“You,” I rasped out, a dam breaking. “I want anything you’re willing to give me.” I needed him to inch closer, to eat the space between us and make it disappear. To come on top of me until blurring the outlines of our bodies. “It’s you I want.”
Never in my life had I imagined breathless words like mine would be the key to something so powerful. A growl escaped Aaron’s body, his eyes turning feral. Hunger like I had never witnessed—not even earlier, when we had kissed—burrowed itself in Aaron’s features, giving way to a pained expression.
/> “I’ll give you the world,” he said against my mouth. “The moon. The fucking stars. Anything you ask, it’s yours. I’m yours.”
And then my world exploded. Aaron’s mouth was against mine, nothing soft about the branding contact. He parted my lips, his tongue plunging inside, while his hands slowly trailed up my back.
He pulled me to him, leaving my ass resting on the edge of the bed. My legs went around his waist, a little too high to make the contact I craved the most—that I knew would make me see those stars he had just promised me.
My head spun out of control, the feel of his strong body between my thighs overwhelming, intoxicating, provoking. I wanted to stay right here forever—with Aaron on his knees and my body wrapped around him. With his lips against mine. His hands in my hair.
No. I wanted more than that, but I needed all these clothes to go away first.
Aaron pulled me closer into his chest, making my body churn, looking for the friction I ached for.
Without breaking the kiss or his hold on my body, he stood up on strong legs, taking me up with him. Holding my legs around his waist, he positioned me exactly where I was coming out of my skin for him to be, sending a twirl of pleasure through every cell in my body at the maddening sensation of having his hardness nestled between my thighs. The warmth of his hands on my ass seeped through the clothing of my dress, the heat of his length throbbing against my center. Hot, so hot that my skin burned.
In two strides, Aaron had me against the wall. He rocked against my center, just once, and it ripped a pained whimper out of me.
“Tell me if you want me to stop,” he gritted out against my lips, his body stiff and rocklike beneath my hands. “Tell me what’s okay for me to do.”
Pushing his hips into me to hold me against the wall and bringing to my sight a starry sky of delirium, he dragged his hands up my sides. Stopping when he reached the swell of my breasts, his long fingers grazed the thin cloth covering them.
“Does this feel good, baby?” he rasped.
Nodding my head, I arched my back, pushing them against his hands. Hands that didn’t waste a second in accepting my offering. Aaron kneaded my breasts leisurely, his thumb grazing over the fabric that covered my nipples. That urge of shredding my dress off my body returned with a vengeance. And I had to physically fight my hands from exposing my skin, so he’d touch me. Not the stupid gown. Me, me. Just me.
As if he had just read my mind, Aaron’s hands flew to my shoulders. He took ahold of the straps of my dress, playing delicately with the fine material before asking, “Can I bring these down?”
His watchfulness, his never-ending diligence at making sure I was comfortable, kept tearing at something inside my chest—something I was afraid that once brought down, wouldn’t crystallize back into the same ever again.
“Yes,” I told him. Hearing the urgency in my voice.
Catching me completely off guard, instead of bringing the straps down, Aaron’s hands slid to my waist, dislodging me from his body. He deposited me on the floor, and my fingertips drifted from his neck to his chest at the difference in height.
Frowning at the loss, I looked up. Aaron’s soft chuckle and radiant smile barely registered when those two large palms that rested on my hips turned me around. Briskly.
My hands fell flat on the wall.
His breath caressed the back of my neck, launching a riot of shivers to gallop down my body. Strong fingers reached for the zipper of my dress, just above the small of my back. He brought it down, my underwear peeking out, if I recalled correctly how low that zipper went.
I felt myself swallow, just as I heard a strangled sound leaving Aaron.
His fingers slowly trailed up my spine, a flock of tingles taking flight. When he reached the straps at my shoulders, he pulled them down. The dress slid down my body and pooled on the floor, leaving me in nothing but my panties. And, God, I had never been happier about wearing a dress with a built-in bra.
Looking over my shoulder at him, I found a troubled expression marring his handsome face. Unconsciously, my body tried to turn, but Aaron’s arms came around me. One hand landed on my stomach while the other went to my hip. He pulled me into him, the heat of his whole body on my bare back, overrunning my senses.
His chin dipped, falling on my shoulder. “Give me a minute,” he breathed into my ear.
After a few seconds of neither of us moving an inch, just taking it all in, I felt his lips on my neck.
“I’m trying to take this slow, Lina. I swear I am,” he continued, his hand drifting up my stomach. His thumb grazed the skin of my breast. “But you are driving me right out of my mind.”
That fingertip brushed over my nipple, eliciting a deep moan out of me. Earning me one of his in return. The hand that rested on my hip slid down to my thigh, close to the edge of my panties. Just a few inches from the point where all this heat running through my body gathered.
“I’m dying to learn every inch of skin on your body.” He took my nipple between his index and thumb and pulled softly.
I whimpered, demolished. Devastated.