Page 16 of Same Rogue
“No, you asked me about the kiss, and you asked me about my Pack, and Seth, and how that kiss felt. I’m sorry,” she said, feeling defeated as he began walking away again. “I don’t understand loss like that. I’m overstepping.”
He rested his shoulder on the wall, facing away from her. “Ten years.”
“Ten years,” she whispered. She’d thought it had been more recent. “And you…you never paired up again?”
“Nor will I. A man like me doesn’t get that lucky twice. Her shoes are too big to fill. I’m good until the end just how I’m going.”
“You aren’t lonely?”
He turned, giving her his profile, and parted his lips to say something but seemed to change his mind. He pushed off the wall and stood there, taking up the entire hallway with his presence. “Tonight was the first time I’ve kissed a woman since…you know.”
A frown took Kit’s face. “You haven’t fucked a woman in ten years?”
He ducked his gaze to the carpet and back to her. “I didn’t say that.”
“But…you said you haven’t kissed a woman.”
“You don’t have to kiss to fuck,” Bridger told her.
Ooooh. A sudden vision of him railing some woman from behind consumed her mind, and she flinched.
“Sometimes it was nice to get out of my own head for a little while,” he admitted softly. “I’m still a man. I’m still part animal. I still have the drive to fuck. I just don’t want it to mean anything ever again.”
His words stung her heart. That was loneliness, and it was the bone-deep kind. Kissing was intimacy to him, and he had avoided it for all this time until Kit came along.
But she remembered the way he’d kissed her back. It was like fire meeting gasoline.
“Alive,” she said low.
“What?”
She inhaled deeply and straightened her spine, met his eyes as she said, “You asked me what kissing you felt like. I felt alive. I felt excited. My body liked it. I craved more. It felt naughty because you are a stranger. If you would’ve asked me for more, I would’ve done filthy things with you in the back seat of your truck. I replayed the kiss in my head for the rest of my shift. I liked the taste of you, and the way your hands were rough on me. I liked feeling wanted. So.” She swallowed hard. “That’s what it felt like to me.”
He lowered his chin, nodding and she could see him run his tongue over his teeth as he thought. Those molten gold eyes slid back up to her, and she could see it there in his gaze—desire.
A thrill of excitement worked through her stomach, and Kit clenched her fists around the strap of her purse. Without another word, she pulled the hotel key out and tapped it against the handle to unlock, then pushed the door open. She waited for a three-count, then slowly began closing the door.
Bridger caught it, and the smile that stretched across Kit’s face felt so good.
She let her hand fall away from the door and rolled her eyes closed as his hand went gently to her waist. He pushed her inside and let the door swing closed behind them.
It was dark in the room, and she thought he might leave it that way, but he didn’t. He reached over and hit the light switch, then turned her slowly in his hands. He took the strap of her purse and guided it off her arm, then let it slip to the ground. He removed his hat and set it on the table by the door, then peeled that black t-shirt over his head and let it slip from his fingers. He was every bit as fit as she’d guessed he was under that shirt. He had a six pack, and veins that traveled down his hips and into the top of his jeans. His pecs were perfection, and the line between them was chiseled. His shoulders were wide and layered with muscle, and on both biceps were veins. God, she was such a vein lover.
He wore a simple white gold chain around his neck. His Adam’s apple moved as he waited for her to finish studying his physique.
“I like the way you look,” she whispered before she could stop herself. He wouldn’t feel the same about her, and a wave of insecurity took her. It was her turn to take her shirt off, but he’d been vocal that she wasn’t attractive to him.
He reached forward and grabbed her hand and pulled it to the seam of his pants. He pressed her palm against his huge, hard-as-stone cock. “Don’t,” he murmured, as if he could tell she was beating herself up.
And it settled her. He was looking right at her and was hard as a rock. She was okay.
The fabric of her cropped shirt was soft in her hands as she peeled it over her head. Her hair fell in a mess around her face, and she shook it out. He helped. He gripped the sides of her hair and pulled her closer to him. She thought he would kiss her, but instead, he lowered his lips to her neck, where he pressed a kiss against her tripping pulse.
Kit fumbled the zipper of her jeans, and he lifted his lips to her ear and murmured, “Let me.”
Relieved, she shook out her shaking hands and clenched her fists against his strong chest as he leaned down just enough to reach the fly of her jeans. He popped the button and unzipped her slowly, teasing her lips with his. He didn’t kiss her though.
Oh, she got this game. He wouldn’t kiss her again. She was just a distraction from his loneliness. Okay. Maybe she needed that too.
