Page 56 of Holding Penalty

“Don’t be afraid to touch me, Piper. Show him you know that you married the right man.”

His voice hits me like a drop of warm honey mixed in a shot of whiskey. Sparks skitter over my body. My nipples pull taut, and a thrilled feeling dances in my chest.

My hand goes to his chest, palm pressing against the firm plane of his muscles. He clasps his hand over it, and a rush of electricity snakes from where we make contact and shoots through my body. His other arm wraps around my waist, and I step into him, letting our hips meet flush.

“That’s more like it,” he says.

I’m lightheaded as we dance pressed together. His hands roam across me, tracing the dip of my waist and the curve of my hip. I let my own hands do the same, following the outline of his obscenely broad shoulders, and spreading across the dense, corded regions of his back.

The air around us is hot, and the heat from Nash’s body only makes me more sweaty and flushed. When my hips sway to the beat of the next song that comes on, I feel an indentation in his pants that brings a rush of scarlet heat to my cheeks.

He’s half hard behind his jeans, but he’s not pulling away. Neither do I.

I roll my hips again. If I had enough presence of mind to consider the wisdom of that action, I probably wouldn’t take it. But I don’t, so I do. This time the bulge is larger, and I feel the unmistakable shape of it right against my pelvis. A tight ache pangs between my legs, arousal scattering through me.

Nash’s eyes are hazy. His jaw muscles flex. There’s a hint of danger between us right now, but it’s a delicious, seductive flavor that I can’t pull away from.

I don’t know where Crew is anymore. I’m not even sure if he’s still here. But I’m not really asking for his sake when I say to Nash, “What else do you think we could do to make him jealous?”

I press myself against him, molding my body to his. His ab muscles jump and dance under his shirt from the contact.

“I could think of a couple things,” he says. His voice is strained and raspy. I feel the low rumble of it at the height of my legs, right where that ache is tightening, right where I can feel myself growing slick.

“What’s one of them?” I ask, my voice half tease, half surrender.

His hand comes to my neck, resting firmly and possessively on the side of it. The pad of his thumb sweeps over my pulse point, making my knees weak as my stomach does somersaults.

“If I kissed you. Right here, right now.” Nash’s throat bobs on a thick swallow. “Then he’d be jealous.”

“And if he wasn’t here? If he couldn’t see it, if it couldn’t make him jealous? Would you still want to kiss me, right here, right now?”

I don’t know what I’m thinking, asking a question like that.

Nash’s face moves closer to me. My heart leaps in my chest. Next thing I know, my eyes are feathering closed, and Nash’s lips press to mine.

I light up from head to toe as Nash’s kiss sends a thrill through me like I’ve never felt before. The movement of his lips is gentle but firm. He controls the pace, guiding me as our lips slant and glide. Hot sparks prickle over my skin, and I melt against him.

My senses swim in him. His touch, his scent, the taste of his mouth. He pulls on my bottom lip and sucks, drawing a whimpering moan from my mouth into his. A low, purring sound of satisfaction rumbles from his throat after he drinks it down, and our kiss deepens.

“Nash,” his name escapes my lips on another moan. I don’t know why I say his name like that. It’s just the only way I could think to relieve this swell of pressure expanding in my chest.

“Fuck,” he groans. The tortured sound, the knowledge I can make a man like Nash Miller make a sound like that, feels like a hit of a drug.

I bite his lower lip, snagging it between my teeth and pulling. He responds by digging his fingertips into the exposed skin between my jeans and cropped top, then plunging his tongue past the seam of my mouth. It sweeps through my mouth and slants over my tongue, seeking my taste with unbridled greed.

Then he catches my bottom lip between his teeth, just like I did to him. He tugs as his teeth press into the skin. I moan into his mouth again, louder this time, the kind of moan I hardly ever even make during sex. I’m soaked between my thighs.

I don’t know what he’s going to do next. Cup one of my breasts? Push his leg between my thighs, grinding it against my center that’s begging for contact? Take me home and fuck me on that bed he’s been making me sleep in?

None of those things happen.

Instead, reality rushes back in when the music suddenly stops, the bright lights come on, and everyone around us starts murmuring and yelling with disappointment.

We both snap out of the trance we were in and jump back from each other. A look passes between us, and we both pull our eyes away, guilt clouding our faces.

For the rest of the night, we do our best not to talk about what happened. Or to pretend it didn’t happen.

But I can’t pretend that I don’t know how good a kisser my husband is now. And I can’t stop thinking that if the music didn’t cut out when it did, we might have finally consummated this marriage tonight.