He grumbled and tugged a handful of hair. “Erin, how am I supposed to trust you? You took mygun.”
I winced, at the anguish in his voice. “In fairness, I also took your gun within ten seconds of meeting you for the first time.”
“This is not funny!”
“I’m not laughing! I’m just stating a fact. And yes, it was a little unfair of me not to tell you my plan, but you wouldn’t have let me do it if I had told you.”
“You’re damn right I wouldn’t have.”
I took a breath to calm us both and circled over to his side of the island. “Look, Bray. We can’t all have perfect families like yours, with parents who buy them cello lessons and let them crash in their condos.” I waved my arms around, and he flinched. “This was likely the only time I was going to see my father, and I wanted to know if he’d changed. If maybe there was something there to start building off of. To start over. Clearly, there isn’t. I’m sorry if I upset you, but can you at least try to understand why I did it?”
His jaw worked as he studied my face. The anger in his gray eyes began to cool but didn’t fully dissolve. “On some level,yes, I can understand. But you didn’t have to be so goddamned reckless about it.”
We stood inches apart. Close enough I could smell the fiery liquor on his breath in a way that made me want to take a sip—of him, not it. The tiny flare in his nostrils and the color warming his cheeks said he was still angry, but maybe a little bit something else too. My hand had landed a few inches from his on the island top. The icy granite against my palm was the only thing keeping me grounded.
I looked up into his stone eyes and reminded him of a truth. “I told you that you wouldn’t like the choices I’d make on my own.”
He stared at me for a heart-pounding second and then blinked, as if something had snapped. In a move even I couldn’t anticipate or thwart, he grabbed my hands and walked me the few steps backward until my back hit the wall. There, he sunk his fingers between mine and pinned my hands above my head. Before I could even gasp, his lips were on mine. The kiss was bruising and pent-up andholy hell, so good. His whole body pressed me into the wall, his hips deliciously pinning mine and his arms bracketing my head. He was a very welcome and warm cage I wanted to be locked inside forever.
A soft moan escaped my throat, and it only made him kiss me harder. His tongue pushed into my mouth, and I met it with mine. They slid and tangled together, dancing while our lips continued to suck and my heart beat harder than when I’d had a gun to my head. I fought against his grip, wanting to free my hands to touch him in other places, but he only gripped tighter and held me harder.
God, this man could kiss. I’d wondered what his lips felt like the first moment I saw him, and the answer was wickedly divine. Liquid flame raced through my veins, pumping straight to the core of my belly as I wondered what else his mouth could do. My hips bucked against his, wanting more, thoughthey didn’t get far with his powerful body crushing me to the wall. I silently begged him to let go, to put his hands on all the places my pulse was pounding in need: my throat, my chest, between my thighs. But he held me firm. I’d knocked him on his ass yesterday, but I had no leverage now. I was at his mercy, and through the haze of his hot mouth devouring mine, I wondered if this was some kind of punishment. A show of dominance and who was really in charge. And God damn it, it did everything for me.
I moaned again and stopped fighting. I let my hands go limp in his and my body sag. Only then did he pull back.
The look on his flushed face said not that he’d been trying to put me in my place, but that he’d lost a battle he’d been waging for a long time. Something had overtaken his will-power, and he’d finally surrendered.
My heart hammered. I could see it pushing my chest out with each thrashing beat. He still held my arms up over my head. We both panted.
“That wasn’t very heroic,” I managed through inhales. I gave him a grin as wicked as his lips had felt.
He let go of me and regrettably stepped back. My body instantly ached for the heat of his to return. He hung his head in shame and stroked his jaw.
I stood there flushed and feral and ready to do whatever he wanted next. My body was one giant livewire begging to be touched. I didn’t care about crossing lines. Not after that.
He eventually lifted his head and gave me a stern look. “Go to bed,” he commanded and stepped away.
The cold command stung in contrast to the heat pumping between us moments before.
“Are you coming with me?” I said to his back, hopeful and only half joking, as he walked toward the garage.
He glanced over his shoulder for a split second, as if looking any longer would tempt him to turn around and stay.“Good night, Erin.” He opened the garage door and disappeared through it.
I stood alone in the silent kitchen, hearing only my heartbeat and wondering what the hell had just happened. Temptation to follow him stirred in my blood, but I knew he would only reject me again. His hero mask had slipped for those few perfect moments of sin, but now it was back in place.
I let out a big sigh and helped myself to the rest of the drink he’d left sitting on the island. “Good night, Cal.”
CHAPTER23
Ihardly slept that night. And not because of nerves or worry or fear, but because every time I closed my eyes, I saw Bray. I felt him pinning me to the wall, his mouth against mine. My blood looped through my veins in ways that had my hands finding all the places on my body I wanted him to touch.
I checked my phone an embarrassing number of times while dozing off between fantasies and waking with my heart racing, hoping for a text.
I didn’t hear from him until he walked in the door carrying to-go coffees and a takeout bag the next morning. He was freshly showered and shaved, smelling like mint and soap. At the sight of him, I half wanted to punch his handsome face and half attack it with kisses for sentencing me to a lonely night dreaming of his mouth.
“Good morning,” I said as he set the breakfast offering on the island. Simmons was in the living room watching the morning news, and I was sipping coffee and scrolling a takeout menu on my phone. I still wore my pajamas and had my hair piled on my head in a sloppy bun, but when Bray’s eyes raked over me, a flush filled his cheeks.
Good.Even if he was acting aloof and like last night didn’t happen, his body couldn’t deny that it had.
