Her eyes rounded when she felt him hard and throbbing against her belly. Her mouth fell open, and he took advantage of her unwitting invitation.
When his lips landed on hers, he wasn’t gentle. He wasn’t rough either. It was more like he was a starving man. Devouring her. Consuming her.
He thought perhaps his abruptness, his lack of finesse, would frightened her. Quite the contrary. Her hands speared into his hair. Her tongue darted into his mouth. And the most erotic-sounding little moan he’d ever heard issued from the back of her throat.
She tasted like something he’d been missing his whole life but hadn’t known it until right that very second. She smelled like sincerity itself, so clean and fresh.
Never dreamed it could be like this, he thought a little desperately.
But that was a lie. He’d dreamed. He’d dreamed every damn night. Except not one of those dreams had come close to this. The reality of her. The reality of them.
She kissed stardust into his mouth. It sparkled. It burned. He wasn’t sure if she flew him to heaven or tossed him into hell.
He was sure that as the moment stretched out, as her unrestrained fingers and tongue and hips moved against him, desire stole away what little control he had.
He’d come to her room to put an end to the idea of them sharing anything more than friendship. But what was he doing instead?
He was kissing her.
And just as he’d feared, now that he’d started, he couldn’t make himself stop.
In the end, he thought, maybe it was inevitable.
Chapter 14
11:15 p.m.
Mason’s lips were like the rest of him. A dichotomy. Both soft and strong. Tender and tough. And he used them so expertly, Alex ached in a way she never had before.
This wasn’t like when she was reading a romance novel or watching a rom-com and felt a squeezing sensation low in her belly. Heck, it wasn’t even like when she was studying up using adult websites and felt beads of sweat form on her brow.
The squeezing sensation was throughout her entire body. Every inch of her skin was dewed.
She hadn’t expected him to kiss her. In fact, she would’ve put down ten-to-one odds he’d choose to come clean about why he was so adamant he would never marry or have a family.
She wasn’t accustomed to being wrong. But she couldn’t honestly say she was upset at having been wrong about this. Maybe she would be later. Maybe after he left her and she was forced to stop her pursuit of him, she’d wish he’d explained himself instead.
Right now, though? All she could think about was the here. The now. And the low, hungry animal noise that sounded at the back of his throat.
“Mason,” she groaned when he let her up for air. “Please.”
She wasn’t sure what she begged for. Or maybe she was. Maybe she begged him not to stop. Never to stop.
It felt so good. Too good. She wanted to get away and get closer at the same time. She wanted blessed relief and for the delicious ache to last forever.
God, he smelled right. Felt right. Tasted right. It was a thing her body had known long before her head caught up.
“Alex.” Her name was a growl. “You taste so fucking good.”
As if to prove his point, his lips skimmed her jaw and then latched onto her earlobe. His mouth was hot. His tongue was wet. When he sucked on her lobe, she would swear she felt the sensation much lower in her body.
Then his lips were on her throat, covering her pulse point.
Could he feel her heart racing? Could he sense the heat of her blood?
Her response was unintelligible, even to her own ears. Her words simply syllables of sensation. Syllables of need.
“Alex,” he said again, shoving her robe down over one shoulder so his mouth could continue its journey south.
“Mason,” she moaned again. Her voice dazed and dreamy. Not her own at all. “Please.”
This time she knew what she begged for. She begged for help with the sharp ache between her legs. She begged for the kind of pleasure she’d only ever dreamed of.
Maybe it was his vast experience, or maybe it was the way she writhed against him, her hips thrusting, seeking the smallest amount of friction, but whatever the reason, he knew. He knew what she needed and he obliged, the magnificent, marvelous man.
Nudging her knees apart, he found the slit in her robe and pressed his thigh high and tight against the junction of her legs.
She gasped at first contact. The material of his swim trunks wasn’t as rough as she would’ve liked. But she was so worked up, she knew it would do the trick.
Pulling his mouth back to hers, she welcomed the silky, hot glide of his tongue and reveled when he groaned, low and deep. One of his hands splayed wide over her hip, assisting her in her subtle but desperate thrusts against his leg.
She ground hard, the material of his trunks growing wet with her desire. Then the material pushed up and it was nothing but skin on skin. Hers was swollen and slick. His was hot and hairy. And this! This was the kind of friction she needed.
Just like that, she was close. She could feel it in her toes. Taste it on the tip of her tongue. That tingling, sparkling precursor to release.
“Fuck me, you’re wet,” he growled against her lips. “And hot.” His accent made the last word sound like hawt.
She could no longer speak. She’d been reduced to little mewling sounds as her body wound tighter and tighter. Higher and higher. As she squeezed her eyes shut and gave herself up to that singular sort of pleasure she’d only ever experienced alone.
This was so much better. Because she was sharing it with someone she cared about. Someone who knew how to kiss her. Knew how to touch her. Knew just what she needed.
She felt the instant he bared her right breast. The cool air in the room made her nipple furl so tightly, she hissed at the pleasure-pain of it.
“You’re beautiful, Alexandra.” There was reverence in his voice.
Without warning, he bent and sucked her nipple into the heated haven that was his mouth.
That was all it took.
A nuclear bomb went off inside her. She contracted. She expanded. She burned red hot and yet goose bumps erupted over her skin.
Pulsing white lights flashed behind her squeezed-tight eyelids. They quickly turned into multicolored fireworks that flowered and sparked as wave after wave of pleasure washed through her. Washed over her. Lifting her up and pushing her down in an ever-slowing rhythm.
And then…it was over.
Not all of a sudden. But gradually her body became her own.
She could breathe.
She could think.