She licked her lips and, without even thinking, she lunged at him.
Going straight for the dirty business, she coiled her arms firmly around his neck and kissed his square jaw, pressing her body against his marble-hard one. Next she trailed her lips down the length of his throat. She’d surprised him, she supposed. For he stood utterly still, maybe not even alive.
Oh, no, but he was definitely alive, very much so. His warmth seeped through his clothes and spread heat all the way to her bone marrow. Intoxicated by the incredible feel of his taut, warm skin under her roaming lips, Molly trailed a path of kisses down to his collarbone, where she crazily wondered if she should just go ahead and trace it with her tongue.
“Molly?”
Julian’s voice was a thick rasp.
“Mmm,” she answered, placing a gentle kiss in that hollow at the base of his throat.
“You could’ve used your lipstick straight on me, baby. You didn’t have to kiss me.”
It took a moment for that guttural whisper to register. She had been happily—maybe too happily—dragging her lips along the thick tendons of his throat so that they ended up smeared peach and no one doubted, not even Julian and especially not Garrett, that Molly had kissed him.
She stopped abruptly and backed off in sudden confusion, all of her body heat concentrating on her cheeks. “What do you mean…? I don’t even remember where I left my purse, I think Beth has it.”
He must have heard the utter embarrassment in her voice, for he gathered her back against him, his voice even thicker and rougher than before. “Shh. Go on then. This works, too.”
But she hesitated, her cheeks now scalding. As though encouraging her, Julian undid another button of his shirt, so leisurely that as she watched she began to focus on details she had never thought of before. How gracefully his fingers moved. How both their breaths ricocheted off the walls of the small space.
How she could feel his eyes burn like lasers through the top of her head as she watched him undo another button.
How a hot little tingle spread across every inch of her skin.
And how this would all be so easy to dismiss if she hadn’t seen him almost naked…
“Now try kissing me a little lower.”
He spread his shirt open, fully open, and Molly’s windpipe clamped shut. Her knees wobbled in place. Jules could be a sculpture, he was so defined and so lean. At such a short distance, he looked even more ripped, like a top athlete. Molly could see every square indentation of his washboard abs, every sharp rise and fall of muscle.
A tremor rushed through her, and when she didn’t move, he slipped his hands onto the back of her head and gently urged her toward him. His fingers were long and felt gentle on her scalp, and as she set her palms on his rib cage and bent her head to his collarbone, she felt his fingertips work on her butterfly clasp and undo her hair.
A hot little shiver rushed from the top of her scalp to the tips of her toes as her hair tumbled to her shoulders. Trembling, she lowered her head and set a dry kiss on the V of his neck. Gingerly at first, holding her breath, trying to suppress another tremor building inside her body. Julian stood utterly still, and she wondered if he held his breath, too. Then she heard him softly say, “Go lower.”
Her eyes drifted shut and she set down another kiss, pressing her lips lightly against the tautly stretched skin above his six-pack. She felt the muscles contract under her fingerprints, and her tummy clenched in response. Why did she feel so shaky? Why was her mind spinning inside her cranium? She felt like a teenager stealing a first kiss, like a bad girl misbehaving, which she’d never been before. Of course it was all due to the excitement of making Garrett jealous. She had to remind herself all these emotions were due to the fact that her and Julian’s plan was so good, it was going to work.
“Lower, baby,” he murmured in a thick, raspy voice.
She was so trusting of Julian that she almost automatically obeyed, following his instructions without hesitation, while in the back of her mind she started to wonder how he would get Garrett to see that Molly had kissed his washboard abs, too. Daydreaming of Garrett’s jealous face while a strange liquid fire simmered through her veins, she let her lips wander lower, Julian’s skin hot and silky under her lips…her heart thundering in her ears as she heard him once again rasp, “Lower.” Feeling like she was dreaming, she went lower, her eyes feeling heavy as a strange tremor tingled along her nerve endings, until she heard him unzip his pants.
Startled, she lifted her head in confusion. He was laughing down at her, his eyes sparkling in the shadows, those sensual lips curled at the corners as he zipped back up.
“You’re so innocent, Molls. I was wondering when you’d catch on,” he said.
She smacked his elbow and straightened, already feeling a rush of color climb up her cheekbones. “You jerk!”
She tried pushing him aside but he seized her wrists and yanked her back to him, his laughter lingering in his voice. “No, no, no, not yet, baby. We need to work on you now.”
He rumpled her hair with those long-fingered hands and Molly felt herself clam up, her throat closing with an unnameable emotion. She felt…unsteady. Vulnerable and open to him. Even those feathery touches on her scalp felt special. Electric. Rushing from the roots of her hair to her brain, charging her with inexplicable adrenaline.
As he worked on her hair, the mist of his breath fanned, warm and minty, across her forehead, and she had to use all her effort to fight the impossible flames flicking through her body. His smell was killing her. Dizzying her.
What was happening to her?
This was Julian, not Garrett. Julian.
She sucked in an unsteady breath, and his hands went still on the crown of her head. Their eyes locked in the dark as his hands slid down to her nape as he slowly ducked toward her. Closer. Closer.
She was frozen in place, her voice a breathless whisper. “Julian…what are you doing…?”
“Shh. I just want some of your lipstick on my mouth. Just a little.” His breathing changed as he secured her cheeks between his big hands, and she became aware of the bite of something incredibly large and rigid against her stomach.
“Julian…” she said, turning her head to the side. Their noses brushed accidentally, but rather than pull back, Julian dipped his head even farther and scraped his mouth purposely across hers.
The contact singed.
Her mouth parted on a gasp.