It was her turn to nip at his mouth, to run her tongue over his teeth, the roof of his mouth, the sensitive skin between his gum and his upper lip. He groaned, sucked her tongue deep into his mouth, and she gasped. She’d never been kissed like this before, never felt such brutal, beautiful carnality for any other man. She wanted to hang on to this moment forever, to savor it—and him—for as long as she could.

For as long as he would let her.

His fingers swept beneath the hem of her T-shirt, skimmed up her rib cage to softly stroke her stomach and lower back. She shivered—it felt so good—then slid her hands slowly up his back.

He was lean but muscular from all those hours of guitar playing and working out when he couldn’t sleep . She’d seen him without his shirt on a million times through the years—in person and on-screen and in photos—but she’d never realized how good it would feel to touch him. To run her hands up his spine and over the taut muscles of his upper back. To slide her fingers over the sexy ink of his tattoos.

He was hard and hot and so inviting she wanted to lick him up right there in the hallway. She would do it, too, just as soon as she could bring herself to stop kissing him. Which, now that she thought about it, might not be for a while. He tasted too good.

His fingers were on the buttons at the front of her shirt now. Then they were tracing along the line of her bra, his warm palms resting on her stomach. A shiver of desire worked its way through her, and Jamison clutched at his shoulders for support.

He smiled against her lips, pressed her more firmly into the wall as he continued his exploration. Her loss of control hadn’t even fazed him, but then he was probably used to women going weak-kneed around him.

The thought pulled her out of her Ryder-induced sex stupor. Not completely, but enough for her self-consciousness to rear its ugly head. She turned her head to break the kiss, covered his hands with her own. He stopped instantly, like she’d known he would.

Of course, the second he did, she could have kicked herself for stopping him. What was wrong with her? Ryder had been with dozens of women, hundreds of women probably, in the last few years. But she wanted this, wanted him—badly—so why had her conscience picked this moment to bombard her with second thoughts? Why had she stopped him when he’d obviously been into it? Into her?

Because, she acknowledged with a grimace, she didn’t want to be just another notch on his bedpost, another girl that he forgot as soon as he’d zipped his pants. She wanted to know that she mattered to him. If not in the same way he mattered to her, then at least enough for him to choose her and not just sleep with her as a means to stop the pain she knew he carried deep inside himself.

When she didn’t say anything, or make any move to disentangle herself from his hold, Ryder murmured, “Jamison, baby? Are you okay?”

He was breathing hard, even panting a little, and his obvious arousal made her feel a million times more secure. As did his concern for her. Even if it was just for now, just for this short moment of time, Ryder wanted her, cared about her. It was enough.

She lightly pushed on his shoulders. When he stepped away, looking wary and more than a little confused, she grabbed onto his hand and continued back down the hall to the bedroom she had woken up in. Once he realized where she was going, Ryder stiffened. Stopped.

Jamison froze, her cheeks burning with humiliation. She’d been wrong. She’d assumed too much. Ryder didn’t want her after all. “I—I—”

His mouth fastened on her shoulder before she could apologize, his tongue licking over the curve where her neck met the smooth line of her shoulder. The slow, wet circles had her eyes crossing and her sex clenching with desire and relief. He did want her. Thank God.

She tilted her head back, rested it against his chest to give him better access. Her eyes fluttered closed even as she fought against it. She couldn’t help it. It felt so good, he felt so good that she didn’t even register the sound of a door opening at the beginning of the hall.

At least not until Jaredyelled, “What the hell is going on here?”

…

At the sound of his best friend’s voice, the sensual fog that had enveloped Ryder from the moment he first touched Jamison fell away. He blinked a couple of times, took in the fury on Jared’s face. Then looked down at Jamison in an effort to figure out just how bad it looked.

Shit. They were fucked. Or at least he was.

The top of her shirt was open, her full, luscious breasts spilling over the top of her black lace bra. Her pale, redhead’s skin was flushed pink with arousal and her lips were swollen from his kisses. Not to mention the fact that the second she stepped away from him it would be obvious to Jared just how hot Jamison had gotten him. His dick was hard enough to pound nails, even with Jared looking at him like he wanted to rip him limb from limb.

“It’s not—”

“What it looks like?” Jared’s eyes narrowed dangerously.

As did Jamison’s, who had turned around to stare at him in disbelief even as she buttoned up the top of her shirt. Damn it, there was no way for him to win this.

He threw up his hands. “Okay, so it��s exactly what it looks like.”

“Yeah, I’m well aware of that. Asshole.”

Jamison turned to glare at Jared. “Why don’t you go back to sleep? This isn’t any of your business,” she said.

Jared gaped at her, his mouth opening and closing as he thought of—and discarded—what looked like a hundred different things to say. He finally settled on, “You’re my sister!”

“Yes, I am. Sister, not daughter. I’ve never gotten in the way when you were with someone. I’d appreciate the same courtesy.” She flipped her hair over her shoulder in a gesture loaded with indignation, then slipped through the doorway into Ryder’s room. “Are you coming?” she asked him over her shoulder.

It was his turn to stare at her, mouth opening and closing like a trout as he tried to find his way through the minefield that had just sprung up in front of him. A quick glance at Jared told him his friend would kill him if he so much as moved an inch in Jamison’s direction. And while Ryder wasn’t known for walking away from a fight, he wasn’t about to throw down with Jared. Not when he was clearly the one in the wrong here.

Shit. What the hell had he been thinking? How had he gotten so pissed off, freaked out, and turned upside down that kissing Jamison had seemed like a good idea? He knew what had happened after he’d kissed her—she was so sweet, so hot, that he hadn’t been able to think about anything but being inside of her. But why had he kissed her in the first place? With his past—and present—he had no business going anywhere near a woman like her, and he knew it even if she didn’t.

“Look,” he finally said to her. “Why don’t you get some sleep? We can…talk more later.”

“Talk?” The word dripped with sarcasm. “Is that what we were doing?”

He shoved a frustrated hand through his hair. “Jamison—”

“Don’t strain yourself thinking up an excuse,” she told him, nose in the air. “I get it.”

She didn’t get a damned thing and he didn’t know how to explain it to her. Not right now when his brain was still fuzzy with desire and his cock still ached with the need to bury itself inside of her.

He would never be able to do right by her—even if he wanted to. There was too much darkness inside of him, too many things he’d done that he couldn’t take back. The chemistry between him and Jamison might suddenly be off the charts, but that didn’t mean there could be something between them. Because there couldn’t be. He wouldn’t allow there to be.

Now if only he hadn’t let his dick do the thinking for the last ten minutes, none of this would have happened. He wouldn’t be sick to his stomach, Jared wouldn’t look like he wanted to rip out his vocal cords and Jamison…Jamison wouldn’t look so damned hurt as she slammed the bedroom door shut behind her. Forget Jared, if he could have reached it, he would have kicked his own ass. He sure as hell deserved it.e He sHe

The sound of the door slamming echoed down the hallway and seemed to release Jared from whatever shock-induced stupor he’d been thrown into. Three seconds later he was in Ryder’s face, shoving him down the hall. “What are you doing?” he demanded, low and vicious. “What the fuck are you doing?”

He didn’t have a clue. And with Jamison’s taste still lingering on his lips, it was hard to think. Hard to breathe.

“It’s not—” He stumbled over the words, forced himself to stop and take a deep breath. Then he tried again. “I didn’t mean anything—”

“You were practically doing my sister in the hallway and it didn’t mean anything?” Jared interrupted, pushing him.

It was the straw that broke the camel’s back, and this time Ryder shoved back, hard. He watched with absolutely no satisfaction as Jared stumbled a little at the unexpected blow. “Stop putting words in my mouth.”

“Well, start coming up with your own, because what I just saw was bullshit, Ryder. Total bullshit, and if you were sober and thinking clearly, you’d see it, too.”

He was sober and he did see it, though he was the first to admit he wasn’t thinking clearly. That was the problem. He hadn’t been able to think clearly since he’d seen Jamison in the audience the night before. But how did he explain that to Jared, when he’d just been caught pawing his sister with all the finesse of a fifteen-year-old with his first girl?