My back’s pinned to the wall but my hands find his shirt, twisting into the fabric like it’s the only thing tethering me to earth. I gasp into him, and that’s all it takes for the kiss to deepen — his lips parting mine, his tongue brushing with a hunger that lights a wildfire under my skin. My knees go weak. My mind blanks. I forget my name. I forget where I am. Heat tingling and pooling in my core.
He growls low in his throat — the sound making my pulse stutter — and then he’s lifting me, like I weigh nothing. My legs instinctively wrap around his waist as he presses me harder into the wall. His mouth never leaves mine, not for a second.
Like he wants to own every breath I take.
He tastes like trouble. And I want more.
When he finally pulls back, just enough to breathe, his forehead rests against mine. His breath fans across my lips that are still parted, stunned.
“I know for a fact,” he breathes, “he doesn’t make you feel likethat.”
Then he kisses me again. Slower this time. A deep, consuming drag of lips and tongue and heat that makes my bones melt. I feel every plane of his hard body as he presses against me, the rough fabric of my jeans rubbing against my clit and making me moan.
He trails kisses down my neck as my fingers curl into his hair and his rough hands make their way under my sweater and move across my waist.
“Tex.” I breathe, “Stop.”
He freezes, and slowly I slide down against the wall and him, legs shaky, body burning. I can feel his erection against me as he gently lowers me back down.
Before I can say anything, he turns and walks out. Like nothing happened. Like he didn’t just soak my panties with a single kiss.
I close the door behind me with a soft click, but it might as well be thunder in the quiet that follows.
My legs are still trembling.
I lean against it, head tipped back, eyes fluttering shut as I try to catch my breath — but it’s useless.
He’s still there.
Tex.
On my skin, in my lungs, like smoke I can’t cough out.
I press my fingers to my lips, swollen and tingling, and it’s like I can still feel him — the rough drag of his mouth, the heat of his breath, the way he kissed me like I’m his and he was done pretending otherwise.
My heart won’t slow down.
It pounds against my ribs like it wants to escape, like it doesn’t know what to do with the storm he left behind.
He kissed me. Hewantedme. No games, no venom, no walls. Just fire and heat andwant.
I swallow hard and peel myself from the door, locking it behind me. Iturn off the main light and slip into the bathroom. The mirror catches me in passing—lips a little swollen, eyes bright, cheeks flushed.
I turn, half-stumbling toward the bed. The silence in the room feels louder than anything, like it’s pressing in from all sides. But still — I feel him.
In the way my hands shake.
In the phantom weight of him pinning me to the wall. In the heat between my thighs and the throbbing I’ve never felt before.
My fingers tremble slightly as I strip off my clothes, layer by layer. The softness of the fabric against my skin feels amplified, like I’ve been turned inside out. I slide into bed wearing just a camisole and underwear, trying to calm the fire he’s left in me. But I can’t. Not really. I curl beneath the blankets, covers pulled high, but it’s no use.
Tex Ward is still with me — in every breath, in every pulse. I can feel his rough hands on my waist, in my hair.
I’m not even sure why I stopped him.
River.
His name drifts in like smoke under a door.
