Chapter 3 #2
I took my time really studying her face. It was obvious she was younger than me. Much younger, I suspected, but by how many years? Grays had already started around my temples, and lines creased at the corners of my eyes, but she had none of that. Her skin was like a fucking doll’s.
“Given that you’re here and what we’re about to do … I’ve got to ask, how old are you?”
“Twenty-three. I know I look way younger. I get asked a lot what year of high school I’m in.” She let out a half laugh. “But on the inside, my soul’s in my forties.” Her eyes narrowed. “How old are you?”
“Thirty-five.”
“Ahhh, now the Hooked handle makes sense.”
I could see that old soul.
I could feel it.
I could hear it.
And I was so curious what had aged it this much.
But I wouldn’t ask. Getting to know her wasn’t on tonight’s agenda or what this evening was about.
Now that most of the basics were out of the way, I asked, “What can I get you to drink?”
I sure as hell needed one. I’d been so rushed when I got to the suite, knowing she was going to come over soon, that I hadn’t had time to pour anything.
I went to the bar, scanning the bottles inside the small fridge. “Options are limited, but they’ve got just about every category covered.”
“Sparkling water. If there is none, I’ll just take a Coke. Or tap water is fine too.”
I glanced across my shoulder. “Club soda … with vodka? Coke with rum?”
“Hold the vodka and especially hold the rum.” She was combing her hair with her fingers. “I don’t drink.”
I handed her a club soda and returned to the bar to grab a mini bottle of whiskey and poured it into one of the glasses, dropping in some ice. “Ever?”
“Nope, not ever.” She was staring at the tumbler in my hand.
“You don’t have to tell me why … but if I drink this, is that going to be a problem?”
“No.”
My brows rose. “You’re sure?”
“As long as you don’t get drunk, we have no problem.”
“You don’t have to worry about that.” I took a sip, leaning my hip into the bar while I faced her.
“You know, I have no idea what alcohol even tastes like. I’ve only ever smelled it. And I’ve never kissed anyone who’s had it on their lips and tongue. You’re going to be my first.”
There was a reason she’d never put a drop of liquor in her mouth. And there was a reason she didn’t want me to get drunk. I had a feeling both of those reasons were the same.
When I’d first looked at her picture, her eyes told me we had something in common.
That similarity, I sensed, was that we both knew what darkness looked like and we knew what it felt like.
And that was what had aged our souls.
But once again, tonight wasn’t about getting those answers or even making that connection.
I brought the whiskey up to my mouth, hesitating for a few seconds before my lips surrounded the glass. I drank—that was who I was. I wasn’t going to change that for a woman I’d met less than ten minutes ago from a dating app, nor had she asked me to.
Rather than sipping, I gulped the liquor down, like a shot, and set the empty on the bar before I slowly walked toward her. I stopped a few paces away, my hands sliding into the pockets of my jeans. I wanted to touch her. I wanted to hold her face and drag her lips to mine.
I wanted to know if she was as wet as I was hard.
I dampened the corners of my lips with my tongue and said, “Tell me something, Sky. Tell me if—”
“If you keep getting taller and more muscular, the longer I look at you?” She grinned. “Yes, you do.”
“I haven’t changed.”
“Oh, but you have.” Her eyes fucking sparkled.
“How?”
“The way you’re looking at me—that’s changed.” She gripped the edge of the wood she was sitting on and leaned forward a little. “The thoughts in your head—those have changed too.”
“How am I looking at you?”
“Like you want to inhale me.” Her grin was so fucking sexy.
“You’re not wrong.” I laughed. “And what about my thoughts? What are those?”
“You’re thinking about the steps you want to take to do that inhaling.”
“Easy guess.”
She shook her head, and some strands fell into her face—ones I wanted to move away, but didn’t. “It’s not a guess. I can see it in your eyes.”
“Seems you know this stranger pretty well.” I nodded toward her.
“But what you see and what you know—is that what you want?” I waited.
“Just because we matched up and you came here and I got you a room, that doesn’t mean you want to fuck me.
” I turned my body, giving her an unblocked path to the door.
“If you don’t want me, you don’t have to stay.
The room I got you will still be yours.”
“I want you to make me forget about the night I had before I got here.” Her voice wasn’t small; neither was her gaze. “I want you to take me out of my head.”
I heard her loud and clear. But I still had to make sure. “You’re giving me your body …”
“Yes.” She released the table, putting her hands on her thighs, and she leaned back against the wall behind her.
“For the record, if I hadn’t had a good feeling right away, I wouldn’t have come in.
If I hadn’t wanted you to touch me, I would have already left.
And it’s not that I want to fuck you …” Her stare lowered to my chest and then to my waist. “It’s that I want you to fuck me. ”
She was speaking my language.
When it came to sex, I was no fucking gentleman.
I wanted it rough. I wanted it hard.
I wanted her screaming so loud that my goddamn eardrums pounded.
“But what if you don’t like the flavor on my tongue?”
Now I was just having fun. Teasing myself until I couldn’t take another second.
Because if we were as compatible as the Hooked software stated, nothing in my mouth should change the outcome of tonight. What mattered was what I was going to do with my tongue.
“I won’t know that answer until you kiss me. Which I hope you do. Soon.”
I’d set the temperature when I arrived, turning the air to sixty-eight degrees. I worked in kitchens, surrounded by ovens and open flames, so I always ran hot, and I was sure this evening was going to make me sweat. But I swore that the room just became warmer.
I took a step closer and then another. My hands slid out of my pockets and landed on either side of her thighs. I didn’t touch her; my palms just flattened against the wooden top of the buffet table.
“You smell so good.” Her head fell back as she looked up at me, her eyes briefly closing. “If ginger and grapefruit and sage were all dumped into a mortar and crushed up with a pestle, that scent would be you,” she said.
“A description I wasn’t expecting.” She made me smile. “It’s my cologne. And yours smells like my favorite fruit. Pomegranates.”
I liked being this close to her.
I liked that I only had to squeeze my arms together and she would be inside them.
I liked how she was biting her lip, as though she were anticipating what mine would feel like.
“Must be my body wash. I don’t wear perfume.”
“What you’re telling me is that every inch of your skin smells that fucking perfect?”
She giggled. “Well, I did take a shower before I drove here. So, yes, it should.”
I kept my eyes on hers until I was so deep into her neck that I couldn’t hold her gaze anymore, and my nose touched the spot just below her jaw. “Fuck me, you do.”
As I got closer to her ear, her breathing changed. It sped up, and her fingers dived into the back of my hair, tightening around the strands. Not to pull me away, but to keep me right where I was. “I have to admit something to you …”
“What?”
My lips hovered above her ear, my dick pulsing for her pussy, and my hands finally landed on her sides. She was as tiny as I’d suspected and even more seductive than I’d thought.
I waited for her to peel my fingers off her, but when she leaned into them instead, I said, “I’m ready to fucking inhale you.”