There Goes My Heart (The Sullivans #20) - Bella Andre Page 0,21

Ever so lightly, but with sinful intention. “Do you have any idea how hard it was not to touch you the way I am now?”

“Maybe.” She weighed the wisdom of admitting the truth before deciding to be just as honest. “I felt the same way. But then, you were so irritating that it didn’t matter how hot you were. If I had only realized you were pulling my pigtails on the playground because you had the hots for me—”

“You would never have let me live it down.” He lifted her gauzy blouse over her head as he finished her sentence. “Thank God I can stare as long as I like tonight.”

Though she was still wearing a black bra and leather pants, as Rory drank her in, she felt naked. No one had ever looked at her like this before. Like she was a work of art. Like she was absolutely perfect. Like she was the most wonderful gift.

And even though she knew she wasn’t, for one night she wanted to pretend that she was.

When he feathered his fingers through the hair at the nape of her neck, she shivered in response. “You’re going to torture me by taking your sweet time getting me to the finish line, aren’t you?” Her words came out breathless. Borderline desperate.

“You’d be disappointed if I didn’t.” He slid a hand over the bare skin of her back. “And you should know I intend for you to cross the finish line over and over again.”

“Rather confident of your sexual prowess, aren’t you?”

His answer came by way of a kiss that was at once wonderfully filthy and breathtakingly romantic. “I know better than to bring anything but my A game tonight. You’d taunt me endlessly at work otherwise.”

She slid her fingers through his surprisingly silky hair. “And you’d be disappointed if I didn’t do just that.”

“I would. Although I can already guarantee nothing about tonight is going to disappoint me. No matter how much we do or don’t do, I’m already a very happy man.” She appreciated that he was giving her time once more to make sure she was fully on board. “So before I strip you down completely and run my tongue over every inch of your gorgeous skin, I need to know your limits—anything that isn’t on the table.”

“I don’t have a lot of rules for tonight,” she said. Especially when it came to his tongue and her skin. In fact, she couldn’t remember ever wanting anything quite so badly. “Only that neither of us gets to act weird when it’s over.”

“Works for me.”

“Good. And for every piece of clothing you strip from me,” she added, “you’ll lose one too.” To make her point, she slipped her hands beneath the lapels of his jacket and pushed it off his shoulders.

“I always did think strip poker would be better played without cards,” he murmured as he played his fingers over her abdomen. “And I’ll have you know that you’re my full-on teenage dream in those leather pants. Especially the part where I’m about to take them off.”

Was there anything hotter than watching Rory use his big, brilliant hands to pull down her zipper? She’d never be able to watch him work again without remembering this heat flooding her body and the mouthwatering anticipation of just where he was going to put his hands next.

“Well, well, well…” His heated gaze caught on her lingerie. “Aren’t you full of surprises?”

Zara had never been a girly girl, but she couldn’t resist soft, pretty things against her skin. She’d chosen a simple black bra to wear beneath her translucent shirt tonight, but there was nothing simple about the lace and silk she was wearing beneath the leather.

Rory knelt before her as he unzipped her boots and took them off, then slid her pants down her legs and helped her step free of them. Once she was standing in only a bra and panties, he stopped to stare again.

“My God…” With his callused fingertips, he traced the extremely thin, extremely small strip of material that covered mere inches of her hips.

He wrapped his hands around her hips to press a kiss to the fabric that still covered her, and she couldn’t hold back a low moan of pleasure. If he was making her feel this good already, how was she going to survive his hands, his mouth, on her bare skin?

He looked up her body from where he was kneeling on the floor. “Please tell me you normally wear big