She wanted more. “I’m off men, you know.”
“Yeah. I know.” He took his hands off the counter and pulled her in, hard against his body.
She took two handfuls of his shirt. For balance, she told herself.
But the truth was, she wanted to put her hands on him. His chest was warm and hard beneath her palms. It almost hurt to look at him, he was so damn good-looking. Those dark, dark eyes that held his secrets and emotions in check, that square jaw with a sexy amount of scruff.
Everything about him saying badass tough guy who didn’t ever do soft and gentle.
And yet he did exactly that when his hands, strong and warm, slid up her back and then down, pulling her in even closer.
Then he looked down on her face for another second, his brown eyes soft but full of intent as he slowly lowered his head.
“W-wait!”
He paused, eyes on hers.
She had her hands over his heart and could feel the beating beneath her palms. Slow. Steady.
The opposite of hers, of course.
“Callie?”
“I…can’t remember what I was going to say.”
His eyes were smiling into hers. “So I can continue?”
She cleared her throat and nodded. “Carry on,” she whispered.
He started with a brush of his lips against one corner of her mouth, a butterfly touch. And then the other corner.
She heard a soft sound, an almost whimper, and realized it was her.
He slowly sank his fingers into her hair and she melted. No other word for it, her bones just melted clean away. And then he proceeded to kiss the living daylights out of her, a hot, wet, deep kiss that was good. So very good.
As it went on his fingers squeezed her hips, pulling her in closer. And then closer still, so that she could feel every inch of him. And, oh goodness, he had some really great inches.
She was lost, swirling in the sensations that would surely drown her if she let them. With a moan she leaned in, feeling his heart pounding at rocket speed now. Gratifying.
Tanner shifted and kissed his way over her jaw to the shell of her ear, his lips closing around the lobe, sucking it into his mouth before his teeth scraped over it.
A rush seared through her belly and she gasped. She opened her eyes and found Tanner watching her with a look she couldn’t quite place. “What was that?” she whispered, staring at his mouth.
“A test.” His voice was husky, doing nothing to ease the need inside her.
“Did we pass?” she asked.
“No. We failed. Spectacularly,” he said. And then he kissed her again—a hot, intense tangle of tongues and teeth that had her letting out that soft, needy sound again.
And again.
And again.
In fact, he didn’t stop until she was completely and utterly one-hundred-percent upside down and inside out. She might have even been transported to infinity and beyond.
When he finally lifted his head, she had to take a second before she could open her eyes.
Or maybe it was an hour.
Or a lifetime.
But when she finally dragged her lids up and stared at him, he smiled an especially bad-boy smile. “We’re going to do that again,” he said.
“Oh,” she whispered. “Okay.”
He nipped lightly at her wet lower lip, flashed a grin, and then…
Left.
Chapter 11
Tanner was halfway out of the building when Callie’s front door whipped open. He turned to find her standing there, hands on hips.
Hair wild.
Sweatshirt slipping off one shoulder.
Nipples hard.
Lips plumped from their kiss.
“What the hell was that?” those lips asked.
His mind was still befuddled, enough that he shook his head. “What?”
“You kiss me and then just walk out of here like the hounds of hell are at your heels?”
Okay, so there’d been a little bit of that. But he’d gotten his hands on her, and her tongue in his mouth, and only one word had crossed his brain and locked into place.
Mine.
That’s it, just that one syllable, going round and round in his head the entire time he was kissing her.
Mine.
There’d been a few other things, of course. The blood roaring through his veins like a locomotive on a downhill track, heading south to pool behind his zipper. Which meant that him thinking at all was somewhat of a miracle.
She was waiting for an answer and he didn’t have one.
“Was there something in the coffee or doughnuts that made you feel ill?” she inquired politely.
“No.”
“So it’s me?”
“No.” Yes. Jesus. He was unsettled as hell that he’d shared far more than he’d expected to. She was far too easy to be with.
He didn’t understand why.
Or like it.
“I have a meeting,” he reminded her.