Total pages in book: 162
Estimated words: 156796 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 784(@200wpm)___ 627(@250wpm)___ 523(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 156796 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 784(@200wpm)___ 627(@250wpm)___ 523(@300wpm)
Stealing the breath from me.
Not that it was mine to give anyway.
I understood that after he broke the kiss and my entire soul protested his mouth leaving mine.
“We can have the fight about how you’re a strong independent woman later,” he murmured, twinkle in his eye as his fingertips moved up my skirt.
“How did you know that’s what I was going to say?” I asked, voice dreamy as he trailed the outside of my thigh, his fingertips at the top of my panties.
“Been around the block, babe. Seen the courtship process from the sidelines. I know how this goes. It’s going to be a battle. One I’m happy to fight.” He yanked his hands downward, my panties going with them, and I’d stepped out of them before I rightly knew what was going on. Gage brought them to his nose and inhaled deeply.
Yes, inhaled.
My stomach burned with shock, and desire.
His eyes didn’t leave mine. “But I’m gonna fuck you first.”
And he did.
Against the wall in the bathroom in a bar.
Crazy. Wild. Brutal. Freaking public.
And I loved every second of it.
Two Days Later
“Late again,” Jen said, smirking. Though again, her smirk was slightly empty.
I winked at her, holding up a coffee for her and a tea for me.
“Yes, but it was because I was getting us drinks.” I paused, thinking about how Gage and I had been about to open the door to leave my apartment and he’d slammed me against the wall.
“Can’t do it,” he rasped, mouth against my neck, bunching my skirt with one hand, yanking at his belt with another.
“Do what?” My words were broken by the stabbing need in my soul.
He pushed my panties to the side, delving into my drenched core.
I let out a moan.
His eyes met mine. “Can’t let you walk out the door lookin’ like that without fucking the life out of you.” He plunged into me again and hissed out a low growl. “And then fuck you back to life.”
And he had done just that.
Hence me being late.
Jen lifted a coffee tray.
I laughed. “Ah, great minds.” I handed her one from mine. “I’m sure mine’s a little hotter since you likely got yours a while ago.”
She took the cup, sipping. “Yeah, I’m thinking you’re not going to be predictable anymore?”
I sipped my tea, thinking of the delicious tenderness between my thighs. “No, I think not,” I murmured.
“Look, Lauren, I don’t know you very well,” Jen said, interrupting my sex flashback, “though I hope that’s going to change because I like you. And I’m saying this because I like you, and please stop me if I’m crossing the line,” she said, putting the coffee down. “But this new guy… he sounds great.”
“Great is an understatement.”
Her eyes flickered. “Obviously, since by the looks of it, he’s changing everything about you in such a short amount of time.”
I stiffened at her words.
She smiled as if it would reduce their sting. “I’m not saying this to be cruel. I’m saying it because I’ve got experience with this kind of thing.” Her eyes went faraway. “I know what it’s like to have someone unlike anything but a tornado come into your life and blow it apart. And at the time, it seems like a good thing. The best. Destruction of who you were before doesn’t matter because of who you are with them.” She paused, eyes zeroing in on me. “But tornados leave as quickly as they come, and the destruction they leave in their wake isn’t as exciting as it seemed in the middle of the storm. That’s all I’m saying. Make sure you know him well enough that you know what he’s taking from you. So you know he’s not taking everything and going to run off when the storm’s over.”
She sipped her coffee, glancing at her computer as if her words hadn’t just hit me and touched all the fears I’d been ignoring.
“Shit, I have a deadline and I just realized I didn’t fact-check this,” she said, glancing back up to me. “I’m sorry, babe. We’ll talk about this later, okay?”
I nodded and wandered to my desk, relishing the tenderness that came with sitting down, trying to hold onto that pain instead of the pain that had just come with Jen’s words.
But I didn’t.
I held onto them both.
All day.
I let Jen’s words eat at me for the rest of the week.
The week that was little more than a blur of work—I was trying to do all my normal duties and finish the story that wasn’t anywhere near normal—and Gage.
Well, work was a blur.
Gage was hot—sometimes cold—stark, beautiful reality.
He had been busy with the club and didn’t come to my apartment until late most nights.
But then he made me come.
Continuously.
He broke me with his body. With his presence.
But he was holding back. I could tell. His darkness was lurking, waiting to strike. It terrified me, but I wanted it to strike.