Total pages in book: 103
Estimated words: 96850 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 484(@200wpm)___ 387(@250wpm)___ 323(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 96850 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 484(@200wpm)___ 387(@250wpm)___ 323(@300wpm)
Several breathless seconds ticked by. Then, “W-while we’re also married?”
“Like I said, complicated.”
“That’s putting it lightly.” Eve matched his whispering tone. “I’m pretty sure a wife with benefits is just a wife.”
“If you go by the classic definition.”
“You’re trying to appeal to the side of me that rebels against the status quo.”
“Am I, Eve?” He rubbed his open mouth against her ear, gratified when her breath caught. “I must have been paying very close attention to you all these years.”
“Seems so,” she said, tilting her head just slightly. An invitation.
Madden wasted no time suctioning his mouth down the side of her neck, grinding his teeth together when she shivered violently and pulled away, her gait unsteady as she took several steps, putting a table back between them.
“Madden, I can’t marry you. I can’t do that.”
Holding in the hurt was not an easy feat. Still, he kept his voice steady. Weighted with patience he didn’t feel. “I don’t suppose you want to tell me why.” When she only looked down at the surface of the table, a groove between her brows, he suspected he’d gotten as far as he could for one night. “Right. Just promise me you’ll think about it.”
Eve’s eyes closed. “I can’t.”
She wouldn’t even give him the slightest consideration?
His Irish temper was a rare thing. When it bubbled to the surface out of sheer frustration, he knew it was time to take a step back.
“Are you finished here for the night?”
“Yes.”
“Grand. I’ll make sure you get to your car.”
Eve nodded. Hesitated. Then set about turning off all the lights and collecting her purse from the office backstage. Madden waited by the door, exiting behind her when she breezed past. Watching her lock the front entrance with a quick twist of her wrist, he noticed that, at some point during the last few minutes, she’d attempted to button her cardigan, but she’d hastily married the buttons to the wrong holes, making the ends of her sweater uneven.
Madden didn’t mention the mistake as they walked side by side to the driver’s side of her car, but once they arrived and she opened the door, tossing her purse across the console into the passenger side, Madden’s mouth moved all on its own.
“Your buttons are uneven.”
Eve looked down and winced. “I did it on the fly.”
“Come here and I’ll fix it for you.”
There was a single lamppost in the parking lot of the Gilded Garden and it stood at a distance, shining enough light to show that her cheeks had turned pink. A war waged itself in her eyes and he counted himself lucky for that. Maybe Eve didn’t want to be in a romantic relationship with him, but she couldn’t completely hide the attraction. The emotion she carried for him.
Eve nodded once. Sniffed.
Heavy throbs worked their way through Madden’s cock as he stepped forward, looking Eve in the eye while he pulled her away from the car. “What . . .”
He turned her around to face the empty parking lot and the tree line that created its perimeter, the lamplight spilling across her cheek, her neck . . . and when he flicked open the buttons one by one from behind, opened both panels of the cardigan and exposed her breasts to the night air, the soft illumination spread across her shoulders too. The sliver of her collarbone that he could see when he tilted his head.
“What are you doing?” she asked, haltingly, making no move to cover herself.
“Feeling my way in the dark with you, love.” He slung the cardigan over his right shoulder, the way he would a towel in the locker room, before sliding his fingers into her hair at the back of her head, tugging downward in a way that forced Eve to arch her back, whimpering over the fact that she was now offering her breasts to the stars. The moon had turned her hair to silver, nearly. “Do you like that?”
A few ticks of silence passed, but eventually she nodded. “I . . . yes.”
With his free left hand, Madden reached around to the front of Eve and gripped the hem of her skirt, lifting it several inches in his grip, up, up, until her panties were visible to the empty parking lot. “Do you like that too?”
Eve was breathing too hard to respond, her body sagging back against him.
Trembling.
Lord, if he was the kind of man who took advantage of another person’s weak moments, he’d walk her around to the hood of the car, bend her forward, and rip her panties down to her ankles. But he wasn’t that kind of man. And he especially wasn’t that kind of man when it came to Eve, the girl he’d loved for fucking years.
No, hunger and temper were not a good combination, so Madden reluctantly drew the hem of her skirt back down, breathing in and out the scent of her hair while he buttoned her back into the cardigan, his fingers itching to massage her tits. Pet her nipples.