Total pages in book: 73
Estimated words: 68987 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 345(@200wpm)___ 276(@250wpm)___ 230(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68987 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 345(@200wpm)___ 276(@250wpm)___ 230(@300wpm)
“You were so helpful tonight,” he murmured against my lips as he pulled away slightly.
“I didn’t do much. You were the superstar.”
He hummed, nuzzling up against the crook of my neck in a way that was going to make me melt.
“So, before everything went to shit, what did you think of our first date?” Jax asked, leaning back a little to look me in the eyes.
“I thought it was good as hell. The bar was great. You definitely know how to have a good time, but I already knew that.”
“I had a great time, too,” he said.
He was leaning against the edge of my seat, his head cocked slightly to one side, his eyes reflecting the light of the lamp in front of my house. For a moment I felt like a teenager, being dropped off back at home after a date. An old but familiar spark of excitement moved through my body. “Was it good enough that you’re going to invite me inside?”
As he asked me, he started to trail his fingertips from the center of my chest downward, slowly moving toward my stomach, then skating across the area just above my waistband. I pulled in a shuddering breath, my body lighting up piece by piece, my cock responding the same way it always did when Jax touched me.
“Maybe,” I said, bringing my index finger beneath his chin, tilting his head up just a little. “You should kiss me again and find out.”
He crushed his mouth to mine in a desperate kiss. He was fucking hungry for it, maybe even more than me, which wasn’t something I knew would be possible. He was deliciously impatient, too, sliding out of his own seat and moving over toward me until he was halfway on my lap, rutting against my body in any way he could.
“Need you,” he uttered, grabbing my hand and guiding it downward to his cock, showing me how hard he was through his pants.
“So fucking hot,” I said under my breath.
He groaned as I squeezed his cock through the fabric. He looked me in the eyes, that same hunger so present there. It was a passionate look, completely raw, even more than I’d ever seen from him before.
“I want you,” he said, his voice low.
My cock jumped. “I know you do.”
“Very badly,” he continued, his gaze unwavering. “Charlie…”
“Hmm?” I hummed, desire filling my veins like adrenaline. Anything he asked for, I would give him.
“I think I’m falling for you,” he said.
Fuck.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
Something seared white-hot in me, like an explosion. One of his hands was still at the back of my head, his fingers stroking through my hair. His body was pressed up against mine in any place it could be in the awkward positioning of the passenger seat, his thigh draped over my lap in a half-straddle.
My heart was pounding what felt like a million times a minute. I froze in place, one of my hands on his thigh, searching for some way to respond to him.
But inside, all I could feel was a hot panic.
“You don’t mean that,” I told him.
“Pretty sure I do,” he said, lifting an eyebrow. “I like every fucking thing about you.”
Panic.
“No, you don’t,” I said softly. “You don’t really know me.”
“Bullshit,” he said, a little actual anger spilling out in his voice. “I fucking know you.”
I shook my head. “No. The real me is needy. The real me wants too much. All of the damn time. The real me has driven away every single person I’ve ever tried to be with—”
“Did you ever want me?” he asked. “Before we started all of the faking-it stuff?”
“Want you?”
“Yeah. If we’d never done this for TV, would you have thought about me in that way at all?”
He doesn’t know.
He never could have known.
“Of course I wanted you.” My voice was weak. “I knew I couldn’t have you. And seeing your friend struggling with drinking too much tonight was just another ugly reminder of who I used to be. Who you’ve seen me be.”
“Guess what? I saw you that way more than once, and yet I’m still here,” he said. “Still falling for you.”
I groaned, scrubbing my palms over my face. It did awful, confusing things to my body to hear Jax say those words. A longing so deep it felt dangerous got stirred up in me, and I didn’t know how to handle it.
I took in a deep breath before I spoke again. “Do you know how pointless it would have been for me to go after a straight guy—”
“Not straight,” he interjected.
“Well, yeah, now I know that. But I didn’t back then, and neither did you.”
“But now we do. And you’re still not letting me in.”
I felt like that same caged animal all over again, only this time, I knew the cage was one I’d put myself in. I only had myself to blame.