Seven #4
“Rogers.” His voice is smooth as silk, but his command has her pressing her lips together, fighting a shiver. “Don’t be shy now. I’m here to help you relax.”
She does not point out that sitting between his thighs is the opposite of what she considers relaxing. His ego doesn’t need the satisfaction of knowing how much she’s already affected by him.
He pats the space again, a knowing glint in his eye.
Clenching her jaw, she stands and steps between his open legs, his smile never wavering. She glares before turning her back to him and perching once more on the edge of the cushion.
Strong arms wrap around her waist, pulling her against a broad, firm chest.
Charlie shrieks. “Quinn—” But then his palms flatten across her stomach, gliding over her hips and thighs.
“That’s better,” he murmurs, his breath warm against her neck. “You looked tense.”
Her skin immediately begins to tingle at the sensation. Resting his hands on her wrists, he slowly moves them up her arms. Squeezing her shoulders, he dips his fingers underneath her cardigan.
“Can I take this off?” he whispers.
Against her back, she feels the steady thud of his heart, grounding her. She swallows and nods.
Slowly, he strips off the material, tossing it on the floor. His palms cup her shoulders, bare now, and heat flares across her skin at the contact.
He exhales a soft breath against her neck before his thumb brushes the pulse point under her jaw.
She jumps.
“Your heart is positively racing,” he hums, his chest rumbling against her back. Charlie closes her eyes, trying to steady her traitorous heart, her breathing sharp and uneven. “That has nothing to do with me, right?”
“It’s my revulsion,” she croaks.
He laughs, low and seductive, before he presses his mouth to her shoulder.
Her lips part in a soft gasp.
“I’m sure that’s it.” He drags his mouth to the juncture where her collarbone meets her neck.
She bites her tongue to hold back a moan.
“Tell me to stop,” he whispers, “and I’ll stop.”
She can’t speak, especially when he sucks on a spot on her neck that she never knew could feel like sticking her finger in an electrical socket.
His tongue laves at her skin before he tilts her head to the other side and begins the same journey from her shoulder to her collarbone, sucking gently at her throat.
His fingers dance across her skin, so light yet blistering.
Ripples of need and desire fizz in her belly.
“Do you imagine me touching you in other places, Rogers?”
She pants, light-headed with want. Liquid heat pools in her core, and she clenches her hands into fists in her lap to keep from touching him.
Maintaining the pressure of his mouth on her neck, his right hand drops to the hem of her tank top, his palm sliding under the material, skimming across her belly and dancing along her waistband. Traveling up her ribs, his hand brushes the underwire of her bra. “Can I touch you here?”
Charlie nods. When he palms her breast for the first time, heavy and aching, she lets out a sound she’s never made before in her life, like a whine and a whimper and a plea all rolled into one.
“Mmm, you like that, don’t you?” He drags his nose up the length of her neck, his lips grazing her jaw. She tips her chin up, needing more, so much more.
“Where else are you desperate for me to touch you?” He palms her left breast, and she arches against him with a gasp. “Would you like my fingers between your thighs? Will you let me feel how wet you are?”
His voice and words are positively sinful, and Charlie is helpless against the pressure building in her core. She shifts on the cushion, trying to relieve some of the need, and lets out a sharp gasp when she feels him hard against her backside.
She’s not sure she’s breathing, certain she’s going to combust, driven mad by his touch.
“Do you want to come for me, Charlie?”
Her name on his lips is a caress, but his words are like ice water, dousing her flames, her brain suddenly remembering that this is supposed to be an experiment. What she’s experiencing is a normal physical reaction to a very attractive person.
It’s not supposed to mean anything.
With a gasp, she staggers out of his grasp, scrambling over his thigh to create space between them on the couch, pressing her palm against his chest.
His face is still too close, his breath fanning her curls away from her face. Spots of pink color his cheeks, and her gaze snags on his lips, slightly swollen from sucking on her neck and lighting fires across her skin. Her pulse jumps, the ghost of his touch lingering.
Charlie feels electrified with unfulfilled desire, and as she gazes at his cheekbones and sharp jawline, she feels an urge to lick a stripe up his throat just to hear him moan.
But this isn’t about him.
He stares at her expectantly, his brow arched, his eyes no longer dark with desire. “Well, Rogers?” He grins. “What are your conclusions?”
She attempts to regain her composure and sift through her thoughts, but it seems her brain has turned into a lusty puddle of goo.
The glint in his eye, however, tells her he already knows.