Total pages in book: 106
Estimated words: 98643 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 493(@200wpm)___ 395(@250wpm)___ 329(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 98643 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 493(@200wpm)___ 395(@250wpm)___ 329(@300wpm)
I should have been pissed. I should have been telling him what a prick he was for making fun of what had been true terror for me. Of course, he wouldn’t have known that. Just like he probably had no clue why I’d been a prick about him not being strong enough to carry the pot of stew.
“If it helps,” Jules managed to say between fits of laughter, “my arm hurts like a motherfucker.”
I couldn’t take my eyes off him. There were drops of moisture clinging to his eyelashes and his cheeks were bright pink against his pale skin. But that smile. Damn, I could live a thousand years on the image of just that smile.
Completely uninhibited and one hundred percent pure. My entire body was already on point because of that kiss he’d voluntarily laid on me, but the sight of his joy made me feel like the most powerful man on the planet. To have been able to give him those few moments of laughter… well, it would have been nice to do it in a way that hadn’t caused him more physical pain, but the more he tried to talk his way out of the situation, the faster he was plucking at something inside of me… scratching an itch that I’d never noticed before.
Jules must have recognized my intensity, but he didn’t know why it was there. The energy in the vehicle changed instantly. He was no longer laughing or crying, and I had yet to remove my hand from his cheek.
Just like he had yet to remove his fingers which were holding mine in place.
With our lips just inches apart, I forced myself to admit something without really admitting it. “Jules, tell me there’s no Stewart,” I murmured. “There’s no guy from the motel who’s coming back—”
Jules answered me with a demanding kiss. “No,” he managed to puff out when we were forced to come up for air. “No one.”
The green-eyed monster that had been eating me from the inside out since I’d heard Jules telling Brooks all about his three-day hookup with some stranger turned into a white-hot inferno of lust and need. Jules still had his seat belt on, so his ability to move was limited. It wasn’t a problem, though, because it gave me the excuse to lean farther across the console and take command of his mouth. Jules whimpered as his greedy fingers slipped through my hair so he could keep me from pulling away.
I could taste the salt on his lips and skin as I pressed soft kisses along his cheeks and jaw when we were forced to catch our breaths. The fingers that had been threaded through my hair were now toying with my beard. The simple move had me pulling back enough to look Jules in the eyes. His gaze was on my mouth, though, so it gave me every opportunity to study his reactions. He seemed fascinated by the neatly trimmed hair as well as the texture of my lips because he was caressing both like he wanted to memorize what they felt like. I pressed a kiss against his fingertip. That got his attention, and when he looked up and met my eyes, I shook my head in disbelief because it was real. That genuine curiosity, the sensual need, this strange sense of an unspoken promise… they were all there in his luminous green eyes.
I dipped my mouth and gently kissed him. “How bad does it hurt, really?” I asked.
Jules didn’t answer for so long that I was the one who had to lift his head. All the certainty in his pretty eyes began to disappear. I could practically read the younger man’s thoughts just by looking into his eyes. If I’d just kept kissing him, the haze of lust would have kept us both under its spell. Instead, my ill-timed question had woken something up inside of him. I had no clue why my question had caused him to mentally retreat from me, but that’s what was happening. Certainty was replaced with mistrust, laughter became fear, and the man I’d been so certain was a representation of the real Jules disappeared just like that.
“We should probably get going,” Jules said, moving back enough that there was no risk of our lips coming into contact as he spoke.
I held his gaze for several beats, but I lost the staring contest pretty fast because the man I was looking at was one I no longer recognized… actually, that wasn’t quite true. I did recognize him. He was once again the man who was way too young to have such a sizeable chip of mistrust on his shoulder. I thought back to the first time I’d met him. The unusual clothing, the makeup, the nail polish—how big a piece of him were those things? Did they bring him that same joy he’d just shown me? Or was I the sole reason for stealing that light? The one I’d never realized was even there.