Pressing her lips together, she nods. “I know. Believe me, I know. I was just…”
“Just what?” I prompt, my tone still hard.
But fuck, I don’t like how close that was. I don’t like how easily that shit stain was able to overpower her. But what am I going to do about it?
Call Parker’s state rep contact and convince him to propose a law cracking down on recreational steroid use? Arm every woman in New Orleans with a taser so they can zap back when big men press their advantage? Buy a Batman outfit and hunt down every guy named and shamed for sexual assault on that “Get Away from Him, Girlfriend” website that an LSU cheerleader started after she realized her friends had been attacked by the same guy who stalked her in high school?
I don’t know. I don’t know how to protect Clover. How to protect my girls when they’re older. How to protect the other women I love.
Fuck, I’m in love with her.
I am, aren’t I?
It’s already too late to walk myself back from this ledge.
I’m still reeling from the realization when she adds in a shakier voice, “I was just trying to make myself want someone I could actually have, okay?”
Someone she could have.
Because she can’t haveme.
She didn’t say it flat out, but the truth is right there, shimmering in her pained brown eyes. And suddenly, I can’t understand why we’re doing this. Why we’re denying ourselves what we both clearly want so damned badly.
Before she can say another word, I step in fast and close, cupping her face in my hands and crushing my mouth to hers.
And God, it’s good.
Instantly good.
Instantly, as sweet and hot and right as anything that’s ever happened to my lips, as she opens for me with a moan of relief that echoes through my bones. Her hands fist in my shirt as she drags me closer, until we collide with the cinder block and she arches off it, pressing against me while I wrap her up in my arms.
She’s hot, burning up from all that work on the dance floor, and I am, too. Hot and already so hard, I know she has to feel it as she rocks against me as we kiss.
Good, I think.
Let her know what she does to me.
The way she makes me want her like nothing else.
Our tongues stroke and spar, our hands everywhere as the self-control shatters on both sides. My hands slide down, overthe curve of her waist, gripping her ass, shifting position until the ridge of my erection grinds over her clit.
She cries out, soft and low, her nails biting through the cotton of my shirt as she clings to me. “Yes, yes,” she pants. “God, Dean, don’t stop.”
I don’t.
I don’t even think about it.
I fuck her mouth with my tongue while I ride her through our clothes, every hitch of her breath driving me closer to the edge. At this rate, I’m going to come in my pants like a teenager, but I can’t bring myself to care.
Not right now. Not when I can tell she’s about to explode.
I skim a hand up under her pathetic excuse for a shirt, planning to tug down her bra, only to discover she’s not wearing one.
Fuck, she’s not wearing a bra, and now my head is fully spinning as I palm the perfect weight of her, her nipple pulling tight beneath my thumb.
I rub, roll, and pinch until she whimpers low in her throat, and her hips work more frantically against mine. An uncivilized sound bursts from my chest as I fight the urge to lose it, a groan like a mountain man who’s been wandering the woods for years without a woman in sight. And now, the sexiest woman on earth is not only in sight, but she’s in my arms, her skin hot on mine, about two seconds away from coming for me.
God, I need her to come for me.
