And if I’m honest, I’m a little afraid I’m doing the same thing all over again with Silas. That I’m being what he needs me to be instead of who I am. And I have to be certain. I have to know for sure that what I do is what I want.

He says, “How about I just borrow you for the night, then? I promise to give you back. Eventually.”

I laugh, and he kisses me in a way that is far from funny. His hands curve around my bottom and he pulls me up against his erection, and I know how very serious he is.

“You need to tell me now, baby. Because all I can think about is being inside you.”

“No one else touches you, either?” I ask. “While we’re doing whatever this is, I mean.”

“If you’re touching me, I won’t want anyone else.” That’s not quite a straight answer, but he continues: “Right about now, I’ll agree to anything, give you whatever you ask.”

I’d expected him to play it cool, to be the confident, cocky guy that he’s always been. His honesty, the desperation in voice . . . it does something to me. I run a finger lightly over the front of his jeans, following the seam in the same way he did to me. He hisses out a breath, and the hands on my backside clench.

So far, our encounters have mostly consisted of him touching me, driving me insane. Now all I want to do is turn the tables. I sink to my knees, dragging my fingers down his thighs as I go. His jaw clenches tight, and when I undo the button on his jeans, he looks up at the ceiling, muttering a few curse words under his breath. His jeans are stretched tight over the hard length of him, and I’m careful as I lower the zipper. I do it so slowly that I can hear every metal tine unhook. When I finish, Silas is breathing heavy, his fists clenched at his side.

“Baby, I need you to go a little faster or I’m gonna die before we ever get there.”

I tug his jeans down, but I’ve forgotten about his shoes, and it takes him several seconds to kick them off with his jeans around his ankles. It’s a touch awkward, enough to make me nervous that I’m going to do this wrong, that after all of this, all the buildup, I won’t live up to the other girls he’s been with. I’m not naive enough to think that there haven’t been many. And I don’t know how to deal with that. Henry and I were each other’s firsts, so there was never any imbalance there.

I take a slow breath and reach up to touch him through the last barrier of material. The tip of his erection has pushed past the waistband of his boxer briefs, and I trace a finger over the exposed flesh. His eyes are darker than I’ve ever seen them above me. I lean forward and run my lips along the muscled V of his hips. I hover next to his waistband, gathering my courage, and when I exhale, his whole body tenses. I tuck my fingers under the fabric and exhale again, looking up at him as I do. He groans and twitches within the confines of his shorts.

“I take it back. You do whatever the f**k you want, however slow you want. I’ll die and be happy about it.”

I straighten my shoulders, feeling a little more confident, and I pull down that last piece of clothing.

That time in the kitchen, I’d touched him, wrapped my hand around him, so I knew he was thick, but I hadn’t been contemplating putting my mouth on him then.

I lick my lips and his hands shoot forward, but at the last second, he stops before touching me, and curls his arms up toward his chest, restraining himself.

“You pictured this?” I ask.

“God, more times than you probably want to know.”

Weirdly, I think I do want to know.

“How many times?”

“Lost count,” he breathes, his voice thick and rough.

“And when you picture it, what do I do first?”

“Jesus, Dylan.”

“I don’t see the point in doing something if I don’t do it right. You want your hands in my hair, right?”

“God, yes.”

“Then do it. Do what you want.”

He does, his fingers tunneling through the thick strands and cupping the back of my head. But even though he’s done as I said, he warns me, “You don’t want to give me free rein here, baby.”

“That’s exactly what I want.”

“I don’t think you understand just what I want to do to you. You don’t want to be mine, but if you gave me my way, I’d own every part of you. I’d make sure you could never look at or touch your own body without remembering what I did to it. I’d take and take and when you think there’s nothing left, I’d take a little more. I’m okay with being selfish where you’re concerned because—shit. Do that again.”

I’d leaned forward just enough to let my lips bump against him in an almost kiss, and his whole body tensed, right down to the fingers in my hair. This time I wrap my hand around the base, and kiss the head again. When I pull away, I let my lower lip drag over his skin, and he hisses out a breath.

Gathering my courage, I say, “It’s not selfish if I want you to take and take and take a little more.”

Chapter 20

Silas

I can’t resist her. I don’t even really try.

It’s probably too fast, too far, too soon, but I want to be honest with her. I want to be able to touch and taste and tease her without holding back or worrying about what she’ll think.

So, I tell her what I want.

“Take your shirt off.”

She sits back on her heels and bats her blue eyes at me while she unbuttons that shirt that’s been driving me crazy all night. Her fingers are too slow, but I don’t reach down to help her. I just watch as inch after inch of perfect skin is revealed. She shrugs it off her shoulders and lets it fall back behind her. She’s wearing this lacy little thing beneath it, and when she lifts it up and over her head, I get my first completely unhindered view of her body. Her chest is small, but it doesn’t even matter. Her rosy ni**les are hard and perfect, and I can’t resist touching her.

I drop one hand from her hair to explore all that new skin. While I do, she drags her lips back to my cock. I don’t know what it is, but watching my c**k bump against those lips is almost better than an actual blowjob. She looks so innocent, and it feels so damn forbidden, like I’m spoiling her in some way by touching her like that. Like she’s an angel, and I’m the one to make her fall.

“Your shorts, too. Take it all off.”