“Naw, you’ve been pretty damn coherent, so don’t cop out now.”
Her mind was going in a hundred weird directions, and she decided to follow one of them to see where it would lead. “I tried to talk Candace out of getting with Brian in the first place. I could’ve caused her to miss out on her happiness. What if she had listened to me?”
“She didn’t. So it’s a moot point.”
“But sometimes I feel like I’m talking myself out of happiness too. I can’t seem to make myself…shut up.”
She caught the flash of his white teeth even in the dimness. “Do you need someone to shut you up?”
“Honestly? I really think I do.”
“I might be useful in that capacity.” His voice positively dripped with suggestion. There was no question what he meant. His big hands rested casually on her thighs now, and oh, how she wanted to feel them move up higher. She couldn’t deny this thing between them. She’d never been able to.
The excitement she needed in her life, the spice she was craving, was sitting underneath her. Something to get her through this slump, or whatever it was. A bridge across the gap to where her friends stood waiting for her to catch up. She didn’t want to get left in the dust—she loved them too much.
Mere inches separated their lips, and she knew he could feel her breath gusting against his mouth. She felt his. Still slow and easy, it tickled her lips. He hadn’t kissed her on the mouth since they’d slid in the car. He’d never kissed her, even before, a fact that had kept her awake at night. But that encounter had been like this one: sudden, rushed, scalding hot. Now, she craved more of a connection, needed it so much it eclipsed everything else.
Gently, she took his face in her hands, looking over him. Outside the car, someone shouted and a few vague, colorful shapes moved past the fogged back windshield toward the club, but she didn’t worry anyone could see them.
She closed her eyes. Leaned toward him. Covered his mouth with hers.
A shudder went through him, and his hands—finally, at last—moved up her thighs. His lips were as delectable as they looked, and he let her tease them apart so she could lick her way inside and taste him. A whimper escaped her; his fingers dented her flesh. His tongue slid past her teeth, flickering against hers in a sinuous dance that had her moving shamelessly on his lap. Sliding her hand behind his neck, she pulled him closer, needing more, fantasizing about what else he could do with his tongue, what he’d just done to her. A groan slipped from her throat.
Macy wanted to weep with relief when his hands moved around to her ass. Surely he would touch her again in all the places her body was going wild. Instead, he let her go, then gently cupped her face until her clinging lips were forced to relinquish their claim on his. She gazed at him reproachfully.
“Damn, girl,” he breathed. He sounded as ragged as she felt. “I think I can handle ‘mopey drunk’ if you’re also ‘incredibly horny drunk’.”
She tried to lean toward him again, but he evaded her, and she resisted the urge to pout at him. “What are you doing?”
“What are you doing?” he returned, his voice a low, sexy murmur that went straight to all the neediest parts of her body and resonated.
“Isn’t it obvious?”
His answering chuckle was dark. “With you? Babe, nothing with you is obvious. Tomorrow, are you gonna just pretend tonight never happened, like you did before?”
“What does it… I didn’t really think you…”
“Didn’t think I cared? Thought I was only after the score?”
It had crossed her mind. Her guilt-ridden mind. It had helped her sleep at night, that was, after she’d tortured herself over the fact he hadn’t kissed her.
Her cheeks burned, and she was glad he couldn’t see her well enough to detect the color that must be raging in her face. Even now, she didn’t like to think about how she’d lost control of herself with him. She was in serious danger of doing it again.
“I know you can’t forget it,” he went on. “I remember how many times you came. I felt it each time, how tight you squeezed me and how wet you were. I remember your breathing in my ear, your begging, your nails clawing my back.”
His words and the way his dark eyes held hers, frightening and feral, were quickly turning mortification into something far hotter. He couldn’t leave her like this, so unfulfilled. Judging from the thick ridge in his pants, which she’d been brazenly rubbing against, she wasn’t the only frustrated one.
Fine. He won.
“Go home with me?” she asked softly.
Seth’s eyes closed, and his head met the back of the seat. She wanted to attack his throat with her lips. She settled for tracing a fingernail down the line of one of the tattoos peeking above the neckline of his shirt. “I told Brian I’d help out at the parlor so he could have the night off with Candace. That’s why I hardly drank anything tonight. I need to get over there.”
“Brian won’t…?”
“Let me off the hook to get laid while they work their asses off? I wouldn’t ask.” He raised his head to look at her. “I imagine you’ll be passed out by the time I’m done.”
His mouth was back in close proximity to hers—too close. She brushed it with her own. Gave his bottom lip a tiny lick.
“Fuck,” he said in a whispered rush, though he still didn’t move. “Macy…you’re gonna get me fired before I even get started back.” He captured her lips with his, once, twice, again. She ached and throbbed and pressed as close as she physically could. His hand disappeared under her shirt, sliding along her bare skin until his fingers covered her breast in the lacy cup of her bra. The pleasure centers in her brain positively purred. Her nipple pebbled against his palm, chafing against the fabric. He must have felt it; he circled the tight peak with his thumb.
“Yes,” she whispered, arching into the much-needed contact. He leaned forward to kiss and lick at the base of her throat.
It was crazy, and it was everything she’d tried to convince herself she didn’t want, but God, it felt too good. His thumb slipped under the lace of her bra, and she nearly lost her mind. In one swift movement, he shoved her baby tee up over her breasts and growled a string of curses, lowering his head to nip and lick the swells above her bra cups. She stroked his smooth head and almost grinned at the memory of Sam talking about bald guys. It was different, but she liked it.
Oh, she liked everything about what he was doing. If only he would do it a little faster…
“Please,” she whimpered, shifting in an attempt to bring his decadent mouth in contact with her puckered nipple. Even through her bra, she didn’t care; she just needed the contact. He kept deliberately avoiding it, teasing her without mercy. She’d never ached so much as when she was with him, but surely this time it had to do with the wrongness of this situation, almost shirtless in his backseat in a bar parking lot. With a guy she shouldn’t be with.
And last time?
Well, last time had almost been the same circumstances, save for the location. It had been dark and isolated, not in clear view of everyone in a busy parking lot. Whatever the reason, she couldn’t stop moving against him, and those little moans coming from her throat that sounded like some other far more wanton woman than she—surely it was some alternate universe she’d fallen into affecting her actions. Her reactions.
Seth pulled his head back. It was all she could do not to hold it in place. “I gotta stop, babe,” he said, bringing her world to an end. “I’m sorry, but if I don’t now, I won’t be able to later. And we’ll get caught.” Carefully, he slid her shirt back in place. Then his dark eyes flickered up to hers.
She could only imagine how she must look. The vast majority of her hair hung in her face. Her lips felt swollen, her eyes heavy-lidded. Tremors shook her hands and pretty much the rest of her body.
“Beautiful,” he whispered, as if he’d read her thoughts. He reached up to smooth her hair back. “Hey. I can’t go with you now, but if you really want to continue this later, you know…my number’s still good.”
Pulling her bottom lip between her teeth, she tugged his hoodie closed over her chest. He expected her to initiate the booty call the next time she got horny? “You have my number too,” she pointed out.
He flicked the end of her nose. “The major problem there is you quit answering.”
Maybe I will now. Oh yes, I will. “I’m turning over a new leaf.”
He chuckled. The tip of his finger caught her under her chin, and it was enough to still all her movements. “Tell you what. If you need help with that, if you need someone to shut you up, or even if you just need to walk on the wild side every now and then…I’m your guy. I’ll show you the ropes, killjoy.” The way he winked at her made her think he meant that idiom way more literally than most people. “I don’t know what kind of identity crisis you’re having, but I think you’re all right.”
You’re all right. It didn’t sound like much, but for some reason it meant a lot coming from him. It made her want to kiss him again—and again and again—but that time seemed to have passed.