“Miles,” I sputtered, stepping to the side until I bumped into his kitchen island.
My kitchen didn’t have an island.
He took one step closer, then another, but stopped short of touching distance. Under the fluorescent can lights in the ceiling of his kitchen, Miles’s eyes glinted with the exact kind of playful mischief that had brought me to his house in the first place.
“Am I wrong?” He scratched at the exposed skin of his hip, long fingers rucking up the shirt and bringing the deep V-cut of his abs into view.
I swallowed, mouth parched. He took a step closer, and I could taste my heart in my throat, covered in regret for the answer I was about to give him. “No.”
“To which part?” He arched a knowing brow.
I dragged my tongue across the front of my teeth, stare catching once again on his exposed hip. My brain fought down the answer because I didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of the confirmation.
“Your secret’s safe with me.” Miles closed more of the space between us until I could smell the wine he’d been drinking on his breath. “Would it be easier if I told you what Ithinkyour answer is?”
“You’re so confident that you know it?”
“What I know is that you can’t stop staring at this…” He tapped his hip with his pointer finger. “Since I showed it to you.”
I tore my gaze upward, but looking him in the eye wasn’t much better.
“I know that this is foreplay for you as much as it is for me,” he went on, tapping his fingers against the spot where his hip dipped down behind his waistband. I wasn’t looking, but I could make out the movement. I understood the intent.
Heat sank low in my belly and even lower still between my legs. Beneath the protection of my slacks and my briefs, my cock throbbed in evident want of Miles’s attention.
“And I know the answer is yes to both questions.”
I exhaled, my chin falling against my chest in defeat.
Miles shuffled closer, his fingers dancing in the space between us. Around me, the room spun like a carnival ride. My equilibrium was shot, my vision blurred. He was so close and he smelled like oak and berries and musky desperation.
“I’m not going to fuck you, though. At least not tonight.”
I found my words again. “Like there’ll be another night.”
He just nodded like he knew I was blustering and lying to save face, but he’d let me get away with it.
“Tell me I can touch you.” he whispered and he waited.
His breath ghosted across my throat, dusting over the exposed skin where I’d long ago loosened my tie because it was impossible to breathe for how tangled up the man had me. I’d started to sweat, the hairs at my temple matted down from the moisture, and my shirt clinging a little too tight across my shoulder blades. My briefs stuck to my cock, the bead of precum more like a puddle by now. Electricity sparked from his fingertips, and even though he hadn’t touched me yet, he might as well have. The tension between us snaked around my waist and wrapped up my spine, encouraging me toward him, loosening the muscles required to say the words…
“Yes,” I whispered.
Again, Miles surprised me.
I thought he’d move fast, that I’d give him the green light and he would have been pedal to the metal, but it was quite the opposite. He barely touched me at first and not even against my skin. The finger he’d been tapping against his own hip landed on my belt, then danced its way up my stomach and over my chest with an agonizing slowness. He held my stare like a vise, mouth spreading into a broad smile when I shivered at the first touch of his skin against my own.
He drew a soft circle around the hollow of my throat, then traced his way up over my Adam’s apple. On reflex, and from want, I tipped my head back to allow him access to my chin, my jaw. Only when he reached me there did he touch me with more than that singular fingertip. Miles took my face into his hand, pulling me back down and finding my stare.
Now warm fingers pressed into my cheek and my jaw dropped, shocked from the tenderness of it. Maybe I’d misjudged him or what he was about, but I’d never expected him to touch me like that. So full of want and care. All of his attention laser focused on the handful of places our flesh connected.
“It’s a lot, I know,” he cooed, stretching his hand around my head and threading his fingers into my hair. I wanted to go to my knees for him more than I’d wanted anything in a very long time. But that wasn’t what we’d talked about. It wasn’t what we’d agreed. “You can close your eyes.”
I took the out, letting my lids fall shut. It was like I could breathe for the first time since I’d walked into his house. Without the weight of his stare on me, the tension loosened and a soft moan tore out of my throat. He made a pleased sound back at me, bringing his other hand up to hold me steady. Miles pressed our bodies together, chest to chest, his erection digging into my thigh and mine into his hip.
“I want you so much it’s hard to breathe,” he said softly, the words barely more than air against my lips.
“I know,” I agreed, because I felt the same.
