Then, I grew angry. Furious that he’d refused to take a kiss I’d welcomed years ago, but now, when there was no such offer, he snatched it from me so callously.

I bit him as he smothered me, his breath catching with a snarl.

“Let me have this.” He kissed me harder. “Before I can’t.”

I should teach him he couldn’t touch me without permission. I should knee him in the balls and hurt him as badly as he’d hurt me.

But his voice throbbed with pain. A pain that wasn’t flimsy or easily cured. A pain that brought tears to my eyes with its rawness.

Our attraction exploded.

Our togetherness ruptured.

It burned.

It ached.

It wanted.

Whatever connection he’d tried to deny, beat him into acceptance.

His lips opened wide; his tongue dove deep.

My bag slipped from my shoulder, smacking against the concrete floor as I rose in his arms, plastering myself against him, placing more of my throat into his control.

His groan was the headiest, sexiest thing I’d ever heard. Rich with longing and deadly with fury.

I opened my lips, inviting him to plunge and suffocate. I answered his groan with a moan that strangled my stomach.

My excuse was I was lonely. I’d always been lonely.

His excuse?

He’d lost.

Lost to me, to him, to us.

There is an us.

Reaching up, I tangled my fingers in the hair that’d fascinated me since finding him. Sinking to his scalp, I deliberately dug my nails into his skin as punishment.

He snarled, kissing me savagely.

I wasn’t prepared for the wave of aggression. He kissed me so hard our teeth clacked and tongues duelled. His taste was everywhere. Mint and sin and something that woke up long ago memories.

He was everywhere. All around me. In me.

I kissed him back, fast and wet, not caring about the hungry noises I made. Not embarrassed that I let myself go. This was the kiss he owed me. And if he wanted more than a kiss...I’d give it to him.

His answering growl sent kerosene licking across my flesh as he hoisted me off the floor and once again slammed me hard against the twanging metal door.

Instinct made me wrap my legs around his waist, trapping him as surely as he trapped me.

I shivered as his hips shot forward, thrusting against me, revealing he was no longer a boy but a fully-grown man with heat and hardness straining against his jeans.

“God, Gil...” I kissed him harder, faster, tongues and teeth and temper.

We were evenly matched in speed and lack of finesse, nipping and licking, sucking and plunging. I squirmed against his body to get closer, demanding, inviting.

I stopped thinking.

I didn’t wonder what caused this explosion.

I just accepted it because that was what my accident had taught me.

Any illusions of a future had been wiped away the moment I felt restaurant glass slice me to ribbons. All we had was now, this moment, this very precious second.

Grabbing a fistful of his hair, I let my other skate down his body, tracing the rigid strength of him, the unyielding power until I found the only hot piece of him.

He stiffened as I fisted him, telling him explicitly what I wanted and was prepared to do.

I wasn’t embarrassed.

I wasn’t second-guessing.

This was the boy who got away, and if I could have a taste—a single afternoon where he was mine...I would take it and suffer the consequences later.

Kissing him with a tongue seeking his with determination, I squeezed his erection.

His taut stiffness instantly became liquid lust, driving both his cock and my hand against me, rubbing against my clit, turning it into a fireball of sensation.

Crying out, I locked my ankles together at the base of his ass, pulling him deeper into me, wanton and blatant and far too bold.

But it didn’t turn him off.

It only struck a match, and the heat between us was nothing compared to the fire that blazed in the moment it took me to tug at his belt and unzip his jeans. His flesh scalded me through his boxers.

His hand dropped to fist my breast, squeezing the very flesh he’d ignored only an hour before. Pinching the nipple he’d clinically painted, he growled the most deliciously needy, dangerous snarl.

I stroked him in reward, in invitation.

Clothes had no place anymore.

None.

My skin prickled with sweat. My heart raced with urgency. We both sped up until our kisses were replaced with one violent mess of melted mouths and rabid teeth.

I scrambled to get my hand into his tight underwear, desperate to have him, completely irrational with need.

But then...his phone rang.

The shrill, hated little ring.

Slicing.

Shredding.

Slaying.

As quickly as Gil had attacked me with passion, he dropped me with ice.

Ring.

My feet splatted to the floor as he unlocked his arms.

Ring.

My body wobbled as he stepped away.

Ring.

My heart cried as he yanked the phone from his pocket and looked at the screen.

Instantly, any heat I’d caused in his bloodstream returned to glaciers and avalanches, killing any sign of desire for me with a rush of smoke.

Wiping his mouth, he glanced at me with crazed, glowing eyes. Partly manic but mostly resigned to making yet another mistake.

Ring.

With a deliberate breath, he wrapped himself in a suit made from nasty unkindness. “You were just skin to paint today, Olin. This meant nothing. Just like you meant nothing to me in our youth. Nothing. Do you hear me?” Holding the phone, ready to accept the call, he pointed at the door. “Forget me. Forget this. Get out, and never come back. I mean it.”

Ring.

Slightly tripping in his haste to get away from me, he hissed, “I never want to see you again. Trust me on that.”

Giving me his back, he marched into his office, his only purpose to answer his phone.

Ring.

He didn’t care his jeans and belt were undone.

He didn’t care his mouth still glistened with my kiss.

Ring.

He didn’t care...

About me.

The office door closed, and the ringing stopped.

OceanofPDF.com

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter Eight

______________________________

Olin

-The Present-

NO WINE.

I have no wine in my stupid apartment.

And I needed wine.

Desperately.

My lips sang from Gil’s the entire Uber ride home. My body ached and my mind—well, my mind was drunk already. Drunk on finally knowing what it felt like to be kissed by Gilbert Clark.

But my heart?

The useless thing was in tinkling pieces.

That damn phone.

Who the hell interrupted us? Why did they have the power to stop something that had felt so unbelievably real?

Throwing myself onto the tatty couch with its threadbare yellow cushions, I closed my eyes.

Stop thinking about it.

It was over.

Gil had kicked me out of his place.

He’d bit me, licked me, devoured me, and ordered me to never go back.

But he’s hurting...

I grabbed a cushion and curled around it.

Don’t, O. Don’t torture yourself—

My mind threw images of Gil in my face. Of the way his anger slipped, revealing bone deep need. Of the way his temper cracked, showing a man gasping for help.

He doesn’t need help.

I squeezed my eyes shut.

That was the problem with me.

I read into things.

Alone and with no one to talk to, my mechanism at coping was to solve other people’s problems. At least my life wasn’t so empty if I focused on them and granted them happiness, even if I couldn’t achieve the same results for myself.