“I will not be told what to do, especially from the likes of you.” I glowered at him. I should have slapped him across his smug face a second ago when the moment had called for it.
Sean leaned back against his pillow, folding his hands behind his head, studying me seriously as if I were a bug under a microscope. “What if I told you to come over here?” he asked. “Would you?”
Frustration boiled in me; I dug my nails into my leg to stop myself from screaming.
“Stop playing with me,” I bit out.
All humour had disappeared from Sean. His eyes burned into mine. “I told you …” He reached out to the lamp next to the bed and, with a delicate tap, plunged us both into darkness. “I don’t play games.”
Chapter Forty-Nine
I sat up in the bed, frozen to the spot.
It was as if all thoughts were wiped from my memory. After a long moment, I heard him chuckle.
“Relax, Amy, go to sleep.”
Sean turned again, making himself comfy nestling under the blankets. This time, I wasn’t angry when I stared at his back. Instead, something else stirred in me – he wasn’t playing with me, or using me as an object. Maybe he just didn’t see me that way?
But as the darkness consumed me and my shoulders sagged in defeat, the exhaustion of the day hit me again and I let down my guard to all the things I had promised myself that I wouldn’t lie about anymore. No more secrets, no more denying how I felt, and that included the infuriating lump right next to me. I just wanted to forget all the things that plagued my thoughts; just for one night I wanted to forget, to feel something other than guilt, and hopelessness, and even though I had no real way of knowing, I knew what I wanted. I could obliterate it all … just for one night.
Sliding down under the blanket, I edged myself up close behind Sean. I slipped my hand slowly under his arm and along his bare stomach. I pressed my lips to his shoulder blade.
“Sean?”
Sean’s breathing changed. I felt it as soon as my hand glided over his ripped stomach. Pressing into him, I felt him tense under my touch. I smiled, feeling a certain surge of power in taking him by surprise.
“Amy?” His voice was low and raspy.
I bit my lower lip, thinking that perhaps I should say goodnight and force sleep on myself, welcome the uncomplicated aspect of that and be happy. But that wouldn’t make me forget, or feel, so instead I whispered into his shoulder.
“I don’t want to play games anymore.”
Silence ensued. A long, painful silence. The only measure of Sean I had was his heart thundering against my palm.
What was he thinking? Oh my God, had I made a horrible mistake? Just when I was about to awkwardly peel my arm away and curse myself for even uttering those stupid, stupid words, Sean turned.
In one fluid motion, he forced me to draw my arm back as I was suddenly face to face with his beautiful, serious eyes. I read his wary expression, lit by the rays of moonlight that shone through the window. His throat worked to swallow as he studied me, wagering on whether I was serious or not.
I had no way of voicing it; I didn’t know how. Instead, I sat up and hitched myself onto my knees. Slowly, without tearing my eyes from his, I peeled one spaghetti strap from my shoulder and then the other. I slid my dress down and pushed it below my belly button. Sean’s eyes watched me intently, his jaw clenched. I shimmied the dress over my hips and around my legs, throwing it across the room. Now I had bared myself to him there was no going back, nothing else to shed; because I then did something so bold, so unexpected, I honestly didn’t know I had had it in me.
I straddled him. I had morphed into the femme fatale I had always joked I could never be. Any doubts of his desire were soon erased when I felt the press of him intimately against the sheer scrap of my underwear. His chest rose and fell heavily at the unexpected movement. His eyes burned into me now with a deep need I had never seen before. It excited me.
I grabbed his hands and placed them on me. A gasp escaped from my lips at the feel of his work-roughened hands on my skin. His fingers gripped me as I moved my hips, revelling in the feel of his touch. This was how I wanted to forget, just like this. I felt all the sadness, doubt, and anger evaporate and channel into something else entirely. Above all this, I needed something more. Before another second passed I found it, or, rather, it found me. Sean sat up and claimed my mouth with an all-consuming passion.
I loved the way he kissed me. It was nothing like the kiss from only that afternoon. He kissed me now so deeply, so unapologetically as if each draw from my lips was needed as much as the air he breathed. As though he needed my mouth with such utter desperation or he would simply not survive.