door, and the impression goes hardcore Downton Abbey.
Brent doesn’t pause to make chit-chat with his staff; he takes my hand and hurries me through an enormous entryway, down a hall that offers peeks into beautifully decorated rooms and up three flights of mahogany stairs.
Opening floor-to-ceiling double doors at the end of the hall, Brent ushers me inside and closes the doors behind him. It’s amazing, everything I imagined from gazing at houses like his from the outside for the past innumerable years.
I never thought I’d be inside.
Especially not like this.
Beautifully crafted and completely male, the space is lined in dark paneling, and oriental rugs in shades of red and blue and black. A glittery chandelier hangs down above us, the opposite wall adorned with curve-topped windows. To my right, the room steps up and the bed is the centerpiece.
I eye Brent and find him looking at me with lust-filled eyes. Between here and the bed, all sorts of curated décor and antique-looking furniture lie in the way.
He unbuttons his suit coat and shrugs it off. His white dress shirt has settled into the dip of his abdomen, showing off the rigid cut of muscle there. A thrill goes through me at the anticipation of seeing him undressed. Of seeing him naked, his silken flesh mine to touch, to taste.
“Come here,” he says while working his tie loose. Taking three steps, I stop before him, reaching for the tie. He watches me for a second before dropping his hands. Slowly, I work the knot until it comes free in my fingers. The dip at the base of his throat bounds with his pulse as I move to work the buttons on his shirt.
I only get to three when he grabs my wrists and drives me backward against a loveseat. His palms grip my face as he slams his lips onto mine. Gasping, I sink into the kiss, opening my mouth when he demands it with a push of his tongue. My teeth scrape his as I turn my head to take him more fully. It’s messy and devastating and I need the kiss more than I need air.
His lust is my breath.
My hands cruise his body. Frustrated by his clothing, I claw at his shirt, desperate to feel the hard-soft planes of his body. Brent grabs the front of his shirt and pulls, buttons popping and flying everywhere. His smile is cocky before he dives into another kiss.
I help him strip the shirt off, then his belt. It lands with a metallic clunk on the hardwood floor, the sound a loud contrast to our heavy breathing. Somehow, we spin as his hands cover my breasts and thumb my nipples over my dress. I clench as pleasure bursts through me. Something behind me wobbles, then tips and begins to roll.
Pulling from his kiss, I look behind me and grab a crystal vase just before it can roll off the dainty looking end table. Brent takes the vase from me and tosses it. It shatters on the floor at the front of the table. Open-mouthed, I stare at him.
“That probably costs more than my car.” I try to shift to the side, but he holds me where I am, my ass pressing into the table.
“That’s part of the fun of it.” He slips my dress down my shoulders and I wish it would just disintegrate.
“Breaking expensive things?”
“Breaking them because of the fuckhot sex we’re having.”
Okay, he’s got me there.
I release the ties that hold my dress in place, and he pulls me roughly forward so it can fall down my body. I inhale a sharp breath as the air chills my skin. Brent rakes me with a gaze that warms me.
“Fuck, you’re beautiful.”
I don’t have time to be pleased by his appreciation. He rips my bra off, the straps pulling sharply against my skin before he unhooks it and throws it. In one move he bends me over his arm and pulls my nipple deep into his mouth. Reaching behind me, I palm the table in an attempt to keep my balance.
Moving to my other breast, he nips and pulls until I’m writhing. It takes a second to realize he’s stopped.
“Wh—what?”
He shakes his head and palms my breast. “Nothing … well, I
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