Total pages in book: 67
Estimated words: 62811 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 314(@200wpm)___ 251(@250wpm)___ 209(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 62811 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 314(@200wpm)___ 251(@250wpm)___ 209(@300wpm)
He shrugged. “I’m not sure I deserve your condolences. He considered me a disappointment, and he wasn’t much of a father anyway. I became a Marine because I refused to follow in his footsteps the way Linc had. I needed to be my own man. And I refused to ever become the cheater and spineless bastard he’d been.”
She cocked her head to one side, curiosity in her pretty blue eyes.
When it came to his father, the irony was that, at the time Xander had enlisted, they hadn’t known the worst of Kenneth’s actions. “My father cheated on my mother,” he told Sasha. “Not just once but over and over again.”
She let out a surprised gasp. “I never knew. I realize I never met him but you always said he was working.”
“Because I didn’t like talking about him. I still don’t.” He cleared his throat and ran a hand over his short beard, thinking about the man who’d been emotionally distant and often absent, and his mother who’d … accepted.
“Mom turned a blind eye. And after Dad died, Linc found a checking account, which eventually led to discovering we had a sister,” he said, recalling the day Linc had told him.
Sasha sighed. “I wondered what Aurora’s story was. I didn’t want to intrude on personal family history by asking.”
“It’s okay. It feels good to get it out now.” Which surprised him. “Both my father and her mother essentially let her grow up in foster care. He didn’t want to admit to the affair by acknowledging her, and she didn’t want to raise a child. She’d damn well cashed the paychecks meant for her care, though,” he said bitterly.
“That’s awful.” Sasha’s soft gaze met his again. “I guess that explains why it was so easy for you to believe the worst of me—that I’d been cheating on you with my co-star.”
He sat up, eased her onto the bed, and straddled her hips, his hands on either side of her head. Shifting, he settled his hips into the cradle of her thighs. She let out a moan and his cock hardened between them.
He forced himself to focus. “Probably. But like you, I’ve grown up since then. I’d like to think I’d know better now.”
Though he couldn’t deny that the instinct to believe the worst might always be there. He would just force himself to think more rationally now.
“But none of that changes the distance or the fact that our needs are drastically different.” And he wasn’t talking about the desire rushing through his body, hot and thick like molten lava. That need, he knew, was mutual and it was something he could act on. “I’m sick of rehashing things and going around in circles,” he said, frustrated. “Can’t we just focus on now?” He jerked his hips against her, deliberately running his erection along her sex.
Her cheeks flushed and she wrapped her arms around his waist, grasping his ass in her hands, pulling him closer.
He couldn’t control the stalker situation. He couldn’t control the future. But he damned well could take advantage of and enjoy the here and now.
* * *
Sasha wasn’t about to fight a battle she lacked a solution to now. She curled her fingers into Xander’s ass and rubbed herself against his thick, hard erection.
“Is this what you’d rather be doing?” she asked, her voice husky to her own ears because he felt so good, so hot against her.
He sat up, dislodging her hands as he moved to one side. Then he hooked his thumbs into the waistband of her panties and pulled them down and off her legs, tossing them to the floor. And since he’d only been in boxer briefs himself, he shucked those just as quickly.
Needing to feel his skin against hers, she pulled off her … or should she say his tee shirt and added it to the pile. His hungry gaze devoured her bare chest, and before she knew it, he had her back against the pillows, his mouth on her breast.
He sucked her nipple into his mouth and the pull went straight to her clit. She arched her hips in a silent plea. With a groan, he slid his hand down her abdomen and patted her sex, which only served to heighten her arousal. The damn man was teasing her and she couldn’t take it. Not when he was plumping her breast in his other hand, his teeth scraping over her nipple, followed by long swipes of his tongue. Her hips moved in circles, need consuming her. Just from this.
And when his hand actually cupped her sex, she stilled, waiting. Hoping. Finally, he slid one finger back and forth over her lips and pushed a long finger inside, gliding in and out, slick and sure.
“Not enough,” she said, panting, arching, trying to suck his finger in deeper.