Page 205 of Tall, Royal Hater
He clamped his mouth over mine in a deep, heavy kiss, and a rush of warmth blanketed me, pacifying all my aches and pains. He tasted of coffee, and I was entirely sure I didn’t, but I couldn’t care less, and neither did he seem to mind as he nipped at my lips and I sucked on his. Eventually, our intensity fizzled out into soft pecks shared between smiling mouths as I scratched my fingers through his trimmed beard, and he teased one thumb in little lines by my ear.
“Good morning,” he whispered.
That one simple phrase made me smile so stupidly hard. “Good morning.”
He caressed his thumb down my temple. “How are you feeling?”
“Fucking exhausted and sore. You?”
His lopsided smile was completely unapologetic. “Great, baby.”
My heart did a movie-dramatic stumble into my rib cage, and a blush ricocheted under the surface of my skin from the impact. I loved it an unhealthy amount when he called me baby as ifI’d never been called so by any other guy before. I had, but it was different with Shehryar. It held so much more meaning and emotion after all the five years of shit we’d pulled with each other.
“Would you like some coffee in bed?” he then asked.
I swallowed around the solid thud in my chest. “Never gonna say no to coffee in bed, Sheri.”
“I’ll go make you some.” He kissed my forehead then sat upright, and the only thing that would have stopped me from ogling him as he climbed off the bed was if someone gouged my eyes out.
Wearing nothing but his boxers, his golden skin glowed in the faint morning light, showing cheeky glimpses of the pink bruises my mouth and teeth had left on his shoulders last night. I shamelessly pushed myself upright to tail his gorgeous body to the door, devouring the sight of his rounded arse and the way he combed both hands through his hair, flexing his back and biceps.
My dickhead was a work of art. How could I not admire him?
But his beauty wasn’t the reason I felt light and giddy. That was just him. The man he was with me when hate played no factor in our interactions.
“You’re staring again.”
My attention refocused on his smug face as he filled the doorway of my bedroom. Desperately fighting the urge to smile, I gave a nonchalant shrug. “Just looking at what’s mine.”
His mouth spread into a stunning grin, and my own smile soared free like a caged bird released.
Without another word, he disappeared down the corridor and I flopped back against my pillow, staring up in stunned disbelief.
I’m smiling over Shehryar fucking Timur while he makes me coffee in bed.
Wow…
What an odd way the world worked.I liked it.
Shehryar and I sat plastered to each other’s sides in my bed, his arm around my shoulders and my leg thrown over his lap under the duvet as he sipped at the last of his coffee and mine sat on the bedside cabinet while it cooled down.
With my arm resting on his warm torso, I swiped and tapped on the screen of my phone, placing an order for food. “There,” I said. “Breakfast will be here in…twenty to thirty minutes. Problem solved.”
“You could have just let me make us something,” he said as I dropped my phone on the duvet.
“I could have…but then who was going to be my heated blanket?”
He shook his head, smirking. “Just say you want to cuddle, little menace.”
I raised a brow. “Why don’t you say it?”
His smile widened. “I want to cuddle.”
I need a recording of him saying that.
“I want to cuddle too,” I admitted, keeping my voice as unbothered as I could manage.
“Good.”
