went to my throat, and he sucked down hard, his tongue lashing against the tender skin.
“Get a room!”
The words had both of us halting, panting into each other as we recognized what had just happened, and where.
I looked over his shoulder, curious as to who’d hollered at us. When I saw it wasn’t someone from the swim team, I let out a breath.
“They’re strangers,” I muttered.
He pressed his forehead to mine. “I don’t care.”
I swallowed. “You have to.”
“I don’t. I hate her,” he whispered. “I loathe her.”
“You married her,” I told him, but there was no poison in my words. Not like before.
He swallowed. “Will you come to my room?”
“Why?”
“We need to talk.”
I rocked my hips, releasing a hissing breath as I felt his dick digging into my belly. “That says otherwise. Talk is the last thing on your mind.”
“I’m not going to lie. I need you. Fuck, I need you, Thea.” He shuddered. “But we need to talk. I need to tell you—”
“What you wouldn’t tell me for the past two years?”
“There was a lot at stake.”
“What? Our happiness wasn’t worth fighting for?” I demanded bitterly.
“Let me explain,” he pleaded.
Maybe I was weak, and in the face of what I’d just learned about my mother, maybe that weakness was even more shameful. But when I looked into his eyes, he was my Adam, and he needed me.
Preferring to think of myself as generous rather than a fool, I muttered, “Okay.”
He smiled at me, and it was like the sun coming out from behind a flood of storm clouds.
“Thank you.”
I dipped my chin, and though I wanted to hold his hand, I didn’t. I moved away from the wall when he did and looked back at the spot where I’d felt my first real brush of passion.
Shaking my head at the sight, because it wasn’t exactly romantic—a brick wall just off the corner of the hotel which took up most of the block—I followed him into the foyer.
The glass windows let in so much light that it wasn’t like going indoors, more like going undercover.
Everything in here stank of money. It couldn’t be much more of a contrast to where I’d spent the afternoon if it tried.
The receptionist sat behind a glass desk that had a frickin’ waterfall incorporated into it, for God’s sake. Everything was chrome and silver, black leather. Like some monument to a modern art god who really needed to get some taste.
Beneath my sneaker-clad feet, shiny and squeaky marble floors echoed our path as we headed to the elevators.
He pressed a button, the doors instantly opened, and we shuffled in.
I didn’t look at the full-length mirror that graced the back wall of the elevator. I didn’t want to see what he saw. I wasn’t sure if I could deal with the sight of me red and hot from his kiss.
We stayed quiet as the doors opened once more, spitting us out onto his floor. He was just to the left of the elevator, and within seconds, we were alone in his room.
Really, truly alone in a way that we hadn’t been for years.
With the door closed behind us, I felt that like a weight on my being. The pressure of knowing that we were sharing a private space tantalized me like nothing else could.
I’d moved into the room, which was a mirror image of mine—a bright purple carpet with light lilac waves on the floor, a black marble wall behind the pair of large, queen-sized beds that were covered in white sheets and a pair of silvery, plush comforters.
To the side, there was a patio door that looked out onto the street, and I stared at that before I turned around to face him and saw him barricading the door.
My heart didn’t leap up like it might with another man.
Adam meant my body no harm.
It was my heart and soul that he could crucify.
I eyed his position, the whole ‘human barrier’ thing he had going on, and asked, “You think I’ll run?”
“I would if I was in your shoes.”
I arched a brow. “Really? Well, you’ve got me here, and we’re alone for the first time in years. What do you want to tell me?”
He licked his lips, and I watched the move, envying his tongue because I wanted to do that. Wanted to taste his mouth, to savor him and sample his flavor again and again.
Adam groaned, then muttered, “You’re killing me, Thea. Don’t look at me like that.”