Page 50 of The Love Lie
She can’t even remember the rules. Her answer comes out half a gasp. “Permission granted.”
“Thank fuck.”
He grabs her by the ass and lifts her as if she weighs nothing at all. She wraps her legs around him. Her spine hits the wall. She couldn’t say which one if her life depended on it. She has no sense of place. She’s lost in him. Lost in the feel of his hips stretching her wide, of the hard heat pressed against her center, of the muscled arms practically ripping the shirt off her body. When he realizes she’s not wearing a bra, he buries his face against her skin with a pained groan. A breathy laugh escapes her lips. He nips at her in reprimand then trails his mouth down the center of her sternum. She goes for his shirt, but he takes both her wrists in one hand and holds them above her head before circling one puckered peak with his tongue. Her head falls back as lightning zips down her spine. She’s completely at his mercy, a place she loathes to be, and yet all she can do is tighten her thighs and submit to the magic of his touch. The subtle scrape of his scruff against her breast does something she can’t explain. Stars work their way across her vision as he grinds against her. He fists her hair with his free hand, the gentle tug on the right side of painful as he moves her where he wants her and lifts his head. Their foreheads press together as their panting fills the air.
“Samantha.” He pauses to breathe.
She speaks just to prove she can. “Cooper.”
He lowers one of her arms and places a soft kiss against the inside of her wrist, just above her racing pulse. The move is too tender, too intimate. It clears the heady fog of her desire and replaces it with a sudden panic. She sobers just enough to retrieve her wits from where they’d been discarded on the flooralongside her shirt. When he looks at her with those piercing green eyes, she’s ready.
“I think it’s time to renegotiate the terms of our agreement, Cuj.”
“What do you have in mind?”
“Let me kiss you.”
He looks at her lips. His breath touches them like a promise. Tingles dance over her skin as her entire body clenches with anticipation. But it’s that very need that terrifies her. “No.”
“Cuj—”
It’s a weak line to draw, but it’s better than nothing. “Not on the lips.”
“Which lips?”
She frowns at him and he barks out a laugh.
“Just checking.”
“No lips and no tomorrow,” she says. “This is one night, to get it out of our systems, and tomorrow we go our separate ways, like we always planned.”
“No lips and no tomorrow.”
“Those are the new rules.”
He mulls it over for a second, two. She digs her heels into his firm ass cheeks and rolls her hips to speed him up. Heat flashes in his eyes. He resecures her hands above her head and drops his mouth to her throat. Nipping and licking, he tastes her sensitive skin like a starving man given food.
“I can agree to those terms,” he murmurs between kisses.
“Are you positive, cowboy?”
“Sure, Cuj.”
“That doesn’t sound very convincing.”
“I don’t need to be convincing.”
“Why not?”
“Because—” He finds a spot that brings a gasp to her lips and presses his advantage. When she’s a breathless wreck of aperson, her entire body tense with wanting, he finally continues, “I’m not the one you’re trying to fool.”
He pinches her nipple and the entire world lights up.
Goddammit.
She moans despite herself, unable to find the words to refute his claim. But she can’t let him have the last word. She just can’t. “I need to know one more thing.”
“Anything, Cuj.” He breathes the promise into her skin.
