He takes a seat beside me, his hand immediately claiming my upper thigh. My breath hitches, my eyes closing slightly.
“Finley.”
His breath crashes against the side of my neck. “Yes, Cherry?”
Sensation bursts through me, want and need coursing through my veins.
Before I know it, Finn’s hand is in mine and I’m dragging him across the bar, which is slowly emptying. I pull him into the corridor leading to the bathrooms; a hallway with low lighting and quieter music.
“I’m either in for a big reward, or I’m in big trouble, which is it?” he asks.
“What’s up with all the touching?”
Finn reels back, eyes wide. “What?”
“The touching.”
He looks around as if the answer to my question will be somewhere in this corridor. “I’m sorry, did you not want me to touch you? I thought we needed to be a couple.”
“I’m not talking about the kisses on the cheek or the hands on my back. I’m talking about the hand on my thigh or the kisses against my neck.”
“What about them?”
“No one else can see them!”
He slowly nods, my current predicament finally settling into his brain. “I know no one else can see them.”
“So, then why the fuck are you doing it?”
“Cherry, I was under the impression that you understood me when I said that we need to act like a couple whether people can see us or not.”
“But—”
“And correct me if I’m wrong, but, last I checked, you haven’t been complaining nor asking me to stop. All you ever have to do is tell me to stop and I will stop. One time, that’s all it will take.” He takes a step forward. “When it comes to this kind of stuff, I go off of your reactions, and the way you’ve been acting, Cherry, is on par with my behavior.”
He takes a step forward again and my feet drag me back. He repeats the action, and so do I, until the next thing I know, my back is against the cold brick wall behind me.
“Last I checked, your reactions were showing you to be very interested. Did I read you wrong, Cherry? Do you want me to stop?”
God, no. I don’t want it to stop. All evening, I’ve only been able to think about the fact that I want more. More touching, more whispering, more of him. My vicious head shake shows exactly that.
He closes what little distance is left between us, not even a soundwave between us. Hands begin a light trail up my sides. My stomach clenches at the contact, each subtle movement so light and yet having the most cataclysmic of reactions.
I shake my head.
“Words, Cherry.”
I shake my head again, but this time it’s directed at his request. How can I talk when my words can’t be trusted?
He leans back, putting some distance between us that has a groan of protest threatening to spill from my lips. He’s smirking at me, as if the sound didn’t even need to come out for him to know how desperate I am for him to stay close to me.
“If you don’t use your words, then I’m not doing anything, my love.”
Screw that.
I lunge at him with a desperation I’ve only read about in novels like the one I’m writing. At first, he’s shocked, remaining frozen and rigid until reality hits him, and then he snaps. From then on, we’re all tongues and lips and teeth. Finn kisses like a man on death row, as if it’s the last thing he’s ever going to get to do and so he’s determined to do it right.
And he gets it so goddamn right.
