My jaw drops at his accusatory tone. “I pay someone to care for my garden!” I stamp my foot with indignation, feeling immediately defensive for some odd reason.
His eyes drift down my body, landing on my legs, and heat flourishes behind his hard grey eyes. He licks his lips and his nostrils flare in challenge. “You have to stop stamping your foot.”
“Why?” I recoil and my face screws up in disgust over his ridiculous demand.
“Because it makes me want to throw you over my shoulder and spank the ever-loving shit out of you. And then I’m going to want to fuck you until you forget whatever it is you’re angry at me for!”
My heart stops. Time freezes. “Hayden,” I croak, not all together comfortable with how my body is reacting to his sexual threat.
As if reading me like a book, his chin drops and he begins walking slowly toward me. His hand grips his wrist so hard his knuckles turn white. “Before…I didn’t think I could have you. But now I know there’s no way I can’t have you.” I inhale sharply at the twinkling determination in his eyes. “I want to know you, Vi. I want to know why you stamp your foot. And what exactly you love to cook. And why you never cared to play football. Who you’ve ever dated. Why you spent six hundred pounds on a keepsake box that you’re just going to give away.” He stops in front of me. “I want it all.”
“You’re so confusing, Hayden,” I reply, my voice embarrassingly breathy as he stands only a foot away from me now. His eyes are glossy with obvious lust. Pure, undiluted lust. “You kiss me and run away, then kiss me and tell me I can do better. I don’t know what you’re even saying.”
He licks his lips thoughtfully. “I’m saying that tonight when you showed up looking the way you did…” he pauses as his eyes drift down my body. His heated expression makes me feel every drop of hot blood coursing through my veins. “I wanted to have you right then and there. But not in a club full of people. I wanted you in the privacy of your bedroom…where the curves of your hips, the rise of your chest, the moisture on your lips…are for me and me alone.”
I exhale at his guttural tone and am embarrassed when a throaty noise comes out of my mouth. He takes this noise as permission and moves in closer, his posture hunched as he looks down at me. “So, I’m sorry for some things, Vi. But I’m not sorry for interfering. To ask me to just walk away when a prat like Ethan Simmons worms himself within inches of your mouth…your fucking mouth that I’ve touched with my lips…lips that I have claimed as mine in a thousand different fantasies…No, Vi. No. I’m not going to be sorry for that.”
“But you said—”
“Stuff what I said. I can’t stay away from you.” The words rush out of his mouth as he harshly grabs me by the waist. His bruising, firm grip shoves up the stretchy fabric of my top as his lips find mine in a desperate, needy kiss. He greedily yanks the cups of my bra down and caresses my nipples in such a way that I rip my mouth away from his and let out a strangled cry. I’m not all together certain I’ve ever heard that sound come from my mouth before.
He releases my nipples to pull my top off over my head, revealing my lacy red bra tucked firmly beneath my breasts, pushing them up for his lustful perusal. He drops an open mouthed kiss on each of them before standing back up straight. Groaning in frustration, he pauses his assault and looks into my eyes. A warmth blossoms in his gaze as he wraps his arms around me, holding me close. “I’m terrified, Vi…of so much. But I don’t have the strength to walk away from you again. You make me weak.”
I exhale with relief and anxiety over his comment, feeling my emotions at odds. I’ve been wanting Hayden Clarke to let me in since he first kissed me outside my building. But what does it mean when he says he feels weak around me? Am I capable of hurting him? I lick my lips and guide him down to my level. “Maybe with time I can make you strong.” He swallows my words with his mouth and our lips move against each other more passionately than ever before. This kiss is less frenzied and desperate. Less lustful and hard. With this kiss, our lips mould in synchronisation, equally giving and taking, like two flames licking the night sky in perfect, rippling unison.
“Stay the night,” I demand against his lips, forgetting everything that confuses me and just wanting to keep him with me long enough to figure it all out. I moved into this flat to assert myself in my life and become more independent. I refuse to let my entire happiness rest in the hands of this stunningly complicated and somewhat broken man.
He swallows hard and nods as if he knows what he’s agreeing to is huge and he’s making a commitment to himself as much as he is to me. “Okay…but no spanking,” he smirks and his chest rumbles beneath my hands with his silent laughter.