My breath catches. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.” He strokes my cheek, his voice gentle. “Let me handle T. I’ll schedule lunch with him. Seems right for me to be the one to tell him. Plus, something tells me you’d apologize, and there’s nothing to apologize for.” He eyes me intently—my face, my lips, my eyes.

“I just don’t know if it’s worth it. I have only a little more than a week . . .” I scowl menacingly. “I’m not sure it’s worth you getting punched by Tahoe. I happen to be fond of this face.” Softly, I reach out and touch his jaw.

His lips curve upward in amusement. “Trust me. You’re worth it.”

He looks at me for a while, as if something I said touched him deeply. He smiles as he leans his head.

“Come here, Livvy. I’ve been craving you.” His arm slides around my waist, pulling us flush.

His kiss is so very warm. He lowers his head even more and kisses the upper swell of one of my breasts, then moves on to my “freckle,” over my top, kissing it, laving it, and it feels amazing.

He draws me up to his length, his hands covering my ass. He squeezes, then clenches me tight in a bear hug as we kiss.

We don’t move, only our lips do. My fingers spread on his back and I feel everything, his hands splayed on my back and his chest flattening my breasts. His frame nearly swallows me in a cocoon of muscles and strength and warmth.

He watches me as he strips off my top. He lowers the bra cups and he sucks the peak of one nipple into his mouth. He turns his head and does the same to the other nipple. Then he lifts his gaze, leaving both my nipples wet, the cool air making them pucker even more.

I’m breathing through my mouth, disheveled and out of control as I grab the back of his head and try to pull him up to kiss me. He obliges me with a kiss that turns my toes to full-on tingling, then lowers his head and swipes his tongue over one nipple again, then the other, as he continues unbuttoning my shirt and smooths it off my shoulders and arms.

Then it’s gone. I’m in my slacks and bra, and Callan is shirtless and I can’t get enough.

He takes my waist, serious about shit now, and flips me around, pressing me up against the wall and kicking my legs apart.

I’m trembling and as turned on as I’ve ever been in my life.

I shiver under the stroke of one hand on my hair, from the top of my head to my back.

He works off the rest of my clothes and then his, then he runs his hand over the front of my body as his erection teases my ass cheeks from behind. His dark, seductive voice is in my ear. “You’re irresistible. I can’t keep my eyes off you, my hands off you.”

I nod. Likewise.

He teases his cock over my folds. I groan and push my ass out, waiting for it.

He thrusts in once. He pulls out. I groan.

He flips me around, lifts me up by the ass and carries me to his bedroom, and I curl my legs around him as he lowers me down on the bed, rolls on a condom and then joins me on his back, dragging me over him. I part my lips, wanton as his tongue strokes mine and I suck and lick and rub his tongue back in a whirl of heat and passion and recklessness. I sit on him—his cock plunging all the way deep with the first thrust.

Oh god, I’m drunk on this.

He’s breathing fast, but I’m breathing faster. His hand covers my cheek and holds my jaw. I’m helpless to his kiss, while his arm holds my hip down and he rocks his hips in a powerful motion and fucks me. Like really, truly fucks me, as if he means for this to be the last fuck of his life, or at least mine.

“No more thinking about consequences; there are none. The risk is ours and ours alone—only between us,” he repeats.

“Yes,” I say.

Though I know this guy is so much more comfortable with risks than I am.

I turn my lips to nip at the heel of his palm, and he releases a sound I’d never heard him make before, like a growl that contains one word inside it—Livvy.

His lips smash to one of my “freckles.” Then the other.

I don’t think a man has ever kissed me like this, unleashed a hunger like this on me, awakened a hunger like this in me.

We move fast and crazy, rolling on the bed until I straddle him, and when he peels his mouth away from my raw breasts, we lock gazes.

I search his dark eyes, nearly bronze as he looks at me.

He rubs the freckles on my shoulders with his thumbs.

I stroke his jaw, not wanting him to stop thrusting inside me.

Doubts try to trickle in, that I’m getting in too far and deep, but they don’t stand a chance against this—against him.

He rolls us over and now he’s on top, pulling out. Watching me as he drives back in. I groan. He exhales sharply, loving it.

I hadn’t realized how much I’ve grown to need this, how intensely he makes me feel alive, happy, female. Wanted.

And in this moment, it just cannot be wrong, nothing as right as being with him feels could be anything but perfect.

When we’re done, I lie on his bed and listen to his breathing.

His nose is at my neck, smelling me.

He strokes my hair from the top of my head to my back.

Once under the covers, his arm comes around my waist, pulling us flush.

I feel relaxed, and so content, tracing the words “I love you” on his chest with my fingertip as my eyes flutter shut. I’m slowly lulled to sleep by the scent of his expensive cologne and a touch—light and tender, almost as if it’s alien to a man like him.

I stir awake to a voice in the distance and Callan’s arm slipping out from underneath me.

I stir awake and sit up when I recognize my brother’s voice growling, “Carmichael!”

My eyes dart around the room in search of my clothes as I watch Callan leap into his slacks and head out of the bedroom, shirtless.

I glance at the clock and realize he missed lunch with my brother.

Oh my god!

Fuck.

Fuuuck!!!

I dress haphazardly and try—really try—not to lose my shit. My whole body is trembling guiltily as I tiptoe down the hall. I can hear Tahoe. His voice is low. Lethal. Furious.

“This is my sister’s bag, these are my sister’s fucking shoes, this is her fucking ring. You touched my sister? I’m going to break you in two!”

I run over to them. “No!” I cry.

Both men glance my way. Callan’s jaw turns to granite as he clenches it. He shoots me a dark and powerful stare, then he puts me behind him and addresses Tahoe in a surprisingly—admirably—calm voice. “I encourage you to make sense in the next few seconds, take the path to the front door, and get out of my home. I’ll be happy to discuss this with you—alone.”

Tahoe’s face is getting redder by the second, the veins popping out of his neck as he charges. “You mother—”

“Tahoe, no!” I leap before them, stopping Tahoe in his tracks. Callan shoves me behind him again, his hand clenching my waist harder this time in a silent message that I stay there.

A scream of unfairness gets trapped in my throat.

Tahoe glares at me past Callan’s shoulder. “Get dressed. We’re leaving. Now.”

Callan moves forward and I grab him by the shoulders, stopping him. “Don’t,” I plead in his ear.

There’s a tense silence as the men face off.

“You leave with me,” Tahoe says warningly, his eyes shooting fire at me again.

I grab my shoes and slip them on and forget about anything else I might be leaving behind—like my damn heart—as I grab my bag and tuck it under my arm, hurrying to leave and get these two away from each other.

“I’ll be back,” Tahoe warns.

“I’ll be waiting,” Callan says.

“Olivia.” Tahoe rakes his hands through his hair as we head out of Callan’s home and toward Tahoe’s Hummer in the driveway.

“I love him!” I cry.

“Jesus!”

“I fucking love him!” I climb into the car and once I’m in the passenger seat, I start crying.

He gets behind the wheel and pulls me to him, growling, “He’s not what you need.”

“He’s your friend.”

“I wouldn’t give him the time of day if I were a girl like you, who wants the things you do.”