Love Triangle Six Books of Torn Desire - Willow Winters Page 0,256

that was.”

“I might’ve hit up your friend for information again.”

I roll my eyes. “Some friend she is.”

“Maybe she is, Reese.”

“By throwing temptation at me?”

He takes a step closer to me. He’s close enough that I can smell him, and desire warms my belly. “I tempt you?”

“Every second of every day,” I breathe.

“Jesus,” he mutters. He pulls me into him, and I don’t have the strength to fight him off. He doesn’t kiss me, just holds me for a few beats, and it feels so damn good here, so right here, that I don’t even care if he is using me because of some competition with his brother. “To answer your question, this is why I came here.”

He buries his face in my neck, the scruff on his jaw scratchy and rough against my skin. My heart feels so full here in his arms. My blood heats, my nerves awaken, and all the feelings rush south to the throb pulsing between my legs.

I don’t just want him—I don’t just want this to be real, to be sincere. I need him. I ache for him. Our one night floods my memories, that hand running along my thigh, his kiss, his touch, his body as it entered mine. It’s so strong, so familiar…yet it’s starting to fade. And then it fades completely as I realize what I’m doing.

I pull out of his embrace, not sure if I’m being noble or stupid.

“Ride with me,” he says. “Vinny can drive your car back and we can sit in the back of the Yukon, just you and me, and talk.”

Trapped in a car for five hours with Mark Ashton?

It’s like a dream come true…except it’s dangerous. Suicidal, even.

“I—I don’t know. And who the hell is Vinny?”

“My head of security. Please, Reese. I came all this way to see you.” This isn’t the fifteen-minute drive from the Strip to my place. He took a five-hour car trip to come see me in another state. For someone who seems as busy as he is, that deserves some recognition. I can hardly think of a reason to say no to him when he did all this because of whatever hope he’s clinging to that we can work this out. “Please just give me a few hours.”

I sigh. I didn’t need to be convinced. The I don’t know was out of obligation to my boyfriend, not because I truly didn’t know what to do. I know what the right thing to do is, but I find myself doing the opposite despite myself. “Okay.”

Chapter Twenty-Six

I press my body as close to the door of the car as I can to distance myself from Mark and all that temptation, but he won’t have it. He sits in the middle, clicks a button that throws up a black divider between us and the driver, and arranges our bodies so we’re sitting the exact way we sat when this same car took us from the concert at Mandalay Bay back to Mark’s place at the Mandarin Oriental.

His hand is on my thigh, and my arms are wrapped around his arm, hugging it to me. He sits with his legs apart, his knee brushing against mine, and I sit with my legs together, like a good girl. I don’t feel very good right now, though.

“I can’t do this,” I say by way of protest. “Let me out. I need to drive myself home. Alone.”

The Yukon lurches forward, and we’re in motion. I sigh and untangle my arms from around his. I cross my arms over my chest, but he doesn’t move his hand from my thigh nor his knee from beside mine. I pick up his hand and place it on his lap, careful not to touch any other part of his body.

“Go sit over there,” I say, nodding across the small space at the row of seats facing us.

He chuckles and scoots over a few inches. “You can have your space.”

“Gee, thanks.”

We’re quiet for a few beats, each staring out our respective windows, and I wonder what in the actual fuck he’s doing.

I finally turn and look at him. “You’re not like I thought you’d be.”

His eyes find mine. “What did you think I’d be?”

“Honestly, I never thought I’d get the chance to meet you. Everything I’ve read and heard about you tells me you use women for sex, but you don’t seem that way with me.”

“What have you heard?”

“Magazines tell me you’re with a different woman every night. Twitter tells me you’re proud