Page 162 of The Unlikely Spare

“Better?” he murmurs, lips brushing the nape of my neck.

“Getting there.” I turn to face him, water streaming between us. “Your turn.”

I pour shower gel into my palm, working up a lather before sliding my hands over his chest. I map each bruise and scrape with careful fingers, memorizing the evidence of what we’ve survived together.

“Eoin.” My name comes out breathless as my hands drift lower, skating along his ribs.

I look up to find him watching me with dark eyes, water clinging to his lashes. The heat in his gaze has nothing to do with the temperature of the shower.

I slide my hands up to frame his face, pulling him down for a kiss that starts gentle but quickly turns hungry.

His mouth opens under mine, and I press him back against the tiled wall, swallowing his gasp as the cool surface meets his heated skin. Water cascades over us as we kiss deep and desperate, bodies sliding together in the most delicious friction.

“Bloody hell,” he pants when we break for air, his hands gripping my hips hard.

I kiss down his throat, tasting water and skin, feeling his pulse race under my lips. His head falls back against the wall as I work my way lower, mapping the column of his neck with teeth and tongue.

“Just how thorough,” Nicholas gasps as my mouth finds that spot where neck meets shoulder, “do you feel this physical inspection should be?”

I pull back to look at him—flushed and wanting, lips swollen from kissing, water running in rivulets down his body.

“Very thorough,” I growl, capturing his mouth again.

He moans into the kiss, one arm reaching around my hip to pull me closer. The new angle aligns us perfectly. I rock against him, the slide of wet skin and building friction drawing desperate sounds from both of us.

Then he’s pulling away, sliding to his knees.

“I’m nothing if not meticulous when it comes to royal duties,” he says.

The sight of Prince Nicholas on his knees in the shower spray, water streaming down his body, looking up at me with those impossibly blue eyes dark with promise, nearly brings me to my knees as well.

He looks like sin and salvation wrapped in one infuriating package.

“Nicholas…” My voice comes out wrecked.

“You keep saying my name like that, and I might start to think you actually like me.” He presses kisses along my hipbone.

“Jury’s still out,” I manage, though my voice cracks when he starts kissing down to the top of my thigh.

“Well then.” His smile is pure wickedness. “Allow me to present some compelling evidence.”

“Get on with it then.” It comes out more like a plea than a command.

I can feel the last vibration of his laughter as he takes me into his mouth, and Christ on a bike, that wicked tongue of his is even more dangerous when it’s not forming words. He works me with a combination of finesse and hunger that has me desperately trying not to thrust into that perfect heat.

“Jaysus,” I gasp, my hands tangling in his ridiculously bleached hair. “Where did you learn to…fuck…”

My hips buck involuntarily, and he pins them against the shower wall, holding me in place while he continues to take me apart with lips and tongue and just the right amount of teeth. He moves one hand to gently stroke the skin behind my balls.

It’s overwhelming, the wet heat of his mouth, the sight of him between my legs, the way he hums with satisfaction when I make particularly desperate sounds.

“Your mouth,” I pant, “should come with a warning label.”

He pulls back slightly, lips slick and swollen. “I’m fairly sure you knew that about me.”

I can’t help tugging him up to me so I can kiss him again. His mouth is hot and slick against mine, and I groan at the taste of him, at the way his tongue slides against mine. My hands tangle in his hair, holding him close as we kiss deep and filthy.

“Fuck,” I breathe when we break apart. “The things you do to me.”