Prologue Remi #4
His hands slid lower, and his fingers were tucked beneath the waistband of my skintight pants. “Perfectly fine,” he said in a ragged voice.
I could hardly breathe when he pressed his fingertips into the top of my ass and tugged my hips flush against his body.
Oh God.
He was hard. And he was huge.
He wanted me so badly that one conversation, one dance did this to him.
I did this to him.
I’d never felt this good. The head-spinning euphoria made me feel reckless.
My hands were shaking as I pushed them up his chest so I could feel the flex of muscle under my palms. He dipped his head to nose my hair away from my neck, his teeth dragging over the sensitive shell of my ear.
“You want more?” He spoke softly, a devilish edge to his already sinful voice.
I nodded, relishing in the catch of his stubble against my jaw. It would hurt if he rubbed it over my skin. And yes, yes, I wanted more.
More.
Everything.
My hand cupped the back of his neck, fingers digging into his thick hair. He groaned against the side of my head, one hand dipping underneath my pants, even though he could hardly move with how tight they were. The other moved up my back and fisted in my hair. The sharp edge of pain made me gasp.
“Oh God,” I whimpered.
“Oh, no, Red, if I take you home, you’ll be screaming my name.” Then he spun me, my back pressed against his chest and his hips rolling against my ass. “This fucking body,” he moaned. “You’re driving me insane.”
One hand locked on my hip, holding me so firmly that it almost hurt.
The other slid across my stomach underneath my loose shirt.
I arched back, rolling my head against his shoulder.
My hand covered his on my stomach, and the thrilling jolt of energy from the music and the lights made me feel like I was suspended in midair, attached to invisible strings that he controlled.
Our fingers intertwined underneath my shirt, and I clasped his hand so hard that he chuckled darkly into my ear. “Can I touch you?”
My breath caught in my lungs.
Yes.
No.
Yes. I did want him to touch me. Whether it was good or bad or so fucking out of character, I didn’t care, refused to think about how I’d ended up there.
“I don’t want people to see.”
Wait. What?
That wasn’t what I’d meant to say.
I’d been distilled down to my baser instincts, someone driven by her screaming pulse and a need for touch and taste and release. I wanted him to snap my spine in half. Nothing else mattered.
He turned us so that I was facing the wall, and his big, warm palm immediately moved up, and his chest rumbled on an indecent groan when he realized I wasn’t wearing a bra. His rough hand engulfed my breast, and my knees went weak.
“You’d taste so good, wouldn’t you?”
I was mindless. He rolled his palm over the tip of my breast, then pinched, and I tried to turn to kiss him, but he held me firmly in place.
“No, not here, Red.” He licked down the line of my neck, placing sucking kisses as his fingers plucked at the hard tip of my breast. “I’ll take you somewhere and make tonight so good for you.”
His other hand moved from my hip, deftly unbuttoning the front of my pants.
I rolled my hips against the hard line of him, and he growled, sucking at the side of my neck so hard that I’d probably have a mark.
Please, please, please, I thought with frantic, sharp panic that made my entire frame shake.
“Listen to you,” he praised. “You’re so sweet, aren’t you?”
Had I said that out loud? I couldn’t even care. I didn’t care about anything except finding an end to this unbearable climb of tension. My entire body was strung tight, skin humming, pulse screaming, and if it didn’t snap soon, I’d scream.
With one palm cupping my breast and the other slowly easing down the front of my pants, he pressed kisses along my jawline.
I gripped his thick wrist as he pushed underneath my underwear, my other hand shooting out to brace against the wall in front of us. My back arched, pressing my ass into his groin, and I bit out a ragged curse.
When he slid the blunt edge of his fingers between my legs and found me slick, he groaned into my ear. “I could take you right here, couldn’t I, Red? Make you scream with all these people watching, and you wouldn’t care.”
I sagged into his embrace, the filthy words only ratcheting up my insatiable need to feel good, feel better than I had in a long time.
Would I let him?
Could I let him take me somewhere dark, somewhere private, where I would have to gather my clothes and walk home knowing that I’d done something I’d promised myself I’d never do again?
No. No.
My eyes flew open.
What the fuck was I doing?
My skin went cold, and my body went still.
I’d let a stranger shove his hand down my pants in a public place. A stranger with no name, who knew nothing about me except my willingness to let him touch my body. Maybe anyone could’ve sat next to him and he would’ve done the same thing.
An interchangeable vessel.
Even worse, I couldn’t fight the curl of shame as I realized I’d done the same to him.
Behind me, he froze, too, instantly sensing the change in my body language.
I tugged frantically at his wrist, and he complied, stepping back so quickly that I almost fell over.
I didn’t want empty or fast, even if it was mutual.
Hot, embarrassed tears blurred my vision, and I took a few jittery breaths to will them back.
I’d been doing it my entire life, whenever my feelings got too big for my body.
Happy tears, sad tears, and in this case, tears that sprang up when I wanted to run and hide from the consequences of my own choices.
I couldn’t, though, could I? I might not see his face again, but I’d still have to make peace with the fact that I’d allowed myself to go this far.
With trembling hands, I buttoned up my pants and righted my shirt. When I finally risked a glance up, his face was unreadable, but his eyes . . .
His eyes still burned.
“Too much,” he said. “My apologies if I went too far.”
I shook my head. “No, it was . . . it was both of us.”
He took a small step forward. “Tell me your name,” he begged.
Tomorrow I’d wake up and none of this would be real. Trying to fit this into the reality of my life was absolutely futile.
“Good night,” I told him instead. “I’m sure you’ll find someone else to dance with soon enough.”