8. Ava #2
I’m also only aware of my hand on Levi’s thigh when a burning sensation slips through my blood.
He cocks a brow at me, his breathing as ragged as mine from the adrenaline, and I look down to where my hand is resting on his leg.
Dangerously close to his dick.
Instantly, I rip my hand away.
“You alright?” he asks when I scrub a hand through my hair.
The deer is gone, lying in the brush somewhere. There’s no way it survived that hit. We were doing well over the speed limit.
My hands are shaking, and my chest feels tight, the adrenaline enough to steal my breath away and my asthma enough to render me speechless. Frantically, I reach for my bag as my throat closes. It’s like someone sucked all the air out of the car.
“ Ava .”
Levi tugs the bag out of my hands, opening it and looking inside while I struggle to catch my breath.
He finally produces the inhaler, popping the cap off and placing it to my lips. He keeps his hand on the back of my head while he pushes the medicine into my lungs, and it’s strangely . . . comforting.
“Breathe.” He says it as if I’ve forgotten how. Not as if I have asthma and we just killed a deer and probably shattered his fancy car.
But . . . there’s also something else in his gaze. Is he worried about me?
Levi Cross, worried about the little maid he was just interrogating FBI-style.
Who would have thought?
I take another breath, laying my head back as my chest relaxes. He doesn’t release me, his fingers winding through my hair at the back of my head to hold me up.
“I’m okay,” I breathe, though my voice is shaky. I’m not sure if it’s from looking up into his eyes or from my breathing condition.
“You didn’t say you had asthma.” It’s an accusation.
“Levi . . . I have asthma.”
He shakes his head, finally releasing me, and grabs the door handle.
“Wait,” I jump, and he pauses, looking back at me. Reaching out, like I’m trying to comfort a wild bear, I touch a spot on his forehead. He doesn’t even wince, though there’s a sizable gash in his skin right above his brow. “You’re bleeding.”
“Not the first time,” he says, looking at his blood on my hand as if something about it disturbs him.
“You need to get it looked at.”
He glances at the rearview mirror.
“I’m fine, Ava. I’ve had worse.”
“It’s not fine,” I argue. He looks down to where my hand rests on his forearm. “Please . . . At least let me look at it.”
He stares at me for a long moment before something hardens in his gaze.
“Fine. I’ll let you stitch it when we get home.”
And with that, he’s pulling away as if I’d burned him.
“Where are you going?”
“To make sure it’s dead.”
I watch him disappear into the tree line while my breathing slowly returns to normal. It’s not long before I hear a loud pop, and sorrow washes over me.
I don’t know whether it’s for the deer or the man that had to kill it, but it’s there, and it makes my chest ache.
And unfortunately . . . I’m realizing I’m not as indifferent to Levi Cross as I thought.
Levi drops the first aid kit down on the coffee table in the den, while I fidget nervously with my hands.
“Have you ever given stitches before?” he asks, cocking a brow at me despite the blood oozing from his head.
“No, but . . . how hard can it be?”
He just shakes his head, stalking toward the door.
“Where are you going?”
“Give me a minute,” he replies gruffly.
He disappears from the room while I open the kit and look through the items, pulling out what I think I’ll need, though I really have no idea.
By the time he comes back, he’s got a bottle of whiskey in his hand and a grim look of determination in his eyes.
“Really?” I shoot him a look when he settles on the couch in front of me. It’s entirely too close, but I’m about to get a whole lot closer when I stitch his head shut.
He doesn’t say anything, popping the lid off the bottle. He raises it to his lips while eyeing me over the top, as if he’s challenging me.
Fine. We’ll see how cocky he is when I’ve got a needle in my hand.
I grab the thread and needle—why does the needle look so weird?—and start the painstaking process of trying to thread it with his gaze on me.
I chance a glance at him, and it’s a big mistake because once I do, a shot of electricity shoots through me.
“Stop staring at me.”
“Just wondering when you’re going to figure it out or let me do it.”
“I don’t need your help. I’m competent.”
He cocks a brow at the threadless needle in my hand.
“Looks like it.”
“You know, I could have just let you bleed out.”
Lifting the bottle of whiskey back to his lips, he takes a drink, a devil-may-care glint in his eyes.
“You wouldn’t.”
“Why, because you’re my boss?”
“Because you’ve got a soft heart.”
I pause, and he smirks, while my chest flutters uncomfortably. Just when I think I have him figured out, he surprises me again.
Finally, I manage to thread the weird needle and hold it up for him to see.
“I told you I was capable.”
“You’re going to have to sit on my lap.”
I’m sure if my cheeks get any hotter, NASA will label me as a second sun.
My stomach dips to my toes. “That sounds nefarious.”
“Don’t worry, sweetheart. You’re not my type.”
Ouch.
“Right, how could I forget? You prefer leggy blondes with a black hole personality.”
“Or I prefer women who won’t get clingy.”
“Okay, that was rude,” I quip, my cheeks flaming. “I do not get clingy.”
“No?”
“No. Least of all with someone like you.”
His eyes flash with that cocky indifference that I’ve come to both loath and crave at the same time.
“Let’s go,” he says, gesturing to his lap. “I don’t want you stabbing me in the eye because you’re unsteady.”
Asshole.
“Should have just let you bleed out,” I grumble under my breath.
I don’t know what it is about this man that makes all my inhibitions and morals jump out the window, but nevertheless, when I place my hand on his shoulder, pushing him back into the couch, my heart skitters in my chest at the look in his eyes.
It was there. That fleeting glance. Like he’d gladly fall to his knees and worship me if that’s what I asked for.
I almost laugh, picturing a man like Levi Cross being so consumed by a woman that he’d give up heaven and earth to make her the queen of his hell.
As if he would be that consumed with me .
Carefully, I slip onto his lap, holding the needle above my head to keep from stabbing him. His eyes never leave my face, his tongue running over his teeth when I settle over him, my legs straddling either of his.
My core warms as his gaze slides down my body, toward the center of my thighs, where I rest just over top of him, hovering in an effort to save myself.
“All the way,” he says, and if I’m not mistaken, there’s a slight rasp to his voice that slips through my blood, warming me from the inside out.
He doesn’t touch me even when I rock unstably on his lap, gripping his shoulder to steady myself, but the heat of a thousand suns burns on my skin when I settle over him, feeling the hard length of him pressed against my core.
Oh my God . . . is this turning him on?
He cocks a brow.
“Problem?”
“No problem at all.”
He readjusts his hips, and his cock brushes against my center, unfortunately reminding me of the ache between my thighs.
“None?”
I grit my teeth. He’s trying to toy with me.
“None at all,” I sigh. “Fortunately, I can get cheap dick anywhere. Yours has no effect on me.”
He chuckles darkly, and the sound goes straight to my core.
“We’ll see about that.”
Shaking my head, I place my hand on the side of his face to steady myself. I move forward, and right when he’s about to say something that will probably make me blush, I pierce the skin with the needle.
He hisses out a breath through his teeth, his hand shooting to my hip and his fingers tightening to near bruising strength, but I don’t stop. I’ve sewn up holes in clothes before. Stuffed animals when I was a kid. This can’t be all that different, right?
“Punishing me, little ghost?” he asks. Despite the needle slipping through his torn skin, the pain doesn’t seem to have much of an effect on him.
“Something like that,” I murmur curtly, my lips pursing as I work. I can’t look at him because if I do, I know I’ll screw this up, and call me crazy, but I have a desire to prove myself.
I finish the stitches, and although they look choppy, they hold. When I settle back, attempting to get off his lap, his grip tightens, locking me in place.
My eyes go to his for only a second, and I find him staring at me with something so far from indifference, it makes my stomach do cartwheels around my organs.
“I’m done,” I say softly, and his jaw clenches. My eyes stay on the lines of his T-shirt where it stretches over his skin.
“Are you?”
I nod, my tongue darting out to lick my lip. Levi’s gaze follows the motion and darkens.
“Ava . . .” he says quietly. “Look at me.”
I suck in a shaky breath and force my gaze to his. It’s a mistake because once I look at him, I can’t look away. Ice-blue eyes, the color of an Arctic tundra. Only, instead of sending a chill through me, my blood heats with fire.
His gaze flicks from the whiskey bottle, then back to mine, dark and so consuming, it feels like swallowing a live grenade.
“I think I should go up to my room now,” I breathe, and neither of us moves.
“I’m thirsty.” His voice is dark and deadly calm, like a gentle breeze before the storm of a lifetime. I blink at him, not understanding.
And then realization hits.
Sucking in a shallow breath, I place the needle on the stand beside us, taking his bottle instead and holding it out for him, but he doesn’t take it.
He nods at the bottle of amber liquid.
When I don’t move, his voice is stern and calculated. Controlled.
“I said I’m thirsty, Miss Ryan.”
A shiver moves down my spine when I realize what he wants.
“You’re insane,” I whisper. He doesn’t try to deny it.
Leaning back, he readjusts underneath me and settles back into the couch.
“It shouldn’t be a problem for you. As you’ve said, you can find cheap dick anywhere. I have no effect on you, remember?”
Asshole.
Why did I have to say that?
Cocking my head to the side, I smile sweetly at him and hope he can see the hate flashing in my eyes.
“Whatever you say, Mr. Cross.”
His chin tips up, his gaze taunting. He thinks I won’t actually do it, which only spurs me on more.
Lifting the bottle to my lips, I gather some of the whiskey in my mouth, and the smooth burn coats the back of my throat, nearly making me choke.
God, how does he drink this?
Leaning forward, I press my lips to his, my stomach fluttering when I taste the whiskey on his lips from mine. Levi doesn’t move, his arms over the back of the chair like a damned God, while I, the poor girl obsessed with him, practically pant on his lap.
The liquor passes from my tongue to his, and with the barest touch, all my senses come alive.
Levi tastes like sin. Like warmth and darkness and everything mothers warn their daughters about, when he lazily slips his tongue against mine, capturing the liquid. Like he doesn’t need to. Like he’s doing it as a favor and not because he told me to.
It should turn me off. Unfortunately, it only makes me want him more.
I want to see his control slip. I want to hear my name in his brooding voice. I want to feel the effect I have on him, even if he’s too stubborn to admit there’s some part of him that wants me.
Armed with a light buzz from the lack of oxygen in the room and a whole lot of ambition found in my new mission, I lean back enough to break the contact and put the bottle back to my lips.
This time, my pulse leaps when I lean back down, aligning my lips to his.
Our tongues tangle and the whiskey passes between us, getting lost somewhere amongst the heavy pants that I’m not even sure are mine or his, at this point.
Everything sharpens to a point, coalescing directly between my legs until my clit throbs behind the lacy material of my panties.
I repeat the motion, and this time, something deep rumbles in his chest when the whiskey flows into his mouth. Something unhinged. Unintentional. Like he wants my taste so bad he can’t fucking stand it.
That makes two of us.
A breathless whimper leaves my lips when his hands finally leave the couch, his fingers hovering over my ribs as they slip up my sides, over the sides of my breasts, then along my shoulder blades. He’s barely touching me, but it brings about a desperation I hadn’t known I could feel.
I take another drink, and when I meet his lips with mine, something in him snaps. He grips the back of my head, forcing my lips against his and pulling me in deep with his tongue. He may as well be licking between my legs with the lust that slips through me.
His tongue tangles with mine, and I suck on the end of his, drawing out his sharp breath. His hands slip down to cup my ass over my jeans, his fingers tightening to a near-bruising strength as my arm wraps around the back of his neck.
He shifts and his erection brushes against my core, drawing out a moan as the friction brushes over the sensitive bundle of nerves, and Levi stops, his face inches from mine and his eyes dark as night.
Watching me with a calculating look in his eyes, he uses his hand on my ass to move my hips against his erection again, and this time, a shiver rolls through me, my blunt nails digging into the flesh at the back of his neck.
It all combines into a dizzying wave of euphoria I’m not sure I ever want to come back from.
Abruptly, he grips my chin, forcing my lips back with a rough growl, and I nearly topple off his lap. My heart hammers in my chest, beating out of tune, and my lips burn where he’d kissed me.
“Go to your room, Ava,” he says darkly. It’s a warning. One I’m not sure I even want to understand the meaning of.
The moment he releases me, reality rushes in, bringing with it all the self-doubt, the insecurity, and the shame that were easy to ignore with his lips on mine.
Shakily, I climb to my feet, and like the prudish good girl I am, I leave the room, not daring to glance back.