Page 27 of Hostile Cravings
“Get off that damned ankle,” he grumbled.
“Is this where you plan to fuck me again?” I asked, as his hands reached to my bottoms and tore them off. “Hey! I liked this suit!”
“I’m sure you’ve got a pink one in there somewhere. Although you won’t be wearing it because no other man is going to be seeing this flesh.”
My heart soared at his statement of ownership. He stepped closer to me, pulling his phone from his pants.
I tilted my chin, questioning him with my eyes.
“Joey wants pictures. Let’s give him a picture. He lifted his camera, but I stopped him. Reaching up and tugging at the buttons on his shirt.
“Who wears a button-down on vacation on an island?” I mumbled.
“Me. I don’t do golf shirts and shorts, Anj.”
Where it had once irritated me when he shortened my name as if he was a close friend, now I recognized that my irritation had been over how the sound drifted down my spine like fingers softly brushing over my soul.
I fumbled with the buttons until he dropped the phone and shoved my hands out of the way, pulling it over his head. I ran my hands up his chest, noting the strength below, the restraint in his muscles as he struggled not to ravage me. His eyes dropped, taking in my body as I traced the tattoos on his chest.
“What is this?” he asked, his fingers skirting down my stomach and dipping to follow the path of my tattoo.
“Just a little something I picked up last year.”
His hazel eyes flashed with something I couldn’t read as he looked up from the thin green and black viper that ran down my pelvis, its venomous head pointing toward my clit. He hadn’t seenit before, his hand blocking it as his fingers had been working their magic.
“A viper?”
My breath hitched, my mind never piecing together why the reptile had been my choice. The nickname he’d so vehemently given me long ago had now become one that sent my insides flipping.
“Fuck,” he muttered, backing up and running his hands through his hair.
I didn’t know what to say, feeling vulnerable as I sat there naked on the sink, so my defensive attitude reacted. “It doesn’t mean anything, asshole. Not everything is about you. There were plenty of other guys before you and there will be plenty after. You’re not the only one who calls me viper.”
My words sounded bitter, the reality of what we’d done, his reaction to my tattoo and the subconscious meaning behind it stirring my anger. I hopped down, forgetting about my ankle, and bit back the cry as pain flared through the damned thing. He caught my reaction and lifted me back onto the sink.
“Damn it, Tyson, let me down so we can forget this ever happened.” I avoided looking at him, hating that he was seeing what I was only now seeing. That all this time, the animosity had covered my true emotions.
He forced my eyes back to his, inserting himself between my legs and yanking me against his pelvis with his other hand. “You said we weren’t pretending,” he said.
I tried looking away again, but he squeezed my chin.
“Did you mean it?” he asked.
“Mean what?”
I couldn’t unsee the hurt that sat in his eyes as he said, “That I’m not the only one who calls you viper?”
“It’s not a very nice nickname, you know,” I mumbled, dropping my eyes.
“Answer my question, Angela.”
My eyes flew to him. He had never used my full name. No one but my father ever did.
“No,” I finally answered. “I’d never let anyone call me that but you, even if it isn’t very nice.”
His hold on my chin relaxed, his eyes lighting. “I call you that for a reason.”
A flutter ran through my stomach. “You do?”
