Chapter Twenty-One

Nora

My heart pounds as Sebastian works me over with delicious, relentless pressure. I'm so close I'm frozen, my muscles wound tighter than a spool of thread.

"Fuck." Sebastian jumps to his feet, lunges for my waist, and flips me in one clean jerk so I'm bent over the table. He grabs a pool cue and positions me like a marionette, bracing me from behind as if teaching me how to hold it.

His chest presses into my back as the door across the game room opens. Somehow Sebastian heard whoever was coming just in time.

His breathing is loud in my ear. "Fix your clothes. We have to go."

Hand shaking, I reach down and slide everything into place between my legs. My thong against my throbbing clit is almost too much.

I exhale sharply, regaining my sensibilities.

He hovers close to my ear. "Ready?"

I'm ready, all right.

We step into the night as rain pummels the ground. Maybe Mother Earth wanted to offer me a cold shower so I could think this through.

But I'm not interested in thinking. I want Sebastian's commanding hands back on me, guiding my legs apart. Even if it's just once, even if we know our days are numbered, I want one reckless night where tomorrow or goodbye just don't matter.

The roof juts out just enough to shield us, but the path back to the main resort is uncovered.

Sebastian slaps his back, his voice a roar in the rain. "Hop on."

"What? No, that's okay. I'll slow you down."

"Would you rather get your boots wet in that giant puddle?" Without waiting for my answer, he guides my arms over his shoulder and squats, leaving me no choice. I launch myself onto his back and wrap my legs around his waist.

He takes off in a jog as I hug his warm body with all I've got.

The cold deluge slaps me in the face, and I can do nothing but bury my face in the cradle of his neck. I shriek into his skin as he picks up the pace, his steps quick and powerful as he tackles the incline past the courts, his shoes splashing water everywhere. I want to joke that my boots are still getting wet with the downpour, but instead I nibble his neck, because who cares about clothes or rain or anything else when Sebastian Rossi is the chauffeur of your mortal coil? Who cares when he's so solid and alive in my arms?

He holds my legs to his stomach with one strong arm, but I tighten them to get a better hold. I am adrenaline and need funneled into a body, clinging to him like he might wash out with the storm if I loosen my grip.

The closer we get to the main resort, the more I feel him tense. He deposits me a ways off from the door.

"My room," he yells. "You take the elevator. I'll take the stairs."

I let myself into the lobby as he disappears, presumably to use a side entrance. We can't be too careful in this place.

My concern proves to be founded the minute I hit thelobby. There are people milling about; none I overtly recognize, but enough that I come back into my anxious brain with a rough landing.I dip into the bathroom just long enough to grab a paper towel to wipe off my glasses.

Dripping wet, I race for the elevator.

Please, no more people. I send up the silent plea as I press the button for our floor. My breathing regulates slightly when the doors shut, trapping me alone in the metal box.

When I step off on our floor, it is blissfully empty.

Sebastian blasts through the door at the other end of the hall, his shirt clinging to his body and his waterlogged jeans a shade darker than they were. My heart is a thunderous stampede in my ears as we move toward his door, each step on the carpet charging my body with electricity. I'm prepared to swerve if needed, to zigzag back to my room and hide away should anyone materialize, but I can't fathom waiting any stretch of time to get my hands back on him.

He gets to his door first, eyes still on me as he lifts his key card to the reader.

With one last look over his shoulder, he guides me inside with a hand on my hip. The door latches shut behind us, cloaking us in darkness. We fumble for each other. The only light in the room comes from bursts of lightning outside his window and the lamp on his end table.

His hands cup my face as his mouth eviscerates mine in a brutally hot kiss.

Our tongues tangle as he struggles to get words out. "I'm glad you're here."

His words slide into my mouth, down my throat, lodging in my heart.It is so hard not to get ideas about what it could all mean.

Calm down, feelings monster.

My hands seek something to hold on to, settling on his arms. "I like these."

"Yeah? I like these"—he tugs my lip with his teeth—"and these"—he cups my breast outside my clothes, sending a firebolt of need through my body—"these…" His thumb brushes the skin right next to the corner of my eye, where my smile lines will etch deeper if he keeps talking like this. "You have intoxicating eyes."

My heart stutters. Mercy , he's good. He's so good it scares me.

"And these really do it for me, too." He taps the rim of my glasses. "You have no fucking idea."

The sweetness gives way to something headier as he pulls back and looks me up and down. A grunt of appreciation rumbles from the depths of his throat. "Let's get out of these wet clothes."

He slides the straps over my shoulders. The romper falls in a heap at my feet with very little coaxing, leaving me in my skimpiest red underwear set.I wrestle his wet shirt over his head.The air changes between us as I move to his jeans.

"You're sure?" His voice is tender but urgent.

"Yes." Rain pelts the window like a drum. "Very sure."

I fumble with his button and drag his pants down. His body is a fusion of art and athleticism. His tattoo stretches over his broad shoulder, spanning his pec, a beautiful ink tapestry of mountains, birds, and trees. It's a moment and place in time memorialized as he remembered it, so in that way, it's like glimpsing into his brain.

I unclasp my bra and toss it aside.

His eyes are on fire as he kneads my breasts with impatient hands, backing me into the wall next to the bathroom door, strumming my hard nipples with his thumbs.

I try to drop to my knees, but he pins both my wrists overhead with one hand as the other explores my body. Heat pools between my legs under the heavy weight of his inspection. He takes his time, igniting flames everywhere he touches. He starts with my lips, pinching the bottom one between his fingers and moves to brush my jaw in a light stroke.

He tilts my face and moves my hair off my neck. His mouth teases a path down my neck. "So fucking pretty," he murmurs into my skin. "Every part of you."

I've never felt desired like this. It emboldens me and makes me want to touch and taste him until the phrase holding back isn't even in his vocabulary. I want to make him feel so good I'm crawling out of my skin with it.

He drags his fingers down my ribs, across my stomach, up between the valley of my breasts.

He releases my wrists and cradles my face in both his hands. The devilish hunger in his eyes softens when they meet mine. For a second, he's just the guy who secured me spaghetti and stuck close to me all week when it would've been easier not to.

The guy I can't seem to stay away from.

The need coursing through my body concentrates to a single sharp point in my chest. My heart flutters in a dangerous, dizzying way.

I push off the wall and let my gaze fall to his abs. Emotionally uncomplicated, delicious abs. I remove his boxers and wrap a hand around his thick length. He is so solid in my palm.

The lust returns with venom and fangs.

"Not yet." His eyes blaze with heat as he hooks his finger into the strap of my underwear and drags them down my leg until I kick them aside. "You were ready to make a mess on that pool table before we got interrupted, weren't you? I could feel that you were close." He runs his thumb over where I'm soaked for him.With his gaze intently on my face, he thrusts two fingers inside, a quick and dirty plunge. A moan escapes my mouth. He slowly retracts, only to give them to me harder."Let's finish what we started."

He slides in and out, unrelenting, goal-oriented, precise . His thumb circles my clit as I scramble to hold onto his shoulders so my wobbly legs don't fall out from under me. My body diverts all its blood, energy, life force to where he's touching me.Sensations stack one on top of another, my nipples pulling tight as the need blooms to an unsustainable height.

My limbs grow tense. I'm suspended in the almost , the moment just before I fall into bliss.

He adds a third finger. I cry out as he changes the angle, pushing just hard enough."It's just you and me now. Let me hear you."

The back of my head hits the wall with a thud as my orgasm plows into me. Sensation bursts from deep inside and radiates out in every direction, further and further until it lights up all of me. I swear the air around me can feel it, too. He draws out the rippling heat, slowing his hand as I ride the wave of pleasure.

As soon as he pulls his hand away, I turn greedy all over again, stroking him. He's hot and hard and his hips jut forward as I tighten my hold. I want him to be as wild with need as I was.

His breaths are sharp daggers thrown at random. He plants his arms on the wall on either side of me, caging me in. Keeping me close.

He toys his lips against mine, kissing when I quicken my hand, giving me his tongue when I stroke him harder. I think if this hotel fell into a sinkhole or launched itself into space, I wouldn't notice for how lost I am in him.

"Will you tell me what feels good?" I murmur. "I want to get it right."

His brown eyes are molten. "Let's get one thing straight: there is nothing you could do to me that wouldn't feel good. Stare at me with that eager look in your eyes long enough and I'd come for you. What gets me off is you , not some trick of your hand. Being the lucky asshole who gets to have you. Watching you even pretend to belong to someone else drives me up the wall. Is that fucked up?"

My skin and need grow feverish. Something rearranges in me on the cellular level at his possessive words. "I want you. Only you."

He growls out a good as his rough hands land on my waist. "Bed."

With that declaration, he throws me on his mattress and tears open his suitcase to find a black foil square. He tosses it somewhere nearby and kisses a path up the center of my stomach, between my breasts, landing on my mouth as my nipples beg him to circle back.

"These have taunted me since the lake," he rumbles against my breast. "Skimpy black bikini, hard nipples begging to be sucked." He pinches the taut bud and dips his head to take it in his mouth. Long luxurious pulls of his mouth until I arch off the bed.

I let out a sharp cry as he bites and pull his gorgeous hair until he sucks for mercy.

Thunder crashes through the night sky outside. When he finally releases me, my body is one raw muscle begging to be spent.

Taking his shaft in my palm, I move him lower and tease myself with him.

"Nora…" My name sounds both like a warning and a question.

If I move my wrist the wrong way, he'd slip inside me. Excitement shivers up my spine. "Want me to stop?"

His molten gaze is fused to where we're touching. "No."

"When you flipped me around and bent me over the pool table, I thought…" I play his broad tip over my clit. "I thought you couldn't wait anymore. I was ready for you to take me right then and there. With nothing between us."

He hisses out a breath. "You're killing me. We shouldn't, right?"

I slowly circle my entrance with his cock. "Definitely not. I'm not on birth control."

His eyes flare with heat. Reaching down, his fingers ghost mine, gently guiding my hand round and round like he can't help himself, ever closer to where I want him. I let out a moan at the tease of his now-slick skin against mine when we reach my center.

"You're dripping wet." His tone is filthy. "You like thething we can't do."

I do. Too much. I arch up. "Just me?"

He slips inside an inch.

" Fuck . No, not just you." The word—his need—rumbles through me. Just the tip of him has my insides fluttering. He slips in another inch. "How bad do you want it? Tell me."

"Bad." So bad I'm an aching mess between my legs, fantasizing that he'll lose control. Trusting he'll hang on to it for the both of us. Hoping he doesn't.

He grips his cock. "You feel so good I wouldn't be able to stop."

"I wouldn't want you to."

He curses long and low, his muscles trembling as he stares down the valley between our bodies where we're just barely connected. I drop my knees open, letting him look his fill.

With a groan, he pulls away and snatches the condom off the comforter. "Someday I'll give you what we both want, but this will feel damn good, too." He bites into the foil and rolls the condom on in one stroke. He shoves my legs apart and spears me in a powerful thrust.

I cry out and slap my hand to my mouth. The walls are too thin for how good he feels, and I don't want to announce it to the neighbors. I'm almost unbearably filled, pressure radiating through my core.The air evacuates my lungs with his second full thrust.

He halts abruptly. "Good?"

"Great."

His third, fourth, fifth, sixth drives me up the mattress. He snaps his hips over and over again as I surrender fully, letting him set the pace.

"Fucking perfect"—he scoops his hand beneath the fullest part of my ass and lifts my hips off the bed, hitting me even deeper—"better than I could've dreamed."

"You're—"

Whatever else I was going to say melts into a quiet whimper as his finger lands on my throbbing center. He plays my body like an instrument, strumming and stroking. I'm consumed by sensation. I want him to crush me into this mattress; to make sure this night counts.His pace quickens and I wear out the word "yes," chanting it between breaths. My need spills past the edges like color bleeding outside the lines.

I don't know how I'm supposed to go back to pretending tonight hasn't broken me open. I'm afraid I'll walk out that door a branded woman after this. It'll be written all over my face that I belong to Sebastian.

He drapes my leg over his shoulder and pushes to his knees, driving impossibly deeper. I'm so full , clawing frantically at his chest and stomach, desperate for release. His moan is throaty as he handles me , giving and taking in perfect balance.

His dark, glittering eyes hold mine and all thoughts in my head fall away in a whoosh . I'm a thoughtless, wordless, wanting mess. This is so much more intense than I was expecting, but like the orgasm threatening me, I'm too far gone to stop it.

"I'm there." His warning morphs into a groan when he looks down at where we're joined again. He pumps in and out at a breakneck pace."Come for me, Nora."

The intimacy of my name on his tongue is my final straw, sending me over the edge alongside him.

I bet this is how jumping off that dock felt. Exhilarating .