Page 126
Then I see it.
Just below his left shoulder blade. A crescent of small, dark marks pressed into his skin—teeth marks, half-hidden under the red of the burn but unmistakable once you know what you’re looking at.
Mine.
From last night.
From the moment he drove into me so deep my back arched off the mattress and I bit down on whatever part of him was closest because the sound I was about to make would have carried through every open window in the villa.
My hands still.
Heat floods my face—not from the sun. From the memory. From the very specific, very vivid recollection of what I was feeling when I left that mark on him and the sound he made when I did.
"Sorry," I murmur, tracing just above the mark with my thumb. "About that."
His head turns slightly. Not enough to see it. Just enough to know what I’m talking about.
"It’s fine," he says.
Then his hands reach back, find my thighs, and pull me closer.
Not rough. Not sudden. Just his palms flat against the outside of my bare legs, fingers gripping gently, drawing me forward until my chest is inches from his burned back and my thighs are pressed against his hips from behind.
My hands freeze on his shoulders.
"Everett."
"Don't read into it." His voice is low. "You needed a better angle."
"I had a fine angle."
His fingers flex on my thighs, the feeling of metal from his wedding ring against my skin.
Neither of us moves.
His thumbs start tracing small circles on the outside of my legs—absent, almost unconscious, like his hands decided to do something his brain didn't authorize.
"You don’t have to do that. The photographer is done," I say. My voice comes out breathier than I want.
"We're not doing anything."
"Your hands are on my thighs."
"You're applying medication."
"That is the thinnest excuse I've ever heard."
His head turns slightly as if trying to glance back at me.
"Then stop me," he says.
I don't.
My hands resume smoothing aloe over his shoulders, slower now, more deliberate. His grip tightens on my thighs, pulling me another fraction closer. The heat between us has nothing to do with the sunburn and everything to do with the fact that this man has been pretending nothing happened all morning and is now holding me against him like his body didn't get the memo.
His phone buzzes on the side table.
We both look at it.