Total pages in book: 55
Estimated words: 50801 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 254(@200wpm)___ 203(@250wpm)___ 169(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 50801 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 254(@200wpm)___ 203(@250wpm)___ 169(@300wpm)
“You’re ridiculous,” she teases.
“Why?” I ask. “Because I love your parents? They love me back.”
“Everyone loves you back,” she argues.
Not everyone.
I almost say the words out loud, but catch myself. I know Monroe loves me. She’s my best friend. And that’s okay. She doesn’t have to love me in the way I love her.
“So, it’ll be a fun Thanksgiving with an NFL hall-of-famer then,” I say. “I’ll have to do a dinner and get all the guys to come so we can fan out.”
Monroe snorts. “He’ll likely beat you to that,” she says. “You know how much he loves hockey. I think he cheers for you harder than I do.”
“If that’s true then you need to up your cheering status,” I tease her.
She gapes at me. “Don’t I always have your number on my back?” she fires at me. “At this point I should just have the number sixty tattooed on my arm.”
The words paint an image that has me salivating in the most caveman way possible and I do my best to quash it. But damn. Seeing her in my jersey—even in friendly support—has always been a turn-on. If she had my number inked on my skin? Fuck me.
I grab my phone, smirking as I bring up a web browser.
“What are you doing?” she asks.
“Searching for local tattoo places,” I tease. “I’m sure there’s one where we could get that done.”
She laughs and reaches for my phone, the motion causing her to come fully onto my chair as I pull it just out of reach.
I loop one arm around her as she crashes against my chest, giggling as I keep it away from her.
Then her mouth is against mine, her kiss searing as she teases me with the tip of her tongue—
“Got it!” she proclaims, taking my phone right out of my hand. “No ink today.”
I laugh, not even trying to get it back. “You’ll pay for that,” I tease.
“Oh yeah?” she asks, putting my phone next to hers on her abandoned chair. “How?”
Lava ripples beneath my skin as I shift her against me, her body now flush with mine and her lips a breath away from my mouth.
“I could ensure that you get no sleep tonight,” I say, my tone lowering as blood thrums hot through my veins. I slide my hands over her smooth skin, relishing every inch of her against me.
“Hmm,” she says, dragging her lips against mine in a tease. “Maybe it’s you who will be kept up all night.”
Fuck me. That quickly, I want her.
So much so that if she keeps teasing me like that, I’ll end up inside her right here on this beach, risk of getting caught be damned.
“Maybe I should take you home right now,” I say, lightly gripping her ass in the way she loves and being rewarded with the sexiest little whimper.
“Home,” she says, then draws back enough to look down at me. “About that…” She dips down again, kissing me quickly, almost like she can’t help it. “What exactly is going to happen when we get home?”
The seriousness of the question shakes a little of the pulse-pounding-lust from my mind, and I clear my throat. “What do you want to happen?”
She sits up a little, positioning one thigh on either side of my hips as she looks down at me, her hands tracing my chest absently. “I don’t know,” she admits. “We live together…for the time being.”
The end of that sentence makes a little hole creep up in my chest, but I ignore it.
“We do,” I say, skimming my hands along her hips.
“And we’ve clearly crossed lines here on vacation,” she says. “Is this an only on vacation situation or…” Her voice trails off.
“I don’t want it to be,” I admit.
“Really?” she asks, the sound of surprise coloring her tone. “You’d want to continue this? Even when you know where I stand on marriage?”
I shift in my seat, sitting up so we can be face to face. “I want you in whatever way you’ll have me,” I reassure her. “If that means we continue just as we are, then we do. If you want to stop, we do. The question is, what do you want?”
She hesitates, drifting closer and closer to my mouth with hers. “I don’t want to stop just because we go home.”
Her words are like gasoline to the flames roaring inside my body, and my lips are on hers in a heartbeat. I tunnel my fingers through her hair, slanting my mouth over hers to kiss her deeply, letting my body say all the things I can’t.
She kisses me back, hard and with as much passion, the two of us completely lost in each other. Her body is soft and flush against mine, and the swimsuit is doing little to separate us. One shift and I can sink between her gorgeous thighs—