Page 44 of The Lockdown Mann

Question after question keep running laps in my head until I’m pulling down Des’s driveway and considering turning around and driving out of it again.

What the hell am I doing?

Before I leave, something I know I’ll regret, I get out of my SUV and turn toward the house. Des probably expects me to leave. Maybe he doesn’t even think I’ll show up. I don’t have it in me to let him be right.

As soon as I walk around the back of my vehicle, my gaze immediately clashes with Desmond’s from where he’s standing on the porch, arms crossed, waiting for me.

“I didn’t know if you’d come, but then I figured you would, just to prove something to me, even if you were nervous.”

Am I that easy for him to read? There’s no way someone I’ve had such limited contact with in my life should know me as well as Desmond does. It’s like he has direct insight into all the little things about me that I try to hide from the rest of the world, some of the things I don’t even know about myself. Yet somehow, he knows it.

“I’m not nervous.” I go up the stairs, standing in front of him on the porch.

“Liar.”

“I’m—”

“Shh.” He puts his fingers to my lips. “It doesn’t matter what we said yesterday. You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do.”

I know that. Des wouldn’t push, and I won’t do something I don’t want to do, but still, somehow my whole body relaxes just hearing him say that. It’s just a reminder of why he was the first man I ever kissed and how we ended up in this same place so quickly.

“How the fuck did this happen?” I ask when he drops his hand. “A week ago, I couldn’t look at you without getting pissed off.”

“A week ago, you were probably just sexually frustrated and mad because you wanted me so badly.” He quirks a brow.

“Cocky motherfucker.”

“Truth.” He grins, and damned if I don’t do the same thing.

And then, before I can even comprehend what’s happening, we’re on each other—mouths slamming together, tongues wrestling for dominance as we both try to taste each other.

Des pushes me back against the railing, hands all over me, traveling up and down my body, squeezing muscles, exploring skin, pushing under my shirt and…hooonk.

The sound of a horn going off somewhere in the distance makes me jerk away from him. Holy shit, we’re in public. I didn’t even think about the fact that I’m kissing him right on his porch where someone could see.

His house is fairly private, but this is L.A. Nothing is sacred, and you never know where the paparazzi could be hanging out or when someone has a cell phone pointed at you.

“Fuck. I’m sorry. You make me lose my damn head,” Desmond says, and that last sentence gets me twisted up in an unexpected way—one I don’t know how to describe or, hell, even what it means. It just has me in knots.

“I was kissing you too. Let’s just go inside.”

He nods, reaching for my hand, but then stops himself before turning toward the door. I follow Des inside the house, heart pounding like a jackhammer, dick half hard behind my fly, body feeling like my skin is on fire.

I kissed Des, and it feels just as good as it did on the beach all those years ago, like kissing a man is the most natural thing in the world. Like kissing this man is.

The second the door is closed, I’m grabbing Des and pulling him toward me. I’m more consciously aware of my tight hold on him this time, the way I jerk his body forward, how I seek out his mouth with my own.

He lets me lead the kiss, while backing me against the door, slow and steady, like there’s no rush, like he doesn’t feel as though he’s going to come out of his skin the way I do.

My back hits the door before I suck on his lip, tease it, push my tongue into his mouth again—hands on his hips, Desmond’s hard, muscular body against mine.

Seconds later, it’s him controlling the kiss, him doing the teasing and tasting.

He smells fucking delicious. Still like salt water and honey and kisses, like he’s an explorer searching for long-lost treasure that he’s found inside of me.

I don’t think I’ve ever been kissed like this—so thoroughly, so completely, like kissing is all he’s ever wanted and he’s taking his fill. Like it feeds a hunger he’s been spending years trying to cure.

I’m sure that’s my brain creating stories that aren’t there, but does it really matter if it’s not real if that’s how it feels?