The Road to Rose Bend by Naima Simone (best book club books of all time txt) 📕

same reaction she’d received from Daniel. To receive just the opposite from a man she respected and admired? Yeah, her knees wobbled with happiness.

But the pain? The pain because his reaction, his praise and unconditional offer of help, only solidified that she loved him.

And she was going to let him break her heart.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

“I’m only speaking the truth.” He cupped the back of her neck, his other hand smoothing over her hair. She sensed more than felt his lips brush over the crown of her head, but the caress still hummed through her like a plucked cord. “Thank you for sharing it with me. For sharing you with me.”

She couldn’t say anything that wouldn’t divulge just how much she yearned for that which he couldn’t give her. Something like, If you’d only ask for all of me, I’d gladly give it. Since she didn’t dare utter that, she settled for pressing her lips to his chest. Right over his barricaded heart.

A growl vibrated against her mouth. His fingers tangled in her hair, gripping the curls. “I’m being sensitive and supportive here, and you’re not letting me.”

“You can be sensitive and supportive,” she said, then bit the dense muscle through his white dress shirt. “And naked.”

“Fuck,” he snapped, pulling on her hair and tugging her head back. A moan escaped her, and she arched deeper into his tall frame. “There’s going to come a time when just the scent of you,” he buried his head in the crook between her neck and shoulder, his heated breath moist against her skin, “doesn’t make me hard.”

“Is that what you want?” She stared up at the ceiling, her heart lodged in her throat. Right where he placed a hot, openmouthed kiss.

He lifted his head, stared down at her with solemn eyes and damp, sensual lips. “It’s what I need,” he rasped. “But not what I want.”

The answer was a double-edged sword, and it sliced her both ways. His mind and heart warred with his body. For now, with her blood simmering in her veins, pooling between her thighs, she’d take it. Take him.

Lifting to her toes, she nipped his bottom lip, then sucked on it. His grip on her hair and neck tightened, and when she would’ve drawn back, he didn’t allow it. Instead, his mouth covered hers, his tongue taking possession of hers. This. Oh God, this she would never get tired of. Like him, she doubted there would come a time when she would. Because his taste, how he mastered every one of her responses, how he seemed to intuit every caress that she needed—they were every bit as addictive as the indescribable pleasure he bestowed upon her.

Being seen.

It was her Achilles’ heel.

Submerging every thought but the heated power under her palms, she met him, thrust for thrust. Until the times—like now—where she just surrendered. Let him take the lead. Let him tug her under with his hungry licks and sucks. Let him be her guide on a sexual adventure into an adult theme park where he was the roller coaster, Ferris wheel and fun house rolled into one.

And damn, did she want to ride him.

She gripped his shoulders, hiking herself higher against him, pressing tighter. Opening wider, granting him more access to the only place she could—her body. With a dark rumble, he tore his mouth free of hers, scattering hard kisses to her cheeks, jaw, throat. His teeth grazed the line of her shoulder before lightly clamping down, marking her with lips and tongue. She tilted her head back, blinking up at the ceiling as molten desire poured through her in a sinuous glide.

Him. She’d been created for him. Like a switch, she came alive in an unprecedented way—an instinctive, primal way. And he was the source.

“Off,” he ordered, fisting the bottom of her top and hauling it upward.

She shot her arms in the air, and as soon as the shirt cleared her head, she attacked the buttons on his. One after the other, she freed them, yanking and snatching until his wide, muscled chest was bared to her like the perfect gift.

“So beautiful,” Cole murmured, cupping her bra-covered breasts, whisking his thumbs back and forth over the straining nipples. For a moment, she paused, staring down at those large hands on her, enjoying the sight almost as much as the heat racing through her like lightning.

She briefly closed her eyes, shivering from the firm strokes to her flesh. Savoring them. But greed rose, swift and demanding, and she flattened her hands on his ridged abdomen. In her head, she could admit she’d become somewhat obsessed with his body, with touching it. And with knowing that Cole seemed to welcome every caress like a big cat basking under a hot summer sun. She licked her lips, imagining tracing each rung of muscle with her mouth. Feeling those muscles flex under her tongue. Later. That promise to herself granted her the strength to refocus and smooth her palms up his torso, over his chest and shoulders and down his arms, taking the shirt with her.

A fine thread of desperation wound through the lust, lending her movements an urgency that hadn’t appeared in the previous times they’d been together. Determined to ignore that tick-tick in her head, like a clock slowly counting down the time, she retraced the same path. Up his arms, over his shoulders and down his chest until the heels of her palms scraped the small brown discs of his nipples. His big body shivered, and she repeated the caress, rubbing, circling...then bringing her tongue into play.

She moaned just as his own moan vibrated under her mouth, his hands tangling in her hair. The flavor of him—rich, sharp, tempered with a sweet, fresh scent like cold water—filled her, and she lapped at his skin, thirsty and unable to quench it. She got lost in him. Capturing him between her teeth and tugging, then licking, sucking the sting away—these became her reason for existence. Her world. Hard fingertips