“I needed to keep you safe,” he insisted.
“And did keeping me safe fromyouplay a part in that?”
It was a shrewd, ruthless question. Sloane swallowed hard but his throat wouldn’t unclench no matter what he did. Barely able to get the words out, he rasped, “I would never hurt you.Never.”
“But you’re a dangerous man. We both know that.”
“Yes.”
He couldn’t exactly deny it, and wouldn’t even if it were possible. He had one use in this world: to be a weapon. If he didn’t fulfill that purpose for the safety of people like Cecilia, then there was no point in him at all.
He wasn’t sure he had a heart to break until she pulled away from him. Sloane flinched when she climbed off the back of the bike, depriving him of her warmth. Watching her walk away from him was stomach curdling, so he didn’t do it. He closed his eyes, waiting to hear her footsteps retreat into the house.
But they didn’t.
Fabric rustled again as something was dropped onto the floor, and then a gentle hand touched his rigid forearm.
“Ease up,” she instructed.
Sloane’s eyes popped open. They widened at the sight of her there, her pink leather coat discarded and her hair wild from the wind. Without thinking, he let her unwind his fingers from the handle bar. It’d crumpled under his grip and would need to be replaced before he could ride again, but he didn’t care.
Cecilia pushed against his shoulder, urging him to sit back a bit. Confused but relieved she hadn’t left him, Sloane planted his boots on either side of the bike and shifted backward on the leather seat.
He thought he’d gotten pretty good at predicting her behavior over the past year. He was wrong.
The air escaped his lungs in a long, pitiful wheeze as his consort threw one long, thigh-high covered leg over the seat — facing him. Their size difference was enough that she didn’t really straddle the bike so much as she straddledhim.
Her thighs draped over his as she settled her weight on his lap. Without her jacket, she was left in small shorts and a skin-tight long-sleeved shirt. He’d seen her in far less, but something about this moment made the outfit somehow more erotic than the number of times he’d watched her in a towel or that distressingly small work uniform.
His skin heated in a flash as she hung her arms around his neck, pressing their torsos together until he could feel every perfect curve and padded inch of her.
Cecilia’s fingertips found the tiny gap between the top of his collar and the accordion folds attached to the bottom of his helmet. When their skin touched, Sloane jumped like he’d been electrified.
“Is this okay?” she asked, dark brown eyes searching his visor.
Sloane’s shoulders moved with the strength of his deep, desperate breaths. “Yes,” he wheezed. “Your touch is… pleasurable.”
She seemed to consider something very seriously for a moment before she asked, “Do you want to touch me?”
If his cock got any harder, he was fairly certain it’d snap off as easily as he’d taken that vampire’s arm.
Making a pathetic sort of gurgling sound in his throat, Sloane answered, “I don’t know how. I wasn’t trained to handle soft things.”
A small smile played at the corners of her lips. “Do you want to learn, champ?”
“Yes,” he answered, short and sharp and sure.I’ve never wanted anything more in my life.
CHAPTER
NINETEEN
He watchedin fascination as her cheeks turned a darker color. The urge to run his lips over them, to feel the heat of her blood as it settled beneath her silky skin, was a tearing thing in him.
“You’re beautiful,” he whispered.
Cecilia looked down. The long, curly wisps of her lashes hid her eyes from him as she skimmed her fingers down his arms to find his hands. Holding them between their bodies, she examined his gloves. “Do you have to wear these all the time?”
He peered at their hands. His looked monstrously large compared to hers, and tipped in the metal claw-caps, they couldn’t have been more different. Sloane’s jaw tightened.
