The Problem with Fire - M.E. Clayton Page 0,21

and was dressed for a night on the couch.

Alone.

“Sayer-”

“Can I be honest with you, Monroe,” he said, interrupting another apology I’d been about to make for being such a clueless tool. I nodded, hoping to salvage some pride. “I like you, Monroe.”

I smiled softly. “I like you, too, Sayer,” I told him honestly. He was a good neighbor, and he seemed like a great guy.

But then he stepped closer until my back was up against the door and his body was crowding mine. “No, Monroe,” he rasped out, low and rough. “I like you.”

Everything stopped.

My lungs, my heart, my brain, they all just stopped.

Was he saying…?

“W…wh…uh, what?” I squawked in a low whisper.

Sayer placed his left hand against the door near my head, and his other hand came to rest on my hip. My lungs started working again, but only to suck in a shocked breath at the connection of his hand on my hip. I stared into his fiery blue eyes as his hand lid upward until it was hot against my bare flesh, his thumb running lazily back and forth over my skin.

He leaned in until his breath was warm against my ear. “I like you, Monroe,” he repeated, his voice low and sexy and incredible.

“You…uh, you do?” I asked breathlessly, because let me tell you. I. Was. Breathless.

This was crazy, and I wasn’t thinking that in a self-depreciative kind of way. I was thinking it in the way anyone would when a good-looking, six-pack-having, sexy firefighter claimed he was attracted to an older, less-than-firm, decent-looking, middle-aged woman.

Sayer’s lips touched the delicate skin right below my ear before saying, “Yeah, I do. I’ve liked you for a long time, Monroe.”

Sweet.

Baby.

Jesus.

His hand wrapped around the flank of my waist and squeezed just enough to make me wet all over. My hands few to his chest and I twisted the fabric of his shirt in my grip.

It’s been three years since a man’s hands have been on me.

“Sayer…” I didn’t mean for his name to come out sounding like a moan, but that’s exactly what it was.

“Baby,” he whispered against my skin, and there was no way I wasn’t going to make this horrible mistake.

I’ve been doing the right thing for the past three years. I’ve been doing nothing but what I think has been best for Leta and our new lives. I’ve been good damn it. I’ve been…I deserved this. I deserved a night of not being inside my mind for once.

I deserved a night with Sayer Hayes.

“Sayer, I-”

“Say yes, Monroe,” he said between the kisses he was peppering against my delicate skin. “I’m not sure how much more I can take, baby. I feel like I’m going to lose my mind if I don’t have you soon.”

I knew the rules. I knew you weren’t supposed to take what anyone said in the heat of the moment to heart, but his words made the back of my eyes burn. They felt like a soothing balm over the burns of an old rejection. Sayer Hayes was the sexiest thing walking the earth, and here he was, telling me how much he wanted me. He was making me feel wanted when I’d gotten over the feeling of being unwanted a while back.

“Say yes, Monroe,” he demanded this time. “Say yes, so I can show you everything I’ve been dreaming about for the past two months.”

Say yes.

His other hand came off the wall and slid over my shoulder until it was cupping the back of my neck. His hand felt like live fire, and I knew there was going to be no turning back for me.

I was going to do this.

He pulled back until his eyes were on mine. I could feel my pulse thumping in my neck and in between my legs with the fierceness of his stare. “I want you, Monroe,” he said, his voice raspy and dark. “I don’t want to be a liar. I want to be able to say that you’re in my bed every night when you don’t have Leta, and it be the truth.” I closed my eyes, and my chest felt like it’d been kicked in.

This wasn’t a one-night stand.

“Sayer-”

“Look at me, Monroe,” he insisted. “Look at me.”

I opened my eyes, and there was no mistaking he dark desire in his eyes. There was no faking that. No matter how it came to be, Sayer Hayes wanted me. His attraction for me was real. And I was going to take advantage of that for