Page 47 of Save Your Breath

Was it the heat from the sun or from him that rushed through every vein, that made my chest rise and fall so rapidly I worried I’d faint? Was it fire or ice? Was I burning alive or about to catch hypothermia?

This is fake,I reminded myself.He’s putting on a show for the cameras.

But,God, what a show it was.

His lips massaged mine, tender and warm and somehow too soft to belong to a man so hard and lined with sharp edges. He nipped at my bottom lip, kissing along my jaw and chin before he claimed my mouth again. This time, I was mid-pant, and he swept his tongue inside to dance with mine.

An embarrassing moan slipped out of me when he did, and it was like that sound unhinged him.

Aleks groaned, wrapping his arms fully around me and pulling my body flush against his.

Heat.

Definitely heat.

That heat was enough to dismantle me now, to burn me from the inside out and reduce me to a pile of soot. His body was wet and slick against mine, steam rising in what little space existed between us, our breaths growing more and more frantic with each kiss.

“You’re putting on quite the show,” Aleks mused against my mouth before biting down on my lower lip.

“No way I’m letting you outdo me.”

He chuckled, but that laugh turned into a low groan when I hiked my leg up over his hip. He grabbed ahold of my thigh, and I wrapped my arms around him, rolling into the next kiss like a desperate teenager.

And maybe I was.

Maybe this was years and years of pent-up energy finally bursting loose.

Maybe this was seventeen-year-old me finally getting her chance.

“Mia,” Aleks warned, and when I felt his erection pressing against my stomach, a rush of power flooded me, replacing the heat.

I smirked, sliding my hand down his chest and tickling the skin just above his shorts with one long fingernail.

“Woman,” he cursed, and then with his teeth gritted and as if it pained him, he wrapped his hands around my arms and firmly put space between us.

He didn’t shove me away, didn’t do anything so drastic that the cameras would notice. But he held me at a safe distance, tonguing the inside of his cheek as he shook his head and let his heated gaze rake over me.

“What’s wrong, Suter?” I teased, hoping the way I was quite literally panting would come off as part of the play. “Afraid the world will see your… situation?”

A challenge sparkled in his eyes. “Oh, you think you’re slick, huh? Think this will embarrass me?”

I shrugged with a coy smile, still trying to catch my breath and come down from a fake kiss that felt anything but.

“Naïve little thing,” he said, running his thumb along my lower lip. “I thought you knew by now that nothing embarrasses me.”

Then, suddenly, he released me, stepped back, untied his board shorts, and ripped them down to his ankles.

I didn’t dare give him the satisfaction of looking down, not even when he smirked and waggled his brows before jogging off toward the water.

But once he did, I let out a fizzle of laughter, covering my face as I shook my head.

That was it.

That was the money shot.

And within an hour, all the headlines had shifted from Garrett Orange and his opinions on my music to my new boyfriend’s gigantic cock.

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