Читать книгу Breaking All Her Rules - Maisey Yates - Страница 10

Chapter Four

Grace thought she might pass out. All of the blood drained out of her head and pooled in her feet, her lips cold, her brain fuzzy.

Her skin was chilled, but inside she was burning up.

She didn’t know what she was doing. She’d led the conversation here, that was undeniable. She’d been baiting him. Baiting this sexy stranger so that she could see just what he might do. So that she could...what, exactly, she didn’t know.

Well, now it had culminated in a request—no, a demand—for a kiss.

His eyes were burning, golden fire, and she could feel it streaking through her.

She didn’t kiss strangers. Ever.

Especially not shirtless strangers in hotel rooms that were probably more than her month’s rent for one night. Especially not big rough, cowboy-type strangers. Who drew foxes and swore and took her phone and freely confessed to the desire to order porn.

Neither of her exes would have ever admitted to such male crassness.

Likely they engaged in it, but they never would have confessed it.

Though, maybe Zack wouldn’t have confessed if she wasn’t a stranger. Maybe he was feeling freer, too.

Maybe this would be good for both of them.

Sliding down the slippery slope, Grace?

She wanted to punch inner Grace in her smug perfect face. Except, inner Grace had a point. Inner Grace was thinking of Hannah. Of the bad sister. The one who had gone off the rails, into parties and drugs and now, to the point where no one had a clue where she was.

Hannah, the daughter who made her mother cry, and her father sit in a dark room and just stare ahead sadly, at nothing.

The daughter Grace had spent her teenage and adult years trying to make up for.

But no one has to know about this. No one would ever know.

She was fighting against this strange, icy feeling inside of her. The one that had kept her mouth frozen shut and her words carefully chosen while her boss had effectively ripped her a new one. The one that always checked with her parents before she made major decisions, to ensure that her decisions were good ones.

The one that kept her head down and worked hard, her entire life a big demonstration of just how good she was so that no one would ever question it.

And after that showdown in her boss’s office, she was tired of that. Tired of trying to be the Grace everyone else wanted to see. The problem was she didn’t know how to be anything else.

But no one was here to question this. Zack was a stranger. He didn’t know anyone at work. He didn’t know her parents. He didn’t know her.

This room was out of time, this man out of context with everything else in her life.

Why not? Why not do this. Why not take this.

No one will ever know....

“One kiss,” she said. And even as she said it, she knew it wouldn’t stop at that.

But she was tired of being frozen in indecision. Tired of being scared to act.

So now she was acting. Just for now. Just for her.

“Sure,” he said, arching a brow and moving toward her.

He hooked an arm around her waist and pulled her up against him, pinning her arms, his chest hard and hot against her wrists. “If you want to stop at one,” he said, his breath fanning across her cheek.

He smelled good. Like skin and soap. No cologne or any other artificial scent. Just man. And she’d never really appreciated the smell of a man before.

“Well, we haven’t even gotten to the one yet. You’re counting your chickens before they’re hatched.”

“Am I still the fox in this scenario? Are the chickens in the same henhouse?”

“I don’t know. Shut up and kiss me.”

He did. His lips were hard on hers, taking, not asking. And there was nothing about that she should find hot. She wasn’t in to being taken. She wasn’t in to brute strength and big hands. Traditionally speaking. Right now his brute strength and big hands were really doing something for her.

Like, lots of somethings.

He curved his arms around her, his palms flat on her back, pulling her in, his large frame enveloping her. He curled blunt fingers onto her skin, her mouth rough on hers, his tongue delving deep.

She arched into him, and his hand slid downward, down the dip in her spine, curving over her butt. She should be...shocked. At the very least she should be shocked. She shouldn’t be aroused. She shouldn’t want to push her hips back so that his grasp on her was even firmer. So that he was holding her harder.