Her gaze darted down, to her shirt, where he clutched it. His big hand, so dark against the translucent linen, was pressed between her breasts. She felt its heat, remembered the rough skin of his palms and fingers. She took a shattered breath, and then another. “Let go.”
She risked a glance at his face, and realized he couldn’t let go. He stared at his hand, his smile gone, his brow creased with frown lines. The sudden intensity in him was startling. He’d made contact, and he didn’t want to break it.
Her eyes returned to his hand, and she watched it open, as if in a trance, and shift to cover her breast. The warmth of his body, even just this part of it, went straight to her head. She braced her hands on the mattress, gaze fixed as he rubbed the soft inside of her breast with his thumb, delving into the valley between the two mounds. The wet linen shifting against her flesh sent shivers chasing down her spine. He squeezed, weighed her. Through the shirt, flirted with the lace edging of her bra cup, and with his thumb, slipped beneath it, sliding the damp fabric down, closer and closer to her aching, pebbled nipple.
“You always liked this,” he said, just a murmur of low, rough sound. “When I played with you.”
“Stop.” But it was the weakest of protests. She leaned shamelessly into his touch, unable to help herself.
He worked her bra down, and then her breast was bare beneath the clinging shirt, its shape, and its dark coral center clearly visible. Her nipple was a hard button, tenting the fabric. When he took her in his hand, her nipple thrusting into his hot palm, she closed her eyes and made a disgraceful sound in the back of her throat.
She felt his breath feather across her lips the moment before he kissed her, and she opened her mouth to receive him.
There was no hesitancy, no uncertainty. In the five years since he’d last touched her, she’d relived every kiss they’d ever shared in her dreams, and their mouths came together with the heat and fervor she remembered. His lips pressed hers for entry; his tongue invaded her. He tasted like beer.
Ava was pliant as a doll when his hand left her breast and he picked her up around the waist, lifting her onto the bed, into his lap. Mercy ravaged her mouth and his hands were so blessedly warm against her cold skin. She twined her arms around his neck, wanting only to melt against him, to pretend that her heart had never been broken and that they hadn’t lost any time.
She was dimly aware of her shirt lifting, of the separation of their lips as it whisked over her head, the fast glimpse of his heavy-lidded eyes, his damp mouth, before his kisses were robbing her of oxygen again. Vaguely cognizant of her bra straps going down her arms. Then his rough, hot palms were on her naked breasts and she was lifting and grinding, undulating at the touch.
Against her lips, he whispered, “Do you get like this for him? Does your rich boyfriend make you this excited?”
A bucket of ice water couldn’t have brought her back to her senses faster.
Ava put her hands on his chest and shoved back, breaking the kiss with violence. Oh, God, what was she doing?
She was on her knees, straddling his lap, her yellow skirt a sunny puddle across his and her thighs. She was topless. His large hands clutched her breasts. And she had been grinding against the telltale bulge behind the fly of his jeans.
“Oh, Jesus!” She leapt away from him, jumping to her feet, covering herself with her arms.
Panic gripped her. Her skin was electrified; the tender place between her thighs throbbed. In a wild craze, her eyes darted, searching for her shirt, her bra.
Oh, how could she have let this happen? How could she not be alone with the man for five minutes without taking off her clothes?
“Here.” Mercy held up her bra by its strap with one finger. The damp shirt was at his feet. He wasn’t smiling; his face was harsh with an emotion she recognized on him: want. Blind physical need transformed his often-jovial face into a mask of anger and aggression.
There’d been a time when she would have allowed herself to regret putting those lines around his eyes and mouth, between his brows. There’d been a time when she was a stupid kid so smitten with him she couldn’t see any of the flashing hazard signals, the red lettering that marked their wrongness together.
But now, she snatched up bra and shirt and put her back to him, struggling back into her clothes with fast, jerky movements.
“You can’t tell anyone about this,” she said through chattering teeth as she tugged her shirt over her head and the wet fabric hit her heated skin with a shock. “Dad and Aidan would flip their shit.”
She spun to face him, searching for an argument, and realized he hadn’t heard anything she’d just said. His eyes burned her, the way they were fixed to every part of her at once.
He swallowed, his throat working. “You look good, Ava. Really good.” Like he hadn’t just had his hands on her; like he hadn’t meant to roll her onto this beat-up mattress and take her right there without even a proper hello. He said it like he’d missed her, like a broken boy standing on the other side of a chasm, longing for what they both knew could never happen again.
“I have a boyfriend,” she said, like an idiot.
“I know.” His smile was slow and wry. “I guess you love him, huh?”
Ava bit the tip of her tongue until she tasted blood. “Don’t tell anyone,” she repeated. “You can’t.”
“I won’t.” His eyes were the color of smoke, of water at night. The way they stroked her was more intimate than his hands or mouth had been. “I never did.”
She left him sitting there, on the edge of the bed, her self-control trailing behind her in tatters.
Five
Fourteen Years Ago
