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She smiled but turned to the side instead. “It’s a side zip,” she pointed out. “I think that’s why it’s so awkward.”
Side zip.
The zipper started in her armpit, right underneath the delicate skin of her underarm.
CHAPTER 14
Be nicer to yourself, you dumb bitch.
-Luce’s inner thoughts
LUCE
Okay, so I was now hyperventilating.
His rough fingers brushed the skin underneath my arm as he slowly started to draw the zipper down the length of tight, unforgiving fabric.
The moment the zipper reached my ribs, I knew that he’d seen my boob. Or, at least, the side of my boob.
This dress hadn’t lent any extra room for undergarments.
Furthermore, had he moved his fingers an inch higher earlier, he would’ve discovered that I had zero undergarments on at all.
Meaning, not only did he see side boob when he got to my rib cage, but he also saw absolutely zero underwear when he got to my upper thigh where the zipper came to a stop.
He sucked in a breath, his breathing now unnecessary as he held his breath.
I turned, twisted toward him, and then lifted my arms up.
“Now, this is because I want you to take it the rest of the way off,” I explained bravely.
I was never the aggressor.
Never, ever, ever.
I’d had two sexual partners in my life, Braxton and one other, which meant that I had zero experience in the sex department. I didn’t have any secret moves to make men want me. I didn’t have any experience telling anyone what I wanted and how I liked it—because, let’s face it, besides the one nameless, faceless guy that I couldn’t remember, Braxton was nothing to write home about.
The nameless, faceless guy that I couldn’t remember, on my drunkest night—the night that I told Braxton it was over and that I wanted an immediate divorce—which also happened to be the same night that was the last night of Bain’s freedom.
I’d been a freakin’ mess.
And that mess had been the single, only sexual experience that I’d ever had in my life that I wanted to recreate.
Though I had a feeling this time, being Bain, the man that I’d wanted for the entirety of my life, it would be better than anything I’d ever had in my life. Better than all those dream-filled nights where I pretended my faceless, nameless man was him.
His hand lifted, and I squeezed my eyes shut, because I was about to get everything that I’d ever wanted.
Bain. Touching me. Where I needed him to touch me the most.
The hugs. The pats. The closeness. None of those had been what my body had craved—though a Bain hug, even a platonic one, was probably the second-best thing in the world.
But when you wanted more than a hug… well, then things started to get a little hairy.
When those hugs were never enough…
His fingers touched me, going to the open gap in my dress as he dragged one finger slowly down the length of my side. Chest to hip.
“Are you sure about this, Luce?” he rasped. “Because I think if you tell me no when we get started, my fuckin’ soul will shatter.”
I swallowed hard.
Yes, I was quite sure.
“Quite sure,” I repeated my inner monologue. “As in, if you stop, I think we can’t be friends anymore.”
He chuckled, the sound so deep and dark that it caused my nipples to pebble and shivers to race down my spine.
“Listen,” he said. “The only way this is going to stop is if you ask me to. And God, baby. I sure the fuck hope you don’t ask me to.”
Then he was on me, his hands on either hip, as he started to slowly slip the dress up and over my body. Exposing first my ass, then my belly, followed shortly by my chest.
Then the dress was up and over my head, and I was standing there naked, hair a mess, in the middle of my bedroom, with Bain’s heat surrounding my back.
“Listen,” he said when he felt me freeze. “We’re not going to do anything you don’t want to do tonight.”
He was misunderstanding my frustration. My wariness.
“If we do this, you can’t decide that I’m a problem tomorrow,” I ordered. “Braxton can suck it. We’re giving this a try.”
He laughed darkly as he settled his hands on my hips, his big fingers spanning almost my entire hip bone as he said, “That was the first and last time that you’ll ever mention my brother when I have you naked. Do you understand?”
The dark, deadly authority in his voice sent a different kind of shiver down my spine. The kind that had me thinking this man was dangerous and he wasn’t just some big teddy bear that he acted like with me.
I shivered but nodded. “I do.”
He suddenly moved, pinning me against the wall with my hands above my head.
“The thought of you with him, even years ago, is like a match to a line of gasoline inside my soul. I want to purge it from my system any way I can,” he growled, his words now a rasp along my skin. “You have any ideas how I can do that?”
