Total pages in book: 117
Estimated words: 111416 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 557(@200wpm)___ 446(@250wpm)___ 371(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 111416 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 557(@200wpm)___ 446(@250wpm)___ 371(@300wpm)
A man who’d support her career and the choices she made in her life. No questions asked.
She had her own thoughts, feelings and desires. The man in her life would need to respect all of those. In turn, she would do the same for him.
She had zero interest in being the “property of” any man. To be his puppet. To be under his thumb. To be forced to obey or face consequences.
While most of the DAMC women wore one of those cuts on the run today, none of them, not one, had come off to Nova as a simpering, weak female. Not one of those women seemed to have a spine made from anything but steel.
In truth, she’d been impressed with them all.
While she didn’t ask them—mostly because she didn’t want them to have to defend their choices—she figured wearing those cuts only came down to the biker culture and long-held traditions. If she had to guess, none of them were forced to wear them and they did so of their own free will. That decision alone gave those women more power than someone outside of the MC would see.
If you explored it even deeper, what was the difference between wearing one of those cuts and a wedding band? Wasn’t a ring worn on your left hand telling others that you “belonged” to someone else?
Maybe.
And maybe she was overthinking it.
“Are you just going to stand there letting the cold air out of the fridge?”
His deep rumble behind her jerked her from her trance. She usually didn’t let her thoughts get the best of her unless she was alone or with people she trusted. Getting lost in her head otherwise could be dangerous.
She shut the door and took a step back, abruptly bumping into Fletch.
His arm shot out and around her, most likely out of instinct, to keep them from getting knocked over. From the unexpected contact, the beer fell free from her fingers, a grunt escaped him and a gasp from her as the bottle hit the linoleum, luckily not shattering.
She stared at it for a second and as she went to pull free, to put space between them, his arm tightened around her middle.
Holding her against him.
Her heartbeat went from zero to sixty to one-hundred-sixty in a flash.
“Nova…” came way too close to her ear and in a way that shot sparks flying through her.
Her breath seized. Her breasts became heavy and her nipples pebbled like the traitors they were. “Let me go,” came out way more breathless than it should.
For fuck’s sake, at least she didn’t moan.
“I just want to make sure you’re okay.”
“I’m fine.” She was not fine. He tempted her and that made her far, far, far from fine.
He immediately released her and snagged the beer from the floor, setting it on the counter. “Let that settle before you open it or it’ll give you a shower.”
Nova swallowed her pounding heart back into her chest and nodded. Cursing her shaky fingers, she grabbed the beer, put it back into the fridge before selecting an unshaken one.
“You sure you’re okay?” he asked, taking the beer from her and twisting off the top.
“Yes.” She needed to pretend the contact with him didn’t bother her. With a schooled expression, she pressed a hand to her thumping heart before turning and accepting the opened bottle from him. “Are you?”
“No, Nova...” His deep rumble swirled through her, causing the fine hairs on her body to stand on end. “I’m not.”
She lifted her eyes from her beer and met his, her fingers now choking the bottle.
Heat. Interest. That was what she saw in his. She wondered if her own reflected the same, if her attempt to hide it had failed.
In what seemed like slow motion and without breaking eye contact, he pried the beer from her fingers and set it on the counter behind her along with his. “Not even close.”
She licked her lips and swallowed again, trying to loosen the tightness in her throat and chest.
“This isn’t smart,” he murmured.
She clung to her self-control by her fingernails, pretending to not understand what he meant. Fooling herself by believing if she acted as if the attraction between them didn’t exist, it would go away. “What isn’t? Having a beer?”
His bearded jaw shifted, his nostrils flared and just as she started to step away from him so she could breathe, his hand snaked out to grab her behind the elbow and yank her into him.
The second her mouth opened, his lips collided with hers, driving his tongue inside and stealing her breath.
Stealing her resolve.
His fingers drove into her hair at the back of her head, fisting it, while his other hand curled around her hip, keeping her tightly pressed against him, against his hard body and even harder cock.
As if someone lit a match and threw it onto a gas-soaked pyre, her body exploded into a firestorm. The white-hot flames licked along her skin, singeing her everywhere they touched. Everything on her body pulsed in time with her heartbeat, including her pussy. Blood rushed in her ears and her pulse raced in her neck. The tight control she normally kept was unraveling more with every second.