Rendezvous (Renegades 5)
“Do you remember?” she asked at his ear. “That night?”
“Can’t forget.”
“Is that where you were a minute ago?”
He shook his head.
“Then where were you?”
He shook his head.
“If you weren’t there,” she said, “where’d this come from?”
She rocked her hips against his erection, and the direct pressure pushed lust through his system. The kind of ecstasy that made him needy and hungry and a little crazy.
He growled and fisted his hands in her dress.
“Where?” she whispered at his ear. “Tell me.”
“Right here, thinking dirty thoughts about you.” He lifted his head, gripped her waist, and stepped back. “Which is why you need to go up to your room now.”
Keaton looked at the winding stone staircase that led to a patio and an entrance into the Four Seasons. He knew because he sprinted these stairs in the morning.
“Those will take you to the lobby.” He released her waist and fisted his hands to keep the hunger in the pit of his stomach from driving him to grab her back.
She stared at him as if he’d spoken a foreign language for a moment, then extended her hand. “Come with me.”
The offer was so…sweet. It encompassed everything Brooke was—real and loving and warm and caring and honest. It encompassed everything Keaton thought he wanted.
“I…” He raked a hand through his hair, struggling against his habit to give in to desire whenever it suited him. “I can’t. You’re too…”
Her hand dropped, and a little frown creased her brow. “Too…?”
“Too sweet. Too good. Too important to me. Just too.”
She exhaled, closed the distance again, and pressed her body against his.
Keaton closed his eyes on a moan.
“Some men say,” she told him, her voice a sultry hum, “that there’s nothing like a good girl with a dirty mind. Where you’re concerned, my mind is good and dirty.”
Fire flared through his groin, and he forced his eyes open.
She was looking up at him with a gaze like the sparkling Caribbean rimmed in thick black lashes. Eyes he wanted to see in every stage of pleasure. He wanted to watch her eyes light with fire as he teased her with the promise of wicked excitement. Soak in the need drenching her expression as he pushed her past her comfort zone until she begged for him. Lose himself in the wild passion unleashed inside her when he drove her to ecstasy. And finally, the shock and awe of bliss as she recovered.
But this was Brooke, not a casual hookup. If their situations were different…
But they weren’t.
“Stop fighting yourself,” she said. “I can see your thoughts battling behind your eyes. If you aren’t interested, just say you aren’t.”
“I am,” he said immediately, vehemently. “I’ve wanted you since I met you in Vegas. I wanted you in California. I want you now. But I’m backing off for the same reasons I did then. Because I’m me, and my life is this, and you’re you, and your life is…”
He heaved a sigh, disgusted that he could talk endlessly and flawlessly about shit that didn’t matter, but now, when he needed someone he cared about to understand, his words got all tangled.
“Okay, stop,” she told him, her voice compassionate. Then she pressed her cheek to his chest, tightened her arms, and said, “Just stop talking and hold me.”
He closed his arms around her and laid his head on hers, his gut aching with regret. “I’m sorry—”