Wild Love (Rose Hill, #1)(85)

“I’ve always respected you.” He crouches to glide the roller back and forth over the paint tray.

“Fine, but you’ve never tiptoed around me. We’ve always gotten in each other’s faces. What’s with the”—I step closer, my wet sandals crowding the space near the paint as I wave a hand over him—“weird pacifist approach? It doesn’t suit you.”

“I told you. I’m just trying to respect your?—”

I use my toe and upend the tray, watching the palest blue ooze out over the drop sheet. “Respect my wishes a little less.”

“What the fuck, Rosie?” He shoots up, towering above me. “That’s going to soak right through this sheet and stain the floor.”

“Good. It will give you something to do while you live out this new World’s Handiest Billionaire era of yours.”

“I had a plan for my life. You—” His jaw pops and his hand flexes tight on his narrow hip.

“Take all your plans, tear them up, and scatter them to the wind?” I ask as I lift each foot to take my sandals off. Unlike his neatly stowed boots, I toss mine across the office, making him flinch. Then he nods tightly, agreeing with my assessment.

I step right into the pooling paint and it squishes between my toes as I shift my feet back and forth. I give him one raised brow.

“Guess what, Ford. Sometimes life gives you lemons, even when you didn’t order them. And you can either make lemonade, or storm around stressing about how yellow isn’t your color.”

“That’s not what happened.”

“I’m not lemons?”

“No, you’re…” His hand swipes through his hair, but his eyes stay trained on my toes. The pink polish on my nails disappears beneath the thick blue liquid. “I had come to terms with the idea that you would never happen for me. You were a memory, not a goal.”

My head tilts as I absorb his answer. The longing in those two sentences hits me right in the chest. I reach for him, fingers hooking around the brown leather belt that props his jeans up, pulling his bare feet into the spreading paint.

“Ford, what if you stopped trying to control everything for a minute?”

I take the roller from him and drop it at our feet right as I slide a hand up his chest, over the warm, firm skin and a smattering of hair. My fingers wrap around my key and give the chain a firm tug. The clasp gives way, and now I’m holding this little piece of us in my hand.

This little piece he’s held on to, an ode to the girl I once was.

I drop it into the paint at our feet, and he sucks in a hissing breath.

“What if you stopped worrying about the girl I used to be and started seeing me for the woman I am instead?”

“Rosie—”

“No. I’m not a memory. I’m not a goal. I’m not out of reach. I’m not the same girl who threw that diary out your car window. And I’m not going anywhere.” I point at the silver glinting between our feet. “That was us then.” I tug at his belt.

First the buckle. Then the leather.

“This is us now,” I murmur as I work the button on his jeans. The zipper.

I don’t know who needs to hear it more. Him, the man who’s stuck in the past where I’m concerned. Or me, the girl who finally feels sure of herself and her choices—because they feel right and not because they feel mandatory.

A girl who knows what she wants for herself.

His jeans fall to the floor, and I fall to my knees. Right at his feet. Right in the paint.

I lift my chin high to meet his bright green gaze. So wild. So unusual. I can’t help but marvel at the way he looks towering over me, all man, radiating so much tension.

“We’re messy. And we challenge each other. And let’s be honest, who the hell else in the world would ever tolerate us? Keep up with us?”

My fingers wrap under the wide elastic of his boxers, and I tug roughly. His cock springs free right before me. Big and perfect and hard.

I lick my lips.

“Rosie, what are you doing?”

His palm strokes the top of my head, and I grin up at him. “Playing in the paint.” My eyes drop to the head of his cock, mere inches from my lips.

“Yeah?”

Fuck. He’s so beautiful. I want to leave my mark all over him. I want him to play with me.

“Yeah,” I murmur, my breath becoming choppy. I crouch slightly to plant my hands in the paint.

Then I reach up and grip his thighs hard.

Leaving my handprints all over him.





CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX


FORD





I watch Rosie on her knees at my feet. Doing her best to piss me off. To make a mess and draw me into it with her. I like things orderly, but if I had to be messy with someone, it would be with her. All day long.

I smirk. She’s not wrong. Who else would put up with her dumping paint on their floor and stamping it all over them?

And what does it say about me that her constantly challenging behavior only makes me want her more?

“You’re out of control, you know that?” My hand slides down her cheek as her hands continue to make a mess on my legs. I press my thumb to her chin, popping those plush pink lips open. “You secretly get off on?—”

“Ford, stop trying to start a conversation with me and get your dick in my mouth.”