Total pages in book: 135
Estimated words: 131916 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 660(@200wpm)___ 528(@250wpm)___ 440(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 131916 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 660(@200wpm)___ 528(@250wpm)___ 440(@300wpm)
I was struck with a wave of possibility.
With that hope I’d felt the first time I’d stepped off the bus and into Moonlit Ridge.
He kept brushing his thumb over my lips. Back and forth. Back and forth.
Mesmerizing.
Hypnotizing.
“Give us twenty questions, Charleigh. Twenty questions of getting to know each other. As simple or as deep as you want them to go. Then you can decide if you trust me. If when you’re in need, you feel safe enough to come to me.”
If I were being logical, if I had my bearings, it would have been clear that I had to tell him no. I could never agree to something so ridiculous or reckless.
But I found myself nodding and whispering, “Okay.”
His expression flashed with something dark and resolved, though his touch remained tender.
Careful, even.
“Good.” His tongue stroked out to wet his plush bottom lip, and his eyes darted all over my face, as if he were searching me for answers to something he hadn’t yet asked.
“I’m going to kiss you now,” he murmured, words raw. “That is as long as it’s good with you?”
It was a question.
A proposition.
One I knew would ultimately wreck me.
I could already feel my heart swinging wildly in the man’s direction. Wanting to make the leap when I knew he’d never truly be there to catch me.
But maybe I did need this.
Maybe I did need a buoy.
A life raft.
Someone to support me for a little while until I made it to shore and could stand on my own two feet.
It was time.
It was time.
I swallowed around the reservations and the skitter of fear that streaked through my being. I didn’t want to bear it anymore.
The fear.
The terror.
The nightmares.
“Does that count as one of your twenty questions?” It came out breathy and with the tweak of a smile at the corner of my mouth.
He touched the spot where my lips fluttered, attention dipping there before the force of it returned to my eyes. “Considering it’s one of the most important ones, then yeah, gorgeous, it does.”
My nod was erratic. “It’s good with me.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
His hand slipped from my cheek, and he glided it up until his fingers were notching into my hair. His other hand came to my hip, and his fingers barely curled around my waist.
Heat sheared through my middle, while a ripple of anxiety spread within it.
I struggled to breathe around it.
River curled his hand around the back of my neck, and his forehead dropped to mine.
“Promise you, these hands will never hurt you, Charleigh. They’ll only ever bring you pleasure.” His words came out in short, heated rasps, panted a hairsbreadth from my lips. “Protect you. Do you understand?”
“I think so.”
I wanted to.
I wanted to believe it.
Did that make me a fool?
More so, did this?
The way his big body towered over mine as he kept me close. The way his fingers felt as they slipped up my neck and to the base of my skull, barely kneading and sending little bolts of that pleasure he’d promised ricocheting through my body.
But it was his lips pressing gently to mine that sent an inferno racing far and wide.
It was a tumult to my senses.
The feeling of safety that swept through me clashing with the need to press myself against him and take everything that he might be willing to give.
The urge to fully place myself in his hands.
He kissed me softly. So soft I wasn’t sure how it was possible for a man like him.
Little nips and sucks of my lips, his head shifting back and forth as he plucked and pressed, nibbling my lips between his.
Then his tongue barely swept across the seam of my mouth. I fisted my hands in the fabric of his tee as I opened to him.
His tongue swept against mine.
Need barreled through me, making me weak in the knees and throbbing between my thighs.
A gush of air ripped from my lungs at the onslaught of sensation, and he inhaled it.
Sucked it down as if he were the one who’d demanded it.
He pulled me closer, and he fully looped his arm around my lower back just as the fingers of the other hand tangled in my hair.
My hands were pinned between us as I hung on, and I could feel the intensity increase.
Could feel the desire curl through his massive, vibrating body.
The way he wanted to take it deeper.
Devour me. Ruin me. Wreck me.
Part of me wanted to let him do it.
The other was relieved when he peeled himself away. Relieved when he made the choice because I wasn’t sure if I could have stopped myself.
The man’s eyes were a toiling mess of greed.
Body twitching in volatility and restraint.
“Still have every intention of makin’ you forget, Charleigh. I’m just not sure you’re ready for that yet.”
With that, he turned on his heel and walked out. He left me gaping behind him, wondering what I’d gotten myself into.