To Hate Adam Connor

Adam reached out and took the script from my hands for a quick glance then handed it back to me. I parted my lips to make a snarky comment about how much he sucked as an actor, but he pressed his finger to my lips.

Again with the touching.

Frank was still killing it in the background.

I frowned, but kept quiet.

“You can’t tell me you’re not tired of all the lies, Laurel. When is it gonna be enough?”

Breaking out of character, I sighed. “Are they talking to each other like this for the entire scene? Face to face?” Adam tilted his head so I got the message and went on with my reading.

“Not yet, Damon. Not when we’re so close to getting everything we wanted from the very beginning.”

He sighed and looked away again. “She’s pregnant, Laurel. Jessie is pregnant.”

And the plot thickens.

I read the next lines and snorted. “How can you be sure it’s yours? You knew she was dating that Jake guy up until a few months ago.”

When Adam looked at me, his features were tight. “It’s mine.”

I quirked an eyebrow. “Take care of it. Make her get rid of it. You can’t let this ruin our plan. We waited a long time for this.”

“Laurel is quite the bitch, apparently,” I mumbled under my breath as I turned another page on the script. Suddenly Adam’s hands were on my cheeks, and he was pressing a kiss to my forehead.

“What the hell?” I mumbled, looking up at him as I tried to scramble away.

Danger! Danger!

Abort!

He gestured to the script. “Read.”

And of course, right there at the top, it said, Damon kisses her on the forehead

Putting my game face back on, I tried to keep my cool.

He kissed me again, his lips surprisingly soft on my forehead, and I tried to stay as still as possible with his face so close to mine.

Then he forced me to meet his eyes. Yes, he forced me…I was pretty sure there was some sort of magic involved because I was barely able to breathe with his hands cradling my face and his eyes pulling my soul closer to him.

Asshole.

I swallowed, then cleared my throat for good measure.

“You’re my sister, Laurel. I love you,” he said with a soft smile on his lips. “I love you, but I’m done. Don’t make me choose. I can’t do this anymore, not when I have so much to lose.”

I glanced down at the script as my brain was having difficulty functioning properly. “What about me, Damon? What do you expect me to do? Go on with my life? Act like her family never ruined ours?”

Adam’s thumb caressed my cheekbone and my entire body started to burn up. Was that in the fucking script? Then his head was coming toward me, and I was bracing myself for a kiss on the nose or something equally innocent like that.

Weird sibling relationship, but whatever, right?

Our eyes locked and, never breaking eye contact, his lips softly touched mine. I froze.

Me. Lucy Meyer, the girl who would have loved nothing more than to kiss Adam Connor just a month before froze with that same Adam Connor’s lips on her lips. My traitorous body took a step toward him to keep the connection.

Definitely weird siblings.

For a few dangerously long seconds, he let me feel his lips on mine as they moved ever so slowly. Then there was a gentle nip on my lower lip and before I knew what was happening, he was kissing me for real, coaxing me to open my mouth.

Gently.

But I felt his tongue. I swear to you, I did.

I inhaled sharply and before I could react in any way, he was pulling back.

Let’s get this straight. I did not follow his lips. Neither did I sway toward him like a love-struck teenager. Nah, I’m not that girl. It was just a trick of the eye.

As soon as he let me go, I ducked my head and started turning pages like a madwoman. When I couldn’t find what I was looking for, I simply raised my hand and slapped him. Hard.

For a long moment, neither one of us moved. Frank was ending another song like a boss, and other than my heavy breathing, he was the only thing we could hear.

Finally, Adam asked, “What was that for?”

“What do you think?” I managed to croak out. Even though I’d been standing in the same exact spot for the last few minutes, I felt like I’d run a marathon—and that was from a small kiss where I didn’t even get to taste him properly. I cleared my throat. “You just kissed your sister.” I pointed a finger at him. “And don’t try to tell me that was a peck either. How do you think she’ll react?”

The record player started playing Frank Sinatra’s “It Was A Very Good Year”, my favorite, and Adam gripped my chin with his fingers and tilted my face up. It wasn’t a gentle chin grip either. His big, warm hand practically engulfed the lower half of my face.

It was definitely a panty-melting moment. Who doesn’t love a man—especially a man who looked like Adam Connor—taking control of your body—in a sexy way, of course.

“I didn’t kiss my sister, Lucy,” he murmured, leaned in, and then kissed me. Again. Like full-on kissed me. His fingers holding my face in place, he tilted his head and sneaked his tongue inside my mouth.

That kind of kissing.

So that’s what he tasted like. Warmth. Silk. Addiction. Sex. Danger. Insanity.

The script in my hand fluttered to the floor.

My brain was a complete mess, giving me all kinds of danger warnings.

He tilted my head to the right and practically ruined me with the way he was kissing me.

It was a kiss wrapped up in another kiss.

Does that make sense? No? It didn’t make sense to me at the time either.

Yes, Lucy! Yes!

No, Lucy! No!

It was like I’d had multiple personalities living inside my head all this time and they’d been waiting to get out of their hidey hole just for this special occasion.

But then again, Adam Connor was kissing me…what the hell was a girl supposed to do when faced with such a problem? Hate or not, you’d go for it too. You’d give it your all and you’d make sure you gave it to him good.

My hands empty, I grabbed his shirt and pulled him closer, returning his kiss with fervor. I could’ve written a poem about how good it felt to have him tower over me, and I wasn’t even the writer.

His grip on my chin tightened to the point that it came dangerously close to hurting me, but I was loving it. I hated him, but I was loving the way he was controlling the kiss. Controlling me. How could his touch feel so different than that asshole Jake Callum’s?

I was loving the way his breathing was getting out of control—just like mine. I was loving that he had sneaked his left hand around my waist and was pulling me toward his body.

Our tongues were in a battle, and I didn’t care who came out on top at the end as long as he kept his lips against mine.

I wanted him to lose his shirt so I could feel his skin under my touch, but that would have required breaking apart from his lips, and I wasn’t too fired up to do that. The earth beneath my feet could’ve cracked, and I still wouldn’t have let go of him. He turned his head the other way and deepened the kiss, forcing me to arch into him.

I was starting to think it was okay to not be kissed for more than a month if the kiss you’d get at the end of that drought was like this one. I was okay with anything that man would do to me.

And holy hell, he was devouring me as if he was quenching his thirst. I was seconds away from climbing him and trying my best to fuck him standing up. It would require a lot of maneuvering, but I could give it my best shot.