Page 92 of Thin Lives

But who was she to say?

Calisto let out a sigh. “You know what’s fucking worse, sweetheart?”

Emma swallowed the lump forming in her throat. Whenever he used casual endearments so offhandedly like he did, it made her heart ache. She saw him interact with more than enough women to know Calisto didn’t use pet names on every female he came across. He rarely, if ever, called them anything but their first name.

With her, he always had something sweet on the tip of his tongue.

“What?” she finally asked.

Calisto’s hands tightened on the wheel. “What’s worse, Emma, is that you don’t even realize how much hell you put me through without even trying. I am fucking hard—like steel—it hurts. I have been this way since you came down the damn stairs this morning. I will be this way until I take care of it, or you do. And you don’t even know—but I sort of love that, too.”

Emma blinked, turning into stone in the passenger seat.

It was rare for Calisto to use that word—love.

Even as a slip of the tongue, or in passing.

He just didn’t.

She knew he loved her, of course. It was hard not to see how the weight on his shoulders disappeared when she was closer to him, and how the sadness and anger that was always in his eyes just left when he looked at her.

How could that not be love?

“What?” Calisto asked, passing her a strange look.

Emma shook her head. “Nothing.”

“Did I say something?”

“No, Cal.”

“You sure?”

“Nothing bad,” she promised softly.

The corner of his mouth tugged up into one of his sinful grins, he snagged her hand in his, lifted it toward himself, and pressed a soft kiss to the side of her hand. Just as quickly, she felt the strike of his hot, wet tongue snake across her skin.

A heat flooded her middle, pooling straight down to her sex.

“Cal …”

Her warning fell on deaf ears.

Calisto was looking at the dashboard clock, he checked his rear-view mirror, and then he was pulling off to the side of the road. Emma didn’t even have a chance to ask what in the hell he was doing as his car slid in between two tall buildings. The alley was dark for it being the middle of the day, the shadows giving the brick walls a dirty, low vibe.

“We’ve got time,” Calisto said.

Emma turned to ask him what in the hell he meant, but her question was swallowed by his mouth landing hard against hers. The surprise move had her gasping, and that allowed Calisto to kiss her even deeper, his tongue tangling and dancing with hers as his hands fisted into the side of her dress.

She was supposed to be meeting her husband for dinner.

Affonso was waiting …

Those thoughts melted away when Calisto’s hands slid around Emma’s waist, and she found herself falling into the backseat under his silent demands.

This wouldn’t be the first time, she thought.

It wouldn’t be the last.