Total pages in book: 135
Estimated words: 128211 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 641(@200wpm)___ 513(@250wpm)___ 427(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 128211 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 641(@200wpm)___ 513(@250wpm)___ 427(@300wpm)
I was speechless. My wheels spun faster and faster as I tried to track through everything. “But at the beach… she was talking like you—”
“Were still together? Yeah. She wasn’t ready to let anyone know. She begged me to wait a few days, to let her do it on her terms. She wanted to have a big breakup where she was the one who called things off. I told her she could do whatever she wanted.” He shrugged. “Like I said last night — I’ll be the bad guy. I don’t fecking care. As long as I have you.”
My jaw was unhinged but I couldn’t think of a single word to say.
“I thought she’d do it last night, make a big scene or whatever, but she didn’t. So yeah, she was still hanging on me, still stealing a kiss here and there. But she knew where I stood. She was just using me for whatever game she’s playing at.” He shook his head. “I still can’t figure it out, but I respected her enough to at least try to let her have it the way she wanted it. But then I saw you tonight with Eli, and I…”
Finn’s nostrils flared, his Adam’s apple bobbing as his eyes darted between mine.
“I fucking lost it, Em.”
“I wanted you to,” I confessed.
“You think I don’t know that?” He laughed a little then, reaching up to thumb my chin. “It was a dare. A challenge. And I knew as soon as you walked outside that I was over all the pretending. I didn’t care what Gisella wanted anymore. I was done with the games. I was going to kiss my girl and I was going to get her back — cameras and public opinion be damned.”
Sparrow wings tickled my stomach as the corner of my mouth lifted. “Your girl, huh?”
At that, Finn slid his hand over my jaw, hooking me behind the neck and pulling me into him. “Damn right.”
He kissed me, and those flutters I’d felt in my stomach from his words dipped lower, igniting a part of me I’d thought was dead. I’d tried so hard to use other people as a distraction since we broke up, but it never worked.
And now that my body was firing up from the simplest kiss, I remembered why.
Sharing intimacy with anyone after having Finn was like trying to substitute a shot of whiskey with a non-alcoholic beer. It didn’t burn. It didn’t tingle. It didn’t satisfy.
“I’m not even drunk,” I whispered against his lips before I was seeking another kiss. “I can’t blame any of this on alcohol.”
“I haven’t had a single sip tonight.”
I laughed, and then I was on the move, crawling into his lap with my mouth traveling along his stubbled jaw. “We’re terrible.”
“Truly awful,” he said breathlessly, his hands fastening to my hips and helping me climb him.
“They’re going to hate us.”
“Absolutely loathe our existence.”
Each sentence came between a heated kiss, a passionate roll of my body against his, a claiming grip of his fingertips in my skin.
“No one will understand.”
“We understand,” Finn said, and this time he stopped everything long enough to lock his eyes on mine. “That’s all that matters to me. I know what I want. I know I’ll risk everything to have it.” He swallowed. “But I’ll walk out of this room and leave you alone forever if you don’t feel the same. If this is too much…”
“Shut up,” I breathed against his mouth, and then the words and confessions faded away as I raked my hands through his hair and held on tight.
I sat fully on him, rocking my hips, the sensitive heat between my legs finding the sweetest friction against his hard shaft. We groaned together, my body trembling as Finn’s hands slid from my hips to my ass and gripped hard. He used the new handle on me to help me roll, to pull me flush against him as he bucked his hips up to meet mine.
It was too much and not enough. I needed more of him, and also felt I’d die from even one more touch. Every sensation was overloaded — my head light, skin buzzing, blood pumping.
This was it.
The dynamite explosion.
For years, I’d convinced myself I’d never have him again. My body had mourned the death of his touch and now it was being revived. Shock and disbelief mixed with such an intense longing and sense of right that I had no choice but to submit to the confusing ecstasy of it all.
I fell into the dark, passionate, bottomless pit.
And Finn caught me.
His touch was everywhere — hands dragging from hips to hair and back again, lips trailing fiery kisses along the column of my throat, down the lacy neckline of my silk top, over each swell of my breast and back up to my mouth.