Page 52 of Of Heartbreak and Harmony
“So what now, boss?” Callie wraps her arms around her midsection and flicks her eyes to the crowd below. There are people watching. There arealwayspeople watching.
“Now, you loosen up.” I erase the distance between us and slip my hands around her waist. Her breath hitches in that tempting way I’ve come to anticipate the moment I touch her, and I find it thrilling. “Put your hands on me. I’m your boyfriend. Touch me how you would touch a boyfriend.”
“In public?”
I laugh and amend my statement. “Touch me how you would touch a boyfriend in a dark club after a double shot of tequila.”
She blinks. A look of determination flashes across her face, then her lips are curling into a sexy smile. She slides her hands up my chest and hooks them around my neck, and I’m suddenly very aware of how close our faces are. Her soft breaths fan my lips.
“How tall are those heels?”
“I’m not sure. Six inches, I think.”
“I like them.”
“Yeah? I’m worried I’m going to break my ankle.”
I pull her body into mine, bringing us closer in a way that makes my heart quicken, and I lower my lips to her ear.
“Don’t worry. I’ll keep you upright.”
She huffs out a shaky laugh, her breath tickling my skin, and her hold tightens around my neck. I close my eyes and breathe, drenching my senses in the scent and feel of her. Once again, I’m bowled over by how much I enjoy it, and it takes all my restraint not to let go and step away. I could drown in her if I’m not careful. If I don’t work to keep my head above this tidal wave of attraction.
It’s strange how powerful physical touch can be outside of sex. It’s bewitching, taking hold of my mind and heart with only the simplest of intimate caresses.
I’ve always put more weight on that connection than there should be, attached myself to it too drastically, and it’s done nothing but causeme fucking pain. I get drunk on the flood of emotions, and I’ve let it manipulate me into believing something is more than it is. I’ve let it trick me into falling in love, and that’s exactly why I’ve not held a woman in years. I’ve not spent time with women for longer than it takes to get us both off. It might as well be another form of masturbation at this point for all the attention I pay to the women who end up at the end of my cock. I don’t kiss them. I don’t engage in conversation. I don’t remember names or faces. I don’t stay in contact, and I prefer it that way.
Hell,theyprefer it that way because that way no one gets hurt. It’s strictly sex under the protection of an iron-clad non-disclosure agreement, and it’s worked for years. This is more contact than I’ve allowed myself in a long time. Warning sirens sound in my head as I register all the ways our bodies are touching, but I silence them.
This is different, I remind myself. It’s not real, it never is, and as long as I remember that, I can let myself enjoy it. I can take sips of it in small doses, stay buzzed, and avoid intoxication.
“Just close your eyes and pretend I’m someone else,” I tell her.
“Is that what you’re going to do?”
Her voice is quiet against the shell of my ear, vulnerable in a way I wish it weren’t. I want to tell her the truth, but I lie instead. I lie because it’s safer for both of us.
“Yes.”
“Okay.”
I let myself slip my fingers into the cut-outs on the side of her dress, absorbing her heat and reveling in the softness of her skin. Goose bumps form under my palms, and when she moves her hands into my hair, I squeeze the flesh on her sides and pull her even tighter against me.
“Dance with me, Callie.”
Slowly, I start to sway back and forth, using my hands to move her body in time with mine. It doesn’t take much before she’s moving on her own. She closes her eyes as she lets the music guide her, but I keep mine on her face. Her soft features are highlighted theatrically in the multicolored lights from the DJ, casting her in blue, purple, and red hues. She looks like a dream, and I’m captivated again by how attractive she is. Beautiful, especially when she’s not scowling at me.
Song after song, I can’t take my eyes off her. She doesn’t stop moving as each track blends into the next. When she throws her head back, her lips parting slightly as she dances, a picture flashes quickly in my mind. It’s her. What she’d look like when she comes. I can almost hear her moans. So real that it almost feels like a memory, not a fantasy, but when I try to pull it back, it fizzles into nothing.
The urge to kiss her full lips overtakes me, and on impulse, I flip her body around, tugging her back to my front. I drag my palms down her rib cage and over her hips, stopping on her pelvis. One of her hands rests atop mine while her other comes up to thread into my hair at the nape of my neck.
“Pull it,” I say into her ear, and when she does, I groan.
I push lightly on her pelvis, urging her to back farther into me, and she does. Her ass presses against my dick, and there is no hiding how sexy I find her.
She freezes, but she doesn’t move away, and I chuckle.
“Have I shocked you, Calla Lily?” I tease, eyeing the rapid rise and fall of her chest, the way her breasts heave against the neckline of her thin dress. When the lights flash in the brighter colors, I can just make out the outline of her hardened nipples. Fuck, just knowing I can turn her on so easily gets me high. “Are you afraid?”
