was saying.
“How do you think I’ll react?” I asked.
“I think you’ll try to climb me, but not so you can put me in a headlock.” He looked good enough to eat when he said it, too.
Despite my better intentions, I couldn’t seem to stop myself from licking my lips, and a thrill rushed through me at the way his eyes followed the path of my tongue.
“Am I right, then?” His voice was rough, like simply getting the words out was enough to leave him straining. “Will you be all over me when I kiss you? Climbing me? Trying to crawl inside me?”
“I don’t know if this is a good idea.”
“It’s not. It’s a really bad idea.” But he inched closer to me on the couch, taking the throw pillow from my hands and tossing it to the floor so there was nothing between us.
“So bad,” I murmured.
“The worst, really.” He was so close his heat swamped me, drawing me in toward him like a moth to a flame. I was powerless to resist. Especially when he settled his hand on top of my forearm and slowly inched upward along my bare skin.
I shivered. “Thought you weren’t going to touch me,” I said, somehow putting some heft behind my voice.
He leaned in, closer and closer. “That was the plan.”
I shifted, as if to move away, but somehow my lower legs ended up draped over his thighs. “This is a bad idea.”
He tucked his other hand under my knee and tugged until I was seated on his lap. “You already said that.”
“So did you.”
“So obviously, you agreed.”
I did. Still. But Jackson brushed the side of my breast with the pad of his thumb, and a great, whooshing breath flew through my lips. Inhalation. Exhalation. All at once. “I don’t think we should do this,” I said, but I grabbed hold of his collar with both hands and dragged myself closer to him. Stupid. Really, really stupid of me.
“I know.” Jackson’s lips were only a hairsbreadth from mine. His warm breath fluttered over my skin, leaving me flushed. “But I want to.”
“So do I.”
Through my dress, he circled my nipple with the tip of a finger. It came to a taut peak, straining for more.
“Dare you,” he said. And smiled. It was his half-sweet, half-cocky smile that had always melted me, getting me to forgive him within seconds no matter what he’d done to earn my ire.
Damn him. Jackson knew I couldn’t resist that smile, and even more than that, he knew there wasn’t a chance in hell I would pass up a dare.
I yanked on his collar and brought him down to me.
Hard. Hot. Wet. Almost bruising in its intensity. This was no sweet kiss.
Both his hands came up to grip my hair, like he’d said he would, and he tilted me until I was exactly how he wanted me. He nipped at my lower lip until I opened and let him in. I moaned, but the sound got lost in our frenzy.
His cock pressed against my thigh. I couldn’t stop myself from sliding my leg back and forth to stroke him. He growled into my lips and tightened his grip on my hair, locking me in place for his feverish assault.
“You make me crazy,” he said when he came up for air.
“You are crazy.” And so was I, for allowing this to happen.
He held my head still, staring down at me, his chest heaving. So was mine. My grip on his shirt was so tight my fingers hurt, but I couldn’t let go. I didn’t want to go back to the real world. I wanted to stay here, in this moment, for as long as possible.
Because in the real world, Jackson and I didn’t kiss like this.
In the real world, we were just friends. Nothing more.
But this? This was more.
And it scared the crap out of me.
“Your lips are swollen,” he said, the half-sweet, half-cocky grin coming back.
Once I caught my breath, I said, “So are yours.” He was wearing some of my lipstick now, too. I reached up to wipe it away, but he sucked my finger into his mouth and nibbled on the tip. I shuddered, trying to hold on to this moment. Because this couldn’t be happening. It was a drunken fantasy and