Page 69 of My Real Love Affair

It was so good and so wrong.

I turned over before I could think better of it, and suddenly we were face to face. I noticed the way his breath had gone shallow. His gaze dropped to my lips.

“Melody.” My name on his lips sent more shivers coursing through my body.

His hands cupped my face. Austin leaned over me and then he was kissing me. They weren’t like the kisses at the wedding or outside the bathroom. Those had been for show, calculated and controlled.

This was desperate. Real. His mouth moved against mine like he’d been dying to do this, like he couldn’t help himself anymore.

Or maybe that was just me.

I kissed him back just as desperately, my hands finding their way into his hair. He made a sound low in his throat that did things to me. Dangerous things.

His hands slid down from my face to my shoulders to my waist, pulling me closer. I was half-sitting on the massage table now, and he was standing between my legs. Everything about this was breaking our carefully constructed rules.

I didn’t care. Not when he kissed like this. Not when every nerve ending I had was singing.

“We should stop,” I breathed against his mouth.

“Probably.”

But neither of us did. His lips moved to my jaw and slid down my neck. I let my head fall back to give him access. His hands were everywhere. My hips, my thighs, skating up my ribs but not quite going far enough.

“Tell me to stop,” he said again, his lips against my collarbone. “Tell me this is breaking the rules and we need to stop.”

“Itisbreaking the rules.”

“Then tell me to stop.”

But I couldn’t. Because I didn’t want him to stop. I didn’t want the moment to end. It would be okay to have one night, right?

I arched into his touch and let myself feel everything I’d been trying not to feel since the moment we had met. It was dangerous and would complicate everything.

I didn’t stop.

CHAPTER 21

AUSTIN

Ihadn’t meant to break Melody’s rule but how the hell could I not?

She was breathless, her cheeks flushed that perfect shade of pink, with her eyes wide and vulnerable. Those sexy moans she let out when my hands moved over her body nearly had me jerking that dress up and plunging deep inside her.

When she’d said those words about understanding me and how difficult it must have been growing up with my father, it was like someone finally saw me. She had spoken to a part of me that nobody had ever even tried to reach.

She saw me. Really saw me. Not the Bancroft name or the trust fund or the reputation. Just me.

And it was effortless for her. Like understanding me was the most natural thing in the world. I didn’t even have to drop hints or pout. She just got me.

So when she turned over on that massage table and looked at me in that way, there was no going back. I did not have that much self-control. Those perfect rosy lips that were all plump and pouty were just too enticing to ignore.

I kissed her and the world ignited.

Melody kissed me back with a fierceness that surprised me. Thrilled me. Made me want more, more, more. I wanted to consume the woman. Devour her. More of those cute little whimpers escaped her mouth when my teeth grazed the sensitive skin on her neck. I suddenly understood the appeal of being a vampire. I wanted to bite her. Suck on her.

I moved to stand between her thighs. She opened them wider instinctively. Perfect. She fit against me perfectly.

She jerked my shirt from my pants and then slid her hands up. I felt her fingers trace my abs, exploring my body. I grinned against our kiss because I knew—I could feel it in the way her breath caught—that she liked what she found.