I blinked hard, but not because I didn’t understand what she was asking. I understood perfectly. Especially after I’d seen that flash of heat in her eyes, but I needed to hear her say it.
“Why?” I asked, my gaze holding hers.
Her breath caught quietly and suddenly it was like I could hear everything she wasn’t saying. See everything she was trying to hide and feel it all as if it was my own emotions. All because Jacque was exactly like me.
She was always busy. Always moving. Always thinking. Never quite feeling like she fit even when she was supposed to.
Maybe that was why I’d latched onto her and couldn’t let go—because Jacqueline Calhoun got it. She gotmein a way no one else ever had. She’d looked at me and she hadn’t just seen the surface.
Instead, she’d been confronted by the teasing, the sarcasm, and the playboy reputation, and she’dstillliked what she’d seen beyond all that.
“I think you know why,” she said, those eyes fixed on mine and her voice just breathy enough to let me know that my suspicion wasn’t wrong.
So, yeah. I do know, and I’m one hundred percent okay with it.
She turned and slid her keycard into the lock, the soft click of the door opening barely registering over the sound of my racing pulse. The second she stepped inside, I reached for her, sliding my hand into hers and using my grip on her to pull her into me.
She crashed into my chest without trying to fight it, winding her arms around my neck and pushing up on her toes just as my head descended. I claimed her lips in a searing kiss, unleashing everything I’d been holding back since I saw her across that room.
She responded instantly and I walked her further into the room, kicking the door shut behind us. I’d always loved a one-night stand.
They were so easy and clean, and done right, they came with minimal to no complications. That was all this would be. At least, that was what I tried telling myself, but even as I kissed her, pulling her closer and feeling her hands grip my shirt like she’d never let go, I already knew this wasn’t that.
It never had been and it never would be, but I went ahead and reached for the zipper at the side of her dress anyway. Jacque and I were inevitable, and maybe this was what she needed to finally realize that.
CHAPTER 42
JACQUELINE
Jesse’s mouth claimed mine like he owned it. He didn’t hesitate or make me wonder if he wanted it too. Instead, his tongue swept into my mouth and he kissed me with all the hunger I’d seen in his eyes tonight, his lips fusing to mine like this was a permanent situation.
In response, I melted into him like I had no choice because, even though I did, the very inconvenient truth of it was that I belonged to him. Whether I’d wanted it to happen or not, this man had stolen my heart and soul for himself, completely consuming me in every way that mattered.
My arms closed around his neck and I pulled him closer, moaning when he fitted his hard body against every curve of my own. He cursed into the kiss, sliding the last bit of my zipper down and then reaching for the thin sleeves at my shoulders.
I felt him hook his fingers underneath them. Then he was tugging them down, his fingertips trailing across my skin from my shoulders to my wrists. I shivered and kissed him harder, lust scorching through me like an out of control wildfire.
This wasn’t fair to either of us, but I’d asked and he’d taken me up on the unspoken offer. Now we were moving toward mybed, stumbling over the thick carpet under our feet while the dress slid further down with every step we took.
Part of me worried that he was going to regret this after. That I was. But if these stolen moments were all we’d ever have, then I’d take as many as I could get. For as long as he’d let me.
One day, I was going to have to watch him marry someone else. I had no doubt that Alex was already finding him a new, more suitable match, and when Jesse met her, I also had no doubt that he’d give it his all.
A fissure opened up in my heart at the thought and I shoved his jacket off his shoulders, suddenly desperate to make the most of whatever little bit of time he and I had left together. Jesse hooked his thumbs into the dress that had pooled low around my hips by the time we reached the bed, giving it the final shove it’d needed to fall to the floor.
After helping me step out of it and kicking it away, he brought his hands to my cheeks, his kisses slowing but somehow becoming even more intense. “God, Jacque. I missed you so much.”
“I missed you too,” I admitted on a breathy whisper, glad that he swallowed the words before they could end up making things awkward between us. “I missed you so, so much.”
For just a second, he stiffened, but then he groaned and shoved me backward. I fell onto the mattress, confused for a beat until I saw the expression on his face. The lights were off in the hotel room itself, but New York was never dark and the blinds were open, which meant that the ambient light was more than enough.
Jesse’s jaw was hard, his chin tilted slightly up, and his nostrils flared, but it was the look in his eyes that made me clench my thighs. They were blazing, but not in the openly turned on way I was used to seeing from him.
This wasn’t just heat. There was something else to it, too. A cool determination that got me even more hot and bothered than I’d already been, because it meant he wasn’t suddenly going to realize this was a mistake and leave me hanging.
Instead, those eyes raked across my mostly naked body, lingering on the tiny panties I’d had to wear under that dress so the lines wouldn’t show.
“I’ll make you a deal.” His voice came out low but confident, his gaze finally dipping to the high heels on my feet before he slowly lifted it back to mine. “No more talking unless it’s to tell me what you want or how good it feels.”
