Too Dangerous to Love
Surprise stole all motor functions from Chris. He couldn’t speak. Couldn’t breathe. He only felt Scarlett’s soft breasts pressed against his chest and the weight of his words hanging between them.
“I need you, Scarlett.”
The confession had slipped as desire had overtaken him like oxygen to a flame.
He should take it back. Needing her posed too much danger.
A risk to them both, but he needed one more taste.
He’d gone too long without a woman. Now the one who didn’t look at him with fear and revulsion but awe clawed her fingers into his back as if she couldn’t pull him close enough.
Bad idea. Let her go.
His body said, “fuck that,” as he lashed his bionic, steel arm around her waist and flattened her against him. Her core collided with his cock. Smiling into her hair, he shifted his hips and left no doubt about where he planned to take her unexpected hug.
“Chris?”
The indecision clouding her voice pitted Red Dress Scarlett and Scientist Scarlett in a battle.
He knew which woman he was laying his money on and would make damn sure she won.
God knew how long they’d be alone in his cabin or when and if he’d see her again once this mess cleared up.
But she was here now, in his arms, begging to be kissed.
Cupping one cheek with his steel, the other with flesh, he lowered his mouth to hers.
He brushed soft kisses against her warm lips, his tongue teasing, promising more.
Take it slow. Don’t scare her.
“Chris.”
This time, his name on her lips floated out like a plea instead of a question. Like a rogue commando hell-bent on a personal raid, he thrust through her cinnamon-laced lips and seized the opportunity to taste her again.
Sparks licked at his cock as her tongue darted out to meet his.
A rough groan rumbled from his chest as she quickly retreated.
Her tentative touch hit him like the clipped, one-word responses she’d offered him at headquarters.
Thrilling because he savored any reaction from Scarlett, yet frustrating because he hungered for more.
Needed more.
Grasping a handful of her soft hair with his steel, he tugged her head back and launched an exploration of her delectable mouth. He teased, licked, and savored until her soft moans drowned out the wind whispering through the trees.
Her sensual surrender whizzed lightning bolts to the loaded torpedo pressed against her thigh. Grasping her hair tighter with his steel, he glided his other hand down her back.
Stop, his brain commanded as he reached her waist.
Too fast.
Again, he ignored reason and gathered up the round ass he’d only possessed in his dreams. As he pulled her flush against him, she scraped her teeth along his lower lip and gently bit down. He sucked in a breath, surprised, and thrilled by her boldness. “Fuck, you taste so good.”
Her tongue tangled with his. “You too. So good. Oh my god. So, so good.”
Like the words tumbling out of her mouth against his lips, her fingers rambled up his sides as if she wasn’t sure where to touch first.
Blood racing, body buzzing, he plunged into his mission to claim his territory as her eager hands snuck under the hem of his T-shirt.
With a frenzied touch, she skimmed his ribs.
The dips and valleys of his abs. He shivered as she pressed her fingertips into the indents above his hip bones and he moaned her name.
His heartbeat tripled in speed. It stopped short when her fingertips met in the middle and grazed the button of his jeans.
Still, he didn’t breathe, afraid a slight move would make the brazen woman disappear into herself.
Her fingernails raked his skin. The sweet pain ripped her name from his lips. Matching her animalistic fervor, he pushed her up against an oak nestled between two pines and pinned her to the rough bark.
Her eyes flew open.
Need as powerful as his own shimmered like the damp grass under the setting sun.
Cradling her head with his steel, he snaked his other hand inside her shirt and claimed her breast.
“You’re full of surprises,” he whispered in between wet kisses behind her earlobe.
“No bra last night. Lace tonight.” He pinched her nipple.
A low moan rumbled in her throat. His need to be the lucky beast who satiated her hunger roared through him as he trailed his mouth to her neck and felt her soft, satisfied hum under his lips.
The sounds and vibrations coming from her intensified to a husky plea as he rolled the hard nub under his palm.
“What other surprises have you been hiding from me?”
Scarlett grabbed Chris’s cheeks between her hands and gyrated her hips against his hard cock, seeking what she craved.
“That’s the best surprise I’ve ever gotten, sweetheart,” he groaned as he rocked with her.
The exquisite friction darted blistering sparks through her body, intense enough to start a forest fire.
He claimed her mouth and pulled her deep into a kiss, his lips consuming hers before she could take another breath. Grinding, pressing, they lost themselves in a moonlit carnal tango.
Panting, she yanked her lips from his and met his gaze, mesmerized by the dark pleasure blazing in his eyes. “More.”
The hand in her hair shot down to cup her mound through her jeans.
Trapping her between him and the oak, he answered her breathless plea with firm pressure.
Closing her eyes, she dropped her head against the tree as she writhed against him like she’d die if he stopped touching her.
She might because nothing on this earth should feel this good.
“Chris, please. I need…please.” His cock pressing into her thigh grew harder than the cabin’s stone chimney. She scraped her fingertips along his rigid length. Heat hotter than the sound of the sexy hiss sliding from his throat scorched her hand.
“I got you.” He undid the snap on her jeans, yanked the zipper down, and kicked her feet apart. “Nice and wide, Scarlett.”
She opened her legs to grant him access to anything and everything he wanted.
Her wet heat met his fingers as he shoved his hand inside her lace and pushed apart her lips.
She gasped as she sank her fingers into his muscled thighs.
Like a sharpshooter, he zeroed in on the spot screaming for attention and plunged in.
“Oh god.” Pleasure flooded her fast and hard.
Wet heat dripped from between her legs like water from a damn about to burst while new, thrilling sensations spiraled up into her belly.
She gripped his biceps and tried to close her knees against the sudden rush, but he braced her foot with his and blocked her retreat.
“Too much.” Everything about him was too much, but God, she wanted more.
He growled loud enough to scare the wildlife. “Oh no, sweetheart. I’m the one pushing you out of your comfort zone now and I’m pushing hard. I need to feel you come, and you will scream my name.”
The dirtiest words ever spoken to her instinctively pulled his name from her lips as she arched into his hand.
He pulled his fingers out of her sopping core and thrust them back in. “I said scream.”
The force lifted her to her toes. Her whimper cried on the wind as her breath caught.
She’d never been touched like this before.
Never so deeply. So demanding. Too much soared into too little as she bucked her hips against his and chased the kind of release she’d only heard about—no, dreamed about, from this man and this man only.
She pushed against his chest. “Chris, I don’t…I can’t…”
He rolled her nipple between his fingers. “Yes, you can. Shut off your brain and just feel.”
Prickles of delicious pain danced under her skin.
He moved his fingers inside her, and against her, in a masterful way that shut down her mind and left her libido in complete control.
Rolling waves of pleasure, need, and many other powerful sensations she didn’t know if science could define coursed through her in a torrent of wonder.
But the need didn’t abate. It only grew until the “more” she sought reduced her to a quivering beggar.
She burrowed her head into his neck. “Chris, please.”
“Tell me what you want.”
“I need to…”
He froze. “What, Scarlett? Tell me.”
She arched against him. “Please don’t stop.”
“Say it.” His hand controlling the sweet release she pleaded for gripped her from the inside out. “I need to hear the shy scientist beg me to make her come.”
“For God’s sake, just do it. Make me come. Now.”
“Yes, ma’am.” With a final twist of his fingers, he pulsed direct pressure to her clit and unleashed everything he’d built inside her.
She bit into his neck as she rode out the waves and drowned in a tsunami of mind-numbing pleasure.
As the molten crest burst into sharp crystals and pierced her body and soul with decadent, animalistic bliss, she finally screamed his name.
Chris felt the familiar high of a completed mission course through him. His target was at his mercy. His goal of learning what drove the writhing scientist in his arms to completely, unabashedly, come undone was complete.
He held Scarlett between him and the tree until her breathing slowed, his hand entrenched in her decadent bliss, not ready to break the connection and craving more.
Much more.
His cock pulsed a painful plea against his jeans. It would be easy to finish what they’d started. So easy, and not because she’d willingly given herself to him. He wanted her—no, he needed her more than he’d needed anything in his life.
“I need you, Scarlett.”
The confession played on repeat in his head as if it needed to be recognized.
Understood.
He couldn’t, wouldn’t, say the words again.
They were too raw. Too real. His driving desire to claim her as his safe harbor was too dangerous.
Needing someone had always left him broken when they disappeared.
He couldn’t let himself need anyone again.
He thought one kiss, one touch, would cure his terminal longing for Scarlett.
He’d been wrong. He was at her mercy, and she held the power to destroy him.
If I don’t destroy her first.
He closed his eyes and savored her for one more bittersweet moment before he yanked himself from the fairy tale forest and focused on the realistic dangers lurking beyond the trees.
And the dangers within me.
“I’m sorry; that shouldn’t have happened.” He made quick work of her zipper and button.
Long seconds passed as the blissful flush he’d put on her beautiful face drained.
“You’re right. We need to keep things professional.”
The steadiness of her voice surprised him. He’d expected her to break into a nervous ramble about boundaries, not agree wholeheartedly with his retreat. The easy resignation disappointed him more than he cared to admit.
She pointed to the cabin. “I have work to do.”
He schooled his features to match her detached tone and stopped himself from rubbing his tattoo. Looking to his father’s memory for strength would show weakness. He couldn’t afford to be weak again when it came to Scarlett. “Yes. Work. It’s the reason you’re here, to save VIPER.”
Her puffy lips opened in a wide circle. She nodded her agreement as she hurried toward the cabin. He almost claimed her lips to relight the blaze he’d kicked sand on. Instead, he stayed on course.
Pushing her away was smart.
It also sucked balls.