Besotted by Rebecca Sharp

Eve

“Miles?” I croaked, the shock of the realization was crushed by the water pooling dangerously low on his hips.

He wasn’t wearing a suit.

My lips parted.

All the water in the ocean couldn’t have wet the dry dunes of my mouth as my eyes skated down his chest, the coarse, dusky hair matted against the hard planes and knots of his abs, narrowing into a small trail that shot straight between the V of his hips before branching out at the very top of his—

My eyes whipped back up to his. One more step. One subtle retreat of the water level and… I’d be able to see everything.

“What the hell are you doing here?” His hazel-gold eyes were like beacons trained on me.

My mouth opened and shut for a moment before I blurted out, “I was just teaching my yoga class, and we saw you in the ocean. Why are you here? Why are you swimming so late? It’s not safe for you to be out there right now. What if something happened?”

“Eve.” His growl silenced me as he pinched the bridge of his nose. “Forget about me. You shouldn’t be here.” He looked over my shoulder at the girls from Blooms. “Fuck. You can’t teach a yoga class here.”

My eyes narrowed. I had this thing… when people told me I couldn’t do something. “Why not?” I retorted, folding my arms.

“Because it’s not your property. And it’s dark out.”

“So, it’s your property?” I smarted, praying I wasn’t in for one more unwelcome surprise. “Because I didn’t see a sign that said ‘Belongs to Miles Madison.’”

His lips thinned, and I hated how it forced me to remember that no matter how harsh the frown, the lips that made it were incredibly soft.

His look was a liar. Hard and callous hiding heat and care.

“You can’t be here,” he repeated, and I realized we were in a turf war for this cove.

“If I can’t be here than neither can you,” I said firmly, crossing my arms over my chest. The gold in his eyes turned molten. “And you definitely can’t be here swimming naked,” I added in a harsh whisper like there was anyone around who could hear.

I realized the moment I’d given him the upper hand—the moment when a small, deviously playful smile tipped one corner of his lips up.

“If me being naked makes you uncomfortable, you are more than welcome to leave my beach.”

I fumed.“Look, Miles, it’s not your beach. I’m having my yoga class here for the next several weeks and there’s nothing you can do to stop me, especially not while you’re swimming naked in the ocean,” I accused saucily, shoving my glasses high on the bridge of my nose, and raised my chin.

“Oh, yeah? Is that what you think?” He arched an eyebrow.

Yeah, because it wasn’t his beach.

I opened my mouth, prepared for another volley, when Miles took another step toward me and the water sunk lower on his groin, revealing more dark hair and the thick root of his cock.

My frustration tripped and fell, dissipating like a bottle of spilled marbles, rolling away from me too fast in every direction before I was able to scavenge them all.

Don’t look. Don’t look.

I put my hands up like it would stop him. “Don’t,” I commanded, looking over my shoulder, relieved that the girls couldn’t see him with the twilight and me blocking their line of sight.

“What are you doing? Y-You can’t come out now. Like that.” I heard how my voice climbed higher as each frazzled nerve hit a new note. “Get… go back in there,” I demanded, pointing to the water, trying to keep my eyes above board.

His laugh was the kind that came from deep inside his stomach, rolling over each hardened ab as it left his mouth and made the ache between my legs spread warmly into my underwear. Crap.

“Now, why would I do that, Evie?” he drawled slowly, his twang rubbing over all the parts of me that were desperate for his touch. “Why would I go back when comin’ toward you gets you closer to vacating my beach?”

I glared at him with my sternest, most threatening stare to not move another inch closer… and he just laughed, and I knew I was done for.

The water pulled higher as Miles took one more step in my direction, and then the seas parted.

Don’t look. Don’t you dare—

Oh God.

My mouth fell, and my traitorous eyes dropped to his groin.

What had I done?

Even though it was fairly dark out, I’d never seen a guy’s dick so close before. I’d never seen a guy’s dick before period.

Miles’ hung long and thick between his legs. For a moment, the water still covered the tip of it, teasing me with glimpses of the blunt bulb as it sloshed around him.

I wanted to touch it.

Just like I’d wanted to kiss his lips.

I wanted to know if it felt hard or soft. I wanted to know if it tasted salty like the sea or had a distinct flavor all its own.

I wanted to know too many things for my own good—too many things for a girl who was holding out for her forever about a guy who was only interested in tonight.

This was my punishment, wasn’t it?

This was the consequence of being the girl with the lofty notions of finding Prince Charming and saving herself for marriage: the most gorgeous man I couldn’t stop fantasizing about—the one man I couldn’t have—completely naked and dripping wet in front of me.

“I thought it was supposed to be small when it was cold?” I blurted out, clapping a hand over my mouth as my eyes whipped to his in mortification.

Shit. Shit double shit.

At least, he couldn’t see the fire in my cheeks.

But, as though all parts of him were made to spite me, his dick lengthened.

Maybe he felt just as hot as I did. Maybe that was why this was happening. Because we might as well have been standing in a hot tub for all I felt the cold water around my legs.

His eyes flared as he chuckled and waded closer to me. I’d never felt so unsteady on my own two feet. The water falling to reveal all of him, every long inch right down to the reddened tip that jutted toward me.

“Eve.”

My eyes jerked up to his with a small gasp. He was right in front of me, within arm’s reach. Within lips reach.

“This is the part where you should start running.”

“I’m not going to run. I’m not letting you b-bully me,” I said even though my voice was soft and breathy, and all I could think about was having his mouth on mine again. “This isn’t your beach. I have every right to be here, too. And I’m going to keep coming back. To teach my class.” I wasn’t sure if I was clarifying that for his sake or for mine.

Because I definitely wasn’t coming back so I could get another view of the gorgeous and impossible man in front of me.

His face darkened, desire burning hotly in his stare—desire I knew he’d fulfill elsewhere while I went home alone to my bed and the torture of my dreams.

“If you come here, I can’t guarantee what you’ll see,” he warned roughly and even though neither of us moved, his body came closer to mine.

Shivers felt like earthquakes down my spine, my eyes flicking down to the hard chest, glistening abs, and hard length of him—all within my reach. But all for just one night.

“If you come here I can’t guarantee what kind of villains will rise from the ocean nor what will happen to you and your future when they do.”

The words should’ve been a threat, but they weren’t. Not from him.

My chest sucked in a harsh breath, and I felt the tight peaks of my nipples straining against my sports bra, wondering what they would feel like pressed up against the coarse hair on his chest.

“Are you going to take advantage of me? Because you don’t know how to share a beach?” I demanded in a hard whisper.

Miles’ head drifted closer to mine, so close that I couldn’t focus on his eyes. Ever so gently, I felt a finger trace down the curve of my jaw, settling underneath my chin and lifting it up like he was going to kiss me.

He smelled like the ocean, like deep depths I ached to drown in. There was so much to him, so much more than what was on the surface… so much more than one night could possibly do justice to. His jaw clenched in time with the heavy thud of my heart.

The world spun and tilted with each breath. Yet we were immovable. Unchanging. Each unwilling to give an inch.

“No, Evie. I’m not going to take advantage of you, but I can’t guarantee your body won’t take advantage of your mind,” he rasped with his lips so close that every ‘r’ brushed them against mine. “I can’t guarantee you won’t end up forsakin’ forever for right now.”

Truthfully, I couldn’t guarantee it either.

“I told you,” I insisted weakly. “I’m not interested in a one-night fling.”

I swore I wasn’t, but my body was definitely interested in him. More than interested. It was jealous of the droplets of water that clung to his body. It was jealous of the oxygen that infused his lungs and flowed through his blood. It was jealous of the moon that got to look on him every night.

It was jealous of all the things that got to have any part of him with some sort of permanence.

He hummed, and my tongue darted out to lick my lips like I could taste the savory sound of it catching on them. I was hot, yet chills ran through me. Full of need yet utterly empty. My eyes drifted shut as I swayed toward him.

It was going to happen again. Just like at the wedding.

I felt the anticipation put a halt to every other effort in my body—seeing, breathing, heart beating. It all waited for his kiss to restart it.

And then he was gone.

Not gone.

He still stood right in front of me, but he might as well have been ten feet away because the pull between us evaporated, and I was left, once again, with the embarrassing look of expectation blanketing my face.

The infuriating Poseidon smirked like he hadn’t felt a thing. No pull. Not even a single flicker of unfathomable need like the kind that made every one of my cells tingle. “I think you’re a little too unreasonable in your expectations, Evie.”

“Of you?” I scoffed.

“Of yourself.”

I sucked in a breath.

Crossing my arms over my chest, I began to back slowly out of the water, willing my eyes to stay locked on his face and ignore the other parts of him that tempted my periphery.

“Well, I think you are a little too confident in your charms, Mr. Madison,” I retorted with a throaty rasp.

His eyes trailed down over my body like he was drinking in one last sight of me before I walked away. “Just stay off my beach.”

It wasn’t—

My mouth clamped shut for a second as I steeled myself and replied, “I’m holding my yoga class here, with or without your presence. And with or without your clothes.”

Turning with a huff, I strode out of the water and back toward my group of girls who’d congregated in a circle, watching our exchange from a distance. Thankfully, I knew they couldn’t hear, but it was hard to miss that Miles was naked even if they couldn’t see every detail.

I just hoped none of them told my siblings. That was the last thing I needed right now.