that same undeniable connection that he’d felt the first time he’d met her. Even though he’d been pissed and angry and knew he should hate her, all he could think about was how much he wanted her. Only that time, he’d had the good sense to walk away.
He was drawn to the only woman in the world he couldn’t have, and yet as he watched her eyes darken and her pulse beat against her neck, he couldn’t seem to find enough energy to care. Being with Regan, like this, felt right.
Deciding to deal with the fallout tomorrow, he pressed his lips to the hollow of her throat, running his tongue over her pulse. Slowly he worked his way down to the curve of her breast, tugging at the V of her top to pull it lower.
“Wait. Holly,” Regan said, her body too alert and her voice too clear for his taste.
Without stopping, Gabe made his way to her ear and whispered, “Passed out. Door is shut. We’ll be quiet. I promise,” and then bit down gently.
“She once slept through a Seahawks game. She never wakes up,” she replied huskily, her hands back on him. This time she trailed her fingers down to his wrists and pulled them securely around her, locking them at her lower back.
So Vixen liked to be held tight, fine by him. Hauling her up against him, he took her mouth in a kiss that left them both panting.
Then her phone rang and she pulled it out of her back pocket. “It’s your grandma.”
Slowly he pried it from her fingers, sent it to voice mail, and set it on the table.
“That could have been important. I have that council meeting tomorrow.”
“You can call her back in the morning.” He nipped her lower lip, getting them back on track. “I’ve been thinking about this all day.”
“All week.” She snuggled into him, her body rubbing against his. But it was her admission rather than the brush of her fingers above the hem of his low-rise jeans that shot straight to his groin.
“All week?”
“Actually, weeks,” she corrected, looking up at him through her lashes. He felt her fingers beneath his shirt, cool and soft, sliding up his stomach to his chest. “Ever since the night at The Spigot.”
“The Spigot?” He leaned back so he could look her in the eye. She had to be shitting him. “You didn’t even like me.”
“I like you now,” she whispered, lifting his shirt and giving him an openmouthed kiss in the center of his chest.
“Yeah?” He fisted up the hem of her shirt, loving how her stomach muscles jumped as he pulled it higher. “Well, I always liked you. And I really like your shirt.”
“You hated me.” She tugged it back down. “And it’s old.”
“I never hated you. And it’s wet.” He pulled it down further, plastering it to her body, and smiled. “And extremely see-through. See.” He dipped his head and sucked her through the thin cotton.
The phone rang again. This time it was his. With a frustrated growl, he reached for the off button, glanced at the screen, and hesitated.
“Let me guess, it’s ChiChi,” she teased, her hands sliding up his chest. When he didn’t answer her, Regan went from turned on to tuned in, and it took every last ounce of control Gabe had not to throw the damn thing through the window.
“Gabe?” She looked at the screen and took a small step back, right into the table. “It’s your sister. You should probably answer it. And then you should leave.”
“I should.” And he should probably take this as a sign from the universe to back the fuck up, walk out of her kitchen and out that front door, because the only thing he could offer Regan was surface—and what he wanted, what she deserved, went so much deeper.
“But the hell of it is”—he turned his phone off and tossed it on the table next to hers—“I don’t want to.”
“I don’t either,” she admitted quietly.
He cupped her face and kissed her hard, bringing the focus back to where it should be. Not on family, or history, or the crap ton of other things that they couldn’t change, but on the one thing that they could—getting naked.
Regan briefly hesitated, then tangled her arms around him, kissing him back with enough force that they both stumbled against the table. Letting gravity, his new best friend, take over, he followed her down on the table, shoving the chair out of the way and doing