“Are you okay?” I ask her.
“Me?” Her gaze flickers down to mine. “I’m not the one who got hit.”
“It’s nothing.”
She gives me a skeptical look. “You look pretty pissed for ‘nothing.’”
“Disrespecting you like that? Yeah, I’m pissed. And then to put a hand on you?” I nearly growl. “Guy’s got a fucking death wish.”
Lila reaches up and pushes my hair back from my forehead. Slow. Gentle.
“Does it hurt?” she asks softly.
“No,” I say.
It doesn’t. Nothing hurts right now. I can’t feel anything except her fingers in my hair and her standing between my knees and the warmth radiating off her body in the small cold space of the storage room.
Itake her wrist and press a kiss to the inside of it. “You take such good care of me.”
Her fingertips stroke along my jaw, cool and soothing against the angry bruised skin there. “I like taking care of you.”
Just like that I feel the rage beginning to dissolve. The need to draw blood, to crush my opponent, slowly receding.
She leans in and presses her lips to my cheek. Then the other cheek. Her hair tickles my skin. Her scent floods my senses. She kisses the uninjured corner of my mouth next, feather-light, careful of the split lip, and I feel that one everywhere. On my skin, in my chest and lower, a heat spreading outward from that small careful contact. She is so gentle with me. More than I deserve.
“Lila,” I murmur against her skin.
Her hands slide down from my hair to my face, cupping my jaw briefly, thumbs grazing my cheekbones. Then down my throat, feeling my pulse thrum under her fingers. Down my chest, her palms flat and warm through my shirt. Further still, down my stomach, past my belt buckle.
Her hand rubs slowly up and down my dick through my jeans and I feel her smile against my skin.
“You’re very grumpy,” she whispers in my ear, “for someone with a hard-on.”
“I’m starting to feel better.”
Her hand wraps around me through the denim. She strokes slow, base to tip, her thumb pressing in at the tip. My hands find her hips and pull her closer.
“Let’s see if we can keep that trend going, shall we?” she murmurs.
She holds my gaze.
And sinks to her knees.
Her fingers work my belt buckle. After she undoes it, she finds my zipper and pulls it downslowly.
I reach down and touch her face. “Baby,” I murmur, “what are you doing?”
She looks up at me from under her lashes, those warm brown eyes sparkling, kneeling between my boots on the storage room floor like she’s exactly where she wants to be.
She offers me a teasing smile as she says, “I think you can figure it out.”
Chapter 45
High Ambitions, Low Places
SLADE
Her hands push into my waistband, boxer briefs and jeans together, and I lift my hips slightly and she drags them down my thighs. My dick feels hot and rigid as she wraps one smooth, cool hand around me.
