The Dare Collection 2018. Taryn Leigh Taylor

you don’t want him to go away, something in her whispered.

      Maya was the one who had gone away. She had withstood the humiliation of her wedding day. She had ignored the advice thrown at her from all sides and come here. She had ignored every single instinct she’d ever had about her own behavior and she’d had sex with a stranger in a shed, of all places.

      She’d already gone off the rails. Completely.

      What was the point of stopping now?

      She didn’t let herself think about it any further. She didn’t want the shame in her to win—because it didn’t matter what she did here. She would never do what Ethan or Lorraine had done. She would never ever have broken her promises or compromised her loyalty like that. Never.

      It didn’t matter that she didn’t know what she was doing. Hell, it was a good thing she didn’t. What had knowing what she was doing, every step along the way, gotten her so far?

      She crossed the floor, let out a breath that felt too hot and too shaky and maybe a little bit ugly, too, then swung open the door to let him in.

      Charlie had never missed a woman in his life.

      Especially not one he’d already had.

      He never found himself awake at weird hours, reliving the encounter. Wondering where she was, what she was doing. Wishing they could do it all over again.

      Charlie didn’t know what the hell it was about Maya that got to him.

      He’d seen her these past few days, wandering around the small, vertical village. Aimlessly, to his mind. He’d seen her in the piazza, charming the locals with that smile of hers that rivaled the summers here, a comparison he hated himself for making. He’d seen her race up one staircase, then the next, her attention focused on keeping her feet on the old, uneven steps.

      She’d never seen him.

      She’d also never looked for him.

      When she smiled at him today, he felt like some kid. The kind of kid he’d never been, awkward and excitable.

      He’d told himself there was no way in hell he was running to her like a dog on a leash—

      But here he was, five stories up at her door, as surely as if he was wearing a shock collar.

      Maya was as pretty as he remembered. Prettier, if he was honest. Her dark eyes were that soft, ridiculously sweet brown, lit up today with something he couldn’t quite read. But he could feel it all the same. Her hair was that tempting cloud of black curls he hadn’t touched near enough. She wore another long-sleeved T-shirt in an obviously expensive, sleek fabric that only suggested her curves. Her jeans cupped her ass in a way that made his mouth dry, and there was no reason that the fact her narrow, elegant feet were bare should make his chest ache.

      She didn’t say anything. She stood in her open door, studying him, and he had the strangest sensation that all the odd things he was feeling were plastered across his face. When he had made a dirty career—and lived as long as he had—by keeping his face like stone.

      He didn’t want to think about that. He didn’t want to let it settle into him, like acknowledging the possibility might make it true.

      Instead, Charlie reached over and got his hands in her hair, then dragged her mouth to his, making a noise he might have called desperate if he’d heard it from someone else.

      This wasn’t him. He didn’t do desperate.

      And still, he was the one moving into the room, kicking the door shut behind him and hauling Maya up hard against his chest.

      He was the one getting his mouth on her like he might die if he didn’t drown himself in her taste.

      He didn’t do desperate. He didn’t feel those things. Hell, he didn’t feel anything.

      But he felt her.

      He was already on fire, and she threw gas on it.

      She met the scrape of his mouth on hers, that dirty, slick tangle of tongue and teeth. Her hands were like lightning, smoothing down his sides and sneaking back up under the hem of his T-shirt.

      And it wasn’t enough. It wasn’t anything close to enough.

      He moved her backward, breaking that wildfire kiss only to haul his T-shirt over his head, then throw it aside. He did the same with hers, hissing in a breath at the lacy thing that held her breasts high, then growling a little when he got rid of that, too.

      This time when he dragged her close, he hauled her up against his chest again so her legs went around his waist, and still he kept moving.

      Her breasts rubbed against him with every step, those dark brown nipples like sweet torture, and she was so smooth, sugar and heat, and still not nearly enough.

      He carried her into the other room, moving until they hit the bed, and then he toppled her down onto the mattress. Then came right down with her.

      And once they were horizontal, it all got a whole hell of a lot better.

      They rolled. Maya was on top, straddling him and sitting up so he could get his hands on her. He filled his hands with her breasts, then jackknifed up to get his mouth on one taut nipple. Then, when she was arching into him and making greedy little noises that made his cock ache, the other.

      They rolled again and he was on top, one hand down the back of her jeans to cup that ass of hers. He ground himself against her pussy, making them both grunt each time his cock pressed hard against the crotch of her jeans.

      It was more torture.

      He rolled away from her when he wasn’t sure his control was going to hold. He kicked off his boots, grabbed a condom from his pocket and then got rid of his jeans, too, never happier in his life that he preferred to go commando.

      Until the next second, when she smiled at him, then crawled over to where he’d rolled. That smile widened as she met his gaze, then reached out to wrap a hand around his cock. She tested him, then took him in both her fists.

      That was good. So freaking good he almost lost it.

      But he thought he might have found religion when she swayed even closer, then took the thick head of him into her mouth.

      Charlie’s mind went blank.

      There was nothing but sensation. Her hands gripping his cock. That sweet, hot mouth of hers. Her wicked, dirty tongue.

      He pulled her away, somehow, and the sound of distress she made was almost too much for him.

      “I don’t want to come yet,” he gritted out. “I have plans.”

      “Plans are overrated.”

      She sounded irritated, cranky and horny, and he liked the combination so much he was tempted to make it worse. Tie her up to the bed. Tease her until she cried, then make her scream. Something fun like that, but he didn’t think he had it in him. Not today. He would have to pick another day, when she could suck him off the way she clearly wanted to and he could take his sweet-ass time with that lush body of hers, making her come over and over, until he was ready to go again.

      It occurred to him that he was doing another thing he’d never done before. He never plotted out sex in advance. He had it, then he had more, the end.

      But everything with Maya was different. New.

      Crazy, something in him growled.

      Charlie told himself it was fury that had him reaching for her, stripping those jeans off her and the lacy panties she wore beneath them. He ran his hand along the silken length of her legs, feeling it shudder through him, all that softness and strength.

      He wanted to eat her alive.

      He moved toward the head of the bed, pulling her with him. Then he set her on top of him until she straddled him. First his chest and then, tipping her forward, he held her thighs open so she straddled his