“It sucked not seeing him as much, but the bright side was that I did prefer to forget about you. It was easier to pretend you didn’t exist and there wasn’t something out there I couldn’t have. And most of the time, I could do that just fine. I didn’t think about you every day, I promise you that. But then the random nights when I did… when I thought about you and what I knew about you, how good you were to Aaron… it would fucking hurt.”
My voice was small as I ran my finger along his collarbones and down the deep line between his chest. I couldn’t help thinking about his undeniable history with women. “I have a feeling I know what you’d do when it was late at night and you felt down.”
“You’re not wrong about it either,” Mason said honestly, his voice low. “Felt good at the time though. At least I thought it did. But I’m realizing now how much more you feel it when you’re with someone you’ve wanted for awhile. Every touch or kiss or just the way she looks at you – it feels nice with any pretty girl, but with the one you’ve been fantasizing about for years, it’s like a fucking high.” His eyes traced his fingers, which brushed down my calves. “It starts to become an addiction and all you can think about anymore is when you’ll see her next. All the things you want to find out about her – what she looks like happy or sad, how she laughs when she’s nervous. What sounds she’ll make when you touch her a certain way.”
God, Mase. He was describing my own recent feelings to a tee but coming from his mouth, they sounded so goddamned sexy.
“I can relate. To that curiosity… just wanting nonstop to discover more,” I said softly, the blue of Mason’s eyes burning into me in a way that sparked all my senses. His bare skin felt hotter under my touch. I could hear every dip, every hum and lilt of his voice and it certainly felt like I was seeing differently now. “She’s a lucky girl,” I smiled as Mason leaned into me. “Any chance I know her?”
The way his lips twisted up was irresistible. “I’d say so.”
I was swooning at this point. I didn’t care that Sofia and Noah were laughing at me from the pool either. I was falling and there was no hiding it, so leaning into Mason, I let his sweet lips kiss me. But I’d felt barely a flicker of his tongue before we both found ourselves doused by two giant splashes of water.
“Get a room!” Sofia eyes twinkled impishly as she clung to the edge of the pool, laughing with Noah and several others. “Seriously, you have a room, so use it. Like… now.”
As she wiggled her eyebrows, I plucked the pineapple slice from my drink and chucked it at her. “I’ll do what I want to do when I want to do it.”
“Fine!” Sofia huffed, splashing me once more before swimming away. I laughed as Mason yelled after her, both of us blinking water from our eyes. He was still running a hand over his face when I got up from his lap to shed my soaked cover-up. But once his eyes found me again, they lit up like diamonds.
“Christ.” His stare devoured me as he rose to his feet and grabbed me like I might disappear if he didn’t. “Taylor, you look fucking…” He cursed at his own loss of words. “I’ll do anything if you let me take you to our room right now.”
I smiled. “Why? Your permission to touch me ends once we get back to our room. Remember?”
r /> “I hate this game. I don’t want to play it anymore.”
“I do,” I grinned as he held my waist tight and kissed my neck. I breathed out hard when I felt his tongue flick over me, drawing a wet, hot line along my tingling skin.
“You’re fucking twisted,” Mason smirked against the underside of my jaw. As his fingertips snuck under the edges of my bikini top, he nipped at me, getting me so painfully hot and bothered. Rolling my head back, I closed my eyes, far too aroused to care about the fact that we were in plain view of the guests of his brother and my ex’s wedding. The engagement itself was built upon tackiness and bad taste, so surely it didn’t matter if I decided to show a little PDA with Mason at the hotel – even if it was the kind that had me briefly cupping his package and squeezing till he gave me that deep, masculine grunt. “Fuck, what are you trying to do to me, Taylor?” Mason whispered pleadingly.
I didn’t answer, only wrapping my arms around his neck and going on my tiptoes to kiss him. My tongue teased his, darting quickly between his lips and disappearing, repeating over and over till he groaned in frustration and slammed me against his chest with two handfuls of my ass. When I gasped, he pounced, thrusting his tongue into my mouth and sweeping voraciously through me, without an ounce of apology.
“God, I can feel how hard you are,” I whispered, my smile pressed against his.
“Only you get me this fucking hard,” Mason muttered. “You have no fucking idea, Taylor. You don’t know how many times I’ve fantasized about you.”
“Tell me.”
“I lost count awhile ago, but trust me when I say I’ve thought way too many times about sucking on those perfect tits and burying every inch of my cock inside you. I’ve waited long and hard for you, Taylor.” Mason’s tone was intense, his shallow breaths serrated. One firm squeeze of my left breast and I gasped again, pushing off of his body. I scolded him with the wicked look in my eye.
“How much longer can you wait?” I asked, my heart pounding.
“I’ve been at my limit for a long fucking time.”
His hard voice made me chew my lip. “No,” I shook my head. “You haven’t reached your breaking point if you’re still standing here and I still have my clothes on.”
Mason groaned angrily. “Fuck, Taylor, seriously. What are you trying to do to me right now?”
I released my lip from between my teeth. “I just want to see what you’re going to do to me after all these years of waiting. And I want to see how much longer you can wait. The longer you do, the better it’ll feel.”
“God, you seriously are fucking evil sometimes,” Mason hissed, his square jaw clenched tight. But he let me go and waltz off to find Sofia, who was already cracking up by the time I joined her, Noah and a few others in one of the cabanas.
“You’re fucking asking for it now,” Noah smirked as we eyed Mason from across the pool. The second I left him, he was quickly flanked by girls he seemed to know judging from the familiar way they said hi. “He’s hating small talk a million times more than usual right now,” Noah snorted as Mason did his best to socialize without looking like some tortured caged beast. His every muscle was flexed in silent irritation as he leaned back on the balcony, barely managing a smile for the chattering girls around him.
God, I’m definitely in for it now, I grinned as I lounged on the chaise. Climbing forward on my hands and knees, I let Mason watch as I slowly lowered myself to lie on my stomach. Somehow, just the position I was laying in had his lip curling, his bicep bulging as he rubbed the back of his neck.
“Let’s see what happens when I do this,” Noah muttered, resting his hand on my shoulder. “Uh oh. Oh shit, he doesn’t like that,” he laughed, sliding his touch slowly down my back and watching Mason’s eyes cloud over with a death look that would’ve had me fearing for Noah’s life if he weren’t Mason’s best friend. It was probably also the only reason he hadn’t already stormed over and grabbed me. He knew his best friend had no interest in me. But then Noah’s hand brushed over the knot of my bikini.
“You’re playing with fire, van Daal,” Sofia warned in a song.