He’d been pissed off and bored at his father’s ridiculous birthday gala. Even his sisters had barely been able to coax a smile from him. Then she’d walked into the room.
Because she was with his half brother, Ian hadn’t planned on approaching her, but the minute he’d caught sight of her alone at the bar, he’d gone after her, compelled by a force beyond his understanding. Finding out she and Alex were just friends had made his night because she’d provide a perfect distraction to the pain that followed him whenever his father’s other family was near.
“Shoes?” he reminded her.
She dipped her head and slipped off her heels, moaning in obvious relief.
“That sound makes me think of other things,” he said, capturing her gaze.
“Such as?” She unconsciously swayed closer, and he suppressed a grin.
“Sex. With you.”
“Oh.” Her lips parted with the word, and Ian couldn’t tear his gaze away from her lush, red-painted mouth.
A mouth he could envision many uses for, none of them tame.
“Is this how you charm all your women?” she asked. “Because I’m not sure it’s working.” A teasing smile lifted her lips, contradicting her words.
He had her, all right, as much as she had him.
He kept his gaze on her face, but he wasn’t a complete gentleman and couldn’t resist brushing his hand over her tight ni**les showing through the fabric of her dress.
Her eyes widened in surprise at the same time a soft moan escaped, sealing her fate. He slid one arm across the love seat until his fingers hit her mass of curls, and he wrapped his hand in the thick strands. Then, tugging her close, he sealed his mouth over hers. She opened for him immediately. The first taste was a mere preview, not nearly enough, and he deepened the kiss, taking more.
Sweet, hot, and her tongue tangled with his. He gripped her hair harder, wanting still more. She was like all his favorite vices in one delectable package. Best of all, she kissed him back, every inch a willing, giving partner.
He was a man who dominated and took, but from the minute he tasted her, he gave as well. If his brain were clear, he’d have pulled back immediately, but she reached out and gripped his shoulders, curling her fingers through the fabric of his shirt, her nails digging into his skin. Each thrust of his tongue in her mouth mimicked what he really wanted, and his c**k hardened even more.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” his half brother said, interrupting at the worst possible moment.
He would have taken his time, but Riley jumped, pushing at his chest and backing away from him at the same time.
“Alex!”
“Yeah. The guy who brought you here, remember?”
Ian cursed his brother’s interruption as much as he welcomed the reminder that this woman represented everything Ian resented. His half brother’s friend. Alex, with whom he had a rivalry that would have done real siblings proud.
The oldest sibling in the other family was everything Ian wasn’t. Brash, loud, tattoos on his forearms, and he threw a mean football as quarterback of the Tampa Breakers. Ian, meanwhile, was more of a thinker, president of the Breakers’ rivals, the Miami Thunder, owned by his father’s estranged brother, Ian’s uncle.
Riley jumped up, smoothing her dress and rubbing at her swollen lips, doing nothing to ease the tension emanating from her best friend.
Ian took his time standing.
“I see you met my brother,” Alex said, his tone tight.
Riley swallowed hard. “We were just—”
“Getting better acquainted,” Ian said in a seductive tone meant to taunt Alex and imply just how much better he now knew Riley.
A muscle ticked in the other man’s jaw. “Ready to go back inside?” Alex asked her.
Neither one of them would make a scene at this mockery of a family event.
“Yes.” She didn’t meet Ian’s gaze as she walked around him and came up alongside Alex.
“Good because my dad’s been asking for you. He said it’s been too long since he’s seen you,” Alex said, taunting Ian back with the mention of the one person sure to piss him off.
Despite knowing better, Ian took the bait. “Go on. We were finished anyway,” he said, dismissing Riley as surely as she’d done to him.
Never mind that she was obviously torn between her friend and whatever had just happened between them; she’d chosen Alex. A choice Ian had been through before and come out on the same wrong end.
In what appeared to be a deliberately possessive move, Alex wrapped an arm around her waist and led her back inside. Ian watched, ignoring the twisting pain in his gut at the sight. Which was ridiculous. He didn’t have any emotional investment in Riley Taylor. He didn’t do emotion, period. He viewed relationships through the lens of his father’s adultery, finding it easier to remain on the outside looking in.
Distance was his friend. Sex worked for him. It was love and commitment he distrusted. So no matter how different that brief moment with Riley had been, that was all it was.
A moment.
One that would never happen again.
* * *
Riley followed Alex onto the dance floor in silence. They hadn’t spoken a word to each other since she’d let him lead her away from Ian. She understood his shocked reaction and wanted to soothe his frazzled nerves but didn’t know how. Not when her own nerves were so raw from one simple kiss.
Except nothing about Ian was simple, and that kiss left her reeling. From the minute his lips touched hers, everything else around her had ceased to matter. The tug of arousal hit her in the pit of her stomach, in her scalp as his fingers tugged her hair, in the weight of her br**sts, between her thighs and, most telling, in her mind. He was a strong man, the kind who knew what he wanted and who liked to get his way. The type of man she usually avoided and for good reason.
But she’d never experienced chemistry so strong before. His pull was so compelling she’d willingly followed him outside regardless of the fact that she knew without a doubt her closest friend in the world would be hurt if she got close to Ian.
“Are you going to talk to me?” Alex asked, breaking into her thoughts.
“I’m not sure what to say.”
On the one hand, he didn’t have a say in her personal life. She didn’t owe him an apology. On the other, he was her everything. The child she’d grown up next door to and the best friend who’d saved her sanity and given her a safe haven from her abusive father.
She was wrong. She knew exactly what to say. “I’m sorry.”