Nick looked down into her face, at her full lips and flushed, freckled cheeks, and those wide golden-brown eyes. Carly Montgomery had no poker face whatsoever. And she wanted him to call that bluff. He lowered his head until his mouth was barely an inch from hers, hovering there and testing his own resolve. For a moment neither of them moved. Neither of them breathed. And then he spoke, just like they’d both known he would.
“Brat.”
This time, when she kissed him, he thought he was ready for it. But no one could ever be ready for the human hurricane that was Carly Montgomery. She claimed his mouth, her tongue darting in with swift determination, and heat swept through him, desire making his skin pulse and buzz with every stroke of her tongue. He couldn’t keep himself from groaning as her fingers tightened in his hair and she pulled him harder against her body, kissing him furiously. She tasted like coffee and sugar, and he lapped at her mouth like it was the first shot of caffeine he’d had in weeks.
Desperate for more, he grabbed her waist and spun her, walking her backward until her legs hit the back of the sofa, swallowing her gasp as he pressed himself against her and she tightened her grip on his hair. It stung deliciously at the roots, and he pinned her to the sofa with his hips, reveling in the breathy mewling sound she made when she felt his hardness through her shorts. It took all his self control not to sweep his other hand up her leg and run his fingertips over the smooth, hidden skin of her inner thigh, over those silvery pink stripes he’d seen during those hours of torturous editing. Instead, he gripped her waist, feeling her muscles shift beneath the fabric as she arched into him, tilting her head to gain better access to his mouth.
Nick completely lost track of time. He forgot about the spreadsheet and the playlist, and about all the very good reasons this was a bad idea. He didn’t hear the rain hitting the windows or the cawing of birds outside. He heard nothing but Carly—Carly’s sighs, Carly’s gasps, Carly’s whimper as his lips left hers and traveled down her neck to her sharp collarbone. In this ridiculous seashell-orgy of an apartment, they were their own tiny world, pressed against the couch and each other for what could have been hours or mere minutes. Her smooth, freckled skin tasted faintly of sunscreen and rose petals, and he wanted nothing more than to peel those denim shorts down her spectacular legs and find out what the rest of her tasted like. His cock was painfully hard, pressing against his shorts and demanding release, desperate for more of her.
He ran his hands down the sides of her body, tracing the curves of her small breasts before skimming his fingers over the taut skin between the bottom of her shirt and the top of her jeans. She gasped and broke the kiss.
“I can’t have sex with you,” she blurted.
Nick froze and pulled his hands from her hips, taking a step back for good measure.
“I’m sorry,” she said, her face screwed up. “We have to stop. And we can’t do this again. I can’t have sex with you.”
Nick took another step back, and Carly’s stomach dropped. He was already walking away from her.
Good. Fine. She’d known he would. God, men were so fucking predictable it was almost funny.
“No one said anything about sex,” Nick said, sounding a little out of breath.
Carly crossed her arms, then looked him up and down pointedly, raising her eyebrows at the very obvious bulge at the front of his shorts.
“Fine, I was thinking about it,” he conceded. “But can you blame me? That was …”
Incendiary. Atomic. And obviously leading to sex. “I know. But I can’t. I mean, I promised I wouldn’t.”
“Promised who?” he said, cocking his head. “Shit, are you … doyouhave a—”
“No, I’m single,” she said hastily. “Very single. Extremely single.”
“Okay, so, who did you promise?”
“Me. I promised me.”
He nodded slowly, as though he understood. But then he spoke. “So are you, uh, waiting for marriage?”
Carly snorted. “Absolutely not. That ship sailed alongtime ago. And it sailed many times. A whole fleet. An armada, even.”
Nick frowned, either at the image or out of incomprehension, she couldn’t tell. “I’m not following. What promise are you talking about?”
Jesus, he was really going to make her say it, wasn’t he? It was bad enough that she’d lost her cool and blurted it out at him, but now she had to explain it to him? Here, in this increasingly small living room?
“I have a health condition that makes sex impossible.”
Nick nodded in comprehension. “The broken vagina.”
Carly felt her cheeks heat. It was one thing to throw around those words jokingly, like a kind of armor over her hurt, but it was another to hear Nick say them. He sounded so serious, as if they were talking about a natural disaster or the national debt.
“That’s not the technical term for it, but yes,” she said, shifting against the couch. “And it doesn’t really make sex impossible, it just makes it … unbearable.” Even though she’d borne it. Made herself do it even when it hurt. Consented to the pain.
“Is it vulvodynia? Vaginismus? Dyspar—I don’t know how to pronounce that one, but I’ve read about it.”
“Dyspareunia,” she whispered, staring at him. Her heart was suddenly racing. “How do you know about that?”
He leaned against the edge of the table and gave a tiny, elegant shrug. “Google exists. I Googled it.”
