“Again with the violence.” I tsk, shifting in the booth in an attempt to make the sudden bulge pressing against the seam of my pants less uncomfortable.
“Keep testing me and you’ll see just how violent I can be,” she warns.
“Now I want to do just that.” I lean forward, pressing my elbows to the table as I stare back at her. “You’re quite beautiful when you’re irritated, you know that?”
She tries to hide her reaction to my words, but I still catch the flustered expression that flutters across her face before she has a chance to hide it behind annoyance.
“What’s your end game here?” she finallyasks, mirroring my stance by lowering her elbows to the table and leaning forward, only the small width of the table separating us.
“Who says I have one?”
“Because I’ve seen this film before. The ending sucked.”
“Perhaps a rewrite is in order.”
She smiles at that.
“I don’t know. I think you’d be better off scraping the project entirely and starting from scratch.”
“Only if you agree to play the lead.”
She shakes her head, her brilliant blue eyes narrowing in on me.
“Whatever you’re doing, I’m not going to take the bait.”
“Who says I’ve even cast a line?”
“Because I can smell something rotten dangling from your hook.” She runs her tongue across the front of her teeth in a way that holds my focus on her mouth for entirely too long.
I try to remind myself of all the reasons I pushed Maisie away to begin with. My fear of commitment. The issues Lana would inevitably cause. My anxiety over... well, everything. Of giving someone too much power.
But as my gaze flickers up and meets hers, I don’t feel even a hint of those feelings. All I feel is the undeniable urge to pull her across this table and devour her the way I’ve daydreamed about doing countless times over the last two years.
I still remember how she tastes. The silkiness of her skin. The feel of her tight and wet around me. The sounds she makes as she comes. My arousal presses even tighter against my pants, and I shift a second time, trying to relieve some of the pressure.
“You know what I think?” I let the question hang for alittle too long and the impatience on her face is unmistakable.
“Don’t leave me in suspense here.” She pulls her elbows away from the table, settling back against the booth seat.
“I think you’re afraid of what might happen if you actually allowed yourself to see past what happened two years ago.”
“Oh yeah?” She snorts out a humorless laugh.
“You’re not nearly as convincing as you think you are.”
“And what, do tell, am I trying to convince you of?”
“That you don’t want to rip my clothes off as badly as I want to remove yours.”
Her breath hitches, eyes widening in surprise. Whatever she expected me to say, this wasn’t it.
“You know, they have medications for that.”
“For what?” I cock my head to the side with a smile.
“Seeing things that aren’t there.”
A deep rumble of laughter bubbles in my chest and spills past my lips before I can stop it.
