Caspian (Carolina Reapers 8)

My eyebrows shot up. “Well, here’s to being your fake rebound.” I passed the box of candy her way.

“You were very…believable at the park.” She swallowed and glanced my way.

The park. Where I’d kissed the shit out of her until we’d been interrupted by London. My pulse leapt just thinking about the taste of her, the feel of her under my hands.

“You know…” she continued slowly, like I didn’t remember. Like I wasn’t doing everything in my power to not think about that kiss. “In the gazebo?”

I swallowed hard, remembering how soft she’d felt against me, how her lips had parted for mine. She’d kissed me back like she’d wanted me just as much as I’d wanted her…even though it had started as a ploy to get Chuck off her back about me.

“And…against the gazebo, I guess?” Her voice pitched upward and she shifted, tucking her legs under her.

“I remember,” I managed to say, my tone somewhere between sandpaper and tortured. The one and only time I’d ever kissed Ryleigh hadn’t lasted long enough.

“Right,” she whispered, her cheeks flushing in the dim light. Her breathing picked up, and something told me it wasn’t because of the action scene on the big screen. “It was hot as hell for a fake kiss. You definitely know what you’re doing.”

The praise was almost laughable since I had no fucking clue what I was doing right now, wanting someone who not only wasn’t available, but wasn’t interested in me.

My gaze focused on her lips. They parted.

Get ahold of yourself.

“So, don’t you think it’s a little ironic?” she rushed, obviously changing the topic. “Watching a movie about tornados while we’re sitting here in tornado alley?” She tucked her hair behind her ears and bit her lower lip.

“Ryleigh.”

“Hmm?” She dragged her gaze to meet mine.

Fuck me, but those green eyes echoed back all the desire I felt for her.

“It wasn’t a fake kiss.”

Her eyes flew wide. “It…wasn’t?”

“Maybe at first,” I admitted. “But the second you kissed me back? It wasn’t fake. Not for me.”

She glanced at my mouth, and I felt her gaze like a brand, inflaming my lips. I drew my tongue across them to ease the sting, but it didn’t help.

I wanted to kiss her again.

“It wasn’t fake for me, either” she whispered. “I didn’t…I didn’t want to stop.”

Those words went straight to my cock, the unruly bastard making his opinion known as he swelled beneath my shorts. “Me, either.”

“Caz.” My name was half prayer, half plea on her lips. There were only inches separating us, and yet it was too much space and not enough. This kind of chemistry was dangerous.

“I know it’s wrong.” I tunneled my hand through the soft hair at the nape of her neck, unable to not touch her. “I know it’s really him that you want. That it’s him we’re supposed to be putting on a show for, but that kiss…”

She leaned into my touch.

“I think about it.” The admission slid from my lips with all the ease of a confession being dragged over broken bits of glass. I wasn’t a stranger to wanting someone, but wanting a woman I couldn’t have? That was all new territory and it fucking sucked.

“I do, too.” She shifted again, coming closer. “All the time.”

I groaned. “Saying stuff like that will get you kissed again, Ryleigh.”

Two little lines formed between her eyebrows, like she was torn, but then she moved, sliding one knee over my thighs and straddling my lap. “What if I want to be kissed again?”

“Fuck,” I hissed as she settled over my cock.

“Feels like you want to kiss me, too.” She braced her hands on my shoulders and mine fell to her waist as she rolled her hips in one long stroke.

“I want to do a hell of a lot more than kiss you.” There, she’d been warned. That was the gentlemanly thing to do, right?

“It doesn’t have to mean anything.” Her tank top rode up, and all I felt was warm, soft skin under my fingers, but was she saying that to me? Or to herself?

“Ryleigh—”

Her mouth slammed into mine.

I groaned and forgot anything and everything about being the gentleman here. I wanted her and she was kissing me, so I kissed her back.

Sliding one hand to the back of her head, I tilted us to the perfect angle, claiming her sweet mouth with deft strokes of my tongue.

She sighed and melted against me, sinking into the kiss like it was exactly what she’d needed to breathe. Her hands were in my hair, on my face, my neck, my arms, lighting up every nerve ending I had as the kiss went from hot and deep to fucking hedonistic and primal in a few short seconds.

Our tongues danced and rubbed, stroked and teased as her hips rolled over my lap in a rhythm that had me hard as steel, my cock straining at the layers of fabric between us.