Page 19 of Ripple Effect, Vol. 3

“I’ll find you something to wear underneath.” Emily bows her head again, slips between the two of us, and I trail a very puzzled stare after her.

What is the deal with this woman? I can’t seem to make sense of anything that’s transpired in the last hour. First she’s warning me to watch out for myself, and the next thing I know, she’s playing some kind of twisted matchmaking game.

Swinging my attention back to Rip, I freeze like a deer caught in headlights.

I’ve been naked in front of this man, but for some reason, maybe it’s because we’re no longer in the privacy of his bedroom, I feel small under the weight of his gaze.

The way he’s staring at me all slack-jawed and intrigued, eyes dark and hungry, leaves me feeling strange—a good strange. A tingly strange.

He steps inside of the dressing room, crowding me against the wall, and I’m reminded of how much bigger he is. The black button-down shirt clings to his massive arms and the buttons strain to hold on, stretched across his chest. With one hand planted against the wall, he snakes a finger beneath the strap at my shoulder, gliding it back and forth. “You like this dress?”

“It’s nice,” I answer back.

I’m flush against the wall, trapped beneath him, and my body shivers at the wily glint in his eyes. I’ve no idea what he’ll do, but I know one thing, he doesn’t give a damn about who’s watching.

He leans forward, his head disappearing at the same time the first whisper of his hot breath hits my neck, and I close my eyes, caught in his spell. “Real fucking nice.” His lips clamp onto my skin, sucking my throat with abandon while his hand moves to my breast, grabbing a palm full that he squeezes.

My lips part at the sudden rush of pleasure that shoots straight to my core.

“Makes me want to cut it off of you. How does that sound?”

“No,” I breathe, palms flat against the mirror behind me, trying to keep from sliding down the wall. “Beautiful things shouldn’t be destroyed.”

“Touché.”

Resting his head against the wall beside me, he looks down and I follow the path of his attention, eyeing the impressive bulge sticking out of his jeans. He inhales deeply at the crook of my neck, and I want to reach down and grab him, do something dirty in this small, cramped dressing room. A part of me wants to brand myself on him and find out what Emily really is to him.

“I want it.” My whisper hardly passes my lips before his hands are up my dress, his rough palms gripping my ass.

“The dress? Or you want me.”

“Yes,” I answer, allowing myself to be drawn into him with the question. “I want you.”

“I want you, too,” he speaks low beside my ear. “You have no idea how much I want you, Dylan.” His lips go to work at my throat and once again, I’m putty in this man’s arms.

I wish he didn’t have this effect on me. I wish his mouth and hands didn’t carry whatever poison he spreads on my skin that makes me so pliant, bending, always bending to his will. The fight is what he craves, but he makes it impossible when his mouth feels like heaven and his touch is salvation.

“Then why ignore me for days at a time?”

Instead of answering, his hand slides to the front of me, his finger moving up and down along my cleft and the groan that vibrates against my neck tells me he’s discovered my dark little secret. “Why do you have to be so fucking wet?”

“You want me this way.” I know damn well the bad he’s capable of, but everything he’s doing feels so good. So good, I feel the need to destroy it with the question burning a hole inside my head. “Do you want her, too?”

He pulls away from me until his face comes into view, and I’m left contemplating whether the dip of his brows is anger or confusion. Like he expected me to glean some understanding that I haven’t grasped in the last hour she’s been dressing me like a Barbie doll.

My attention is veered by the figure standing outside of the dressing room, where Emily doesn’t bother to look at us, while she offers a stack of lace and satin lingerie. “I thought you might like these.”

She doesn’t seem uncomfortable that Rip has me pinned to the wall. That he has me disheveled and hot, an observation I catch in my reflection, that has me feeling like my mother in the back alley of the bar. I’ve rarely given a fuck what people think of me, but I wish I knew how she perceived me, if only to give some insight into what I am to this man. How I fit into his world.

I wish I knew what the hell was going on between the two of them.

The tattoo is odd, too. In fact, the more I think about it, the more it creeps me the hell out.

“Somebody likes the dress.” A shy smile lights up her face where her eyes are glued to Rip. It’s as if she wants to please him, and dressing me up is the way she goes about it.

“I’m going to need a few T-shirts.” Rip’s eyes are trained on me, refusing to look away for even a second. “You’ve done well, Emily. Thank you.”

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