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“I don’t even like Paul!” She was nearly shouting, her cheeks blazing red.
“You don’t like me, either.” This was bullshit, but it was necessary bullshit. She might be irritated with him, but Tom knew if he touched her she’d come to him willingly. She knew it, too. The attraction between the two of them was a wildfire, and pretty soon it was going to crown and start spreading so fast they’d be helpless to stop it. He needed to leave before that happened. Before he did something he’d regret for the rest of his life.
“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” she said, exasperated. “Are you really that clueless?” And then she rose up on her toes, wrapped both hands around the back of his head, and kissed him.
When he kissed her back, there was nothing sweet about it. His mouth was hard and furious, his tongue punishing as it swept between her lips. He picked her up to crush her against the cheap siding of the shop, his grip on her hips tight enough to bruise. She twined her legs around him and held on, wanting him any way she could get him.
She hadn’t meant to do this. But when she’d found out for sure he was planning to leave, she suddenly understood that if he left now, she’d never get the chance to find out how she felt about him. She’d never learn what made him tick, she’d never see him smile again, and she’d never get to find out what his mouth would feel like on hers. She couldn’t bear that.
This was much better than not knowing.
Tom groaned deep in his throat, and she slid her hands down his stomach to grab the hem of his shirt and push it out of the way, needing his bare skin against her palms. Wrapping her arms around him, she splayed her fingers across his naked back and pulled him to her as tight as she could. The thick ridge of his erection landed between her legs, and her hips tilted a bit higher to put it exactly where she needed it.
Nothing she’d ever done had felt quite as reckless as this, but the payoff was beyond incredible, and she wasn’t going to second-guess herself. She could do that later. Now, she was going to wring every last bit of enjoyment out of this moment.
“Damn it,” he muttered against her lips. “Tell me to stop.”
“Don’t stop,” she begged, grinding hard against him until he took her mouth again and began thrusting against her in rhythm. Squeezed between him and the wall, the pressure of his body on hers was hard enough to hurt, but it was a good pain, a searing burn that hit her in just the right spot to create the tingling pull of an orgasm barreling down on her.
Tom kissed her with the desperation of a condemned man, holding her up with one hand while the other found her breast through her wet shirt and plucked at her nipple. Not gentle, not even nice, the touch produced a pulse of excitement that shot straight between her legs and made her gasp on an inhale, a choked, desperate sound she’d never heard come out of her mouth before.
Tom set her down so fast he nearly dropped her, backing away with his hands outstretched as if she were going to come after him and wrestle him to the ground. Lexie the succubus. She’d have been insulted if she hadn’t remembered, suddenly and horribly, that she was supposed to be a married woman.
He was breathing hard, his jaw clenched tight, hands curled into fists at his sides. Still aroused, but the anger was winning now.
“Tom—” She didn’t know what she was going to say, but she had to say something. To apologize. To take it back. To keep him from leaving her.
But she couldn’t tell him the truth. Not right now. If she told him now, he’d not only go, he’d ride away furious with her for lying to him and then clinging to that knee-jerk deception far longer than she should have.
He shook his head sharply, his entire body a negation. “I’m heading out. You’re riding with Paul.”
“I won’t. If you go, I’ll ride by myself.”
He exploded. “For Christ’s sake, Lexie! You can’t just do whatever you want to do, whenever you want to do it. I’m responsible for you, and I can’t leave you to ride alone.”
“You’re not responsible for me! Your sister answered my ad. That doesn’t make you my guardian angel.”
He stepped closer, looming over her, the angriest man in America. Maybe he should have been frightening, but she’d never once been afraid of Tom. She wasn’t about to start now. “In this case, it does,” he insisted. “I need to be sure you’re going to be safe.”
“So stay.” She stepped toward him until they were only inches apart again, their eyes locked, both of them too stubborn to yield.
“I can’t.”
“What just happened. That was—” She faltered again. She wanted to tell him it was a mistake, that it wouldn’t happen again, but it would be a lie. If he stayed, she was going to have sex with him. Against her better judgment and against all reason, just because she wanted to more than anything.
More than she wanted to finish the trip, even.
The thought caught her up short. What was the matter with her? How had she managed to lose her mind so completely in such a short period of time?
She needed to let him go.
“What just happened was wrong,” Tom said. His voice was low now, practically a whisper, but he spit out the word like an expletive. “I can’t do this. I need you to tell me you’ll ride with Paul so I can go.”
She met his tortured eyes and nodded.
He walked away.
8
