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She shook her head. Over the past few days she had figured that one out for herself.
“I was too young for you, Dawg,” she finally admitted as she turned back to him. “We both knew I was too young for you. I couldn’t handle what I felt for you along with what I thought you wanted from me. It was too much. ”
“And now?”
“And now you’re blackmailing me. ” And she loved him more now than she had then.
“If I hadn’t blackmailed you?”
There was something in his voice that pulled at her then. Something she was certain she would see in his eyes if she pulled the dark glasses from his nose.
She reached out and did just that. Slid them from his face as he watched her, met his darkened gaze and felt her heart trip in her chest.
He was staring at her like no other man ever had. Equal parts hunger and pain.
If he hadn’t blackmailed her?
“I would have caved eventually,” she whispered, caught, held by that look in his eyes. “One of those nights that I was driving around the marina just to see if you were there, I would have weakened. I would have walked out to your houseboat, and if you had been alone, I would have come to you. ”
She had been weakening, and she knew it. Tempted by his smiles, his teasing, his determined irritation each time she rebuffed him.
“You came to the marina just to see me?” He reached out, his fingertips smoothing over her collarbone and sending heated spirals of need crashing through her system.
Crista licked her lips, and for once, she didn’t fight the need welling inside her. She didn’t fight the love she knew no other man would ever possess.
“Often. ” She fought to overcome the breathlessness, the racing of her heart. “And I’d stop and see the lights on in the Nauti Dawg, and I’d have to make myself stay in my car. I’d have to fight the need to go to you. ”
“You should have come to me. ” His hand cupped the back of her head, and he pulled her to him.
“You should have let me love you, Crista. ”
Crista’s senses exploded when his lips touched hers. It wasn’t the fiery, hungry kisses she was used to. It was a slow, tender exploration. It was letting her get used to the feel of his tongue against her lips before he slipped inside. It was sharing the taste of himself even as he drew hers in. It was heated, sensitizing, it was a kiss that drove the breath from her lungs and left her moaning with the need for more.
Her hands braced on the cloth beneath them as her hair enveloped them, hiding their faces, their kiss, shielding them in a veil of intimacy as his lips pulled back just enough to cause her eyes to open as a whimper of denial left her lips.
“I would have pulled you inside,” he whispered, his lips brushing hers as he spoke. “I would have locked out the world and drawn you to my bed. I would have made certain you never wanted to leave it again. ”
“I don’t want to leave it now. ” She couldn’t hold the words in.
A distant part of her brain cursed her foolishness, cursed her weak heart and the part of her soul that had never released the memory of his kiss, his touch.
She watched as Dawg’s eyes dilated, darkened, then he was stealing her kiss. He ravished her lips, ate at them, and grew greedy on the taste of her. His tongue licked, his head slanted, and the kiss deepened as fireworks exploded through her body. Brilliant heat. Flames licked over her flesh and seared her nerve endings.
When he drew back, all the way back, they were both breathing hard and fast and fighting for control.
“Not yet. ” His voice was a graveled sound of need. “Too fucking soon. You have a few hours before you can take it yet. ”
“There are other ways. ” She leaned forward, touching her lips with his again, and saw the surprise in his eyes. She whispered wickedly, “Come on, Dawg. Show me how nasty you can get. ”
Show her how nasty he could get? Oh, she had no idea the fantasies he had of getting nasty with her.
“What about lunch?” He glanced down at the food she had laid out.
“Fried chicken tastes better cold,” she reminded him, and Dawg watched in eager anticipation at the slow little lick her tongue made at her lips. “We can always eat later. ”
Repacking the food was a simple matter of snapping the lids back on the containers and resetting them in the basket. The basket itself was set to the side. Dawg found himself moving, forcing her down to her back as he came over her.
“I won’t be nice,” he warned her. “You might want to reconsider that little dare you just made. ”
