibly hard.
