Chapter Thirty-Two Hunter
Chapter Thirty-Two
Hunter
Lucky made a sound at the back of her throat. “I did not! I would remember if I had!”
She had. Even if she didn’t want to admit it. I tried not to smile. “Last night. On my cheek.”
The expression on her face was one of guilt. Was that because of the rules or because she’d thought I hadn’t been awake? I didn’t need an apology.
I only needed her to do it again. But in a different spot this time.
And I couldn’t get over the fact that she had thought I didn’t want to kiss her. It was all I ever thought about. It was amazing that I could still manage to do my job at all.
“That is ... neither here nor there,” she said, raising her chin slightly.
If she hadn’t been wearing so little clothing, I probably would have recognized that she was trying to give herself an out. But we’d been handed a golden opportunity to break the rule in a way that we technically couldn’t be held responsible for, and I didn’t want to waste it. “That’s confirmation. Why won’t you admit to it?”
“Because I can’t.” Her voice broke. “I can’t kiss you and you can’t kiss me and that’s just how things are. And that cheek kiss was unintentional.”
“How do you kiss someone unintentionally?”
“By not intending it. It just happened.”
I couldn’t stand the distance between us. I put my hand on her waist and tugged her forward. She came very willingly. “And why did it happen?”
“Because . . .”
Because she had wanted to kiss me for as long as I had wanted to kiss her. She needed to know that. “I’ve been imagining kissing you for weeks, Lucky. I want it more than almost anything.”
“Why didn’t you mention that earlier?” she demanded as our chests collided with each quick inhale and exhale. She was so soft that I was having a hard time focusing.
“You spook easily.”
“I’m not a horse. And I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have kissed you like that.”
“Yes, you should have.” I let go of her hand and cradled her face, running my thumb along the lower edge of her lip. “I think you should kiss me more.”
She made a noise at the back of her throat that made my knees go weak.
“But it’s your decision,” I said. I would walk away if that was what she wanted, even if it killed me. “Whatever you want, I’ll respect it.”
“You just said you have to follow the rules.”
I nodded. “I do. But right now I don’t care.”
I was past caring. She made me feel like I was getting dragged out to sea by the tide and I should just go along with it and not try to fight. I should give in.
But this was deliberate. This was a choice. One we were both going to make together.
I leaned in so that my mouth hovered just above hers, not touching. She was unbelievably tempting and someone should have given me a medal for keeping my lips and hands to myself for so long. I had to gulp back the sensations I felt in my attempt to keep a clear head.
I reminded myself that this was her decision and I would respect it.
But it didn’t mean I might not try to sway her a little. “I promise not to tell the captain.”
“That’s not the point. I would know.” She was trying to sound determined but she had already decided.
I couldn’t stop the eager grin that spread across my face. “Yes, you will most definitely know when I’m kissing you.”
“I don’t want us to get in trouble.”
“Everybody else is doing it.” I murmured the words while nuzzling my nose along her wet, dark hair.
“To quote my nonna, just because everybody else jumps off a bridge doesn’t mean that I should.”
That put an image in my head that I had to share with her. “It will feel like that between us, you know. Like we’re free-falling, not able to catch our breath. Our stomachs will swoop, we’ll be in sensory overload, dizzy and weightless, that spike of adrenaline making it thrilling and terrifying at the same time.”
“Terrifying?” She said the word so sweetly that a bolt of desire shot up my spine and I had to lean slightly against the door so that I didn’t fall over.
“You’re terrifying, Lucky Salerno. You scare me to death. The things you make me want, the way you make me feel ...”
She reached up then to run her fingers along my cheekbones, and her touching me, wanting to touch me, ignited my blood, setting me on fire.
Then she said the one word I had been waiting for.
“Yes.”
I would go slowly. I would. I would not freak her out. I watched as her eyelids drifted shut and she waited. I wanted to remember this moment. The last one before I kissed her.
After this, everything was going to change.
I lowered my head slightly and softly brushed my lips against hers. It was so light that there was barely any contact, but it was like I’d licked a live electrical wire. I felt that small kiss in every corner of my body, lighting me up like a Christmas tree.
Then she did something that almost destroyed me.
She moaned.
And that sound fizzed hotly in my blood. It made my hands tremble when I moved them up to her hair, anchoring her against me.
I used the tip of my tongue to lick her lips briefly, needing to taste her.
“You taste so sweet.” I groaned the words against her, not knowing how I was still capable of speech. “Like you still have sugar on your skin from last night.”
“I washed it all off,” she said, her breath catching.
“Then it must just be you.”
Not able to help myself, I returned my lips to hers. I kissed her as thoroughly and tenderly and gently as I could. I needed to tell her with my kiss the things I couldn’t yet say. Her mouth moving against mine ... it made me shiver and I felt the heat and sweetness of her lips all the way down to my toes. It made me want to forget all of my resolutions.
I had no idea that my lips were connected to so many nerve endings in my body. Every single one of them was exploding.
Something she seemed to be feeling, too. She wrapped her arms around my neck and pulled me closer. Urging me to do more.
Not yet. I had to retreat. I pulled my head back. “Slowly. I’m going to enjoy this. I intend to savor it. Savor you.”
I saw what my words did to her. Her hungry expression was doing unspeakable things to me. She tried to challenge me. “Says the man who stole cookie dough because he didn’t want to wait for the cookies.”
“You said I couldn’t have a cookie, so I took what I could get.”
I wouldn’t give in to temptation. I would take things slowly. I would learn every one of her sighs, the way her body felt against mine, all the different ways her mouth could kiss.
If I had thought I was being tortured before, I had been wrong. This. This was torture. The most exquisite kind imaginable. Especially because all I wanted was to rip this swimsuit off her and take her over to our bed and sink into her, but there would be time for that later.
My body began to argue with me that this was a bad idea. I felt like I’d crossed a desert, desperate for water, but was only allowing myself one drop at a time. It was delicious and I’d been dying for it, but it wasn’t enough. I wanted to guzzle it down, have it spilling from my mouth, drink so much that I would never feel thirsty again.
But I was pretty sure that my thirst for her would never be quenched.
I started to trace the shape of her mouth, lingering and exploring. I kissed her thoroughly, with a devastating slowness, and she arched against me, panting and pleading. The kisses that passed between us were intimate and sensual and my bones were melting. My fingers didn’t get the message from my brain that I was moving at a glacial pace because they were teasing and feeling and exploring and she shivered against me.
“Please,” she begged, and it broke something inside me. My body was rigid with restraint, desperate for her, and I lost my self-control.
She opened her mouth and I slid my tongue inside, stroking hers. She collapsed and I grabbed her by the waist, pinning her between me and the door. She arched her back when I sucked her tongue into my own mouth and made the sexiest sound I’d ever heard.
Liquid heat pooled at the base of my spine and then exploded outward.
She was the best hit of dopamine I’d ever had.
I felt everything I had promised her—my stomach swooped, feeling hollowed out, my senses overloaded, adrenaline spiked inside me, I was dizzy and weightless.
“I didn’t know it could be like this,” I said to her, dazed, and she nodded, her lips swollen, her hair a beautiful mess.
“Neither did—”
I took her mouth again before she could finish her sentence. Each stroke of her tongue against mine was electric, traveling along my synapses and frying my nerve endings, sending me into a frenzy of wanting.
I loved this woman so much.
She melted against me, hot and soft and pliable, and I was determined to wrench every moan, every wave of pleasure, from her body, to watch her fall apart while I—
There was a pounding on my door. “Lucky? It’s Captain Carl.”