Promise Me This(75)

I stepped closer and saw how her breathing faltered.

“I thought you like how I go all caveman on you,” I said, now running my fingers up her leg to her hip.

She inhaled sharply. “Sure I like it in the bedroom, but in public, not so much.”

Something about that statement made the synapses fire inside my brain.

“What’s the difference?” I said inching nearer and trailing my nose along her jawline.

“The difference is . . . that one is behind closed doors and is about playing a role during . . . s . . . sex,” she said, almost breathless. “The other is in front of other people and makes you look like an ass.”

God, Jessie was such an enigma. Submissive in bed and assertive in every other area in her life. Was that possible—to only play a certain role in the bedroom and not have it infiltrate other areas of your life?

Did that mean I could keep my different tastes, desires, and personas separate as well?

I thought about my parents. My father wanted to control my mother in every possible way and he did it with fear, by ruling with an iron fist.

But I didn’t want to control Jessie or anybody else for that matter.

So what was that shit I just pulled in the hallway?

That was jealousy, plain and simple. Something I’d never felt before. Because I wanted this girl, more that I ever wanted anybody else in my life. And I didn’t know how to make her mine without fucking everything else up.

I ground my hips into hers so that she knew just how turned on she’d made me. My lips were hot on her neck as they trailed up to her ear. “I want to bend you over this sink right now and show you just how caveman I can be.”

I felt her knees quiver against mine.

“Yeah?” she whispered. “Would you spank me, Nate?”

“Fuck,” I moaned, right before my mouth crashed down on hers. My tongue invaded her mouth and she whimpered as I licked and nibbled and tasted her.

“I’d want nothing more than to have you take me like that, Nate,” she said, panting hard.

And then suddenly she straightened herself and thrust me back forcefully. “But you can’t have it both ways, even if you’re working some shit out.”

My eyebrows bunched together, confusion over what she was trying to say.

“I can’t keep hooking up with you,” she said. “That’s not my thing. No matter how damn much I like being with you.”

She pushed out of my grasp and then smoothed down her shirt. She looked around the grimy bathroom and said, “And I certainly wouldn’t be fucking you in a nasty bathroom.”





Chapter Thirty-four


Jessie



My fingers were shaking so badly as they turned the knob. It was so difficult to walk away from him but I needed to, or I’d just fall even harder.

Before I could get out of the room, his strong arm gripped my waist and he shoved the door closed. Nate lifted me, swung me around, and then forced me against the wall.

He grasped for my hands as he raised them above my head and his mouth lowered toward mine. “Is that really what you think? That all I want from you is a hookup?”

My body was trembling head to toe because I could feel his heat and smell his fresh soap scent. His breath fanned across my lips and his arousal pulsed against my stomach.

“C’mon Nate,” I whispered, because I didn’t have the strength to muster anything else. “Is . . . isn’t that what you do—with girls? You screw them to fulfill a need and then you move on?”

I knew it had been a low blow, but who was I to guess what the hell this had become between us.

“But I haven’t moved on, have I?” His gaze practically pierced through me. “I can’t fucking move on . . . not from you. Not after I’ve discovered how you taste, how you smell, how you sound . . .”

I inhaled a harsh breath as his nose brushed along my jaw and headed toward my ear. God, how I wanted his lips on my mouth, on my breasts.

“You’re branded in my brain,” he whispered against my neck. “I have your skin committed to memory.”

It was like a visceral punch to my gut, zapping all of my air, that’s how much I savored hearing that.

“Like how that roll of film on your forearm nearly reaches the inside of your elbow . . .” His gaze slid down my body painstakingly slowly. “And the corner of that picture frame on your stomach shows just above those lacy panties you wear.”

My breath released in fluttery wisps as his fingers came down to trace across my chin before gliding down my throat.

“Nate.” My free hand now reached for his hair.

“I’ve got your lips memorized as well,” he continued as he outlined them with the rough pad of his finger. “Not only how they taste, but their shape.”