Accidental Shield (Marriage Mistake #6)(83)

“But it does,” she whispers, her eyes fluttering, pain chiseled into her face.

“Wrong again. It doesn’t matter worth a damn what you did or didn’t do before this. All that matters is what you’re doing about it now.”

“Doing about it?” Sadness fills her eyes as her head rolls from side to side. “Like I’m able to do anything. We just spent the whole morning with you and your friends figuring out my jam. I’m helpless.”

“Bullshit, Valerie, but thanks for proving my point.” I cup her other cheek, tracing her bones with my thumb. “You said you’ve got no friends. Woman, you have friends. I’m your friend, and I’ve got my friends by extension lined up, all willing to stick their asses out for you. Cash, Davis, and the rest of my boys aren’t doing shit because they owe me favors. They’re doing it for you. If you were this horrible shit of a person, nobody would. Nobody hates you.”

Her face tilts down. “You would if you knew the real me.”

My hand runs softly up her face, reaches around her head, and tangles in her hair. Then I pull—gently, but just hard enough to startle her.

“Ah! What was that?”

I shake my head. “That was me proving how real you are. Didn’t think it’d be appropriate to pinch you right now, considering the waterworks and all.”

That gets a small smile and a roll of her eyes.

Good.

“For the last damn time, listen, and listen good. I know the real Valerie Gerard. She’s standing right in front of me. She’s a good, honest, beautiful woman with a smart head on her shoulders, and she also just happens to be a total fucking babe.”

“Flint, I—”

I’ve had enough with this sparring.

To stop her from disagreeing, I silence her off with a kiss that could end the next ice age.

I take her deep, take her hard, plunder her little mouth so she’s got more to fret over than who the fuck’s after her and who she used to be. I’ll drag her into the present, into the here and now, kicking and screaming if I have to.

Go ahead and call it psycho, but I’m past caring.

The frustration, the need, the evasive song and dance between us that’s been building up for days peaks in a wildfire collision of slashing tongues and breathless heat.

Then I pull her closer, pressing my forehead firm against hers, a low growl rumbling up my chest as I come in for more.

She kisses me back harder this time, taking her taste of me.

I fill her mouth with a groan, a snarl, telling her exactly what I’d like to do to her far louder than words ever could.

It’s too fucking late.

Too late to stop if I tried. Every taste of Val builds a thunderhead in my blood, and the only cure for a proper storm is letting it rip.

Her arms wind around my neck. Her body presses to mine. Her legs part for my knee and I push it into her heat, her desire, her sweet fuckery I mean to claim.

She wants it so bad she might die.

Next thing I know, we’re up against the wall, and my hand replaces my knee. I toss her dress aside and rub her pussy through her panties, showing what I aim to take, as long and as hard as I want till we’re both fucking sated.

We can’t get any closer.

Our kissing turns nuclear hot, famished, wild, driven.

I’m not sure who moves first, but we do move, nearly stumbling along the lanai where it wraps around toward the French doors leading to my bedroom. I tear them open.

By then she’s got my shirt unbuttoned, running her hands over my chest, down my sides, raking her nails across my skin. I love how she touches me.

“Goddammit, Val,” I growl, backing deeper into the room, her wrapped around me.

The bed hits the back of my legs and I fall down backward, pulling her onto the mattress with me. We bounce into the softness, and she giggles.

The brief separation of our lips gives me a second to think. To realize what’ll happen next if we don’t stop.

Shit.

My cock wants to reach up and stuff a gag in my mouth, but I have to ask her one more time. I have to know she wants this like I do.

“We probably shouldn’t do this,” I mutter, reluctantly as hell because I don’t want to stop.

“Probably?” Val kisses my chin, my neck, grazing her way up in these hot little whimpers.

“Probably not.” I let my hands roam over her back, across her firm, perfect ass. Barely able to hold in a groan due to my raging hard-on.

“Sorta late for that, no?” Nuzzling my neck, she whispers, “You said you like me.”

“And I do,” I grunt, pinching my jaw shut as her hand brushes my bulge.

Goddamn, doesn’t she get it?

That’s why we should stop, I tell myself, but I’m not very convincing to anyone. Least of all me. And I don’t have it in me to fight.

“I like you, too, Flint.” She arches up, looking down at me, her eyes narrowed in this adorable sex kitten squint. Her dark chocolate hair falls around her face, spilling on my chest, her fingers teasing me in ways that make me want to shoot off in my shorts.

“I like you, and I don’t want to stop,” she whispers.

My dick jolts like it’s got a live current.

Damn it, this girl. She’s not even talking proper dirty yet and she’s got me so riled I can’t even think anymore. Not unless it involves every inch I’ve got buried deep inside her.