CHAPTER 6
Reyes pushes off the wall with a growl, and I know I’ve pushed too far. What I don’t know is why I can’t seem to stop.
In the blink of an eye, the tables have turned. My back’s against the wall. My heart is beating too fast. My skin is hot all over, and the alcohol isn’t the only thing reddening my cheeks.
“Uh-oh,” my voice sounds like it’s coming from outside of me. “Did I get under your skin, viejito?”
Big hands find the wall inches from my ears. He doesn’t hit the mirror, and there’s no violence to the intensity in his gaze. The same part of me that can’t stop pushing his buttons is equally torn between poking the deep furrow in his obscenely smooth complexion and sinking my teeth into the angrily pulsing vein in his neck.
Maybe the alcohol is affecting me a little bit more than I thought. But like he said, we aren’t teammates anymore. A little one-night fuck between rivals might be just what the doctor ordered to take the edge off before I head back home to a team that hates me.
The elevator dings, and I’m not sure if I’m praying for it to go faster or for it to stop entirely.
“Cat got your tongue, big man?” I taunt, apparently getting my payback for the uncomfortably silent drive.
He bends his elbows and leans in. His forearms hover so close to my shoulders I can feel the heat of him, and I’m as good as trapped. My mouth has already betrayed me, and my body is following close behind. It’s all I can do to keep my eyes open and focused on his, when all I want to do is close my eyes and inhale him. He smells as complex as he is—like well-oiled leather, tropical nights, and dark rum, but beneath that gruffly charismatic exterior, he’s all body shots and fucking in the dirt.
“I told you to knock it off.” His voice tears through me as rough as sliding through gravel, each syllable knocking the breath from my lungs.
Not enough to keep my big mouth from opening again.
“Make me.”
I can’t stop the whimper on my lips when he spins me around. My hands splay on the mirror—my fingertips grazing his wrists as he boxes me in again. Everything about this is painfully vulnerable for someone who craves control as much as I do, but those fingertip brushes are the only contact between our bodies. His chin hovers above my shoulder, and my heart beats in my throat.
His eyes look darker like this—staring into my soul through the mirror. His tongue darts out to wet his lips, and I feel that sweep of his tongue as if it’s between my legs. My thighs clench, searching for friction in my wet leggings and desperate for more.
My pussy clenches around its emptiness. For every unwanted reaction I try to hide, he responds with equal frustration. I bite my lip to hold in an unseemly noise; his nostrils flare. He breathes in so hard a loose strand of hair flutters against my cheek; my back arches. I lose track of the elevator’s tell-tale beeps as my hips find his, and his fingers curl against the mirror.
“Don’t let one good game leave you thinking you’ve earned the right to talk to me that way,” he groans through gritted teeth.
I slide my hands higher, streaking the mirror as I tease my fingernails along his forearm. I feel his groan in my own body, leaving me aching for more.
“If you’re looking for an apology, you’d better keep looking.” I back into his body, my ass searching out confirmation that he’s as consumed by this impossible need as I am.
“Don’t play games you can’t finish,” he snaps.
“Do I look like I’m quitting?”
I take another step back, and his hands shoot to my hips. Before I know if he’s going to pull me against him or push me away, the doors roll open.
I hesitate, frozen between his hands. My brain shouts at me to get off the elevator. To get the hell away from this man and the temptation he lights in my veins. A second passes. Two. Inside this elevator, time stands still. The doors begin their slow roll shut, and I think they’ve made the decision for me. One more floor, and I’ll be alone with Reyes.
His hand slams between the doors before they shut. The other pushes me into the hallway the second the doors have opened far enough to let me through. We stare at each other from across that mechanical boundary, both of us breathing hard, and the part of me that’s too lonely to know better begs my mouth to invite him to my room. The same part of me that’s been taunting him all night has, ‘Are you coming, or do you need a moment, viejito?’ locked and loaded.
“Get some rest, Texas,” he says before I can say something I’ll regret once my liquid courage wears off. “You have a long way back home.”