Steph glares at Linden, and I continue. “And for fuck’s sake, we barely know each other. We’re fucking, so let us fuck and shut the hell up about it.” I look at Steph. “And please, the last thing I need is for anyone to get crazy, unrealistic notions inside my head. No one loves anyone. I don’t know Lachlan and he doesn’t know me, and we’re both fine with that. We have to be fine with that because he’s leaving in forty-eight hours for a land far, far away. So please, just let us have our time with each other until then. We don’t need any complications. We don’t need love, or even feelings, because what we do have is hot as hell and fleeting, and I’m going to suck up as much good fucking sex as I can with him. Got it?”

Bram, Nicola, Steph, and Linden are staring at me wide-eyed.

“Jeez,” Linden finally says, “I was just joking. Touchy, touchy.”

“Well I’m not joking,” I tell him, getting out of my seat. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go find him. When we come back, I hope to god none of you utter the L-word or any other word except for ‘goodbye,’ okay?”

I turn on my heel and march past the wine bar, half the patrons looking at me as I go, since my outburst was probably a little too loud. Still, that made me angry as hell. Why did people always have to try and complicate shit? Why couldn’t people just fuck and that be the end of it? I mean, my friends never even knew the names of any of the men I slept with after Kyle. Why does it have to be so freaking difficult with Lachlan?

Because you do have feelings for him, my inner voice whispers to me. Because you are falling for him.

“Argh,” I growl to myself, hands on my ears, turning around in circles in the cave’s foyer. “I don’t want Steph to be right.”

“Kayla?” I hear Lachlan’s voice.

I stop spinning and look up to see him on the other side of the heavy door, in the dim cave I looked into earlier, staring at me with his usual concern.

“Yeah,” I say, feigning normalness. “Hi.”

He frowns deeper then gestures with his head to come inside.

I step in through the doors and he carefully closes them behind me. I look around. The cold stone walls are curved with buttresses, making the room take the shape of half a wine barrel. I take a few steps forward and peer down the rest of the empty hall. It looks like the kind of place where you’d have a Game of Thrones wedding, complete with alcoves and elaborate candelabras.

“What were you saying out there?” he asks softly, coming up behind me and placing his hands around the small of my waist. His breath smells like wine. “You don’t want Steph to be right about what?”

“Don’t worry about it,” I tell him, closing my eyes and leaning my head against his chest. “Stupid girl nonsense.”

“Mmmm. Sorry I took off like that,” he murmurs against the top of my head. “There’s only so much I can handle.”

I’m not sure if he means the wine or the social situations, so I don’t say anything except, “I wanted to get out of there too.”

“Good,” he murmurs, his hand briefly sliding over my hip. I want him to slip it lower, in between my legs, and flip up the hem of my dress, but he takes my hand instead. “Come here.”

He leads me down the long, cavernous hall, my sandals echoing as we walk. At the end, there is a large ornate mirror and a hall leading to the left and right. To the left it’s blocked by a heavy door, and to the right there is a locked, floor-to-ceiling iron gate between the room and what looks like a hall to a maintenance area. A cart full of towels sits outside an open door, but there doesn’t seem to be anyone around.

“I don’t think we’re supposed to be in this area,” I tell him. I turn around but the look in his eyes grows molten and I immediately know what’s going on. The hairs on the back of my neck stand up, and a lone shiver slides down my spine.

“I don’t think so either, love,” he says gruffly, taking a step forward until my back is pushed against the gate. “But there are no dogs here.”

I bite my lip and wrap my hand around his neck as he presses against me, the hardness in his jeans digging into my hip. He groans quietly, lips at my neck, pushing me further into the gate. The bars hurt my back, but it’s a good kind of hurt. All the pain you get from sex is a fair trade, especially when it’s coming from Lachlan McGregor.

He puts his hands on my thighs and slowly skims his palms up, the hem of my dress lifting with them. They leave trails of stardust and heat then pause at my hips. He lets out a heavy exhale against my neck.

“No panties,” he murmurs. “Why do I have to leave you again?”

I swallow, my heart pinching. There is no room for anything except sex, especially here, especially now. “Because you’re a smart man who is going back to a promising career.”

“But how smart am I when I have to leave a woman like you behind?”

I shut my eyes. “New rule,” I tell him, my hand slipping to his jeans and undoing his fly. “We are never to mention the fact that you are leaving. From now on.”

He pulls back and stares at me, one hand dipping down between my legs, the other cupping my cheek. His lips are wet, parted, so entirely suckable, his eyes fraught with some wild emotion I can’t read.

“I’m not sure I can pretend that,” he says thickly.

“You don’t have to pretend,” I tell him, moaning softly as his fingers slide along my wetness. “We just won’t bring it up. Live in the now. Always now.” My hand finds the stiff, hot length of his cock, and I pull it out of his pants. “By the way, you don’t wear underwear either.”

He closes his eyes and hisses softly as I wrap my fingers around him. “Just trying to keep up with you,” he says, voice rich and raspy.

“I appreciate the effort,” I manage to say as he dips a finger inside me. My body seems to exhale from his touch, as if I need him in order to breathe. Everything aches for him, and I clench around his finger greedily, wanting more, needing more.

But this isn’t about me. I slide my hand over his cock, dragging the silk of his precum down his rigid, heated length. I want to unravel him. I want to bring him to his knees. I want, more than anything, to undo this man and leave him the way he’s leaving me, like a string pulled and a top spinning, over and over again, waiting for the fall.

His head goes back, mouth open. He lets out an elicit moan, the cords of his neck and the thick lines of his shoulders straining. Good god, watching him succumb to pleasure makes me happier and crazier than he would ever know.

Naturally I want to give him more. My hand works him expertly, knowing now just where to grip, where to twist, and judging by his quick breaths, I’m sure he’s close to coming. But he finally raises his head, his eyes unfocused as they roam over my face, fighting through a haze.

“Turn around,” he says, his voice so hoarse that it’s barely audible. “Please.”

I do as he asks. He pushes up my dress so it’s bunched up at my waist, and I bend over, grabbing the iron bars for support. It kind of feels like I’m about to be fucked in prison, like some kind of conjugal visit, and my deepest fantasies go wild. It’s not hard to imagine when you have a troubled, tatted beast of a man about to take you from behind.

His hands skirt my sides, over my hips, and down my thighs. I feel him crouch behind me, his fingers gripping my ass, and I try and sneak a look over my shoulder. He’s down on his knees and I can just see the top of his head beneath me.

I’m about to ask him what he has planned, but then I feel his face sink into me from behind, his hot mouth closing over me, his bottom lip sliding up over my clit.

Jesus. Being eaten out from behind? Yes, please.

He groans into me and I can feel the vibrations in my bones. I swell between his lips and he sucks me in his mouth like ripened fruit. I let out a loud gasp, my hands gripping the bars for dear life. It nearly knocks me off my feet.