Total pages in book: 99
Estimated words: 92782 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 464(@200wpm)___ 371(@250wpm)___ 309(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 92782 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 464(@200wpm)___ 371(@250wpm)___ 309(@300wpm)
I refused to meet his eyes and glared at the wall instead while the pad of his thumb moved to my bottom lip.
“Don’t do it for me,” I said. “If you hadn’t thought to do it already, clearly, you like it. I don’t want to stand in your way.”
A low chuckle caused his warm breath to tickle the side of my face. “This is sexy as fuck—you know that?”
I tensed as the area between my legs decided to wake up. My damn body was a traitor.
“Don’t,” I warned him. “You can’t act like a psycho, hurting an innocent man after a stripper you used to fuck was all over you, and talk to me like that.”
Liam stilled, and I wondered if I had pushed too far. Had I not been easy this time and he was tired of it? Why deal with my anger when he could just go crook his finger at dozens of women and one would come running?
“You heard about that, huh?” he asked.
I realized I’d said something that Nina had told me and I shouldn’t have. I had to fix it.
“Just a good guess,” I blurted.
His fingertips trailed down my neck. “Sure it was,” he replied.
When he reached my cleavage, I started to tell him to stop, but he trailed over to my shoulder. I was not going to react to this. Even if his touch aroused me, even when I wanted to hit him.
“Once, Demi was my go-to around here. She wasn’t clingy, and there was no drama. We had a no-strings setup, and it worked. But then she began to act like there was more to us. Started hinting for it. I was bored, and it ended,” he said.
Closing my eyes, I tried to fight the ache beginning to stir between my legs.
“Is that my future too? What happens when I want more? And you’re bored and you end it.” It wasn’t really a question. I was saying it more for me than for him.
Gritting my teeth, I turned to finally look at him. His hooded eyes were watching me.
“I won’t be her. I won’t hang around, waiting for some scrap of your attention.”
Liam tucked some of my loose hair behind my ear. “You could never be her,” he said softly. “You’re the mother of my child.”
I wanted to scream, That’s not what I meant. I needed something more than that.
“Why did you hit Country?” I asked him.
His eyes went from my ear, which he’d been momentarily fascinated with, to look into my eyes. “I thought I’d made that clear,” he replied. “He wants what is mine.”
I was about to push him, but it was the only way I could force something out of him that would give me hope. That would reassure me when I was no longer pregnant, I’d be more than the mother of his child.
“And when you and I end this and we go to just being our child’s parents who get along, what if he wants me then?”
I held my breath as a flicker of the man I’d seen downstairs returned to his eyes. That was good. I had pointed out what could happen. Although it wouldn’t. I didn’t want Country. I loved him. Even his insanity downstairs hadn’t been enough to dull the way I felt.
“I’ll kill him,” Liam said in a cold tone that made me shiver.
I’d come this far, so backing down now wasn’t an option.
“So, after you, any man I date, you’ll kill? That seems unfair. You’ll be bored with me, and I’ll have needs—”
My feet left the ground, cutting off what I was going to say, and Liam carried me over to the bed and dropped me on it.
“Don’t fucking talk about your needs, Liberty. Not in the same sentence where you mention another man.”
He grabbed my blouse and ripped it open, buttons flying free. Gasping, I stared down at my exposed breasts just as his hands cupped them. That sight never got old.
“You got needs?” he growled. “I take care of those needs. You think some other man can make that pussy squirt like I do? Hmm?” He tossed my shirt down, then grabbed my skirt.
“Don’t rip it! I don’t have many that fit,” I reminded him.
A twisted laugh fell from his lips as he snatched it down, and I heard the sound of fabric tearing.
“I’ll go buy you all the fucking clothes you want.”
That was not the point. I didn’t want him buying me anything. The longer he saw me as a charity case who needed someone to take care of me, the less likely it was that I would ever win his love, and I wanted that. More than anything.
“Liam,” I said as his fingers slid into the sides of my panties and he jerked them down, “we don’t need to do this.”