Kai is a big man, in case I haven’t mentioned that before. There isn’t a part of my body he can’t reach as he crowds me, his mouth a hairsbreadth from mine. I feel him everywhere, from the tips of my toes to my tingling scalp. From my belly to my jaw as he cups it with his rough palm, swiping his thumb over my lips. “Are you implying that you’re so good at fucking I’d never let you stop?”
Fuck my life, I underestimated him. He’s too good at this. And I’m so monumentally bad. What I think, what I say, and what I mean never match up, and Kai has cherry-picked the best and worst parts and created something filthy sweet, just like him. “Maybe it was the other way round. Ever wonder ifyou’dbe so good at it that I’d never be able to leave?”
“That’s what you’re scared of?”
“I’m not scared.”
Kai finally kisses me.
Once.
Twice.
Feather light and beautiful.
Then he pulls away with a sad smile. “I don’t believe you.”
He backs up, returning to the middle of the room.
I stay where I am, breathing hard, an existential crisis I don’t have time for looming in the dark pit of my brain.Come back. The words stick in my throat, but somehow he hears me and turns to face me again.
He’s still so far away. Iachefor him, and I don’t mean my dick. I mean my heart. He’s kinda right about the fucking—it would be epically good. But I’m starting to realize that we’re screwed anyway.
I can’t handle the fact that he’s four feet from me. How am I gonna feel when there’s a transatlantic ocean between us?
“Joss.”
“Yeah?” My voice sounds distant. Hoarse. I clear my throat and try again, but it’s late, and my Tourette’s hasn’t got the memo that I’m not in bed and asleep yet. A nerve spasm rocks me. I clench my teeth. It doesn’t hurt, but lord knows what it does to my face. “Sorry.”
Kaigrowls, giving weight to a distant theory that he really is a wolf. Or a bear. “Stop apologizing for who you are. If you’re sorry for anything, it should be listening to Jax’s meddling bullshit and letting it mix with yours.”
“I don’t meddle.”
“No?” Kai snorts out a laugh that has barely any humor. “Dude, we’re in a secluded cabin in the middle of the night. It’s hotter than sin with no AC and we still have our clothes on. Without your crackpot theory about breaking my poor little heart, what do you think we’d be doing?”
I know what we’d be doing. We’d be destroying his Pinterest-worthy bed. The pillows would be on the floor, the blankets and throws bunched at the bottom. We’d be naked. Him on his back, me on top of him. I’ve never asked which way round he’d want to do it, but my body knows. He wants me to fuck him. And I want to fuck him. Ineedto fuck him. Or I’ll die. I’m sure of it.
How much of that is transmitted in my gaze, I’ll never know, but whatever Kai sees in me it draws him back to my orbit.
He braces his arms over my head again. “I think you’re scared,” he whispers. “Of how it’s gonna feel foryou. That’s fuckin’ wild, and I love you for it, but don’t make decisions based on what you think I can handle. I’m here for this, Joss. I’m here foryou. And I promise, it’ll be okay.”
23
KAI
I accidentally just told Joss I love him. Kinda told myself too, but I don’t dwell on the meteor strike of emotion. The rest of it is too important. I need him to hear me. Tobelieveme. Not so he’ll give in and fuck me, but so that I know whatever happens between us is ours and not tied to the cursed fuckin’ PTSD I’m still trying to escape.
Joss has been breathing hard since we got here. His muscles are taut with tension that’s not entirely natural. I massage his shoulders. He bites my arm, a sultry nip of his teeth, and something goddamnshifts.
He pushes off the wall and spins us around, his fingers still twisting my shirt. “The sensible person I try to be is telling me we need to talk about this more.”
“Talk about what?”
“About sex. Aboutfucking. I think I know what you want, but you already told me not to assume shit about you, so…”
“Don’t assume, then. Say it and see if I say it back.”
Where I got this confidence from, I have no clue. And I’m still kinda hoppin’ mad, fire in my veins and my skin too tight. But as Joss stares at me, walking me back to a bed I haven’t slept in for months and months and months, none of what led us here seems to matter.
