eight

We walked out of the elegant restaurant tucked away on a side street of Lisbon later that night. Hunter had hustled us out of the house and down the short hike in the mountains, no easy feat in heels, so I’d worn my sneakers and carried the five-inch death traps, and then we’d taken a car into the city.

My mind whirling with the knowledge that we would be leaving at three A.M. to get to our flight on time, I couldn’t wait to put my feet up and relax—a book and a bubble bath had been my original plan—but if I couldn’t do that, at least I’d had some great food.

“That was amazing.” I closed my eyes, soaking up the soft guitar music filtering out of a downtown apartment. “I could eat those clams every day for the rest of my life. Where is the car picking us up?” I finally turned when I realized he’d stopped behind me.

“Let’s go somewhere.” He reached for my hand and the moonlight glinted off his corn-silk hair and gave him an other-worldly glow that pulled at the corners of my heart.

The energy he had was boundless and intoxicating. “Sure,” I smiled, and with our hands still locked, he tore off down the street.

“We passed a bar that looked great on the way in.” He turned a tight corner and we kept walking.

“Are you sure?” I frowned and slowed.

“Yeah, right around this corner I think.” He tugged me along and turned the street corner where a couple people spilled out. I raised my eyes in surprise. These weren’t the normal tourist fare we’d seen dotted all over during the daylight.

“Seriously?” I grinned as Hunter hauled me up the old stone steps and into the hot and crowded bar. A live band played melodic chords on stringed instruments while the mournful voice of a woman lamented in Portuguese. Hunter urged me onto the dance floor, and after two craft beers, the crowd suddenly looked friendlier, the night much younger. I was spinning in Hunter’s arms in no time, laughing and giggling as I stumbled on his feet. He laughed and held me like a gentleman, swaying and dipping me, and then we’d start again. After the third song, my forehead was damp and I couldn’t peel the smile from my face.

“I need another drink,” I hollered to my beautiful blond companion.

As the slow beats took a turn on the floor, his arms wrapped around my waist and he pulled me into his lean body. “I want you another song.”

My muscles rippled with sensation, every nerve responding to his on each level, from the tips of my toes to the hairs on the top of my head. He had me.

“You okay?” He placed a soft kiss at the cleft of my neck.

“I’m perfect,” I answered, eyes still closed, relishing the feel of his body dancing against mine.

“We can go home if you want.” His voice lowered an octave and I knew instinctively what that meant. We would continue the foreplay we’d toyed with all day. I could feel it throbbing between us like an incessant heartbeat, strong and steady. Lust. Mad, raging, wild lust.

“I want to go where you want to go,” I offered, compliant with him in every single way, something I had never, ever been with anyone else.

“Good,” he gruffed, the warmth of his breath heating and chilling me all at the same time. “Ready?” he murmured, his forehead pressed to mine, lips nearly breath to breath.

“Always,” I breathed. I would follow him around the world and back. I already had.

“A friend told me about this place,” Hunter muttered as we wound down a twisty side street a few minutes later.

“How many friends do you have?”

“I’ve met a lot of people,” he answered before turning down a grassy path. “I think this is it.”

I glanced up to find the ruins of an old building, hundreds, if not even a thousand years old. “Wow,” I said when I felt Hunter’s palm at my back, his thumb weaving small figure-eights above my bottom.

“It’s tough traveling the world and never getting more than a weekend in a location, but my favorite part is getting to see the city at night. It’s an alternate perspective. Bent reality and intrigue. Mystery and beauty all rolled into one.” He said the last sentence on a soft note, his fingertips trailing across my wrist and tickling me just enough to cause goose bumps. “Wanna go inside?” he murmured, and butterflies raged in my stomach, pounded against my ribcage, and shot up my throat looking for an escape. I wanted to kiss him, to press my fingertips across the hard angles of his chest, our pelvises pressed together while he fucked me with his tongue in the soft moonlight.

“Would you rather enjoy the view from here?” His throaty voice moved closer to the shell of my ear, the soft hairs at the base of my neck tingling and rising with arousal.

“Yes,” I finally uttered, more desperate for him to push me into the tall grass and fuck me until I couldn’t think straight. He’d left me sitting on the edge all evening. The things he’d said at the shoot earlier had been rattling in my head on a loop and kept me in a constant state of anxious arousal.

“Something else on your mind?” He pulled me from my thoughts when his fingertips flirted with the hem of the dress brushing in the breeze across my thighs.

“Maybe.”

“Jesus,” he pulled me into his arms then, the warmth a comfort against the cool breeze. His forehead dipped and his lips took mine in a pressing kiss. Soft, but with edge, just like everything he did. With his fingertips still roaming at my inner thigh and his other hand pressed against my waist, his tongue shoved past my lips and darted, fucking me in a way I’d been dreaming of since I’d first set eyes on his sculpted, sensual mouth.

My heart thundered as one of Hunter’s hands dove in my hair and his tongue delved deeper, his lips bruising with passion before he finally pulled away, his breaths quick and shallow. His eyes fluttered closed just as I opened mine. “I wanted to shoot you against that tree today. The entire fucking time I wrapped the leather around her I thought of your body. Your dark hair. I wondered if your perfect pink lips matched your nipples. Fuck, Erin. I shouldn’t touch you for so many reasons, but you look up at me with those big dark eyes, and my dick pounds.”

“Hunter, I—”

“I’m serious, me touching you is wrong in every way, but I don’t think you want me to stop anymore than I want to.” Words clogged in my throat as I tightened my fists on his biceps. “But I’ll give you all the time I can.” He wove his fingers in mine. “Now, let’s get closer.” He pulled me down the path to the entrance of the building as my stomach rolled with cartwheels.

That kiss. Jesus Christ that kiss was incredible. But why was he so persistent that he wasn’t good for me? Wasn’t that my decision to make? He was different from anyone I’d ever met. The sweet reverence that emanated from his beautiful irises warmed the chilled chambers of my heart. Looking into Hunter’s eyes felt like seeing into my own soul.

His hand fell away from mine then, and I turned to hear that familiar click and found Hunter, head behind his camera, taking pictures of a half crumbling stone archway with small heads engraved at the corners.

“Sorry, the moon hit that corner in just the right angle; I had to capture it before it was gone.” His face appeared apologetically.

I smiled. “I love seeing you work.” I was pulled into his gaze, his swirling depths lit in the shadowed light.

“Some people are bothered by the click.”

“Not me. It’s comforting.” I slid my hands out to his wrists, unwinding the strap he’d twisted to keep the camera safe, and brought it to my face. I aimed, focused the lens, then clicked. “I want a copy of that one.” I grinned after inspecting the finished image, handing it back to him.