He shifts to his side, facing me, as he reels off his next line. His eyes glitter, and his mouth sensually forms each word, delivering the dialog with passion and drama.
I squint at his intense facial expressions. “Are you making fun of this movie, Cole Hartman?”
“Never.” He inches closer and trails a hand down the back of my t-shirt.
While he showered, I slipped into pajamas, opting for the most coverage. The shirt is tight but longer than most, gathering around my hips. And the flannel pants have a double-knotted drawstring at the waist.
He turns his attention back to the TV and continues his speaking parts. But that hand is still moving, roving lower on my back, rubbing, and exploring. I soften beneath the affection, mesmerized by his presence. So much so the movie fades into the background.
Under the guise of massaging my tailbone, he works open a gap between my shirt and waistband. When his fingertips find my skin, goosebumps skitter up my spine.
He rests his cheek on the pillow, watching me intently. His deep brown eyes are magnetic, beguiling in their focus, baiting me to tip closer, peer deeper, and fall in.
Closing the distance, he presses his hips against mine and seizes my mouth with warm, soft lips.
His fingers stretch beneath my shirt and splay across my back as his other hand cups my head. With his arms around me, he pulls me flush against his body, chest to chest, mouths fastened, and tongues plunging.
Our legs twine together, rubbing, sliding, my fingers tangling in his hair and my nails scratching his scalp. Holding my head, he adjusts the angle and deepens the kiss. Groaning, breaths quickening, he dips his other hand beneath the waistband of my pants and palms the curve of my butt.
I tense, knowing we’re headed toward a landslide that won’t quiet. Not until we’re both moaning with release.
“Don’t get stiff on me. I just want to feel you,” he breathes against my lips. “This ass…” He squeezes a handful of flesh. “Fuck, I missed this goddamn ass. The round, toned shape, this tight little hole…”
He sinks his fingers between my clenching cheeks and strokes the rim of my back opening.
I whimper. “Cole—”
“Let me touch you, baby. I won’t push for more. I just…need…” His brow rests heavily against my temple as his entire body vibrates and rocks closer. “Christ, Danni, it’s been so fucking long.”
So long since he’s touched me. Since he’s been with a woman. Since we’ve let ourselves come together in the spontaneous, unrestricted, explosive way we both want.
If I let him fuck me, I’ll have to tell Trace, and it’ll shatter him. Or I don’t tell him, and the guilt will eat away my insides until I’m sick with it.
Or I do the smart thing and resist Cole’s advances.
“No.” I clutch his wrist and try to remove his hand from my pants. “We can’t.”
He fights me for a moment, his fingers tightening against my backside. Then he snaps his hand away and rolls to his back.
“Goddammit.” His guttural whisper breaks something inside me.
“I’m sor—”
“Go upstairs, Danni.” He closes his eyes and rests his forearm across his brow, shutting me out.
My shoulders curl forward, and an ache swells in the back of my throat. I feel bruised, rejected, which is stupid since I’m the one who rejected him.
He continues to lie there, with his cock standing like a flagpole in his lounge pants. He holds that arm over his eyes and fists his other hand in the bedding, waiting for me to leave.
Because he wants me out of his sight.
He can’t even look at me.
My chin quivers as I climb off the futon. My bones feel heavy and wounded, and I can’t stop the hurt from rising up my throat and choking past my lips.
I make it halfway to the stairs before the futon creaks beneath his weight.
“Are you crying?” Concern roughens his timbre.
I’m always crying, because I’m not strong enough for this. Hell knows what he sees in me. A wise man wouldn’t waste his time with me. I’m fucking pathetic.
The tears slip free and course down my face. I keep walking, taking the steps two at a time as his footfalls give chase. He catches me at the top and swings me around in the doorway.
“Fuck.” He swipes his thumbs across my damp cheeks and drops his hands to my waist, pulling me against him. “I’m a prick.”
Thick shadows encase the stairway, snagging and snaring every crevice and crack without mercy. He stands one stair beneath mine, putting us at eye-level, his gaze somber and inklike in the phantom darkness.
I sense his unease, his creeping sadness. I recognize it, because it’s coming from me, too.
The last four years changed us, and now everything hangs in the balance. Our hopes and dreams are on pause, and I’m terrified to press play. I don’t want to know the ending.
As my tears continue to fall, he kisses them away, whispering between the brushes of his lips. “I sent you upstairs because I don’t trust myself. I don’t want to fuck this up, and when I’m with you… Dammit, Danni, I want all of you, in every possible way.”
“I’m making it worse.” I grasp his tense neck, holding our foreheads together. “I’m not good at saying no, especially when I’m dying to say yes. I’m failing—”
“No, baby. The person failing here is me. I’m impatient and selfish and demanding. I make mistakes and lose my temper.”
“You’re passionate and impulsive and yeah, sometimes you get out of control. But if I can’t handle your worst moments, I don’t deserve your best ones.”
“Jesus. I must’ve done something right to have been given a chance with you.” His voice rasps, deep and throaty. “You have such a beautiful mind. You’re incredibly understanding and gracious. And those qualities are shaped into a stunning flesh-and-bone work of art. I only have to look at you to know I have something special and rare.” He releases a breath. “Sometimes you feel like an unattainable dream.”
“I’m just a girl, Cole. And I’m right here.”
“You’re everything, and I want more.” He palms my backside, fitting our hips tightly together as he speaks against my lips. “I want you to belong to me. I want my ring on your finger, my babies growing inside you, and your future welded to mine. I want to watch you teach our kids how to dance and see you swing on that pole when you’re ninety years old—”
“Gross.”
“Never. You’ll always be beautiful.” He kisses the corner of my mouth. “I had my grave marker removed from the cemetery yesterday.”
“You did?”
“I’m going to buy a larger plot. When you die, I want you buried beside me.”
The air whooshes from my lungs. “That’s kind of morbid…in a really romantic way. Now I feel all glowy and mushy.” I grin a soggy, hot mess of a grin. “Is that weird?”
“No.” He trails kisses over my face, tingling an electric thrill through my body. “Not at all.”
“I’ve felt this before, right outside, when a sexy hunk of a man rolled up on his motorcycle.”