Lizard’s skin brushes my back, his hands sliding up my arms before sweeping through my hair. “You and I both know you can never get enough.”
The smoky scent of whiskey wafts off his breath, turning my knees to jelly. “It’s not gonna work this time, Lizard. You can’t just hate-fuck me into submission every time I’m angry at you and expect all this to magically go away. That’s not how real-life works.”
He unfurls my arms and sets each of my palms flat against the wall. “It’s how we work,” he drawls in his smooth, silken voice. “And I think we’re pretty great together.”
With a slow deliverance, he unties the scarf belt from around the waist of my skirt. Everything goes black as he brings it to my eyes and secures it behind my head. My other senses heighten. I’m cognizant of where he is. His heat, his scent, his roving hands. He’s all around me, toying with my every emotion. I hear him, feel him, need him to satisfy the starving ache I feel every time he gets this close.
This is when the self-loathing kicks in.
My words may come wrapped in wrath, but my body language can’t lie. It feeds off his touch like a dog begs for affection, my whimpers the same as he runs the pointed tip of his tongue up the length of my neck. He teases me with tentative little licks that send me spiraling.
“You know you want me.” His fingers glide under my chin to swirl over my needy lips, his guttural demand like gravel in his throat.
“Fuck you,” I spit, but my traitorous voice comes breathless and weak. He touches me, teases me, owns me entirely. Life with him will never be simple. He works me up until every nerve in my body is humming with fury, brimming with life, then breaks me down to my basic urges. He’ll never be satisfied until I’m liquid in his hands.
In an instant, his body heat leaves my back and slinks up each thigh. He curls his deft fingers into the elastic band of my underwear, and he glides it smoothly down, taking great care to get it past each slouch ankle boot.
“Spread your legs.”
Adrenaline ratchets my pulse to eleven. “You don’t own me.”
“I do inside this bedroom.” The veil of darkness shrouding his voice sends an immediate throbbing right to my core. I concede, the cool air in the room blasting against hot flesh.
Rustling near the floor calls my attention below. I chew my lips, anticipating his next action, but I don’t wait long. His scalding tongue sweeps across my opening. That fucking tongue is my undoing every time. He uses it as a weapon, destroying me with every languid lick.
The descent into madness is slow and steady, but he likes it this way, prefers to watch me teetering along the brink before giving in to what I want. Making me beg is what he does best.
“Just fucking doing it, asshole.”
My head falls back with a desperate mewl. When he finally dips inside my wet entrance, I’m already on the verge of shattering to pieces. He palms my ass, holding me against his mouth, sucking hard until I’m soaked and panting. My trembling legs threaten to give out, but I remain planted firmly in place.
A low, feral groan vibrates against me. Am I sliding? No, he’s lowering me down the wall. My knees hit the hardwood floor as his fingers bite the backs of my thighs to keep me from sitting on his face completely.
A ball of fire ignites in my core. It blazes in a slow burning circle and spreads through me like an inferno. At this angle, I’m half afraid I’m going to suffocate him, but it feels too damn good to stop. Resting my head between my hands, I grind my hips, riding his tongue as he laps up every last wasted crumb of my anger.
My shriek echoes against the cold sheetrock. I sag onto my ass as he skims out from under me. He grasps my hair and tips my head, his opposite hand gliding around my throat as he drops his mouth to mine. The taste of me lingers on his lips. Sweet as sugar, sour as sin.
I wrench from his embrace, knocking him backward. He catches himself with his palms as I twist onto my knees and pull off my blindfold. “I hate you so fucking much,” I mumble, crawling forward on all fours.
If only that were true. Hating him would make everything easy. I could turn away and never look back, but his words sting with the bite of truth: I can’t get enough. I can’t let him go. No matter how my heart brawls with my brain, Chett “Lizard” Connelly is the man I want.
Muscles ripple like ocean waves as my fingers reach the band of his pants. His cock springs out, thick, hard, and pierced. I despise it as much as I worship it, and I curse the traitorous need simmering inside as I yank the little ring with my teeth.
A low-pitched groan escapes his lips. He threads his hands behind his head, biceps straining under his skin. Bit by bit, I trace the thick ridges and twirl around the velvet tip. A salty trickle beads around the slit. I lap it up before drawing him into my mouth.
The breath leaves his lungs. I grip his solid thighs with my palms, bracing myself as my lips slide down his shaft. He thrusts his pelvis, knocking my head back. I suck hard, swallowing him down the back of my throat. The sound of my name tumbling gruffly off his lips is a beautiful thing. Every visceral groan arouses me, obliterating my self-control.
He pulses in my mouth, and I slide all the way up, suckling the tip before letting go. The sight of his glorious cock, thick and purple against the cool silver steel lodged in the crown instills a sense of urgency I can’t control. A slick, swollen anguish only he could soothe.
Gliding up his body, I grab his length and position it at my entrance and ease down slowly, inch by thrilling inch, until I’m full, stretched to capacity with the tiniest bite of decadent pain.
With my hands planted on his chest, I move my hips in slow, methodical circles, building up a rhythm all my own and taking back control. Emotions run high -- lust, love, loathing -- all of it swirling together inside my heart, pumping my body, and radiating between my legs. I ride him hard, wringing every ounce of pleasure I can until I’m on the brink, gasping for breath, and crying out from the sheer ecstasy of it.
Pure bliss twists and rolls and threatens to tear me apart. I’m almost there.
Almost there . . .
Oh, fuck, almost . . .
Beyond the window, a horn blasts. Our heads swing toward the sound a second before the timbre of Lizard’s name is bellowed from below. “Shit, that’s Slade,” he grumbles, pushing me aside before rising to his feet.
A knot forms in my stomach as he stalks to the mirror, my cum still glistening on his chin like he couldn’t care less. “Are you serious right now?”
He swaps his jeans for a pair of red leather pants cut so low that a swatch of trimmed hair peeks up from the waistband. “What? We can fuck again later.”
I stare at him in disbelief. “What’s happening here, Lizard?”
“Jesus, Maribelle, you scratched the hell out of my chest. I’m playing the Roxy tonight and I look like I was mauled by tiger.”
A crimson scourge rolls up my face. I hate what he’s turned me into. This clingy, where-do-you-see-this-relationship-going, pathetic girl still spread-eagle on the floor riding the heels of her lost orgasm. “No, I mean between us.”
Lizard rolls his eyes. His go-to response whenever I attempt to bring up the future. “Can we talk about this later?”
“I’d like to talk about it now. We fight, we fuck, you disappear all night . . . what are we?”