Everything was such a mess inside me, two opposing forces battling for dominance. On the one hand, I wanted to give in, to throw myself at this man’s feet. On the other, I wanted to fight.
It was that urge that won out.
“Wow,” I said, turning to face him and watch him go. “Cool. So this is how it’s going to be now? I turn you down, so you give me the silent treatment?”
He paused then, and I noted how his fingers rolled into fists at his sides, those back muscles still rippling in the low light of the gym. Only one light was on overhead, and it bathed him in menacing shadows, highlighting the cuts in his body even more.
It was psychotic, how much I loved that I’d made him stop with those words, how much I got off on knowing I had the power to make his fists clench.
“I said I’m sorry,” I repeated.
He cracked his neck.
“Well, that’s real mature, Vince,” I said, tonguing my cheek on a laugh when he didn’t respond. “I’m so glad we’re both adults. I’m so glad—”
My next words were sucked out of the room, along with all the oxygen in it, because Vince spun on his heel and charged toward me. My heart lodged in my throat, eyes wide as I took in the snarl on his lips, the furrow of his brows.
He was a man on the edge, and I’d just shoved him over.
But I wasn’t scared.
I stood there, not moving, waiting for him to wash over me like a barrel wave that would take me down to a world I’d never known. My chest heaved with my next breath, and in four long strides, he invaded every inch of my space.
Every inch of me.
He sucked in a harsh breath through his nose as his hand reached out for me, snatching my chin just like he had that day in Boston. His eyes flared when I didn’t pull away, when I leaned into the touch, pushing until I was sure his fingers would bruise me.
I held his stare, both of us breathing hard and shallow as he squeezed my jaw and tilted my head even higher.
It was just the permission he was looking for.
“I’ve had enough of that fucking mouth of yours,” he husked.
And then he kissed me.
We both inhaled a fiery breath the moment his lips crashed down onto mine, and he held me there like he was afraid I’d pull away. But I didn’t. I couldn’t.
I pressed up onto my toes, threading my hands into his hair and twisting the strands between my fingertips — tugging, pulling, demanding more.
Vince released his grip on my jaw, reaching down to palm my ass, instead. He lifted me, pulling me into his massive arms as my legs wrapped eagerly around his waist.
We were on the move then, his mouth still devouring mine until my back slammed against the wall.
No, not the wall.
The mirror.
“This fucking mouth,” he breathed, biting my lip until I winced. As soon as he released it, I was kissing him again, asking for another lashing. “This fucking dress,” he said, his hands fisting in the velvet fabric at my hips. He nudged my chin with his nose at the same time, giving me no choice but to let my head fall back as his lips descended on my neck.
His hands gripped my hips while he wedged himself between my thighs, and he ran his tongue up my neck and along my jaw before sucking my earlobe between his teeth.
“You have me so fucked up, Maven. Every waking hour, every waking minute of my life is wrecked by thoughts of you.”
I whimpered as his hand slid under the hem of my dress with those words, and he teased the line of my lace panties, running one fingertip along the edges that hugged my inner thighs. I spread wider, wanting him to cross that fabric boundary.
“You are so deep-seated in my mind, in my being. I will never be rid of you.”
That made my heart stop, my anxiety trying to snake its way in. I pressed my hand to his chest, making him look at me, ashamed of the weakness in my voice even before I spoke.
“Even once you’ve had me?”
His eyes danced under those bent brows of his — one scarred, one perfect — and he dropped his forehead to mine on a long sigh.
“Especially then,” he breathed against my lips.
For a moment, I thought he was second-guessing, thought he might pull away and put my feet back on the ground, help me right my dress, and tell me we shouldn’t.
So, before he could, I grabbed him by the back of his neck and pulled him into me again.
“Then I guess we’re both fucked,” I said, and I licked his lip until he opened his mouth and let me in.
He kissed me on another deep inhale, smothering the curse and any resolve I had left to fight the chemistry between us. Even if it was just once, even if this was all we had — I wanted it.
It was all-consuming, that kiss — his hands completely destroying my blowout, his mouth completely destroying my lipstick.
Him, completely destroying me.
He wrapped me up in his arms, holding me to him as my back left the mirror. He held all of my weight then, and he kissed me every step of the way until dropping me carefully onto a weight bench. I didn’t have a chance in hell of catching my breath when he released the kiss, and as soon as he did, he yanked my hips until my ass was hanging over the edge of the bench, my body in a tilted, awkward angle.
My hands flew up to grip the first thing they could find — a cold barbell — and then Vince smacked the outside of my thigh.
“Lift,” he commanded.
I pressed weight into my heels on the floor, just enough for my ass to rise off the bench. Vince shoved my dress up to my rib cage, wetting his lips at the sight of my thong before he hooked his thumbs in the band of it.
“Let me see you,” he said, slowly peeling the fabric down over my thighs. As soon as it was past my ass, I sat down again, and I had no choice but to lift my legs and let him peel it the rest of the way off.
When my panties were tossed somewhere behind him, I tried to put my legs back down, but he clamped his hands over them and held them up — ankles wrapped together in one of his hands, legs fused together, my bare pussy framed by the swells of my ass propped on the edge of the bench.
“Fuck me, this is a beautiful sight.” He quirked his scarred brow at my sneakers next, laughing a little as he popped one off and then the other.
“Don’t judge,” I breathed.
“Pet, the only thing I’m judging right now is how fucking soaked you are,” he said, kissing the inside of my ankle once he had my socks discarded. “Stubborn girl. How long have you been this wet for me?”
I ripped out of his hold, pressing my toes into his chest. “Don’t call me pet.”
“You like it.”
I tilted my chin in defiance, but couldn’t fucking deny it — so I kept my mouth shut.
Vince smirked in victory, and then he grabbed one of my ankles in each hand and slowly, painfully slowly, opened me.
His eyes drank me in as he spread my legs, and he stared at where I knew I was glistening for him before he dropped to his knees in front of me. He placed one of my feet on the bench, the other on the floor, and then he hooked my hips and tugged me even closer, my hands holding the bar now working overtime to keep from falling on top of him.
He seemed to notice because he nodded at that bar with a wicked grin. “Hold tight,” he said, and then he descended.
It was a slow, teasing torture — his lips kissing up my thigh that was propped on the bench. He flicked his tongue over my clit just once before he was kissing down the other thigh, and I squirmed, gripping the bar so hard I wondered if I’d callous.