Page 48 of What You left in Me

I plant my palm on the rail by her hip. I do not touch her. I get close enough to feel the heat coming off her skin through thethin robe and the thinner willpower. “You came out here to see me,” I say, because I’m done pretending.

“I came out for water,” she repeats, her brows furrowing together petulantly. It’s brave and adorable, and it’s also a lie that doesn’t even try to be good.

“Right,” I say, letting my mouth tilt because I can’t help it. “And then you ended up in my arms by accident. Happens all the time, right?”

“I did not…” She stops herself, frustrated by the honesty sifting up through whatever speech she wanted to give. “I did not mean to end up anywhere near your arms.”

“I didn’t either,” I say. I lie like a professional; I lie well. But not to her and not about this. “But since we’re here, we should at least stop pretending we aren’t.”

“Finn.” My name in her mouth again, shaped like a warning that accidentally learned how to sound like a plea. “We can’t do this.”

I lean in just enough that her back registers the paneling. I still don’t touch her, but I can feel the heat radiating off of her. I let the idea of contact do all the work. “You keep saying that to me,” I remind her, because I’m a bastard who keeps score.

“And you listened,” she says, and her eyes dip to my mouth and then jerk back up like she wishes she could take the glance back. “Sort of.”

I put both hands on the wall, bracketing her shoulders, every muscle tight like a leash about to snap. If I move an inch, we won’t stop anywhere short of disaster. “Tell me to go,” I say. I make it easy for her. I give her the exit I don’t want her to take.

She wets her bottom lip, cruel little gesture, and nods once, like she’s trying the word on for size. “Go.”

I don’t move. “Look at me and tell me to go,” I say. I want the truth, not the script.

She raises her gaze and meets mine straight on. Her eyes are too bright, like she’s been arguing with herself for hours and lost.

“Go,” she repeats, clearer this time, like a good student hitting the line.

The fucking honesty of it kills me. So does the way her body leans forward by a millimeter, just enough to betray her. The robe parts by the same measure, a soft opening and closing like something alive trying to make up its mind. Fuck. Her tits are out now. It’s like she’s provoking me. The lace of her white bra doesn’t leave anything to the imagination. Her chest rises and falls as her breathing gets more intense and I just want to devour her.

I lower my head until my breath ghosts across her cheek. “Liar,” I breathe out, not unkind, but not soft either.

“Fuck you,” she whispers. She says it like a laugh that got nervous halfway out and changed its name.

“You first,” I say, because I have never been the bigger man and I am not auditioning for the role tonight. “I insist.”

And then she proves me right. Not with words but with the smallest, bravest tilt of her mouth toward mine. That’s consent enough to set the world back to true north. I still wait half a beat to watch her choose it again.

She does.

The first touch is a collision disguised as a kiss. It’s not tidy or cautious. It’s a grabbed shirtfront and a muffled sound that makes my muscles remember exactly what they’ve been trained not to and none of that matters because it’s her, finally.She tastes like the better version of every bad decision I’ve ever fucking made.

I keep my hands on the wall for a heartbeat because if I touch her now there won’t be anything left to explain. Then I fail at that, and one hand drops to her jaw, thumb skimming that soft place where pulse argues with reason. The other anchors at her waist, the thin cotton doing nothing to stop the heat of her. She’s shaking, and the way she leans into my palm is going to be the detail that kills me at the end.

She kisses like I thought she would when I wasn’t admitting I was thinking about it: earnest, hungry, smarter than sin. I take it slow on purpose for exactly three seconds, then she makes a sound, desperate and ruined, and I stop pretending I have restraint. Her back hits the wainscoting; my mouth opens over hers; we find a rhythm that has nothing to do with mercy.

A glass clinks. She breaks away just long enough to put it on the rail, careful even now, always the good girl, and I want to reward that and ruin it in equal measure. I chase her mouth when she turns back. The second kiss is worse than the first because it’s permission set on fire. She rises on her toes; I bracket her with my body to keep her there; everything lines up in a way that makes both of us swear.

I feel her nipples drag against my chest even through my T-shirt. The heavy weight of her breasts are pressed up against me. Her body is on fire and it’s my pleasure to fucking burn.

“Finn,” she says against my mouth, and it comes out like a debt.

“Say it again.”

“Finn.”

I don’t mean to make a sound, but when her hand slides into my trousers and closes around me, the breath tears out ofmy chest anyway, a broken, grateful exhale against her cheek. Heat, tight and sure, her fist testing my control with every slow stroke. I brace one hand beside her head and fight the instinct to thrust into her palm like a starved man, but she changes the angle and I’m gone, hips jerking, pulse kicking hard against her grip.

“Do you like it like that?” she whispers, and my answer is a wrecked, “Yes—god, yes.”

I can feel my own restraint fray, each drag of her hand drawing another thread loose, while I finally give up and yank down the flimsy neckline of her nightdress. I mouth hotly along her nipple, licking and suckling at it, swallowing the sinful noises she makes.