Page 37 of Hate To Want You
“I’ll drive you home,” I say gruffly. I walk up to the bar and settle the rest of our tab, paying for mine and Heidi’s drinks. When I make it back to the table, she’s waiting for me, and I can tell she’s just as disconcerted by tonight as I am.
We make our way to my car in silence, and I open her door. She mumbles her thanks under her breath as she slides in, and I close the door. In the few seconds it takes for me to walk around to the driver’s side, I decide it’s up to me to dispel the tension.
Except I can’t. Because in the close confines of my car, all I can think about is how close she is. How alone we are. And how badly I want to pull over and find out if she’s as desperate for me as I am for her. Dip my fingers underneath her panties and see if she’s wet to match the ache of my hardening cock. Kiss her and feel her mouth open to me and her body melt under me.
Fuck.
That ache? It’s now a sharp throb as my angry dick presses against my jeans.
Thank fuck, the drive to Westport is quick at night. We manage to fill the time with superficial topics about work, and before I know it, I’m pulling up in front of her apartment building. Shutting off the car plunges us into a silent darkness, but the air is charged with something indescribable. I can sense it like a living being in the car with us, begging to be set free.
I open my door and get out, discreetly adjusting myself to try and hide the evidence of how badly I want her. Walking around and opening her door, I realize my mistake in standing so close when she brushes against me as she stands.
Her intake of breath tells me I didn’t manage to hide fucking anything. And when those mossy green eyes turn up to look at me from under long dark lashes, I know I’m lost.
My hand lifts to stroke her cheek, tucking her hair behind her ear.
“I really want to kiss you,” I admit, my voice sounding hoarse with need.
“Why don’t you?”
At her bold question, my heart fucking stutters in my chest. “Because…I shouldn’t.” That sounds pathetic, even to me.
“There are no rules against this. I checked.” Shit. Her boldness is sexy as hell. The admission that she wants this, wants me, enough to have looked into whether we can be together? The last shards of my resolve are dissolving rapidly.
“Heidi,” I say warningly, but it comes out half-hearted. We both know where this is headed. My hands cup the back of her head and I pull her in until our lips are barely an inch apart. I need to know she’s certain. This is a line we can’t go back from. “Are you sure?”
Heidi answers by closing the distance between us. The second our lips touch, the ripples of sexual tension and attraction that have been growing between us turn into a tsunami-sized wave of lust. She moans into my mouth, and I take the opening, teasing her with my tongue, nibbling on her lips, and consuming her with my kiss.
This is unlike anything I’ve experienced in my forty years on this planet. One touch of her lips and I’m gone, spiraling into the unknown. She was tempting before, now she’s irresistible. Our kiss turns deeper, more intense. Her hands are clutching at my shirt as if she, too, is desperate to get closer.
A car alarm going off startles me back to reality. We’re outside her apartment, this is anything but private, and we’re bordering on indecency with this kiss.
“Wow,” she gasps when we reluctantly separate. Her hands are still gripping the front of my shirt, just as mine are still tangled in her hair.
“Yeah. Wow,” I reply. My heart is thundering as I try to regain some sort of control.
“That needs to happen again. And again and again and again.”
We both laugh at her enthusiasm, and I duck down to press a firm but closed-mouth kiss to her luscious lips. “Agreed.”
Our foolish smiles match as we stand there staring at each other. “But next time, maybe we go somewhere so we won’t offend your neighbours.”
Heidi’s head darts from side to side. “I don’t see anyone offended.” She gives me a wink. “But private sounds good, too.”
Private. Because we shouldn’t let anyone know about whatever this is, not yet.
“The optics of this won’t be great for you if people at work find out.” My thumb strokes her cheek. “Are you sure you want do… whatever this is we’re doing?”
I give her credit; she does seem to pause and consider it for a second. “First of all, let me be clear. I wantyou. Second of all, I appreciate your concern about how this will look for me, so yeah, we’ll keep it a secret for now.” Her hand lifts to cup my cheek as she stares into my eyes. “But are you sureyouwant to do this. I know I said it’s not against the rules of the hospital, and it’s not. But you’re right, it could look wrong to anyone on the outside. I don’t want to cause any problems for you or me.”
I truly didn’t think it was possible to want her even more than I already do, but somehow, I do. Her transparency, her authenticity, her willingness to be open and bold about what she wants… Fuck, it’s sexy.
I kiss her again, partly because I can’t help it, but also because I’m having a hard time coming up with my own response.
Normally, I’m fully in control. I know what I feel, what I want, and what I’m going to say. But Heidi manages to somehow erase all of that from me and turn me into a simple man who wants to worship at her feet.
“You’re a temptress, Heidi Morgan. I think while I was so busy hating you for all the wrong reasons, I didn’t realize just how much I wanted you. But I don’t want to hate you anymore. Not when wanting is so much more fun.” Our lips crash together in another kiss, this one a little more desperate and messier than the last. “Tomorrow night, after our shift, I’m picking you up and taking you out. You deserve nothing less, hell, you deserve a lot more than some secret rendezvous with your ass of a boss. But I’m a selfish man. And I want you.”
