‘I know another couple of people who should be, too. Though not for the same reason.’
‘You should be nicer to your sister,’ I say, not taking the bait. ‘You’ve only got one.’
‘Thank God. And I’m disinclined to be nice to someone who sang at the top of her lungs in the cab all the way home. Besides,’ he adds, pulling the throw from the nearby armchair to cover Mel with it himself, ‘this Tinder shit she’s pulled makes me want to suffocate her myself.’
‘So you’re jealous?’
‘Why would I be jealous?’ he asks, full of a supreme and taunting kind of confidence as he stands, seemingly taking up all the air in the room.
‘Jealous of the attention my Tinder profile had tonight.’
‘You think I resent you going on coffee dates with a few limp dicks?’ His gaze drops from my eyes to my mouth, and then my breasts, and my nipples begin to tingle like his touch is a physical thing.
‘Maybe I’ll like one of them. Maybe he’ll go to dinner.’
‘Maybe you will,’ he says, coming to stand in front of me.Towering over me.
‘Maybe I’ll let you take me to dinner.’
My reply is less like a retort and more tentative. ‘Sweetheart, I don’t want to take you to dinner.’ His tone is lazy, low, and seductive, a tenor that shivers across my skin. But I’m not disappointed by his words. Not as he leans around me, flicking the light switch and plunging the room into semi darkness. ‘I want you to bemydinner.’
In the dark and with his sister soundly sleeping on the sofa behind him, Ben takes my hips in his hands, pulling me into his hardness. My breath hitches, everything within me suddenly dialled to a nine. My nipples ache in the confines of my bra as I strain to rub against him, my panties already damp.
‘I am jealous,’ he whispers. ‘I’d go insane if I let myself think about other men’s hands touching you.’ His head moves a fraction of an inch, the streetlamp outside making his eyes glitter at that moment as his warm, hoppy breath touches my face. ‘But you’re right to find someone else.’
‘Ben,’ I whisper, raising my hand to cup his cheek. ‘Let’s not talk about this.’ He’s not going to be around. I get it. But that’s later, not now.
He swallows audibly, preparing to speak again, when I place my finger across his lips to silence him.
‘Not tonight,’ I whisper, still sensing his hesitancy to give in. ‘Tomorrow. We’ll talk tomorrow. Just.. .’
In the dark room, it’s easy to forget that Mel lies asleep on the couch. It’s easy to ignore that we will never be more than stolen moments without promises. But there’s something about the darkness that makes me feel brave as I tip up onto my toes, pressing my lips to the small triangle of skin exposed at the neck of his shirt.
His skin vibrates under my lips, his fingers tightening on my hips.
Tightening. Loosening. Tightening again.
Sliding around to squeeze my ass.
Backing me up against the wall.
Pushing his hard body against where I’m soft.
Heightening my senses.
‘W-what about Mel?’
He doesn’t answer, not with words; instead, he presses his lips to my head with a desperate growl.
‘Stop talking.’ His first kiss is just a wisp of air. His second, a brush. His third, the press of teeth against the soft skin of my lip.
‘She might wake up.’
‘I don’t give a fuck.’ His words are like a sudden thrust of fingers between my legs—a shocking sensation that makes my core clench. Drowning in an overload of sensation, I whimper as his teeth find my jaw, my neck, the day’s stubble abrading my skin.
‘You make me want to hurt you,’ he whispers, taking my head in his hands. Everything turns molten, and I’m thankful for the wall at my back, keeping me up.
‘You make me want to let you.’ It’s not so dark that I can’t see the gleam of his white teeth.
