Up in Smoke (Crossing the Line, #2)

Connor’s rigid length dug into her belly and she could feel the pain coming off him in waves. She lifted the hem of her shirt so she could feel it against her stomach, and smooth flesh greeted her. The head of his erection was visible over the top of his sweat pants, round and damp. Her hands itched with the need to touch him there, but she hesitated. Could she please a man like him? She’d learned how to intimidate men by being overtly sexual, but she hadn’t called her own bluff in so long. No, she would try for him. After what he’d done…

Above her, his breathing grew stunted and shallow, as if it were being ripped over razor blades. “I can only take so much, Erin.” He skirted past her and strode away, toward the bathroom. The door shut behind him and silence fell in the apartment. Not complete silence. Her pulse still pounded loud enough to echo in her ears. But his presence leaving the room had the effect of a mute button being hit. She closed her eyes and listened, finally hearing Connor in the bathroom. Heavy breathing, the occasional groan. Something anxious twisted inside her at the realization that he was touching himself. A multitude of emotions had her drifting toward the bathroom. Curiosity, lust…affront that he’d taken the privilege away from her.

She opened the door and stopped in her tracks.





Chapter Four


Connor felt Erin behind him in the bathroom. He’d left the door unlocked for a reason, but when he made eye contact with her in the mirror, that reason seemed unworthy of the moment. Out in the living room, she’d made him feel useless and exultant at the same time. The latter made no sense, so he’d focused on what she hadn’t let him do. She hadn’t let him touch her, taste her. He’d stood there like a rodeo bull and let her use his body to get off. So yeah, when he’d walked into the bathroom, raging with lust so thick he couldn’t breathe, he’d thought, fuck it, let her see. I’m not ashamed of a damn thing.

He’d mistaken the fact that she’d humbled him for taking away his pride.

She stood behind him now with her lips parted and cheeks flushed, watching him stroke himself off like a hormonal teenager. It shouldn’t have made him hotter, not when he didn’t fully understand the problems she obviously had knocking around inside her beautiful head. He should stop now and make her explain, tell her she couldn’t touch him anymore until he knew what she was going through. But there wasn’t any turning back. Not right now, not with his cock heavy in his hand, ready to erupt.

In the mirror, he could see her fingers smoothing against each other, as if she were imagining what it would feel like to replace his hand with her own.

Jesus. He liked having her watch. If her expression had been any different, it might have been another story. The look of wonder, the renewal of arousal that transformed her as she came slowly closer, had him clenching his teeth to prolong the moment. Fuck, though, it hurt. The front of her panties were wet from riding him until she came. Her flat stomach peeked out under the edge of her shirt, reminding him once again how crazy he was to yank it up and see what she hid underneath. At the same time, she looked like an innocent who’d stumbled upon something very, very bad happening and God, it made him want to corrupt her even more. Sick. I’m sick. His balls drew up tight…the tingling began at the base of his spine…

“You should leave,” Connor grated, squeezing his eyes closed. Christ, any minute now…he couldn’t wait any longer. Looking at her, knowing he couldn’t touch her, was killing him. At the same time, his mind was projecting images in a desperate attempt to send him over the edge and find relief. Erin straddling his face, hands cuffed behind her back. Erin’s eyes going blind, ankles around her ears, as he drove into her like a madman. “Go, Erin.”

He didn’t hear her move. One second she was standing at the door, the next she was standing on the rim of his bathtub, just beside his left shoulder. Closer. Her tits were eye level and it took every ounce of self-control inside him not to suck them into his mouth, right through her T-shirt. A tiny moan dropped from her lips as she leaned close, watching his hand work his stiff cock. She placed her open lips on his neck and dragged them higher, where she licked at his ear.

“What are you doing?” he demanded. Do it again.

“What feels right,” she whispered, stroking her fingers over his chest. “Tell me what you’re thinking about. Is it me?”

“Of course,” he shouted. “You don’t want to know any more than that.”

“Yes, I do.” She lightly scraped her fingernails down his back, and he growled. “I want to know what I’m missing out on. Tell me.”

Against his better judgment, he let his lips come within a breath of her straining nipples, shifting beneath her shirt with every breath. Torture. This was torture.

“You said you want to fill every inch of me. Is that what you’re thinking about?”

“Yes, goddammit.”