LITMIR.BIZ

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mind pushed into overdrive.

      Eyes closed, fingers flared at his shoulders, she tried to brace against the curl of anticipation licking through her belly. Remind herself that Nate’s mouth sliding against her own was just for show. For whomever had opened the ballroom door—the door that remained open if the volume of the music spilling into the hallway around them was any indicator. It was a kiss for the gossips. For their individual self-serving interests. But not for their hearts or souls or even their libidos. Only the deafening rush of blood speeding past her ears—the heat of it surging through her veins, awakening her body in ways she couldn’t deny—suggested otherwise.

      Any second he would stop. Pull away and take this fantasy, a lifetime in the making, with him. But until then…

      Payton clutched at the hand-stitched lapels of his jacket, her body curving into his. She’d call it a good show, call it anything Nate needed to hear, but the honest truth was no fantasy had ever measured up to this moment and, audience or not, she couldn’t control her physical reaction to a kiss she’d dreamed of since she was thirteen.

      Her fingers skimmed over the contours of his broad shoulders, following the column of his neck until they threaded into the thick silk of the curls at the base of his skull. The forbidden luxury of her hands in his hair, coupled with the seductive pull of his mouth against her own, was too much—too good, everything and not enough all at once—and drove a soft, pleading moan past her lips.

      Nate stilled, his mouth fused with hers.

      Oh, no, he’d heard her. Heard the sound of desire in a kiss scripted for deceit. She couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe—couldn’t quell the frantic beating of her heart or her desperation to take this insanity further.

      And then a breath, warm and wet, slipped between her suspended lips, carrying the gruff response to her needy plea. “Payton.”

      Tension charged the air around them, a current jumping from each point of contact to the next.

      What was this?

      The arms that held her circled tighter, slipping into something wholly different than the embrace of a moment ago. Into a slow, sensual exploration of his hands across her body.

      Heat radiated from his touch like a hot claim, waking her every nerve. Every sense. Every desire.

      She needed to stop.

      Nate obviously read her renegade moan as a call to spur him further. To up the charade. Only Payton was already in over her head. Her body couldn’t decipher the real from the imitation. And—as his tongue licked at the corner of her lips, eliciting a shudder that racked her from top to toe, had her opening wider to the exquisite sensation of Nate Evans seducing her with his mouth, his tongue, his teeth, and the soft rumble of his groan sounding between them—she slipped beneath reason, drowning in need. She wanted him. More than his kiss. She wanted everything he could give her, show her.

      Only, already it was ending. His lips eased from hers by degrees until only the barest brush of skin and breath kept contact. That lingering touch, suggesting he, too, was hesitant to break away.

      A kiss so carnal, so hot, couldn’t have been—

       Don’t be stupid. Of course, it could.

      She was dealing with notorious Nate, playboy extraordinaire and on a worldwide scale as she heard it. She was out of her league. Out of her mind. And potentially spoiled for life because of one insane, staged make out she hadn’t had the sense of self-preservation to defend against.

      But Nate had caught her off guard. And within the decadent span of that kiss, every fine strand of lingering attraction toward the boy he’d been wove and wound itself into an indestructible tether to the man he was now.

      Oh, she was in such trouble.

      Breath ragged, she tried to focus on the shadowed planes of the face only inches above her. Taking in the harsh drawn features she knew so well—the strong cut of his jaw, chiseled lips, that once-broken nose—she couldn’t bring herself to meet his eyes. To see his thoughts or risk he’d see hers.

      Gaze fixed on the breadth of the shoulders shielding her from the reception, she waited for him to step back and reveal his latest conquest. Then it would be over.

      Only she didn’t want the seduction to end.

      Her hands slipped down to his chest, palms pressed flat against the definition of pure masculine form. If he could sneak up on her like that, she could grope him a bit while she got her breath back. It was only fair. Except the feel of his hard-packed physique beneath her hands wasn’t doing much to calm her. The flex and pull of his layered muscles. The beads of his nipples. Hard and enticing. Forbidden little playthings that, once found, she couldn’t leave alone.

      Nate’s hands clamped around her wrists, stilling her shameless exploration as his breath punched out in a cough.

      What a fool to think this could be hers.

      Pulling herself together, she managed to make light of a situation that was anything but. “You could have warned me,” she laughed, praying the sound was more convincing than it felt.

      A second passed. And then another. Her eyes closed against the rising ache in her chest. The crazy sense of despair she didn’t have any right to. She wanted more. Wanted to be the kind of woman a man like Nate took home. But he’d already said it once. She was the good girl.

      He took her chin between his finger and thumb. Her gaze lifted to his and her breath caught. Strain deepened the lines etched around his mouth and blatant hunger darkened his eyes. His jaw jumped with a tension she couldn’t believe.

      “Warned you? No.” His gruff voice was low and serious, not the jovial Nate she knew so well. He held her gaze, considering, and then slowly the corner of his mouth turned up. And closing the distance between them, he answered, “I don’t think I could have.”

      Hell, this was Payton Liss twining her arms around his neck, melting into his kiss with a breathy sigh—a sound that was all sex and need, and doing very bad things to his imagination. Brandt’s little sister whose grown-up curves burned against his body, heating his blood like liquid fire. Miss Off-Limits herself, with her fingers wound tight in his hair, opening that lush mouth of hers in a sweetly seductive invitation, begging him to take. And he wanted to take. To hell with however many sets of eyes were trained on them through the open door at the end of the hall.

      Except, as of that moment, Nate didn’t want to share.

      He didn’t want to play pretend. He didn’t want anything but the private continuation of the kiss that just blew his mind. There had to be a hundred reasons why giving into the need surging through his veins was a bad idea. Only, he couldn’t think of one. All he could see, and with a sudden, vivid clarity, was that Payton Liss belonged in his bed.

      The music faded, quieting to a muffled hum that resonated through the hallway around them.

      Straightening, Nate shot a glance over his shoulder. The door to the ballroom had closed—whoever opened it having come, seen their fill and left. Whether they’d recognized Payton he had no idea, but they’d seen someone in a rather conspicuous dress. Which was enough for today.

      His focus turned back to the unexpected lure in his arms, his gaze touching on each delicate feature of her upturned face. Lingering on her mouth as the brush of his thumb across her kiss-swollen bottom lip set off an all too satisfying shudder.

      He wanted her. As he couldn’t remember wanting before. And she was willing, in his arms, looking up at him with eyes asking for one thing. More.

      Only with a woman like Payton, more could mean way more than what he had to offer. She didn’t know the score and didn’t play for fun. He couldn’t risk her reading promises he had no intention of delivering on into the kiss they’d just shared.

      “You know I’m not the right kind of guy for you, Payton.”

      It was a warning. Plain and simple. To both of them.

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