Page 42 of Playing the Field
“You’reyou, and I’m me. I’m overthinking every kiss, every part of you I touch. Wondering how I’ll stack up next to the women you’ve been with. That’s…the issue.”
I don’t know what I’m expecting. Maybe I figure that after this moment of vulnerability, Hunter will realize that I sold him a false bill of goods by flirting with him in a restaurant hallway andsuggesting we hole up here. But his face breaks open into a wicked smile that would be alarming if it didn’t look so good on him.
“Well, then, we have no issue.”
“No. Really.”
He moves so he’s kneeling in front of me. “Tink, I’m not here because I have some laundry list of moves or things I expect women to do to please me. I definitely only have one thing on my mind right now, and that’s how I can make you feel good.”
“Okay.” I look down, embarrassed, but I’m still glad I said something.
“So here’s what we’re gonna do, if it’s alright with you.” He tilts my face to look at him with one finger beneath my chin. This tiny touch calms me.
His gruff whisper drags my breath away on each languid syllable. “I’m going to slowly, very thoroughly, find every pleasure center on your body until you are so…completely…desperate for me, so wet and swollen…that you’re begging me to lick and kiss and…fucking consume you. I want you so goddamn turned on that all other thoughts leave your brain. So the overthinking…” He snaps his fingers. “No longer a thing.”
My skin ripples with heat so fierce that I have to swallow the sudden rush of saliva so I don’t drool. “I want that,” I practically pant.
“Okay.” His eyes roam over me like a leopard deciding which part of me would make the best appetizer. “Good.”
Hunter tips me back onto the bed, leaving my legs dangling. He doesn’t give me any more time to negotiate whether this is a good or bad idea. I’m too focused on the seductive feeling of his breath against my ankles as he slides the shoes off my feet. Watching the care he takes is its own turn-on.
He kisses his way up my legs, taking his time at the area behind my knees. My head falls back on the bed, and I let out a moan. He’s right. I’m barely aware of any of the worries and fearsI had moments earlier. I’m barely able to remember the hotel’s name. Or my own.
“Gorgeous,” Hunter says, staring at my legs. It almost stops me because I want to protest. I don’t think any part of me qualifies as gorgeous, but the way he’s looking at me makes me believe maybe I am. At least, maybe to him.
Moving me up the bed, he climbs up as well, straddling my hips but barely touching me. He gently reaches for the straps of my dress and slides them over my shoulders and down my arms. When I lean back on my elbows, it gives me a chance to look at him the same way he’s been looking at me. He’s so beautiful, with his hair raked back from his forehead, his angular cheekbones and straight nose, and the dimple in his cheek when he smiles. He’s smiling now, and it makes me do the same.
Feeling more confident, I lift the hem of his shirt, exposing a tapered waist and a checkerboard of taut abs that I’ve been wanting to touch since the first moment he walked into the kitchen shirtless.
Hunter reaches behind him and yanks the shirt over his head by the collar. He flings it to the floor and does the same with the blazer I was holding.
“I’ll fold it later,” he says.
“Please do.”
He smiles. “What am I going to do with you, Gracie?”
I give him my best deep, sultry voice. “What do you want to do with me?”
“So many things.” His gaze moves from my eyes to my mouth to my breasts, and he sucks in a breath. “So fucking gorgeous. And way too many useless clothes.”
Hunter’s lips drop to mine, but with more urgency this time. He bites my bottom lip, holding it between his teeth before letting it go. “Every time I see that lip between your teeth, I’ve wanted to do this,” he breathes against my mouth.
With my arms wrapped around his neck, I tug him closer sohe’s lying on top of me. I can tell he’s holding back some of his weight, but I love the feel of his strong body overwhelming mine.
The kiss gets hotter, deeper. Tongues moving and fighting for dominance. I can’t get enough of him. I want to drink him in, but no matter how long we kiss, I want more.
His hands cup my cheeks, and he plants a long, soft kiss on my lips. “Relax, Tink.”
“I think I’m relaxed.” I sigh.
“You’re getting there, but we can do better.” I love how he says “we” as though he and I are on this mission together to make me comfortable and content. It’s a side of him I keep glimpsing in all the sweet gestures he makes without comment, but before now, I convinced myself they were one-off outliers. The image of him as an aggressive, ruthless player on the field and a ladies’ man off the field was glued in my mind, all from hearsay and evidence I hadn’t collected myself.
I chastise myself for letting false impressions implicate him in a narrative he’s done everything to fight from the time he walked into Kyler’s house. I need to let those wrong ideas slide away in favor of the man who’s here with me now, doing his level best to allay my insecurities and make me feel good.
“I’m sorry I had the wrong impression of you.”
He backs away enough to look me in the eye. “I think I earned all those wrong impressions. I’m glad you don’t hold them against me.”
