Total pages in book: 140
Estimated words: 138003 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 690(@200wpm)___ 552(@250wpm)___ 460(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 138003 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 690(@200wpm)___ 552(@250wpm)___ 460(@300wpm)
“Yes!” I want this—I’m desperate.
“Lavender, you’re nothing but a cock teasing bitch who deserved it.”
I’m suddenly not hot anymore, the voice one I recognize. My blood runs cold, and I let out a sob that I’m instantly sorry for. I brace for the worst, pulling my hands to my face when the voice changes, and I hear my name, soft and filled with concern.
“Lavender.” Hands catch mine. “Lavender, open your eyes, princess. It’s just me.”
Raif’s eyes meet mine, inky pools that shine in the darkness.
“I-I had a dream,” I begin, my voice halting and rusty. Between my legs aches, my clit still pulsing against him. I begin to pull away, my movements jerky and awkward when he stills me with his hand on my hips.
“Are you okay?”
I nod, not trusting myself to speak. A dream. Just a dream. A bad dream I haven’t had in ages.
“Don’t leave.” His voice sounds hoarse and full of longing as he wraps his arms around my back. “Go back to sleep, princess. You’re safe here.”
Something inside tells me this is true.
I drift off into the blackness.
14
RAIF
I glance up, the sky powder blue, not azure. The sun, not so unforgiving here.
“This way,” Lavender mutters. “Watch the gate,” she tacks on, slamming the wrought-iron frame back into the catch.
I open it without saying a word. Lavender is… not happy. That much is obvious. She says she’s hungover, but her bad mood didn’t occur until breakfast when I mentioned what had happened during the night. I’d woken in the dark to her body on top of mine, hard as a pole and panting as she’d rocked over me. A pleasant surprise until her heart-rending sob yanked me from my sleepy stupor.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she’d said when I’d pushed her on it.
“I woke up, and you were on top of me. We were about to fuck.”
“If I don’t remember, it mustn’t have been all that good.”
I didn’t say anything else. What was the point? She wasn’t going to explain. But the tremors that wracked her body kept me awake for some time afterward.
She’s not hungover, whatever she says. It could be that she’s embarrassed? For her dream, or what happened on the terrace last night?
“I can’t believe you’re making me do this,” she mutters.
“You mean Sunday lunch with the my new fam?” The opportunity was too good to miss. “I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”
“Why are you being weird?”
“Why do you look like you’re going to a funeral?” She’s dressed for one, too.
She pivots and begins trudging along the crazy-paved garden path, bordered by colorful summer flowers. By stark contrast, Lavender is dressed from head to foot in black. Pants, T-shirt, sweater, jacket, boots. I happen to know even her panties are black.
We’d stopped by her flat on the way back from the airport so she could change. She didn’t ask me to leave the room, though she had turned from me as she’d stripped.
Maybe she decided I’d seen it all. Felt it, too. Even if she won’t speak about our late-night interlude.
Her face is pale as she swings her dark hair over her shoulder to consider me. “Says the man dressed like he’s on the way to watch his eight-year-old play soccer.”
But the sweep of her gaze contradicts her complaint.
“You’re such a ray of sunshine, wife.”
“No one is nice when they’re hungover,” she says with a glower. “And don’t call me that.”
“Sunshine?”
She growls.
“Oh, you mean wife? My wife?” I like the sound of that more than I should. “My hot as fuck wife,” I add, purely because she looks pissed.
“You suck.”
“But only if you ask nicely.” Before I know what I’m doing, I have my arm around her waist, and I’ve hauled her against an old sycamore tree. Our bodies are glued together, and her face is in my hands. “Tell me what happened in bed last night.”
“Nothing. I told you I don’t remember.”
“Why don’t I believe you?”
“I dunno. Could it be because you’re the insecure, suspicious type?”
I say her name—say it like she’s driving me insane.
“Look, it was just a bad dream.”
My eyes on hers, I slide my thumbs over her cheeks. “Was it because of what happened on the terrace?” Are we moving too fast?
Her expression flickers, but she answers with an emphatic, “No. If you can go down on me, I can go down on you.”
“It’s not a competition, though you would probably win.” My hands slide away, and I straighten.
“A compliment?” She cocks a taunting brow.
“Only where they’re due.” I lightly touch her chin.
“Well, then you’re a good dancer.”
I smile—almost laugh. Such a prickly confessor, my wife.
“And I still think you were probably a lesbian in a former life.”
With a shake of my head, I give in to a deep chuckle.
“Come on, then,” she says, pushing from the tree. “We’d better get this over with.”