in my place in Charleston. I want you to. I want you to be safe. And you can call if you need help. Margaret will take care of you. Or one of my guys. But it won’t be me. We are never going to talk or see each other again. Ever again. Do you understand that?”
She nodded, her cheeks bright. Her eyes brighter.
“Do you still want me?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said on a sobbing gust of air, sounding nearly hopeless against this thing between them. “I do.”
Dylan knew the feeling. But there was no point fighting it anymore. The new rules were set. Today and then over.
He tore off his shirt, the buttons flying from the fabric to ping against the wall. He felt her eyes on his chest, the Virgin Mother and his own mother’s name. He felt her picking apart his secrets, gathering up sharp broken pieces of him and trying to put them back together. Just like he was doing with her, trying to pick apart her lies and her secrets to find the truth of her.
And they would keep on doing that if he didn’t stop it.
“Spread your legs,” he said. And she did without hesitation. Without fear. “Wider.”
She braced her heels on the bed and spread her legs as wide as she could. God. She’d totally shaved. She was bare and sweet between her legs.
“You shaved your pussy. For me.” He couldn’t help himself anymore—he reached out and touched her, ran his finger down the seam of her fat, soft lips. It came away wet. She wanted this just as much as he did. The reality of it was kerosene on a fire.
She jerked and groaned at his touch, gathering the bedspread in her fists. “I thought you’d like it.”
“I do like it. But you are going to love it,” he breathed, and then he got down on his knees beside the bed and pulled her by her hips to the edge. “Keep your legs apart,” he growled, and she snapped the leg back that had curled over his shoulder.
He licked her with the flat of his tongue, all along her lips, and she closed her eyes, her breath a ragged gasp. It was better if she didn’t watch. If he didn’t feel her eyes on him. He used his thumbs to part her, to stretch her wide, and she flinched, so he eased up. Until she moaned with pleasure again.
“Look at you,” he breathed, staring down at all that pink flesh. With the tip of his tongue he touched her clit, licked it, and rolled it. And then sucked it into his mouth. Hard. She shot up off the bed, her legs jerking, clasping his head between them.
“Don’t make me tell you again,” he said, breathing all over her pussy. “Spread. Your. Legs.”
“I don’t like bossy men,” she groaned but did what he asked, and he felt like he had her all staked out for his pleasure. The only places they touched were his mouth, his fingers, and her pussy. And yet he felt that connection all through his body. Like they were skin to skin with not even air between them.
He teased her with that long, slow lick over and over again and he could feel her arching up toward him, searching for something solid to grind against.
“Touch me,” she whispered.
“I am.”
“More.”
He curled his tongue over her clit, barely touching it.
“Why…why are you being so far away?” she asked.
“Because you’re lying to me about something and I don’t mind getting used as long as I get to use you right back.”
She flinched at his words. The ugliness of them.
But then he slipped a finger down to her pussy, entering her just enough so she could feel it, and then he pulled back and slid his finger down from her pussy to her asshole, burning a trail against the slick flesh there.
“Dylan,” she sobbed, pushing against him. Wanting more. The fucking truth of her was that she would take everything he had. They could burn down his whole mountain with this fire between them.
And the knowledge sucked.
“This is what it’s like between two liars, baby,” he said, his finger rimming her pussy. “This is what you get.”
“I want more, please.”
“There is no more.”
“Don’t,” she breathed. “Don’t be like this.” She sat up, reaching for him, tears in her eyes, and he couldn’t fucking take it. He stepped back away from her, trying to get his breath. His bearings. The ragged, burning edges of his