“You only did it to help me,” she said in a voice that dared him to contradict her, “so how could any of this be your fault?”
Especially the part where she’d always loved him.
God, if he weren’t here, she’d have a couple more drinks and then lay her head down on the bar top and pretend it was all just a bad dream.
But there wasn’t time for her next breath before Ryan’s hand was on her neck and he was moving over her, his strong thighs trapping hers between his, his dark eyes flashing with heat as he stared down at her.
His mouth was a breath from hers before she could react, before she could get a single synapse to fire, or send out another silent reminder to herself about control and self-restraint and impossible futures.
“Here’s how.”
His words were a breath on her lips and then he was covering her mouth with his and kissing her like she’d never been kissed before in her life, not even by him the past two times.
This kiss was a full-on slick of his tongue against hers, as if he was trying to learn all the shades of her taste. As his kiss spiraled deeper, darker, hotter while he pulled her closer and savagely took everything she could give, how could she do anything but give in—at least for a split second of heaven—to the need to taste him for herself?
She wanted him so bad, years of need culminating in this moment in a bar when he was kissing her like he needed oxygen from her lungs to breathe.
The two drinks she’d just gulped down, plus the champagne that had been refilled constantly for her at the Hawks’ team party, were making her reactions slower, fuzzier, looser.
She could use being drunk as an excuse.
Only, even when she was a teenager, hadn’t she known better? Hadn’t she been smart enough to realize that being the drunk lay was so much worse than not being laid at all?
And if Ryan didn’t want her when he was sober, it meant he didn’t actually want her.
She forced herself to pull back from his mouth. From the heat that poured from him, that drew her hands to his strong arms, to his broad chest, to his tight, muscular hips.
“No one’s watching us now,” she made herself say, the words escaping her mouth between her panting breaths. Even back when she’d thought herself to be madly in love with her ex, his kisses had never left her this out of breath. Or anywhere close to the edge of giving over every last part of herself. “No one in this bar cares about baseball or whether we’re engaged or not.”
With those reminders in place between them, meant to douse the fire jumping and flickering so wildly, she would have scooted away from him.
But he didn’t let her move.
And, oh, if she didn’t end up even more lost to desire, to pleasure, at the way he used his muscles, his strength, to keep her right where she was. Still, she had to try, at least one final time, to try to save herself before she went all the way under.
“The show’s over now. You don’t have to do this, Ryan.”
“Yes,” he growled, “I do.”
And then his mouth was back on hers and he was pulling her from her bar stool to fit tighter between his legs, his hands hard on her hips, his tongue forcing hers to dance with his again in a kiss that was as close to making love as she’d ever come with all her clothes on.
The groan she’d been trying so hard not to let go of sounded wanton and breathless into his mouth as Vicki gave in to what she’d wanted for so long...to be in Ryan Sullivan’s arms.
At least for one beautiful night.
* * *
It had been a hell of a night.
As one second had ticked through to the next, Ryan had wanted Vicki more. He’d been hyperaware of every sensual shift of her body, her mouth, her hands, her eyes. Her laughter had repeatedly lit up the party, and her innate sensuality had inflamed every living, breathing guy—and many of the women, he suspected—at the party.
He’d worked to hold onto his self-control, but being so close to her tonight while pretending to be more than they actually were had kicked him right over the edge.
It didn’t help any that he was jealous as hell of anyone else who made her laugh, who looked at her with appreciation, who couldn’t take their eyes off her luscious curves. If one more guy at the team party had asked to see her sculptures, he would have pounded his skull into the nearest marble tabletop.
Only, when they’d gotten in the limo to head back to his place, the madness had gotten worse. She smelled so good and as the party had worn on, he’d gotten used to the pleasure of reaching for her, stroking her soft skin.
He hadn’t wanted to stop, didn’t see any reason why he couldn’t pull her into him so that she could lay her head on his shoulder. Two friends who had made it through a rough evening together.