Role Playing(77)

When his mouth covered hers, she felt unmoored as the soft brush of his mustache and beard tickled against her lips.

She sighed and leaned in.

Heat and energy rang through her, tingling through her nerve endings and lighting her up like a scoreboard. She made an involuntary soft sound of surprised pleasure, and kissed back, hard. Gentle be damned. She had wanted this too much and for too long, whether she was conscious of it or not, and now that he’d opened the door, she was running right through that mother. She licked at the seam of his lips, and he opened with a stunned small groan that she felt more than heard over the overloud pop music the DJ was playing.

He was too tall, was the problem. Even with her heels, which she was managing to wear more easily than she’d thought (it was like riding a bike, apparently), he towered over her, and she was in serious danger of climbing him like a jungle gym.

He pulled away, suddenly, his breathing harsh and ragged. His blue eyes were wide and alight with hunger, and she was there for it.

“Maybe we should have that talk now,” he croaked. “Probably somewhere without spectators?”

She blinked. Then she looked around to see people staring, some whispering, all with varying expressions of curiosity or shock. The blush that ran over her covered every square inch, it felt like. Even her knees and elbows. At the same time, another, louder part of her wanted to say: So fucking what? I kissed Aiden Bishop, and it was glorious. Ten out of ten, would do again. And will, as soon as he gets his mouth back down here.

But he was right. Privacy was good . . . and her body was signaling, not so subtly, that more privacy would be best for what it had in mind.

Knock it off, she chastised herself. Aiden liked kissing, it seemed—he was physically affectionate. That said, she didn’t know that much about being demi, but she knew that he might be good with some things and not others. Just because she was turned on like a lighthouse didn’t mean that he matched her intensity, and that was fine. She wasn’t going to put him in a position he was uncomfortable with, not ever.

And why is that, do you suppose?

She ignored the voice in her head, instead walking with him to the table and grabbing her purse. His mother had already left, as had Davy and Sheryl, probably off to their respective hotel rooms. A quick scan showed Riley dancing with a pretty woman in a pale-peach dress—bridesmaid, she registered. She picked up her purse and then looked at Aiden with a nod.

He had an arm around her, gently guiding her to the stairs. He was on the upstairs floor. She noticed his hand was shaking slightly as he pulled out his key card and opened the door, then held it open and gestured her inside.

She vaguely took in the room. It was cute, with hardwood floors, and a chair and desk, and what looked like a big bathtub in the bathroom beyond. But what dominated the room—and her attention—was the giant king-size bed with a dark craftsman headboard.

Perfect to hang on to.

She startled. What was she thinking? It had been a while since she’d had sex, and honestly, even then it had been pretty vanilla and infrequent.

Maybe it was deprivation?

She turned to find Aiden staring at her, a small, happy, eager smile on his face, his eyes shining.

Nope. It’s definitely the guy.

The fact that it was Aiden, who had always been consistently kind and understanding to her, who had always listened and supported her . . . that seemed to dial the intensity up to eleven.

She shivered, and it had nothing to do with her having left her coat at the coat check the hotel had set up for the wedding. He was looking at her like she was the most sumptuous dessert he’d ever seen and he hadn’t indulged his sweet tooth in too long.

“Is this weird?” she asked, putting her purse down, feeling nervous.

He wrinkled his nose a little, and even that was adorable. She was losing her mind.

“Because I’m demi, you mean?”

“Maybe?” She hadn’t quite meant that. Well, perhaps she had meant that, now that she thought it through. “I don’t want you to be uncomfortable. Ever. And I’ll be honest, I really don’t know what the boundaries are, and I don’t have any expectations, and I know we probably ought to talk . . .”

He stroked her arms softly, his gray eyes shining, and he shook his head. “It’s not uncomfortable,” he murmured. “Trust me.”

She swallowed hard. She could feel her pulse like a bass drum in her throat, almost a tangible bump. She swayed a little closer to him.

“What did you want to talk about?” she murmured, smoothing her hands along his chest, moving them around until she was hugging him. It wasn’t like their usual hug-hellos—which she hadn’t realized had become “usual” until that moment.

“I like you.” He huffed out a laugh, tucking her head under his chin and squeezing her a little. “God, that sounds so high school, doesn’t it? I mean, I’m interested in you.”

She felt her cheeks heat, and she squirmed. “Really?”

“In a relationship-type way.”

Man, the way his voice reverberated through that barrel chest was amazing. Even better when she got to lay her cheek against his sternum, feeling all that bass rumble through her. “Mmm.”

“You have an opinion about that?” he teased gently . . . but she could sense an underlying tension. Which, given his romantic history, was completely reasonable. Actually, even without his romantic history, putting yourself out there with someone you were interested in was terrifying.