Total pages in book: 241
Estimated words: 229266 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1146(@200wpm)___ 917(@250wpm)___ 764(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 229266 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1146(@200wpm)___ 917(@250wpm)___ 764(@300wpm)
“Oh, yes. You’re always so damn distracting,” he chided gently.
“Sounds like that’s your problem.”
“It is both our problems.”
“What are you asking permission for?” I sounded breathless, as if I were standing on an edge. “What is this idea?”
“If you want,” he said, his chest rising and falling against mine, sending darts of forbidden pleasure through me. “We can pretend again.” His hand slid along my thigh, higher and higher—
The tips of his fingers reached evidence of what I knew he’d already sensed. My hips jerked at the illicit thrill as a breathy moan parted my lips.
He dragged his mouth over mine. It wasn’t a kiss, just a passing glance of his mouth against mine. “You can pretend.” Cool air seeped in as he lifted his head. “You can pretend that this isn’t because you don’t have a of need me.”
My heart felt like a trapped butterfly as I opened my eyes. His were blazing, a heated honey. “I don’t.”
The curve of his lips was cruelly sensual. “You can pretend that this—” He eased a finger inside me, just the tip, but I rose up on my toes. His eyes turned luminous as his gaze drifted over my face and then lower to where my breasts had risen up above the churning water. He lifted his gaze to mine as he pressed his finger in further, and I could feel my inner muscles clenching around him. “That this has nothing to do with you wanting me.”
“I don’t,” I told him, even as I lifted my hips off the rock, pressing against his hand, against him.
Casteel hissed as my stomach brushed the hot, hard length of him. He pushed me back to the rock, trapping his hand between us as his chest flattened against mine. The skin-to-skin contact, the way he slowly pumped his finger, shorted out my senses. “You can pretend that it’s just the sensitive bite on your neck causing you to squirm against my hand.”
I was squirming as best I could.
“You can pretend that’s the reason you wish it was my cock you were grabbing onto so tightly.” His head dipped to mine once more. “We can both pretend, and we both can…”
“Can what?” I breathed. “Just be Hawke and Poppy?”
For a moment, the hardness etched onto his features slipped and then cracked, revealing the near-desperate need underneath. A need for me. For us.
What if Kieran was right?
I could barely breathe, let alone think, but I knew what he meant. Gods, did I ever. And in this moment, we wanted the same. Perhaps we needed the same—to just feel and let everything else fall to the wayside. To just be here, in these seconds and minutes and no place else. Could we do that? Maybe he could. Perhaps this was all about slaking a physical need for him, even as inexplicable as that was. Why couldn’t I? I wanted what he could give me. Pleasure. Momentary escape. Experience. A sense of freedom. Because that’s what release felt like. How was that a betrayal to anyone, including myself? Wasn’t denying it more treacherous? Or was I lying to myself even now? And if so, did that even matter?
His touched stilled as he searched my face for an answer. And in that moment, I realized that this was my life. What existed between Casteel and I was neither right nor wrong. It was messy and complicated, and maybe I’d regret this later as I gave him more and more pieces of me, but I wanted him.
And I was so done denying myself anything.
I was done lying to him and to myself.
“Only on one condition,” I said.
“You have a condition now?”
I nodded, my heart thundering. “I don’t want to pretend,” I whispered. “I’m Poppy and you’re Casteel, and this is real.”
Chapter 31
“Can you agree to that?” I asked.
His eyes drifted shut for a heartbeat, all the striking lines of his face were tense. “Always,” he whispered. “Yes.”
I reacted and pulled away from the rock. Closing the distance between our mouths, I kissed him. I knew the moment my lips touched Casteel’s, the very second his lips parted, that this was real.
I lifted my hands from the rock, looping them around his neck as I took what I wanted, tasting him on the tip of my tongue, reveling in the decadent thrill of his sharp teeth. I didn’t know what I was doing, only that instinct guided me. I moved my lips against his, nipping and exploring and learning.
And Casteel didn’t seem at all bothered by the artless inexperience. If anything, it seemed to inflame him. He gave me what I wanted. Kissing me with a wild sort of abandon that bordered on crazed.
When he ended the kiss, he was breathing just as heavily as I was. “We’re not pretending, Poppy? No more? You want me. Knowing everything, you want me.”