“You make me laugh,” he said softly, as if he could read my mind. “Sometimes, it feels like I’m nothing more than Dad. But, with you…When you’re around…You make me feel like I’m me again. The person, not just the parent. Almost…Happy.”
I made him feel alive.
Like himself.
Happy.
That was crazy. There was no way I had that effect on someone.
I was just me. Just Kali. Crazy and idiotic.
Not all the things he was saying.
“Stop,” I said softly, sliding my hands up his chest. “That’s not me—that’s you. That’s you living again.”
He cupped my jaw, his fingers curling over my skin. Our gazes collided, and there was no controlling the rapid-fire of my heart as my dark eyes met the turquoise perfection of his.
“Maybe it is,” he replied, tilting his head in acknowledgement of my words. “But I’d be remiss if I didn’t admit you had an awful lot to do with it.”
I swallowed hard. My thumb stroked across the soft material of his t-shirt, eliciting a shiver from him. The reaction was so unexpected my breath hitched, because realization fell at the same time.
How many times had I shivered at his touch?
I affected him the same way he affected me.
I slid my hands up his chest, and without hesitation, cupped the sides of his neck and kissed him.
I knew I shouldn’t do it, but I didn’t care. There was something deep and…jarring…about knowing that I made a difference in his life. Something that hit me hard, that made me not care anymore.
That make me want to break all the rules, even if it only lasted for right now.
My lips worked across his even as the thoughts sped through my mind. I didn’t want to stop—I couldn’t stop. In that moment, I wanted him more than I ever knew I could want a person.
I wanted to feel him, breathe him in, suffocate myself with his touch.
I didn’t care about anything other than kissing him.
And the foreign feeling took over me. Grabbed hold of every cell in my body, pushing its way through my veins until I felt it from the top of my head to the tips of my toes.
Consumed.
I was consumed with the taste of him—consumed with the way I felt when we kissed. Kissing him made me feel like all my nerve endings were fireworks, and every kiss was a fuse burning down until, finally, everything exploded, blinding me with the intensity.
Brantley flipped me over onto my back. His hard body covered mine, and I welcomed his weight as he settled over me. Our lips met again, and I sighed as his tongue found mine.
My fingers combed through his soft hair. His hand slid down my body and down my thigh, pulling my leg up as his fingers probed my thigh. A shiver ran through me when he shifted and his hardening cock pressed against my clit through my shorts. The pressure was intense, making me gasp into his mouth, and his lips twitched into a shadow of a smile.
It lasted only a second.
The amusement was quickly replaced with a raw need that tingled through my veins. The kiss moved from deep to desperate quicker than I could keep up with it, and before I knew it, my hands had slipped out of his hair and was tugging at the material of his shirt.
Up, up, up. I tugged it up his body until it was scooped under his armpits. He finally got the message, sitting up. It slid down, and he grabbed the hem and tore the shirt over his head.
My gaze flitted up and down his torso, over the hard pecs of his chest to the shadows that lined the packs of muscle on his stomach.
Steadying himself with one foot on the floor, he pinched the collar of my shirt, tugging with a half-grin on his face. His fingertips tucked beneath it, brushing my collarbones, before he sat fully upright, grabbed my arms, and pulled me up, too.
He wasted no time in sliding the shirt over my shoulders and down my arms. He threw it to the other side of the soda, then grabbed at my tank top and pulled it up. I raised my arms so he could pull it over my head.
I bit the inside of my cheek as his gaze swept over the white, lacy bra that cupped my boobs. I glanced up, and, just like that, our eyes met.
He kissed me again.
Hungrier. Harder.
Together, we sank down into the soft cushions of the sofa. His hot skin rubbed against mine, and I cupped his neck, stroked his hair, explored the muscles over his shoulders.
I wanted to touch every inch of him—map out the dips and curves of his body and commit him to memory. Revel in touching him and feeling the sensation of my fingertips across his skin.