Hard No: Secret Baby Enemies to Lovers Romance by Hazel Parker (sad books to read txt) 📕

“Yes,” I say. “So far, so fantastic.”

“Good. Now, let’s get you home.”

Chapter 16 - Trent

Steph takes my arm for the second time tonight as we walk along, our heels making soft clicking sounds on the sidewalk.

I am deliberately setting us out at a slow pace. I want to draw out the evening. I’m not ready to say good night to her yet, especially not now, when she has her arm threaded through mine and I can feel the soft press of her breast against me.

During dinner, I had wished more than once that Louis hadn’t been there, that it really had just been Steph and me. I didn’t want to share her with anyone else at that moment, or at this one, either. I want her all to myself.

And I want her.

“I guess this is the part where I ask if you’d like to come in for a drink or coffee,” she says as we reach the door of her apartment. “But all I have is vodka, I’m out of coffee, and my living arrangements are a good bit humbler than I’m sure you’re used to.”

“That’s all right,” I say. “I don’t really feel like a drink, or coffee. And as I remember it, your apartment is perfectly fine, albeit a little decked out in flowers by an overzealous admirer.”

“Oh, it struck me as just the right degree of zealousness,” she replies. “So…would you like to come in, then?”

I step a little closer to her. “I said I wouldn’t keep you out late.”

“We’re not out anymore,” she murmurs, looking up into my eyes.

“Still, I wouldn’t want to keep you up late.”

She steps in closer to me. “I’m always up late anyway,” she says.

“Me, too,” I say, taking her face gently in my hands.

Our lips come together, softly at first, then with growing intensity. Her apartment door is open partway behind us, and she slaps a hand at it, trying to open it up all the way without breaking our kiss. I put my hand against it and shove it open. It bangs against the inside wall.

Steph steps backward over the threshold and into her living room, her hands on either side of my neck, trying desperately to keep me close.

We break apart, and she looks at me through slightly lowered eyelids, breathing heavily. She reaches behind her back and attempts without success to lower the zipper of her dress. After a few maddening moments of watching her struggle, I come forward, turn her around, and yank the zipper down. Too much force. There is a rending sound as the fabric tears.

Heedless, she shrugs the dress from her pale, flawless shoulders and looks over at me. It’s all the invitation I need. I put my hands on her waist and bring her in close, kissing the nape of her neck, exposed now from beneath her tousled hair. She sighs and lets her head dip forward, allowing me access to even more of her flesh.

The ruins of her dress have pooled down around her waist. I figure the garment to be a lost cause and tear at it further, splitting it right up the middle, yanking it away from her body and tossing it aside.

She is standing there in her heels and undergarments, against a background of flowers, and the sight is driving me out of my mind. I have to have her.

She presses close to me and opens her mouth to mine again, her hands busily removing my coat and tie. They join what’s left of her dress, flung carelessly off to parts unknown.

I bend at the knees, hook one arm behind her lower thighs and lift. She falls into my arms as I pull her from her feet.

“There,” she breathes, jerking her head in the direction of the bedroom.

I carry her across the living room and into the semidarkness of the bedroom. There is a wide sliver of moonlight coming in through the curtains, slashing across the bed. That’s good—I want to see her.

I lay her down on the coverlet and reach for her, but she has already come up onto her knees and is tugging at my belt buckle. The rest of my clothes and the few ones she has left on are soon shed.

We fall back onto the bed, wrapped up in each other’s arms. Her breasts are crushed against my chest and one of my legs is between hers. She makes a sound in the back of her throat, her lips still locked against mine, and reaches down.

She moans again as she finds me hard and ready, her fingers closing around me.

I roll over on my back and pull her to me. The soft, barely there weight of her atop me is making me insane with lust.

She sits up, straddling my hips and places me against her slit, teasing herself. No, not teasing, she’s actually rubbing me against herself. Her eyes are locked on mine as her breathing becomes more and more wild and erratic.

Unable to wait any longer, I guide myself into her, grab her ass, and haul her onto me, my full length burying itself inside her.

Her shoulders hunch, and her head rolls forward, hair hanging in her face. Then she is leaning back, grinding her hips against me, taking me even further into her. The moonlight cuts across her torso like a sash.

My hands reach up and find her breasts, the nipples erect and hot beneath my fingers. I don’t trust myself not to be too rough with them, not at this point, and drop my grip to her waist. She lowers her own hands and clamps them over mine as her hips begin to move faster.

The whole bed is shaking now. The headboard collides with the wall and a framed picture falls free somewhere to