I said.
“Believe me, I want to take it. But not yet.”
“Please,” I begged, the juncture at my thighs almost painful in its heat. “I need you.”
“I need you too.”
“Show me.”
“Show you what?”
“How much you need me.”
Fire shot into his dark eyes. “Are you sure?”
I inhaled, gathering all my courage. “I’m sure, Brad. I want it to be you.”
He cupped my cheek, thumbing my lower lip. “Come on.” Then he led me back into his bedroom. The door locked with a click.
What if Sean came home? What if Patty was with him? What if…? What if…? What if…?
I’d made my decision, and I wasn’t backing out now.
Brad deftly removed his jacket and then his shirt. I drew in a breath at his chest. Male perfection in all its glory. His shoulders were bronze and broad, his abs a perfect six-pack. And his chest—the perfect amount of black hair scattered over it, framing his copper nipples.
I dropped my gaze. Yeah, the bulge. The bulge he’d eventually uncover tonight. The first time I’d see, in real life, a man’s penis.
I swallowed back the sliver of fear for what it was. Not fear so much as apprehension.
He took my hand, kissed the fingertips, and then placed it on his chest. His flesh was warm and hard. Tingles shot through me at this tiny bit of contact. Tingles that bubbled through me like hot lava and landed between my legs.
That feeling… That feeling of wanting another person, of being truly ready…
It intoxicated me.
I’d been intoxicated two nights ago, and before I’d gotten sick, the feeling had been euphoric. But it was nothing compared to what I felt now. Euphoric, yes, but also an ache so pure and raw it was almost beautiful in its pain.
“God, Daphne. Your hand on me. I can’t…”
“What?” I whispered.
“Just touch me. Touch me everywhere.”
I added my other hand and slid them up and over his broad shoulders. His flesh was hot against my fingertips. Burning hot, just like that place deep in my core. I was burning for him. For his hands on my body, his tongue against every part of me.
I slid my hands up his neck and cupped his cheeks, scraping my fingers against his black stubble. I traced his full, firm lips, lips that had touched my own.
Lips that would touch me everywhere else.
God, I was on fire!
“Should I take off my dress? Or something?” I asked.
“Do whatever you feel like doing,” he said. “This is your call. Your speed.”
“That doesn’t seem fair.”
“Daphne, I’m not sure you understand everything you do to me.”
“Sure I do. You want me like I want you.”
He clenched his teeth, his jaw tightening under my fingertips. “I want to rip your clothes off your body, shred them into tiny pieces if that’s what it takes. Then I want to sink my cock so far into you that our bodies never come apart.”
A chill swept over my skin. I hadn’t expected such bluntness, but it made me want him even more.
“I want you to,” I said.
“Daphne, you don’t know what you’re asking.”
“I know exactly what I’m asking, Brad Steel. I want to feel every part of you joined with every part of me. And I’ve never wanted anything more.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Brad
I was burning so hot right now, I almost felt like I could dissolve Daphne’s clothes with a mere look.
She was so beautiful.
And so innocent.
She thought she knew what she was asking for, but truly, she didn’t. I didn’t just fuck. I took everything a woman’s body had to offer me. I took control, and I liked it.
Daphne Wade wasn’t ready for the kind of sex I liked, and for her, I’d make an exception.
For her, I’d do anything.
Fucking anything.
She’d asked me about fate. About destiny. Only moments before, I’d been certain she was my soul mate.
Which meant we were both thinking the same thing.
God, my cock was aching to get out of these fucking pants.
Should I? Should I give her what she asked for? I could sink into her for days and never want to come up for air. Days upon days upon days.
She stood, gazing into my eyes, her lips swollen from the kiss I’d given her earlier. That kiss. It was that amazing. That magnificent.
My balls ached. My cock burned.
I pulled her to me and grabbed the front of her dress. Such flimsy fabric. I could rip it down the front with minimal effort.
How I was tempted.
“One day,” I whispered, “I’m going to tear this dress from your body.”
Her brown eyes