I want her to know that no one else couldevermake her feel like this.
“Please.” She gasps.
“Not yet.” I pull back just enough to press another wet kiss to her inner thigh, and she makes a sound somewhere between a sob and a curse. My fingers keep moving inside her, dragging against that soft, spongy spot that makes her legs shake.
“I could do this all night,” I murmur against her skin. “Keep you right here, on the edge, while he’s inside wondering where his fiancée went.”
“Don’t,” she whispers, but her hips roll into my hand.
“Don’t what? Don’t talk about him?” I curl my fingers and she gasps. “Or don’t stop?”
“Don’t stop. Please don’t stop.”
I press my mouth to her and give her everything. No more teasing. My tongue and my hand working together until I feel her tighten. Her thighs clamping around my head. Her pulling my hair so hard my scalp burns. Her breathing in short bursts she’s trying to keep quiet. I reach up with my free hand and lace my fingers through hers where they’re braced against the wall.
The ring presses cold between our palms, and my chest twists.
“Come for me,” I say. “Show me who you belong to.”
She shatters.
Her back arches off the wall, and the moan that tears from her throat is so raw I surge up and cover her mouth with mine, swallowing the sound, and letting her suck my tongue to taste herself—kissing her through it while my fingers keep working, drawing it out until she’s shaking so hard she can barely stand.
I hold her up. My arm around her waist, her body slumped against mine, her face hidden in my neck. She’s trembling. Breathing in stuttered gasps. Her fists curled into my suit jacket like I’m the only thing keeping her from dissolving.
Through the hedge, champagne glasses clink. Someone laughs. The party goes on.
I pull my fingers from her slowly, and she whimpers againstmy neck. I move my lips to her temple, the same spot Art kissed earlier and hold them there like I can wash away his touch with my own.
She moves back just enough to look at me. Her eyes are glassy, lips swollen, hair a disaster of copper against the ivy.
She looks wrecked.
She’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.
Genevieve reaches up and wipes her lipstick from the corner of my mouth with her thumb, and my heart skips.
“I know you,” I say. “I know the sound you make before you break, and the way you sing off-key when you think nobody’s listening.”
She presses her lips together.
“You touch your ear when you lie, you show your love through food, and you talk to Cavall in French because you think he deserves romance.”
A tear slips down her cheek, and I wipe it away with my thumb.
“I know you check your phone for your dad every morning before your feet hit the floor, and you compartmentalize so you don’t get sad.” I lean my forehead on hers. “So he can have the ring and the room and every camera in Rosebrook Falls. But he willneverknow you the way I do.”
Her eyes are dark, and her lips are parted, and her fingers grip the fabric of my suit.
“And in two days, I’m getting you to Boston.”
She sucks in a stuttered breath. “What?”
“Play the game. Be thequeen. And then it’s time to strike.”
“Two days,” she says.
“Two days.”
