Total pages in book: 93
Estimated words: 91507 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 458(@200wpm)___ 366(@250wpm)___ 305(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91507 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 458(@200wpm)___ 366(@250wpm)___ 305(@300wpm)
Rafe exhaled in a gush. Stupid relief turned his limbs to jelly.
Hop looked up. “What the hell took you so long? I probably got fucking frostbite from waiting in this cold.”
The laugh broke from him in a single, belly-deep chuckle. Jesus. He was absurdly pleased. It probably should have set off alarm bells. His smile was so wide it stretched his cheeks. He unlocked the car with a press of a button on his keychain.
“Why did you wait out here? I told you to come to my office.”
Hop hugged himself tighter and studied the brick wall of the building nearby, its graffiti stark in the glow of a street lamp. “Yeah, well, I was gonna to go home.”
Rafe shoved his briefcase into the backseat. “But?” he asked. There was something in Hop’s voice that made Rafe want to dig deeper until he uncovered all his secrets.
Hop threw his hands in the air. “My willpower is shit.”
“So you froze to death out here to spite yourself?” Now that his hands were empty, Rafe rubbed Hop’s shoulders briskly to warm him. The need to touch him was too strong to deny.
“Well, I didn’t expect to be waiting for fucking three hours. Thanks, by the way.”
Rafe chuckled indulgently. “How was I supposed to know you were out here? I thought you’d stood me up.”
Hop flicked a quick glance at him, then away again just as fast. “I wanted to, but I... I couldn’t.”
Another flood of satisfaction suffused all the cracks in Rafe’s pride and crystallized until he was once again the self-assured man he’d been this morning.
“Come on, let’s get you defrosted.” He guided Hop around the car and opened the door for him.
As Rafe slid into the driver’s seat Hop said, “I have rules this time.”
“Lay them on me.” He started the car and backed out.
“No bruises. No marks of any kind that can’t be washed off.”
Rafe gripped the steering wheel hard. “Did I hurt you?”
Hop’s silence spoke volumes, but then he said, “Not in the way you’re thinking.” So quietly, Rafe thought maybe he’d imagined it.
A thousand and one scenarios flashed like black-and-white snapshots, all of them disturbingly erotic because in each and every one his marks glowed on Hop’s pale skin like a brand.
The tension stretched out between them for blocks, the usually blinding lights of the city muted by snow and ice, but nonetheless beautiful in Rafe’s mind. New York was an unforgiving mistress, but also unforgettable, much like the guy beside him.
“What else?” Rafe prompted.
“Nobody can know.”
“Because you’re ashamed?” Rafe asked. When he glanced over, Hop’s face was hidden in shadow. “It’s who you are, there’s nothing to be embarrassed about.”
“Says the guy who admits to hiring professionals because he’s worried about his rep.”
“That’s different.”
“Why? Because you’re a big bad club owner it’d be somehow worse for anyone to find out you like to hit the people you’re fucking than it would be for my mother to know I like to be used as the world’s sluttiest sex toy?”
“I don’t get off on hitting the people I fuck. I’m more about the power play.”
Hop waved a negligent hand. “Beside the point.”
“Fine. I concede.”
“To keeping this secret or to the fact that you’re a hypocrite?”
Rafe narrowed his eyes. “Don’t push it.”
“Yes, sir,” Hop said, with zero capitulation in his voice.
Rafe gritted his teeth as he turned onto his street. “Are you done?”
Hop grew serious. From the corner of his eyes, Rafe saw him fold his hands together.
“One more.”
Rafe slowed enough to pull in the garage where he rented a space. He rolled down his window and entered the five-digit security code and waited while the gate lifted enough to let him through. He parked in his reserved spot, turned off the engine and adjusted his position to look at Hop.
“Are you going to tell me what it is or do you want me to guess?”
Hop licked his lips nervously, eyes on his lap. “It’s just sex. No...not a... I mean...”
“Sex.”
“Yes.”
“But no strings.”
Hop’s lashes fluttered like he was struggling not to look up. “Right.”
“So, we can still fuck other people?”
“Yes.” The fists on his lap clenched.
As if Rafe couldn’t see the war he was fighting—the battle between a strong mind and a gentle heart. “That doesn’t work for me.”
“What?”
Rafe shrugged when Hop finally looked up. “Maybe it makes me a bastard, but I don’t want to share you. If you think it will make it easier to pretend this is just sex, fine, we can—for now. But I won’t agree to fucking other people.”
Hop smashed his lips together so hard they curled inward and rolled his eyes. “Possessive much?”
“Yep, I’m a greedy sonofabitch.”
“As long as you own it, I guess.”
“Any more rules you’d like to lay out before I tie you up and make you come a dozen times?”
Rafe almost laughed when Hop’s eyes widened; he definitely did grin.