They were laughing as I walked away, exchanging words with Jax, who lingered as I hit the bar to drop off the empty tray.
“You okay?” Nico asked, intercepting me.
“Yep.” I straightened my shoulders and abruptly decided on a course of action. Jax and I could dance around each other for days if I let us. I didn’t have the patience for it. “I’m heading out for a bit.”
He nodded and reached over to squeeze my hand. “Give him hell.”
“Thanks.” I pivoted and nearly ran into Jax, who’d come up behind me. “You staying somewhere?”
The faint amusement on his face faded into something darker. Hotter. “I’ve got a room, yes.”
“Let me grab my purse.”
He caught my elbow before I walked away. “Gia.”
I looked at him, let him study me.
His thumb brushed over my skin. “There’s no rush.”
“In three days, you’ve popped up where I am across three different states. Now you’re going to cock-block yourself? Really?”
A slow smile curved his mouth. “You’ve got a point. I’ll go get the car.”
* * *
A SLEEK BMW waited just beyond the front doors of Rossi’s when I stepped outside. The car was a rental, but it suited Jax. He was standing by to open the door for me, his lips brushing over my cheek before I took the passenger seat.
It was addicting the way he touched me, as if he couldn’t help himself.
Jax slid behind the wheel. The engine purred to life, and we set off.
Sitting back, I watched him drive, turned on by his confident handling of the powerful car. His grip on the wheel was light, his arm extended in a way that showed off the beauty of his chiseled arms. He was an inherently sexy man and I was crazy in love with him, able to adore every commonplace thing he did.
Which wasn’t fair, I realized. I’d never recognized his flaws, although he surely had some. I had never acknowledged that there might be struggles in his life, circumstances and people who might pull him in different directions and away from me. I’d never scratched below the surface.
Reaching over, I set my hand on his thigh, feeling my palm tingle as the hard muscle bunched in reaction to my touch. He switched driving hands so that he could hold me in place, his skin warm and dry.
He glanced at me. “Are you nervous?”
“No.” Wary, yes, but not anxious about it. “I want you.”
He nodded and drove faster.
We didn’t say anything further on the drive to his hotel or once we arrived. He parked and we entered a center courtyard via a key-card entrance at the side of the building. We took an elevator up, standing on opposite sides of the car, our gazes locked as the seconds ticked by.
The tension was so thick I found it hard to breathe, my lips parted as I pulled air into my lungs in a near pant. I could feel the need radiating off him, sensed the hunger tightening his muscles and sharpening his focus on every response of my body to his. He was hard already, his cock straining against the button-fly of his jeans.
And I was wet and ready, aching between my legs, my breasts full and heavy. My nipples were furled so tightly they throbbed and stretched shamelessly toward him.
His gaze was there on my chest, caressing me, his tongue sliding along his lower lip in a blatant promise of what he’d be doing to me as soon as we were alone.
The elevator dinged to announce our arrival on his floor and he surged toward me, grabbing my hand in his and dragging me after him. A long hallway later, he was shoving open a door to a suite and then he was on me, grabbing me so tightly my feet left the floor. I dropped my purse and hung on.
Jax’s mouth found mine as the door clicked shut, one arm around my waist and the other hand shoved into my hair, dislodging the elastic restraining my ponytail. The finesse he’d shown the night before was gone, only animal hunger left in its wake. His lips slanted over mine, his tongue plunging rhythmically into my mouth, luring me to climb his big body.
My legs wrapped around his lean waist, my arms caging his shoulders, my hips rocking to rub my cleft against the rigid outline of his erection. I moaned as the pressure drove me mad, the layers of denim between us too thick to relieve me.
“Jax,” I gasped into his mouth.
“Hang on,” he growled, pinning me to the door.
My legs straightened, my hands going to the front of my jeans. I popped the button open and yanked down the zipper, struggling against Jax, who was shoving up my shirt.
His hands found my breasts and squeezed through the thin satin of my bra. I gasped, shocked by the intimacy.
“Christ, you’re gorgeous,” he breathed, his thumbs circling the hardened points of my nipples.
My head fell back against the door, my lungs struggling for air.
His dark head lowered, his tongue licking me through my bra, his lips wrapping around me. He sucked hard, and I writhed, my hands clawing at the door behind me.
“Hurry, Jax. Damn it!”
His dimple flashed, then he was kissing me again, his body hard against mine, his hands between us as he wrenched his button-fly open. I barely had the sense to dig his wallet out of his pocket before he shoved his jeans down and out of the way. Fumbling, I found a condom and tossed the wallet on the tiled entryway.
I was ripping open the foil with my teeth when he started pulling at my pants, tugging them roughly. I stumbled, laughing, falling into him, letting him sweep me up again and lower me to the floor.
Kicking off my shoes, I wrestled with him, our arms and legs tangling as we fought our clothing and our own desperate urgency. Jax yanked off his shirt, pulled the jeans off one of my legs and ground out, “That’s good enough.”
He ripped my panties to get at me, hissed through his teeth when I sheathed him in latex. Then he pushed my thighs wide to sink between them.
His first thrust inside me had my back bowing off the floor.
“Gia.”
With his neck arched, shoulders straining, sweat glistening on his chest, Jax was impossibly beautiful. He throbbed inside me, so thick and hard, so deep. My heels dug into the carpet, my hips churning as I struggled to accommodate him.
“Baby, wait,” he gasped, gripping my waist to hold me still. “I’m too close....”
“Jax...please!”
He looked down at me fiercely, his eyes glittering in the semidarkness of a room lit only by light spilling through the windows.
“Is this what you want?” He pulled back, sliding out of me. Then thrust.
“Oh, God,” I moaned, quivering. “Don’t stop.”