One Wild Wedding Night_ Three-Way - Leslie Kelly [13]
But he doesn’t love you. The thought came rapidly, unexpectedly, and she couldn’t force it away. Brandon had thought he was falling in love with her. That, however, had been before she’d run out on him with nothing but an easy lie for an explanation. Any fragile, early feelings had to have been crushed by her actions.
It was far too late to regret pushing away any chance of a future—of love—with Brandon, because tonight wasn’t about love. It was about lust and unkept promises and unfulfilled desire. It was about eroticism and pleasure. And, she strongly suspected, it was probably also a little bit about revenge.
Mia wasn’t stupid. She’d sensed Brandon’s anger and knew his taunts about having one sexual night with her before they parted forever had been partially inspired by payback. He wanted to show her what she was missing out on.
His plan would work. She wouldn’t soon forget this night, though not for the reasons he might expect.
It wasn’t just the sensuality she’d remember…it was the realization that she might have made a horrible mistake. She’d refused to let him love her, pushing him away, without realizing that maybe—just maybe—Brandon was strong enough for her after all. Perhaps he wasn’t too good or too nice. Tonight had shown her he was real and unpredictable and open to absolutely anything. Maybe even handling a relationship with a cold, bitchy woman like the Mia the world knew.
And she’d tossed him away.
“How far, Mia? How far do you want to go?” Brandon asked, still watching through heavy-lidded, half-closed eyes.
Thrusting off her cloak of sadness for the mistakes she could not unmake, she forced herself back to the moment. She had one night…damned if she’d waste it on regret.
“Mmm…further.”
He smiled in approval and Mia licked her lips, wondering why it was so exciting to watch him watch her. Something wicked deep within her wanted to push him, to drive him to insane lust. So she arched her back slightly—two inches at most. Lifting her bottom, she silently invited the stranger massaging her legs to move his attention higher.
He did so. Immediately. When Mia felt his hands slide high enough to brush the cotton towel and the vulnerable curve where her cheeks met the backs of her thighs, she groaned in sensual response. He soothed her, caressed her…but moved no further.
“God, I need another drink,” Brandon whispered hoarsely. He slowly moved out of the room, still watching, as if loath to miss a moment of what was happening.
When he disappeared from sight, Mia tensed. She had a stranger’s hands on her—a faceless stranger’s. She suddenly realized that Brandon’s presence was the only thing that had given her the courage to do this. And that watching his pleasure and excitement had made this interlude a warmly erotic one. Now, with him gone, what had been so damned exciting seemed incredibly risky.
The man seemed to know it because he immediately moved back down her legs, massaging places he’d already covered. Safe places. Non-intimate places.
A very intuitive one, this Sean.
When Brandon reentered the room, he was carrying something in his hand. Something that was ringing. “Hmm, Bridget Donahue, that’s your cousin, isn’t it?” he asked.
Mia sucked in a shocked breath, realizing he held her cell phone. “Brandon, don’t you dare answer that…”
But he did. “Hello?”
Mia swung her arm out, trying to grab for it as he passed by her. She missed, of course.
Brandon held the phone out of reach, grinned and sat back down where he’d been before. “You’ve got the right number.”
What her cousin must be thinking, Mia had no idea. Especially when Brandon leaned close to her, pressing a kiss on her bare shoulder and saying into the phone, “I’m sorry. Mia’s in the…middle of something.”
She heard a low chuckle from the man behind her and closed her eyes in shock. Hopefully her sweet little bookkeeper cousin would never realize that the very wicked Brandon