Pull You In (Rivers Brothers 3)

Rush.

I had shimmied back into him while I was asleep.

In fact, my butt was rammed back into his pelvis. Where I found the origin of the groan.

His erection pressed into my ass. Which I must have wiggled against in my sleep.

"You're killing me," he murmured into my ear, breath hot, making a shiver move through my insides.

"I'm sorry. I, ah, I don't know why I can't, you know, stay on my own side of the bed. I guess I just... it's been a while since I shared one, I guess. My boundaries are, um, off. I will scoot," I told him, my body trying to lurch forward to do just that.

The arm around my hip stopped me, sinking into my hip bone, jerking my back into him.

"Don't you dare," he told me, voice low, sexy, turning my insides to liquid.

This was how he sounded on the phone.

Husky.

Commanding.

Voice full of promise.

If there had been anything resembling resistance in me, it evaporated in an instant. Though, truly, I didn't think it had ever been there. Not with regard to him.

"Rush..." I had no idea what I was trying to say when his name left my mouth. Was it some attempt to de-escalate the situation, to remind him that we worked together, that it would get messy? Or to beg him to push me down, to whisper those dirty things he said to me over the phone, to slip inside me, to erase the months and months of longing, but not having?

I had no idea.

Because Rush scooted back, making me go somewhat flat, looking up at him, finding hungry eyes I was having trouble believing were meant for me.

Yet there they were.

Looking down at me.

Heavy-lidded.

Smoldering.

"I..." I started, again, having no idea what I was going to say.

But just this once, that was okay.

Because Rush leaned down and silenced me, his lips pressing to mine.

Not hard and hungry, the way I had imagined them over the phone. But soft, sweet, almost a little tentative.

I felt like my entire body went boneless at the contact. A small sighing sound escaped me as my hand rose, sliding across his jaw and to the back of his head as his lips pressed deeper, harder, got more demanding as his body shifted over me, his welcomed weight pressing me deeper into the mattress.

His tongue traced the crease of my lips, moving inside when they opened on a whimper, claiming mine as my arms went around him, pulled him tighter to me.

No thoughts could penetrate my mind in that moment.

Until it happened.

Until we heard it.

Ringing.

A phone.

Somewhere in the house, a phone was ringing, a lifeline to the outside world that seemed to have forgotten all about us.

Rush's lips ripped from mine, his body pressing up, looking down at me with drawn-together brows for a long second, like a part of him was struggling to comprehend what the sound meant.

But then it seemed to get through the fog in his brain, having him flipping over me, rushing out of the room, going through the pitch-black house at a dead run as I folded slowly up, trying to push down the disappointment flooding my system, the sensation of something important lost.

Because there was a little devil whispering in my ear that we would never get this same moment again, nothing was ever going to line up the way they had lined up this night.

It was over.

Stifling a pathetic whimpering sound, I climbed out of the bed, grabbing the flashlight and the hurricane lamp, carefully making my way down the stairs, finding Rush standing in the living room we never went in because of all the heads on the walls.

In front of him, a cabinet was open, a long curly phone cord spilling out, slithering up Rush's shoulder to the old-fashioned off-white receiver he had pressed to his ear.

I had no idea who was on the other end of the phone, but whatever they were saying had wiped all that softness, all that heat from his face, leaving instead what looked a lot like anger there instead.

"Yeah, well, it's not fucking funny. Something could have happened," he said, turning his wide back to me as he spoke, making me feel like I was intruding on something personal.

Shut out, I set down the oil lamp a few feet away from him, taking the flashlight with me.

I had no destination in mine, just as far away from the rejection I had felt as I could get.

It wasn't long before Rush joined me in my room, the hurricane lamp lit, brightening the dark space.

"Fee said the owner will be here at first light to deal with the tree in the road. We have flights back in the afternoon. It would be smart to pack tonight since you unpacked everything," he told me, placing the lamp on the nightstand before making a hasty retreat back to the doorway.