“No one will believe this”—I gestured between us—“if they think we jumped into bed together from the start.”
“Already called you my girlfriend. That’s unbelievable enough.”
Ouch.
“No one will buy us waiting,” he continued, oblivious to the sting that smothered any trace of heat left in me.
The sting was good. Better.Smarter.
I let it sink past the exhaustion to ground me back into reality. “They’ll buy it if I’m supposed to be different.”
“Fair point,” he conceded.
“Why did you change our story anyway?” I asked.
He rubbed his hand across his jaw. “Figured you had to be around even when you’re not on shift. People would start getting suspicious if you were just my cousin but always hanging out.”
That made sense.
I nodded. “I’ll see you tomo?—”
Before I could finish my sentence, strong hands cupped my cheeks and tilted my head as his mouth crashed down on mine. I wrapped my arms around his shoulders to appear into it, but that was as far as it needed to go.
In my opinion, at least.
Rhys seemed to be under the assumption that anyone watching was doing so with a telescopic lens that could see every detail. He speared his fingers into my hair and moved me how he wanted. I, on the other hand, kept my lips pressed tightly together and tried to turn my face away.
I wasn’t fighting the kiss.
I was fighting my reaction to it.
Just an act.
Nothing more.
I kept repeating that mantra as his hold on my hair tightened until a pleasant ache tugged at my scalp and my lips parted on a cry that I couldn’t choke back.
He swallowed the noise as his tongue forced its way in. It twirled around mine, fighting for dominance as I gave as good as I got. He groaned as he backed me toward the door.
I reached behind me to grip the handle before pulling away with a firm nod. “That was neat. Have a good night.”
And then I hurriedly darted inside and flipped the lock.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
NEXT STOP: HELL
RHYS
That was neat.
Lo’s words from the night before ricocheted through my head over and over. And each time, I got angrier. Not at her. She was doing her job.
I was pissed at myself for losing control.
I was the one who’d made the kiss more than it needed to be. I’d gotten a taste of her fuckable lips, and my brain shot right down to my dick.
Christ, she’d tasted good. She’d felt even better with her soft curves pressed to me. It was a good thing she’d ended the kiss when she had because I wouldn’t have been able to. Not till I had her beneath me.
