Chapter 1

The kiss is everything. Soft, plump, full lips caress over mine like a whisper, igniting sparks and tingles like nothing I’ve experienced. Eyes search mine for any hesitation, but there’s none. A feeling of truth washes through me. I tilt my head, and we continue. The kiss is chaste yet full of passion and need. On and on we go, chasing for more. This is what I’ve been missing. Eager for more, I wait for our lips to part and my first taste. But instead, teeth nip my bottom lip, and I groan. My dick pulses and throbs harder than it’s ever been.

Finally, lips press on mine to open my mouth. Oh. My. God. The taste is incredible. I acquiesce, and soon our tongues are tangling, dipping in and out of each other’s mouths. It’s not until hands slip under the hem of my T-shirt and onto the small of my back that it hits me. The hands are large and the pads rough. The firm grip comes from a man. Not from a woman with soft, slender fingers with long nails I’m used to. The ones I’ve accepted as my bed partners for the last eighteen years.

I never want the kiss to end. I stroke over the stubble on his chin, the firm, masculine jaw, and hold his face as I continue to kiss him. A kiss is not enough. I want to feel his bare skin against mine, to have his hands all over me as he finds the sweet spots that will have me begging for more. What will his rough fingers feel like on my nipples, a zone most of my previous bed partners have ignored? Do women think they’re the only ones who like their nipples played with? To be pinched, bitten, or sucked?

Is he going to want to do more tonight? Would he come back to my place if I asked him to? As he slides his hands down and cups my arse, he breaks off the kiss. He looks at me, his eyelids heavy and his pupils blown. I imagine I look the same. I lick over my swollen lip. He smiles.

“Do you want to get out of here?” He doesn’t even look at our surroundings. Shit, we’re in a packed club with people all around us. I’ve come here with my colleagues for a leaving party for one of the trainers, but I lost track of them some time ago. I’ve been looking forward to blowing off some steam. It’s been a long week. So while I have no idea who this gorgeous man is, I don’t care. I only want to go with him.

“Yes.” We’re not in full view of everyone, but no one is paying any attention to two guys kissing their faces off. It’s a gay club after all. “Your place or mine?” Please let him say mine. I need to go somewhere familiar. More importantly, he’ll be the one to leave. After we finish, I can worry about whether I should get up immediately or if there’s cuddle time. What if I fall asleep?

“I’m just around the corner.” He gives me an incendiary look that burns through me. The bright lights pulsating to the heavy beat glint off his hair. How can hair be that shiny?

He takes my hand and leads me through the sweaty, hot bodies smelling of cologne and perfume.

He doesn’t let go of my hand as we walk quickly down the street. The night’s almost as warm outside as it is in the club. He was right about him being close. It’s not a house, though, but an upmarket hotel. Not uber-posh and expensive like The Ritz or The Savoy, but it will have large, comfortable beds and endless hot water.

We walk straight to the bank of lifts to the right. A quick press of the Call button, and one door glides silently open. The smoky glass mirrored back wall reflects our images. He smiles and leans in to lick my neck. He is a stunningly beautiful man with a strong jaw and high cheekbones. His hair is scruffily hot and long enough to run my fingers through. His bright blue eyes sparkle with mischief of what is to come. He looks like he’s around the same age as me—thirty-five.

Before I can kiss him again, the lift chimes melodically, announcing we’ve reached our destination.

“This way.” We turn to the left and tread silently on the thick, dark burgundy carpet. No chance of hearing the clacking of footsteps at three in the morning in this hotel. His keycard works the first time, and the door swings open. Side lamps cast their soft glow around an elegantly decorated room. I was right about the bed. It’s huge but doesn’t dominate the room. A sofa and two chairs around a round table fit easily here as well.

I turn to face him. He’s leaning his shoulder against the wall, his ankles crossed, watching me, stroking his thumb over his full bottom lip, which is still red from our kisses. I want to bite it.

Without hesitation, I step into his space, cup his jaw, and kiss him again. He’s a little taller than my six one, but leaner. My life revolves around running Well Fit, and I’ve been working out for over twenty years, which shows without being a gym rat.

He breaks the kiss with a flick of his tongue on my top lip. “Christ, you’re gorgeous. I want you naked. I can’t wait to be inside you.”

“Fuck, yes!”

I wake up slowly. The sun is streaming through the window. How weird I didn’t close the curtains last night. Last night! Hot, firm muscles, brutal kisses I begged for more of. The taste of sweat on a broad chest and ripped abs. I squeeze my eyes tightly shut, ineffectually blocking out the image on the inside of my eyelids. I squirm, the ache in my arse unfamiliar.

What. The. Fuck. Did. I. Do?

When he fell asleep, I slipped out of bed, dressed, and went home.

Regret washes over me. Not at being with a man for the first time in my life. No, I’m comfortable with that. I regret leaving him. Not that he asked me to stay, and I have no clue what the etiquette is for leaving a man’s bed. Hell, I don’t even know his name.

At least I have a vivid memory of everything he did to me, that we did to each other. Every moment, every touch, every stroke, every lick, every breathless sigh and cry through hoarse, dry lips are imprinted in my mind.