“I want to tell you something,” Smith says then, clasping the back of his neck with one hand.
“Now?”
“Yes.”
I peer up at the sky. “Fine, but you need to make it quick. I don’t like standing out here and you shouldn’t be driving in this anyway.”
“I’m leaving Franklin.”
A frown and furrowed brow take over my face.
“What? Why?”
I meet his gaze then, and something spicy and unavoidable flares up in my veins. His lips are parted and his chest is almost heaving with each intake of breath.
“You know why.”
The words are so low, they’re a half growl. I suck in a breath.
“Smith . . . ,” I begin, trailing off. His gaze pins me and he tilts his head to one side as he regards me.
“Are you saying you can keep doing this?”
I swallow hard. “I—I don’t know.”
He takes a slight step forward.
“Because I can’t,” he says, his voice strained. “I can’t see you every day and not touch you. I can’t listen to you talk without watching your mouth and imagine it wrapped around my cock. I can’t show up in your classroom and not push you up against the wall and slide my hand inside your skirt to see if my presence makes you wet. If I see you, I want you. Period. And I can’t do this anymore.”
“But—your credits . . .”
“I’m not worried about that,” he says, almost spitting the words at me. “And neither should you.”
“Excuse me?” I blink at him. He just shakes his head with his eyes narrowed. He looks furious. He looks furious at me.
“When are you going to say what you really want to say?”
“I don’t—what are you—”
“Come on, Cyn.” He shoves a hand back through his hair. “Stop letting your brain do all the talking.”
I open my mouth, then shake my head. The fury bubbles up in my chest and feels like it might spill over into my entire body.
“You know what? That’s fine. Drop out. Do exactly what I wanted to do—quit. But then you’re the quitter. You’re the one who gave up.”
I want to punch him. I want to shake him.
“All I’ve done is defend you. What a waste of my time. You clearly don’t care about anyone but yourself, and you don’t care if you are something different—something better— than the parents you’re a product of or the friends you’ve surrounded yourself with.”
I cross my arms over my chest and tip my chin up.
“I refuse to be the only person in your life who wants something better for you. And I do, Smith. I want so much better for you—you deserve so much better.”
And that’s Smith’s breaking point.
He pushes off the doorframe and moves toward me. When his hands reach my hips, he doesn’t even pause as he pulls me into him. I don’t care that he’s soaking wet as I wrap my arms around his shoulders. Neither of us says another word and really, why would we? There’s nothing left to say that our mouths can possibly communicate better by speaking.
When Smith kisses me this time, it’s like he’s on some kind of quest—like he’s searching for something that he knows I’ve got and he’s waiting for me to give it up to him. If that something is a whimper, he gets it right away. He takes advantage of my open mouth and prowls inside.
There’s nothing about this moment that is gentle—it’s fierce and hot and commanding. His tongue delves between my lips, coaxing my own to meet his. I feel my hands move up to grip the front of his shirt as he presses a palm into the small of my back. A thick, hot coil of desire settles low in my belly and I force myself to pull back.
“Smith,” I manage to say when I’ve gotten enough of my own mouth and brain available to form words again.
But that’s all I say, because he leans back in and captures my bottom lip with his teeth.
“Don’t stop me,” he murmurs against my mouth, coaxing it back open, licking his way back in. “Please don’t stop me.”
Maybe it’s the please. Maybe it’s the darkness or the way his skin smells like rain. Whatever the reason, I shift in toward the apartment so that I can close the door behind us. As soon as I do, he’s got me pressed up against it, his body pinning mine in a way that leaves no doubt how much he wants me. How much he wants this. His hardness presses into my softness and we both groan at the contact.
Then, his hands are in my hair and he’s palming my scalp, directing my face up toward his as he lets his lips slide along my jaw to my neck. When his mouth reaches my ear, I know I’m lost to this man. Nothing matters now but how good this feels and how much I want it.
How much I never stopped wanting it—not for a single second, even when I should have.
“All I want,” Smith says into my ear, his breath coasting along my neck, “is to feel you. To taste you. To have you any way you’ll let me. I can’t not be here right now, Hyacinth.” Then he bites down lightly on my earlobe, and my body bows, arching out from the door and into the hard planes of his chest and torso. I reach up to stabilize myself or find some sort of balance, but instead let my hands course over his collarbone and his chest, feeling the straining, muscular flesh beneath and knowing that I need to see it again—this time without the body paint.
“Take your shirt off,” I say, hardly recognizing my own voice.
I’m already pulling at the hem, and Smith doesn’t make me wait. He reaches back behind his head with one hand and yanks the wet cotton up and over.
Holy shit.
He’s even more gorgeous than I remembered. His skin is tan and taut, his powerful frame as impressive as it was the night we met. More so even, since I’m seeing it in my own living room. Even the stormy weather can’t compete with the tempest brewing in my body and hurling itself right between my legs.
“Now you,” he says, cocking his head and caging me in with both arms.
But I’m still mesmerized by him, now reaching out to coast my fingertips along the prominent ridges of his six-pack. There’s a heat that feels like it’s emanating from within him.
Then, I realize what he’s asking me to do and I meet his gaze, feeling shy.
“I—I’m not wearing anything underneath.”
His lips lift on one side in that oh-so-sexy smile, and he leans forward and places his mouth against the crease between my shoulder and neck. I feel his tongue flicker against it and I huff out a ragged breath.
“Neither was I,” he whispers against my skin. “And, in case you haven’t noticed, your shirt’s gotten a little wet . . . it’s not exactly hiding much.”
I glance down, realizing that I’ve absorbed a lot of the water from his shirt into mine—and my white cotton tee is now practically see-through in the front. I’m basically ready to enter a Cancun wet T-shirt contest up in here, and I can feel my cheeks heat with embarrassment. The view isn’t perfect, considering the dim lighting, but every flash of lightning proves to give Smith a full-frontal shot of me and all I have to offer.
I look up at Smith again, watch the embers in his eyes create the kind of fireworks show you only see on summer nights, and I whip the shirt up over my head.
“Fuck,” he mutters, not even bothering to pretend that he’s doing anything but staring at every inch of my exposed skin. I lean back against the door, unsure of what to do with my hands, so I do what comes naturally. I tuck them into the front pockets of his jeans and pull him into me.
The feeling of his skin, so hot, against mine, still cool from the wet fabric, is like some kind of miracle. I feel enlightened by it. I feel alive. He hisses when our chests meet and reaches up to cup my face and kiss me hard—kiss me stupid, as it were, just like I asked him to not so long ago.
“You are so goddamn beautiful,” he murmurs, then slips his tongue back into my mouth, past my teeth, unfurling it and pulling it back, dancing with my tongue and reminding me of what I’ve been looking for since I even knew about kissing—that I wanted to be made to feel that kissing me was as essential to someone as air. Smith makes me feel that way and more.