Page 26 of Expressionate
I shake my head at him. "Why do you have to dissect everything Isay?"
He smiles. I had almost forgotten what the concentration of his smile was capable of. I'm sure any other woman would be a quivering mess on the concrete, but I'm not every woman. I've been used up by a man before – by many. He can't get to me. Not in my mind – that's the place I'msafest.
"You're so damn interesting," he says, “a woman full of contradictions." His eyes trail down my arm to the blackbirds etched in my skin. I cross them over my chest, putting one hand over the tattoos. "You're like those birds," he continues, "beautiful in your dark feathers. You make me want to pull one out. See if you'll snap at me or if you'll let me doit."
"I won't," Isnap.
"Then just give me a souvenir for when you leave," he urges, stepping closer. "Let me in, just alittle."
"Why?" I stare up at him shocked by the fervor in his words, in his tone. "Why should I trust you like that? I don't knowyou."
"You could, though." Tax hovers over me, his big frame blocking out the street lights, the apartment building, and the parking lot. "You could trust me and I'd—I might trust you. We could trust eachother."
"Why me?" Idemand.
This doesn't feel right. But it also doesn't feel completely wrong. It feels like falling, head first, into a tornado – dangerous, but also exciting. It kickstarts my heart and my roilingemotions.
Tax's hand touches my arm, pulling me closer and my heart jumps into my throat. It pounds in my ears, blocking out his next words. I can't even hear him as his lips move in my vision. Those full, masculine, sensual lips open and close, framing words that don't reach me and then they'redescending.
Tax kisses me with a dark reverence. His lips move over mine, pushing them apart, and I'm too shocked to do anything but let him. I don't realize I've closed my eyes until I'm surprised by the feel of his arms coming around me. I fall deep into the kiss. Feeling like I’m wrapped in silk and chocolate. But there’s something more as his erection presses against me. Something darker, dangerous. Something painful. It rockets up through me. My eyes are stillclosed.
When was the last time someone kissed me, and I didn’t have to force my eyes to close? My hands move, with uncertainty, toward his neck, cupping him at the base of his skull and grazing my fingers along his hairline before moving up into the dark locks. He groans into my mouth, clutching me harder, tighter until I can feel him pressing against mybelly.
That dangerous feeling comes back. When he pushes me, I feel a zing. A zap of power in the muscles under his skin. We’re just two bodies bumping and grinding against each other, but it’s what’s inside our minds – the abstraction of our souls that make the feelings explode. Ripping through me like wildfire,uncontrollable.
My core clenches – another surprise – and I move in closer, wanting to grind against that hardness. I gasp lightly when his hand grips the back of my neck with a force that shoots sparks up my spine. I’m reeling – sinking into this strangeman.
Tax yanks his mouth away and my eyes pop open. We're both breathing hard, our chests rising and falling rapidly. Our gazes lock together and a spark of something passes between us before Tax and I dive for each other again, at the same time. He picks me up and then my legs are wrapped around his waist and he's pressing me into the warmth of the Jeep's hood. There's a little lip on the front, but it's too low for me to sit on, so he places his knee there and keeps me upright with a leg on the ground as he grinds his cock into my pussy through ourclothes.
I bite his lip when he kisses me again and he groans, his hips stilling as if he needs to regain his composure or he'll come in his jeans. The outline of his head is the only thing I can see, I can't even distinguish features and then, suddenly, it's not Tax hovering over me. It's Danny. I gasp and my pulse doubles in time – and this time it's not the good kind of adrenaline that begins to course through me. My hands find his chest and Ipush.
"Love?" Tax's hoarse voice is filled with lust, withpassion.
I just need him off. I need him to get off me. I can't have him this way. I can't have Danny ruining things for me. It wasn't rape. I let him do it. I could have said no, and Ididn't.
"I can't," I rasp through tight lips. "I'm sorry, Tax. Ican't."
He doesn't ask me why. He doesn't curse or call me a whore or a cock tease. He simply nods at me and then backs away slowly, so I won't fall. My legs drop from around his waist and I slide down the front of the Jeep until I'm standing on my own two legsagain.
"It's okay," he says, surprising me further. "I get it. I didn't mean to kiss you...it just happened." He seems to rethink his words, and his burning ocean eyes meet mine with intense solemnness. "I don't regret it,though."
He's so full of everything I’m not – yearning, passion, playfulness, excitement, lust. I feel like he's pouring those emotions into me and bringing me back to life – even if he doesn’t know it. I didn't realize how numb I was until he started shoving those emotions at me. It's almost like being drenched in hot water after years in the frozen arctic tundra. A shock to mysystem.
"I'm going inside." I tear my eyes away from his. I can't let that dark stormy ocean in his eyes trap me beneath his surface. I don't want to be trapped anymore, no matter how much the chains I'm in are the ones I’ve made for myself. I need to be free of them. Getting too close to anyone isdangerous.
I take off toward the building, walking fast, but not running. If I gave in to the need to run, then it would just show him how deeply he’s affected me. I don't want that. I feel only marginally better when I make it to my apartment and shut the door behindme.
8
Tax
Iwatch Love take off towards the building. Even though she takes measured steps, her legs still waver on the sidewalk. I wish I could say it was because of me, but I saw how her face changed when I came down on top of her. One moment, she had been as drenched in me as I was in her, and the next, it was like she was in a different time – with someone else. Whoever it was, it wasn't someone she wanted to be with. That much wasobvious.
Leaning back against the Jeep, I inhale the warm night air and fill my lungs with the smell of gasoline and oil from the passing cars. There’s also smoke on the wind; it could be the smell of a fire burning somewhere, but the only fire I’m concerned with is the one Love has left me with. As I wait for my erection to go away – because that girl really fucking gets me hot – my phone buzzes in my pocket. It's Keith. Ianswer.
"How did it go?" heasks.
"I won," Isay.
