Jonquils for Jax (Blueberry Lane 3 - The Rousseaus #1) - Katy Regnery Page 0,34

damn it, he didn’t want her fucking pity. He wanted her—

“Gardener,” she whispered, reaching out to flatten her hand on his chest, directly over his heart, her unexpected touch effectively ending his train of thought. “Listen. I’m sorry for asking. For pushing. For being rude. For—for being a bad friend. I said you weren’t good at this and then I…I go ahead and…”

He’d been holding his breath, but now he released it in a low hiss. Fuck. She wasn’t sorry for him. She was sorry for her behavior. Half of him wished she’d said, “I’m sorry your girlfriend cheated on you,” because her pity would have made it easy to push her out the door. The fact that she was apologizing for her own actions instead of pitying his past, however, made him feel relieved, made him step forward instead of away, his eyes dropping to her lips.

“You were right,” he whispered, inclining his head to hers. “I’m not good at this.”

His lips touched down gently on hers, trapping her top lip and pursing its softness between his. A breathy “ahhh” sound released from the back of her throat made him move his lips again, this time capturing the bottom one for a long moment before releasing it. Her hand moved to his chest, flattening beside the other, her nails curling just slightly into his shirt as he deepened the kiss.

The smell of lemons and rosemary invaded his senses and he closed his eyes, sealing his lips over hers as he pulled her into his arms. She fit easily against him, slipping her hands up his chest and around his neck. Her breasts, crushed against his pecs, made his dick swell against her hips. Tentatively he touched his tongue to hers, and when she moaned into his mouth, he clutched her tighter, sliding his tongue along the length of hers, exploring her mouth, which tasted sweetly of IPA and the pineapple of her lipgloss. He skimmed one hand up her back, over her T-shirt, sliding his fingers into her soft mane of hair and tilting her head back to give his mouth a better, more dominant angle over hers. And she leaned back against the arm still around her waist, submitting to him, letting him ravage her mouth the way he wished he could ravage her sweet body.

“Duchesse, duchesse, duchesse,” he murmured, trailing his lips down the hot, throbbing skin of her throat, feeling her beaded nipples pushing against the muscles of his chest. Her pulse beat wildly and her breasts thrust up against him with every shallow breath. She was panting as hard as he was, as turned on, as undone.

Letting his fingers go slack in her hair, he lowered his hand, holding her tightly against his body as her forehead dropped to the crook of his neck and rested there. It felt good—so good to hold her, to feel the warmth of her body against his and the whisper of her sweet, soft breath dusting his skin. It had been so long…so long…

“Gardener?”

Her voice was breathless and soft, a reminder that she was vulnerable and lonely, and a sudden wave of guilt washed over him as his body tensed. What the hell was he doing? Was this okay with her? Was this what she wanted? Fuck, they barely knew each other and he was kissing her like he had a right, like she’d given him permission…and she hadn’t.

He cleared his throat. “Jax…I didn’t mean to—”

She jerked her head back to look up at him, her eyes severe. “Don’t apologize. Don’t be sorry.”

Her reaction surprised him, but in an instant he realized that apologizing to her would read the same way to her as her pity would read to him.

“I’m not sorry,” he said quietly.

He hoped that he was convincing. He hoped she didn’t hear the lie in his voice. Because he was sorry. He was sorry he knew what it was like to hold her, to kiss her. He was very sorry because the real thing was so much better than his fantasies, and his fantasies had been enough to keep him awake two nights in a row. Yes, he was sorry.

“Good,” she said, her face still worried as he released his grip on her. “Because we can still be friends. It’s still—I mean…it was just a kiss, right? A blip. No big deal.”

Just a kiss? A blip? No big deal? He concealed a flinch by rubbing the back of his hand over his lips. It hurt a