Page 19 of The Next Lie

“God, I hate rich people.”

“I’m going to drown you.”

“Try it and I’ll haunt your dick.”

He makes a sound that might be a laugh if it weren't buried under a groan. “Romance really isn’t dead.”

“Give me five minutes. I’ll kill that too.”

He kisses me hard enough to shut me up. For a little while, there is no room for anything else. No Delia. No Deacon. No women with tattoos moving through Noir Night like they own the air. No childhood assignment. No sheets. No blood. No question of which girl was supposed to die and which one was supposed to be carried off into the dark.

There is only Shiloh under me, inside me, his mouth on mine and his hands all over me now because I gave him permission and he is done pretending he does not want to use it. Good. I want his greed. I want the heat of it. I want the proof that someone can want me without turning that want into a cage. His hand slides between us beneath the water. The touch of his thumb against my clit makes my hips jerk.

“Cocky bastard,” I say, but it comes out thin.

“You wound me.”

“You’ll live.”

“Currently undecided.”

Then he does it again, slow and firm, and the rest of my insult dissolves into a sound I will deny making if anyone asks. His eyes lock on my face. I hate that I love it. Hate that he watches me as if this matters beyond bodies and water and shock. Hate that I want it to matter, at least for these few minutes, because despite being scared to death, if tonight means nothing except pain, I may actually start screaming and never stop.

CHAPTER FOUR

REVA

Pleasure gathers low and mean. I try to keep the pace, but my thighs are shaking now. Shiloh knows it. The man probably reads muscle fatigue like poetry.

“Let me,” he says. The words brush my mouth. This time, I do.

His arm locks around my waist. He holds me close and thrusts up into me, keeping his thumb exactly where I need it, turning the rhythm into something rougher, deeper, better. My hands clutch at him because there is nowhere else to put them. His shoulder. His hair. The back of his neck. I bite him when it gets too much. His whole body jerks.

“Jesus.”

“Sorry.”

“No, do it again.”

So I do. He groans, and that is it. That is the thing that tips me over. Not the water. Not his hand. Not even the way he fills me. It is that sound, torn out of him because I put my teeth in his skin and he liked it. The orgasm hits hard enough to knock the air from my lungs. My body locks around him, pleasure clamping down so tightly I go silent for one stunned second. Then it breaks through me, hot and shaking, dragging a cry out of my chest. I clutch him through it, hips jerking, forehead pressed to his as his whole man-luxe bathroom blurs around the edges.

Shiloh watches me like a man who has forgotten how blinking works. I jerk my gaze down and to the side. “Don’t,” I manage.

His brows pull together. “Don’t what?”

“Look at me like that.”

“Like what?”

“Like I’m precious.”

He lifts a finger and pushes my hair damp and stringy, behind my ear. “You are.”

My eyes sting immediately. Absolutely unacceptable. “I will bite you again.”

His mouth curves. “Threat or promise?”

I kiss him because he is still inside me and I am still shaking and if he keeps being sweet, I may have to fake my own death and move to Ohio. He lasts another three seconds. Maybe four. Then his control goes. His hands clamp on my hips, and he thrusts up into me with a sound that has no polish in it. I feel the change in him, the snap, the hunger he has been swallowing since the second I turned around in his lap.