Total pages in book: 113
Estimated words: 107826 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 539(@200wpm)___ 431(@250wpm)___ 359(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 107826 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 539(@200wpm)___ 431(@250wpm)___ 359(@300wpm)
“I’m very busy.” I flush, but I’m not entirely sure if it’s with embarrassment or pleasure. There’s a little bit of both in there. “Thank you for…taking care of me.”
“Mm-hmm.” She steps closer, pressing against me. Her expression is soft and open. “I like to take care of the people I care about. It’s important to me.”
I need to talk to her about Hephaestus, but the words freeze on my tongue. We’ve had such little time alone together. I don’t want to waste it talking about plans and fear and the future. Maybe that’s selfish, but I don’t give a fuck. “I care about you, too.” I release her hip to brush a strand of her hair back and let my hand linger on her throat. “I won’t pretend this didn’t start a particular way, but I’m drawn to you like I’ve never been drawn to anyone else before.”
“Not even Adonis?” She says it with a playful tone.
I should allow her to tease this into a joke, but I can’t quite manage it. “It’s different.” I trace her jaw with my thumb. “Everything’s different with you.”
“Eris.” She bites her bottom lip and meets my gaze. “We don’t have much time before the guys get here.”
“We have enough.” I lean down. My emotions might be tangled when it comes to my husband, when it comes to Adonis, but it feels so damn clear with Pandora. “Let me keep you.”
“I already told you.” She smiles. “I’m not the type of person who’s meant to be kept.”
“Then let me…” Why does this feel so incredibly vulnerable? My instincts demand I retreat, throw up shields between us, but if I do that, I’ll lose her. I recognize that, acknowledge this moment is hung in the balance. Pandora might not be for keeping, but I want her in my life.
No matter what else happens.
I kiss the corner of her mouth. “Then let me share time with you. However that looks. I don’t want to let this go, but it’s becoming increasingly clear that none of us were meant for…a traditional relationship.”
“Are you sure?” She searches my face. “It’s bound to get messy from time to time.”
I laugh a little. “Messier than me marrying your best friend and him seducing my ex?”
“Well… Probably not messier than that.”
“Then we can handle it.” I hope to the gods I’m not lying to her. I want to handle it.
She kisses me before we can talk ourselves out of this. Maybe that would be the smart thing to do because this is so damned complicated. If I was honest with myself, I’d admit I don’t see a way through without crashing and burning.
I pull her close and kiss her hard. We only have a short time and I’m not about to waste it. She tastes of peppermint and feels like a dream in my arms. I want…
I want everything.
I always was greedy like that.
It takes effort to draw away enough to say, “I know I said no sex but—”
She digs her hands into my hair. “Don’t you go noble on me now.”
“Gods forbid.” I smile. “Bedroom or closer?”
“Closer,” she whispers against my lips.
Perfect.
I move back toward my living room, taking her with me. It’s an awkward dance of short steps and bumping into each other, but I don’t want to add even an inch of distance between us. So much about my seduction of Pandora has been calculated—at least in part—but there’s nothing calculated in this. I’m fumbling like a teenager as I reach for the hem of her dress and work it up over her hips.
We tumble onto the couch in a mess of questing hands and greedy lips. Pandora yanks my shirt over my head and my arms get tangled. I curse and have to move off her to free myself. I take the opportunity to divest myself of my pants as well. “Get that fucking dress off.”
“So bossy.” She’s grinning as she pulls her dress over her head and tosses it away. Pandora doesn’t wait for me to say anything to do the same with her bra. There are no panties to speak of.
I have to stop for a moment and just look at her.
“You are so fucking beautiful,” I murmur. Her lush body is a present I’ve been dying to unwrap and now that we’re here, I don’t know where to start. Her wide hips with their scattering of stretch marks? Her soft belly that looks so damn kissable?
My gaze falls to the tops of her thighs. No. That’s where I’m starting. I was thinking about her pussy even before she rubbed herself to orgasm against my thigh. “Spread your legs, love.” I shiver a little as I hear the echo of my husband’s voice in the words, remember how he told me to do the same thing last night. It’s different with Pandora, though. The whole dynamic is different and yet no less necessary. I want to fill my senses with her, to get drunk off the sight and smell and touch and taste of her.