He chuckled a little and lowered his head so that his lips could brush against mine. I never wanted to kiss anyone who wasn’t him again. Even that light touch had my knees weak and my center going liquid and soft.

His lips ghosted across the curve of my jaw and trailed up my cheek until they brushed against my ear. His deep voice was heavy with seduction and promise as he told me, “You don’t have to do anything with the words because they’re the simple truth. You inspire them just by being you, Sayer.”

His mouth was on mine, his tongue was tangled with mine, my bra was gone, and his callused fingers and rough palms were working the hem of my skirt up my thighs. It was a whirlwind of sensation and all of my senses exploded and filled up with Zeb. I could taste the spicy tomato sauce on his tongue. I could feel his heart where it tip-tapped against my own and my hands delighted in digging into all the hard muscle that stretched taut across him. He was a tactile fest and I wanted to stroke him, hold on to him, dig into him so deep that he couldn’t ever get rid of me. I could hear our labored breathing as he backed me out of the kitchen and the light groans and moans that escaped both of us when his hands curved over my backside as he shoved my skirt up around my waist so that he could pull on the lacy panties that matched my abandoned bra. I could smell that scent of wood and work that clung to him no matter what and all I could see was green bleeding into the endless black of desire in his gaze as we hit the stairway in the living room that led up to my bedroom.

Maybe if I was more graceful, more familiar with these kinds of situations, I wouldn’t have stumbled. Maybe if I was used to mind-blowing sex and wanton desire, I could have pulled away and taken his hand while leading him seductively up to my lair. Maybe if I was confident and poised in my sexuality, I wouldn’t have teetered and faltered, I wouldn’t have tripped and fallen just like my heart was bound and determined to do every time I was around this man.

But I was just me, the girl who was so overwhelmed by him, by the things he made me feel, so my knees were weak and I lost my balance when he pressed into me and I landed with a grunt on my exposed backside. Suddenly having my skirt shoved up around my waist and being mostly naked in the middle of my house seemed less sexy and way more silly. I groaned and went to drop my head in my hands in embarrassment because only I could ruin such a sexy and heated moment in such a gloriously inept way, but I didn’t get a chance because Zeb’s hands were on my waist and he was urging me up another step as he fell to his knees before me. I never in my life thought that being manhandled would be a turn-on, but the way he effortlessly moved me where he wanted me made my skin prickle in arousal and had me clutching his wide shoulders as his hands skimmed the last scrap of lacey undergarment I was wearing down my legs.

“What are you doing?” I felt like all the control, the purpose I held on to, was fraying and unraveling all around me. Instead of making me panic, the feeling was fuzzy and filled me up with something soft and indulgent. It felt decadent and lush.

“I told you we weren’t going to make it upstairs.”

His deep voice was even huskier than normal, and I shivered at the way it rumbled out of him. His eyes gleamed at me like polished stones, and when he shifted so that he was directly between my spread legs, I could see his erotic intent reflected back at me. I wasn’t the type of girl to let a guy go down on her without several dates and a strong sense of comfort built into the relationship. It was too intimate, too open and raw, so it generally made me too tense to enjoy, but here I was on the stairs in the center of my house, not caring that the lights were on, the windows were open, and I wanted it. God, did I want him to lower his head and fulfill all those dark and dirty promises his eyes were making me.

I leaned back on my elbows on the stair that was behind me and whimpered a little bit when he tickled the inside of my thigh with his work-roughened fingers as he put one of my legs over his shoulder. Thank God for yoga and mornings at the gym. Even with him a few steps below me he was still so tall and so big, so it was a stretch and it burned . . . in a really good way.

I was pretty sure I was blushing the brightest red possible, even in those hidden, sweet places he was now staring directly at. I gulped a little bit and squeezed my eyes closed as tightly as they would go.

“You are flawless. You know that, right?” I felt his words right before the damp press of his lips hit the inside of my knee. The soft brush of his facial hair had goose bumps chasing his mouth as he kissed his way up the inside of my leg. I’d never felt flawless, just honed and polished to a perfect shine that reflected back what I thought everyone wanted to see. With Zeb’s mouth on mine and his hands touching me like I was something rare and precious, that shine was starting to dull, to get marked up, and all the rust and tarnish that went way down inside of me was starting to show.

One of his hands curled around my hip and the other made me jolt as his fingers dipped between my legs and danced between folds and into places that were already wet and aching. I muttered his name on a drawn-out sigh and shifted so that I could wind my fingers into the thick mess of his dark hair. I wanted to hold him to me forever, and if I thought the tickle of his beard against my lips was addicting I knew that I would never recover from the way it felt rubbing against the sensitive skin at the apex of my thighs. It was rough and springy. It scraped across my skin at the same time as his fingers stroked inside my body and his clever tongue landed on my clit.

I think I screamed. I probably screamed because he chuckled against my throbbing center and continued his overwhelming stimulation. I was pulling on his hair, urging him closer and closer even though he was invading all my private places in the most devastating ways possible. He added another finger to the wetness he was coaxing out of me and the gentle nip of teeth. It had my hips arching up off the step I was sitting on and my legs quaking where they rested next to his head. There wasn’t any place to hide from him or the feelings and emotions he had coursing through me. It was a lot to process and I was shocked that I wanted more. I was stunned when the words flew out of my mouth between pants and his name. I asked him to destroy me, to own me, to push me over the edge and leave me shattered in the aftermath. I didn’t use those words exactly, but when I told him “more,” and “deeper,” and “harder,” I think he understood the message.

Suddenly he had my hips in his hands and was lifting them up to his face. The sheer strength this required made me melt, and when he barked at me to touch myself right before his tongue filled up the empty space his fingers had left, I thought I was going to evaporate into nothing. He was fucking me with his mouth, his hands were hard on my skin, leaving marks I knew I would stare at with a mixture of awe and pride in the morning, and I was letting my own fingers drift over that intense spot of pleasure with a deftness I had never, ever known myself to have. The thought of all the times I had done this to myself while thinking of him, while imagining him doing this very thing to me, was enough to have me convulsing and enough to have pleasure rushing across my fingers and flooding his quick tongue with desire. He groaned deep in his chest, a heavy rumble of satisfaction, and it was so hot. We were so hot and I couldn’t believe it. There was nothing cold or icy crawling up my spine, just languid satisfaction and the need to make him feel as good as I felt.