Total pages in book: 167
Estimated words: 157162 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 786(@200wpm)___ 629(@250wpm)___ 524(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 157162 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 786(@200wpm)___ 629(@250wpm)___ 524(@300wpm)
His fingertips returned to my hips, softer than before, then something warm wiped at the liquid that had seeped down my thighs.
My entire body quivered as he cleaned me, tenderly, slowly. I wanted to argue against it, but no one had used such a caretaking touch on me before. No partner had ever done that. I’d always thought it was something invented by hopeful women who longed for men who didn’t exist—except in the pages of books.
Yet there was Elliot Shaw, tenderly cleaning his cum from me after he’d fucked me harder than I’d been fucked in my life.
My wits scrambled as I internally screamed at myself to stand and snatch the cloth to regain the autonomy I’d gladly given to him, as if it weren’t something women had been fighting for for years.
Yet I stayed still. And the weakness in my limbs couldn’t be entirely blamed.
When the cloth left my leg, I squeezed my eyes shut with the childish wish for that gentle rhythm and sensation to go on forever.
Nothing lasted forever.
My skirt was placed on the bar beside my hands.
Somehow, the vision of the garment, one of the pieces of my armor, shocked me back into my body, into my mind.
I grabbed it, pushing myself off the bar to turn to Elliot.
He was standing close. Too close. But I couldn’t retreat. Had nowhere to go. I gritted my teeth, refusing to look for my panties.
“This is just sex,” I reminded him as I pulled my skirt over my hips, sans panties.
Before I could snag the zipper at my lower back, Elliot was there, one hand steadying my hip with the other going to the small of my back to work the zipper up.
I held my breath so that I didn’t react.
“This isn’t just anything.” His lips landed on my neck. “This was everything.”
I whirled around then, denying my instinct to sink backward into his body, into the promise of a different relationship dynamic.
He was grinning, hands on his hips as if he was expecting my reaction. “I don’t do relationships.” I tried to sound authoritative, despite the lace of my bra exposing my nipples that were pebbled against the thin fabric. “And even if I did, it wouldn’t be with someone like you.”
His forehead wrinkled, but otherwise, his face didn’t change at the insult I thought he’d take as such. “What? A lowly fisherman? A bartender?” His voice still had a teasing edge, but there was also a sense of pride, a security in who he was.
He was not ashamed by the simplicity of his life, nor should he have been. It was hot as fuck to see a man with an appropriately sized and solid ego.
That would’ve been the easy, cruel way out to stick the knife in. Lie to him and say that it was because of those titles that I didn’t consider him worthy of me. It was an arrow on the tip of my tongue, tasting like the poison it was. Not once had I hesitated to sling such weapons at men.
But to Elliot, I couldn’t do it, even if it would eventually be for his own good.
“No,” I sighed. “Because you are a good man.”
The crinkles on his forehead deepened as he stepped forward with purpose. “The insinuation there is that you don’t consider yourself a good woman.”
I looked downward. Again, the first time I’d ever refused to hold my head up high.
Elliot wasn’t about to let that happen, his fingers reaching for my chin and lifting it so my gaze was level with his.
His slate gaze was unyielding, inescapable, and fuck, did it hold me in place. It quieted the static inside of my mind.
“I’m not a good woman, Elliot,” I admitted. “I never will be.”
Elliot stared at me for a handful of seconds instead of rushing to fill the silence with assurances that he knew me to be good or some such bullshit that I had assumed would be his knee-jerk reaction.
“I think I’ll be the judge of that.” He stroked my jaw with his thumb. “And even if you are, I’m a grown man. Think I can make the decision if I want something a little different for once. Because maybe I like bad women. Maybe I like you.”
The honesty of his feelings, the way he laid them out without adornment or agenda hit me square in the chest.
When was the last time a man said he liked me? Ever? I didn’t think any man had said anything like that, truthfully or not. I’d never let any man think that that was an appropriate thing to say, never let someone get close enough to say it. Except Jasper. And he’d never verbalized something like that. Never exposed that weakness. I couldn’t even be sure whether he truly liked me.
“I like you too.” My words fell out of my mouth before I could stop them.