Chapter 16
Chapter Sixteen
SYLVIE
Eli walked down the hall to his room as if he couldn’t get away from me fast enough.
He shut his door, and I exhaled, rattled in the best possible way.
I’d thought about kissing him. Wondered, maybe even wished a little when I let myself, but I hadn’t expected that. That was something altogether different than anything I’d ever experienced.
Potent.
I was flushed with heat, my skin branded everywhere he touched me. I raised a finger to run it along my swollen lower lip. Hot damn, that had been a hell of a kiss.
But my life was a mess. I was homeless, my career on hold, and temporarily flat broke. I was not in a position to be starting anything with any man. Definitely not with my reluctant partner, who was helping my investigation but also keeping things from me.
On one hand, I trusted Eli with my life. And on the other, I didn’t trust him as far as I could throw him—which, considering his size and my biceps, wasn’t very far. So many good reasons to forget he’d just laid one on me.
I jumped as the kettle shrilled beside me. Fuck, it had all happened fast. In the time it took to boil water, Eli Bishop had rocked my world.
I took the kettle off the heat and flipped the spout open, shutting off the whistle. I filled my cup with steaming water. Eli’s sat beside it. Guess he hadn’t really wanted that tea. What he had wanted—for just a few minutes—was me.
I bobbed the tea bag in my cup, thinking as red hibiscus spread through the hot water.
On one hand, getting involved with Eli was a terrible idea.
Of course it was. Mixing business with pleasure.
Blah, blah. But we were both adults, and my body hummed with desire for more.
Everything had been going wrong lately—but not that kiss. That kiss had felt very, very right.
Lost in thought, I added honey to my tea, gave it a stir, and followed the same path Eli had taken down the hall to the bedrooms, turning left where he’d turned right. His door was firmly shut, light leaking from beneath.
Was he really going to bed, or was he just avoiding me? I didn’t know. Did it matter? Not if there wasn’t going to be a repeat of that kiss.
I went through the motions of getting ready for bed. There wasn’t much to do, considering I was already in my pajamas and had already washed my face. I brushed my teeth, thinking fleetingly that doing that before drinking tea with honey was probably a waste, but God knew I wasn’t perfect.
I crawled under the covers and turned off the light, sitting up in the dark, sipping my tea and thinking.
I’d been exhausted, my stomach full of casserole, the day dragging at me, but that kiss had been a shot of espresso.
I wasn’t sure if it had woken up my brain, but it had fired up my body.
I shifted my legs, crossing one ankle over the other.
Down, girl. You have enough trouble as it is. Getting involved with Eli Bishop was probably not a great idea. But who said we had to be involved? I wasn’t looking for a boyfriend or a long-term anything. I didn’t have room in my life for that.
We were temporary work partners, investigating Emily Shaw while we figured out how to unfuck my life.
Why not have a little fun together? Going by that kiss, fun with Eli would be worth the risk.
And he wasn’t indifferent—he’d walked away, but it wasn’t because he didn’t want me.
I was sure of it. I’d been there. I’d felt how much he wanted me.
After a good twenty minutes of dithering and sipping at my tea, I put the mug down on the bedside table with a decisive click. I hadn’t gotten where I was in life by dithering. I pushed the covers off and stood, shaking my loose hair out over my shoulders—still damp but not soaking wet anymore.
The worst that could happen, I reminded myself, was that he could say no and I’d be momentarily embarrassed.
But I was used to hearing no, not necessarily from men I wanted to have sex with, but when you investigated a crime, people often didn’t want to talk.
Some of my best interviews had come from people who’d turned me away multiple times.
I’d learned to suck it up, take the no, and try again if it really mattered. I could handle a brief embarrassment.
And if he didn’t say no, I thought as I eased open the door of my bedroom?—
Yeah, it was worth the risk.
I crossed the hall, noting that the light was out beneath his door. Had he gone to sleep? Maybe, but my gut said he hadn’t. I rapped lightly at his door before turning the handle and cracking it.
“Eli?” I said in a low voice in case he was sleeping.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, sounding too alert to have been asleep.
“Can I come in?” I pushed the door open.
Sheets rustled, his body moving in the bed. “Sure.”
I stepped into his dark room, blinking as my eyes adjusted to see him sitting up in bed, the sheets pooled at his waist, his bare chest exposed—smooth golden skin speckled with hair, stretched tight across corded muscle.
My mouth watered, my fingers itched to touch.
I looked to his eyes—not at all sleepy. The chocolate brown was almost black in the dark, but alert, simmering with heat.
“I was thinking,” I said, moving closer to the bed.
“Yeah, about that kiss, Sylvie—” he began, then stopped, raising his eyebrow.
“I’m not sure about it,” I said, lifting my chin and stopping at the side of his bed.
“What are you not sure about?” he said.
“I don’t know. It happened so fast.”
“Should I apologize?” He didn’t sound apologetic. The rumble of his voice had my nipples beading, the heat of anticipation flooding through my body.
“It’s not that,” I said. “I just think to make a proper assessment, we need to try it again.”
Before he could say anything, I planted one knee on the side of the bed and swung my leg over until I straddled him, sitting on his upper thighs, his back to the headboard. I leaned in and kissed him.
If Eli had planned to argue, he changed his mind.
His hands dove under the back of my sleep shirt, splaying across my skin, his palms callused and hard and hot, fingertips digging in, holding me as his mouth ravaged.
This was what I’d wanted. More of this. No thinking, no talking, no worrying about what it meant or where it was going. Just Eli. Strong. Hungry—for me. He tasted so fucking good, his tongue sliding against mine.
He sat up, his hands slipping down to grab my shirt and yank it over my head. Our mouths parted, and he groaned.
“Beautiful, Sylvie,” he said, cupping my bared breasts, his fingers sliding over my nipples, squeezing, sending bolts of pleasure through my body.
One hand came around my back, pulling me closer until I arched, lifting my breast to his mouth.
My head tipped, eyes closed as sensation washed through me—the sharp tugs of his mouth, the bite of his teeth.
So perfect. They obliterated any thoughts in my head.
All I wanted was this. His arms caging me, holding me as he tasted and touched.
I’d wanted my hands on him. But now I was more than happy to give Eli control, especially if it felt this good.
I moaned, hearing the surprise in the sound.
This wasn’t my first time, but it felt like it—intense, saturated with the sensation of Eli.
The scent of him, the scrape of his stubble.
He was everywhere, and it all felt so fucking good.
He shifted in the bed, sliding his hips and me forward, and I sensed he was about to roll us over—but not yet.
I had plans too. I leaned back, feeling a twinge of regret as his mouth slid from my breast. I braced my palms on his shoulders and pushed until he was flat on his back.
Rising up on my knees, I moved slowly down his body, closing my teeth over his jaw, then his collarbone, licking into the hollow of his throat.
I rubbed my cheek in the coarse sprinkle of hair on his chest on my way to taste the lines of his abs—a delicious triumph shivering through me as the muscles there clenched the closer I got to his cock.
I slid the sheets down to find him in only a pair of boxer briefs, the cotton straining to contain him.
Hooking my fingers in the waistband, I pulled, his hips raising just enough for me to peel them down.
I shifted to the side until they were all the way off, and then stared down at him in the faint light coming in from the hallway.
He was thick and hard, the head weeping with arousal as it rose from the nest of dark curls between his legs.
Eli was beautiful from head to toe, and I wanted to taste more than his mouth.
“Sylvie,” he groaned as I licked, savoring the musky heat of him, taking him in my mouth and sucking hard, sending a shiver up his body that filled me with need.
I wanted this. I wanted him. I took as much of him as I could. He was a lot, in a way that filled me with anticipation and a hint of worry. I was no virgin, but it had been a while.
His hips rolled, his hand coming to hold my head—not to pull me down and take over—just to feel my jaw, my lips as I moved up and down his length.
“Fuck, Sylvie. So good.”
I reached to cup his balls, and that was his limit—he shifted, curling up, hooking his hands under my armpits and pulling me, dislodging my mouth from his cock and rolling us both until he loomed over me.
“Goddamn, Sylvie.” He sat looking down at me, his eyes fixed on my mouth, then rising to meet mine, hot and intent. “You’re sure about this?”
I just raised an eyebrow.
“Think about it,” he said, “because once I’ve had you, I’m not going to let you go.”
If I hadn’t been drunk on lust, those words might have made me stop and think, but lying beneath him, legs spread, my body needing Eli, him touching me—I didn’t care. I just wanted. I’d worry about the consequences later.