Page 21 of Hostile Cravings
“Well, they’re staying closed for you, but I’m tired of being in this room. I don’t care what you or the doctor says, I’m going out.” I pulled a tight halter top out of my bag, ignoring his grumbles as I pulled my shirt off to change. “Maybe I’ll pick up a real man who can make me come better than you and will ruin me so that I’ll never need you or your stupid touch.” The words had come out in haste, and I realized how they sounded too late.
I looked over at him, seeing the hunger that sat in his eyes, the fight there to not yield to it. Only then did I remember I’d started changing in front of him and my shirt was still off, revealing my pink bra with lace that was thin and see-through. There was so much tension in his muscles that his shirt was straining to rip. I wanted to turn away, to run from that look, from what it meant, from how it changed everything we were, but I didn’t. Because as much as I wanted to run from it, I wanted to see where it led, to experience what Tyson Raines could do to me, even if I suspected he really would ruin me for any other man.
Chapter Seven
TYSON
Angie was killing me. After I left the room, I had every intention of taking my frustration out on another woman, but the closer I got, the further I came to going through with it. For the life of me, I couldn’t explain why I hadn’t. Or why a strange guilt sat in my chest at the thought.
Instead, I walked along the beach, letting my irritation simmer. She was such an annoying, stubborn-headed, foul-mouthed little bitch. One who was slowly growing on me like moss on a tree. It was something I couldn’t get rid of, but something pretty and soft the closer I came to her. The more I touched her. The way her skin sat below my hands, lush and warm, inviting, and those damned freckles she hid below the layers of makeup I detested. Although I didn’t know why. Most of the women I slept with wore makeup, but something about it on her bothered me.
Seeing her like that when I’d walked in with dinner had nearly destroyed me. There was a vulnerability to her when she wasn’t trying, when she wasn’t fighting me. And draped in my T-shirt, her cute glasses, and messy ponytail that just begged to be pulled did nothing to ease the growing attraction to her. That reactionwas so unusual for me because the women I hooked up with dressed like Angie and wore thick makeup like she did. Women who were looking for the same thing I was, sex with no emotions, no attachment, just pleasure and an escape. They weren’t nerdy or cute unless it was a sexy cute. Those types of women didn’t hang in my circle, not with men like me. They gravitated to Mason but knew not to look my way. Well, now they didn’t look at either of us because Casey would claw anyone’s eyes out who dared look at Mason.
Seeing Angie like that had thrown me off guard, hitting me in a place that I sheltered, that I refused to let anyone into. And my reaction had been honest. She was beautiful that way, her brown eyes dusty with slight black flecks in them, her glasses framing her perfectly round face, the slight dimple on her left cheek showing without the mask to shadow it, and the light tan birthmark that sat just on the edge of her jawline like a mark of the gods. She’d stolen my ability to function.
Even her insults had seemed softer with her like that. I didn’t know what I was thinking, rubbing her legs, then pulling her to my lap. The move had been instinctual, and I’d wanted to keep her there, to bring her lips to mine and kiss her again, but this time for real. But the moment was over and now she was blabbering about going out. Like I was going to let her walk out of the room on that sore ankle or let her anywhere near another man.
She pulled her shirt off, and I had to catch the drop of my jaw. I’d seen way too much of her skin as she’d scampered around her father’s estate in her tiny bikini with the strings sitting just right on her hips, the tiny triangles keeping me from seeing her nipples which were regularly hard against the thin material that covered her perky breasts. Her body was fantastic, but she flaunted it and that annoyed me. That annoyance had grown over the years as she’d matured, and her mouth had become an unfiltered supply of insults and quips aimed at me. Ones I served up just as often.
She turned to me, a revealing halter in her hand but not asrevealing as the thin lace of her pink bra. Every inch of those perfect tits was there for me to see, and my hard-on worsened, pressing against my pants and disregarding my complaints for it to stop. Because this was Angie Donelli, not some hot woman who I could play with. This was the woman I detested who detested me just as much. But she was hot, and my body knew it.
As bad as my body’s reaction to her was, her words had gripped me with a completely different intensity. She wanted another man so she wouldn’t need my touch. Those words burned through me, making me desperate to keep her from another man’s touch and to know how much she wanted mine. To see if she was craving it as much as I was craving hers. My jaw clenched at the thought. I didn’t want Angie. I hated her, but that line between hate and lust was blurring.
She looked away from me, heading toward the bathroom. I could see she was trying to walk without limping, and it irritated me that she was still hobbling on that damned ankle when she was supposed to be resting. Rising, I snatched my T-shirt from the bed and followed her to the bathroom. She was moving slow even if she didn’t want me to notice. As she closed the door, I stopped it with a hard smack of my hand. Her jump made her drop her glasses, but my eyes stayed glued to the way her tits bounced enticingly.
“Go away, Tyson,” she grouched, bending down to reach for her glasses. I stopped her, scooting them out of the way and stepping into the bathroom.
“You’re not going anywhere and the only bed you’ll be in tonight is that one,” I growled, pushing her against the wall and locking her arms over her head. I was too close to her and the position only exposed her nipples more to me. I wanted to touch them, to have them rise below the thin material. As it was, they were puckering out, tempting me to touch them, to make her moan, to make her come for me harder than she’d ever come for any other man. It was a possessive thought, and I’d never feltpossessive about any woman. But the need to claim her, to own her, was there, pushing past the hatred. I had to be going mad. This wasn’t a woman I wanted but being so close to her when I’d kept my distance for so many years was messing with me.
“Tyson.” The breathless way she said my name tugged at me and I pressed against her, knowing how wrong this was, how it went against everything that defined us.
Her eyes searched mine, a resolve in them that was a clear acceptance of what was happening. But then, as if the same battle was happening in her, she hardened her eyes, saying, “Get off me. I’m not one of your bimbos.”
“Could have fooled me,” I retorted, relieved that she’d destroyed the moment, even though disappointment sat within that relief. Snapping her bra-strap, I said, “I’ve seen strippers show less skin than this.”
Her hiss gripped me with its venom, and I saw then what I’d been blind to all those years. The back and forth we had, the aggressive battle of insults, the angst that sat between us had been a wall I’d built and one I imagined she’d built. We were too alike for her not to have. The discord between us hid the attraction, the something we could have been that neither of us wanted because it scared us both. The realization hit me like a bullet careening into my reality and shattering it.
Releasing her, I backed away, stopping whatever witty quip she was preparing to send at me by throwing my T-shirt at her. “Put this on.”
“I’m going out.”
“The fuck you are. You’re staying here.”
“To do what? Have you insult me the rest of the night or…” Her words drifted off, and I had a notion why she’d stopped. She’d been close to admitting there was something there, that thing we’d been hiding from, but like me, she didn’t want it because it meant giving up too much.
“Just put it on. We can watch TV while you finisheating.”
“I’m not hungry.”
I glared at her, but my phone rang, pulling my attention from her.
“Yeah,” I said to Mason as Angie put the shirt on.
“That’s the second time you’ve greeted me like that, prick.”
“Damn, sorry, the bitch was aggravating me.”
She stuck her tongue out and tried moving past me. I was like a wall to her small frame. She wasn’t petite, but she was thin and too light to move me out of the way. I bent quickly and scooped her up, throwing her over my shoulder while I talked to Mason.
