“Oh, hey, Griff,” Morgan said, as if they hadn’t spotted him from across the lobby. Then she planted her hand on the small of Kinsey’s back and gave her a quick shove that sent her into the elevator.
Griff released his hold on the door to catch her before she went face-first into the elevator’s back wall, bringing her up tight against him, his touch sending shivers of pleasure across her skin.
“I’m taking the stairs,” Morgan said. “You kids be good.”
Kinsey couldn’t get her brain to function well when he was touching her like this and the first thought she had just popped out. “It’s thirty floors.”
“Gotta love cardio day.” She winked at them and gave them a jaunty little finger wave as the elevator doors closed.
Neither Griff nor Kinsey said anything for the first ten floors. Kinsey just stayed there glued to his side, his hand leaving a flaming-hot imprint on her side, as she used all of her self control not to flip the emergency stop switch and yank all of Griff’s clothes off, security camera be damned. At about the eleventh floor, he did a sidestep thing that resulted in her being in front of him, her ass pressed against him, with his hands light on her hips. The harsh breath he let out was completely indecent, and she would have sold her soul to hear it again. So she took a half step back and did a little upward-wave motion with her ass against him. He didn’t make a sound—she wasn’t even sure if he was still breathing—but his grip tightened on her hips, holding her there against his hard length.
Anticipation licked at her skin as she watched the floor numbers light up.
Twelve.
Fourteen.
Fifteen.
Griff dipped his head down, his lips brushing the shell of her ear so softly, she questioned whether it had happened at all.
“You left this morning without saying goodbye,” he said, his words barely above a whisper. He slid one hand from her hip down toward the hem of her circle skirt and tugged it higher. “That wasn’t very nice.”
If she could have spoken, she would have, but the light touch of his fingertips on the outside of her bare thigh had short-wired her brain. It was pleasure. It was torture. It was everything she wanted and not even close to all she wanted. She bit down on her bottom lip as lust took over, melting her against him as she watched the floors go by.
Nineteen.
Twenty.
Twenty-one.
Under her skirt, hidden from the prying eyes of the camera, his fingers skimmed across her thigh and then moved upward inch by gloriously teasing inch until he was at the edge of her panties. He didn’t ask. She didn’t think about it; she just spread her legs in a silent plea.
Twenty-five.
Her pulse was raging.
Twenty-six.
She was ready to straight-up beg.
Twenty-seven.
He eased underneath the elastic and slid his fingers through her slick folds. The grateful moan escaped before she could stop it.
Twenty-eight.
He dipped inside her, stretching her. She let her head fall back against his chest, not caring about the camera, about why she shouldn’t be doing this again, about anything but Griff and how he was making her feel at that moment.
Twenty-nine.
Pulling out, he circled her clit once, twice, three times, so slow and controlled. She let out a gasp of pleasure, arching her hips against his soft touch.
Thirty.
He withdrew, taking his hand out from beneath her skirt, and took a step back as the elevator doors opened. While she was still trying to catch her breath and bring her brain back online, he stepped around her and out into the hallway.
“Nice talking with you, Kinsey.” Pausing, he looked at her over his shoulder. “See you at my place tomorrow for dinner.”
Then he walked down the hall, disappearing inside his front door before Kinsey could react. She barely made it out of the elevator before the doors closed. Turned on beyond belief and left wanting, Kinsey shook her head in disbelief.
Who was Griff Beckett?
An evil motherfucker.
Full stop.
Oh, he was going to pay for that. Big-time.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Griff
Griff had just pulled the pork shoulder off the smoker on his balcony and was letting it rest on the kitchen island while he wrapped ears of corn in aluminum foil when the doorbell rang.
Fuck.
He wasn’t ready. He hadn’t started the barbecue sauce or the boxed cornbread mix yet. This was what he got for answering a call from his dad. The old man had been at least two doubles into the good bourbon and worked up about how Griff hadn’t pushed his cousins enough to take Beckett Cosmetics from luxury boutique brand—billions of dollars of revenue or not—to the top of the food chain.
“A son of mine shouldn’t be working in the B league. This is what happens when you give up so easily, when you’re lazy,” his dad had said, slurring only the slightest bit. “If you had half my brainpower, you’d see that. You’d understand all the places where you’re going wrong, but you’re just too thick to see it.”
Griff had nearly hung up the phone a million times during the ten-minute diatribe. But every time his thumb had gotten close to the end call button, Griff couldn’t do it. It was his father, the only parent he had left, as the old man let him know every time he called. If losing his mom early had taught him anything, it was that family—even the fucked-up nuclear one he had—meant something. He was strong enough to put up with the bullshit. He could take it and then he could take some more. Plus, it distracted the old man from calling Morgan and pulling this shit on her. That, Griff wouldn’t let happen.
So he’d taken his dad’s call, and it had thrown him off his game.
Now here he was, standing in his open front door staring at the sex-goddess version of Kinsey in a white strappy sundress that ended a mile above her knees. It left everything and nothing to the imagination. God help him. Meanwhile, he was in a pair of jeans, a T-shirt, and a black apron Dixon had gotten him that said Every Butt Deserves A Good Rub.
You are such a dick, Beckett.
“You look amazing,” he said as he stepped back so she could walk in.
And did he take a good look at the view behind as well when she strode into the hall? Without a fucking doubt. He may not be a genius like his dad, but he sure as hell wasn’t a complete dumb-ass, either.
“This old thing?” She whirled around, the turn making the skirt of her dress flutter upward.
The move gave a peek at her plushy thighs that he’d slipped his hand between on the elevator yesterday. His cock twitched in response to the memory, having Kinsey back at his place, and just that fact that she was in this world.