Total pages in book: 154
Estimated words: 148473 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 742(@200wpm)___ 594(@250wpm)___ 495(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 148473 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 742(@200wpm)___ 594(@250wpm)___ 495(@300wpm)
It’s said like he’s holding something back, like he’s adjusting what he really meant to say. But I think I know what he’s saying—he likes me. And I think like wasn’t the verb he originally wanted to use either.
Or maybe I’m just hoping another four-letter word was forming on his tongue. Maybe I’m feeling far too much. Maybe all these emotions bubbling up inside me are making me want something I probably can’t have.
He lifts the brush but doesn’t touch me with it. Instead, he runs it across the back of his hand, as if he’s testing its softness. Then, in a low, smoky voice, he says, “Lift your chin.”
I do, and he drags the brush from the bottom of my chin, along my throat to the hollow at its base, then continues down, down, down my chest, between my breasts, all the way to my belly button. I’m trembling everywhere. The hair on my arms stands on end. I feel electric in my own skin—just from that one stroke.
He travels back up with the brush, stopping at my right breast, tracing the bristles around my nipple and I’m gasping, hoping, wanting—until the peak tightens into a little diamond.
“There,” he says, his voice low and satisfied. “I think my wife is going to enjoy being my canvas.”
“I think I am too,” I say softly, breathless.
He turns away, so he can spread some of the paint onto the palette. Then he dips the brush, and adds with a teasing smile, “If you have any tips on how to paint this canvas, I trust you’ll let me know.”
My breath hitches again. “I will,” I whisper. But I already know I probably won’t say a word—because this man knows exactly what to do to me.
He dips the brush in the red paint and then slowly, dizzyingly, glides it around my right breast. The moment the brush touches my skin, it’s like a spark ignites in my veins. The paint is cool and smooth, but the friction of the bristles sends heat rushing through me.
He’s measured and deliberate as he paints circles around my breast, turning it the color of a summer cherry as my skin wakes up with each stroke.
When he reaches the nipple, I’m shivering as he paints that red too. Then he steps back, looking cocky, and also incredibly aroused.
He doesn’t say a word, but he returns to me, only this time instead of dipping the paintbrush, he slides his finger into the paint and then drags the color onto me.
With each touch, I grow hotter, wetter, more aroused from the slow, sensual way this man who uses his body to play a rough, brutal sport is using me as art.
He looks at me like an artist who worships his subject. With adoration. With reverence. And with a desire that I recognize completely—not only the kind I feel when I’m creating, but the kind I feel for him. It’s something rich and potent, something that comes from deep inside. Something that fills me up, when I felt empty before.
He squeezes more paint onto the palette, dips his fingers into it, and takes his time, painting my other breast with slow, deliberate strokes. When he finishes, he steps back, glances at his stained hand, and says, “I guess my hands are all red now.”
It’s said as an invitation.
“Then mark me,” I whisper. I stand, sliding off my jeans and panties, leaving myself bare before him. “Mark me with your hands.”
Without hesitation, he dips both hands into the cool paint, pressing them against my stomach. I shiver from the cold of the paint and the heat of his hands. He pulls back. We both look down. His ruby-red handprints are stamped on my body, vivid and bold. He moves lower, leaving prints on my thighs and calves before coming back up, his hands tracing my arms, wrapping gently around my throat. His voice drops to a growl as he says, “I think I’ll call this one ‘My Scarlet Work of Art.’”
And here in my brand-new studio, where I can paint and sketch and create to my heart’s content, I feel like a work of art. Because I see myself through his eyes.
I reach for him. “Want to get messy with me?”
“I really fucking do,” he says.
His clothes vanish, and soon, we’re breaking in the studio. He sets me on the workbench, and he fucks me with paint all over my body. And soon, it’s all over him as the handprints he left on me turn into smudges on his chest, his arms, his thighs. My legs wrap around him, and he drives deeper, filling me completely, taking me apart, like we’re creating something entirely new together.
Maybe that’s what we’ve been doing since we said I do.
“Well, this blouse is toast,” I say, sliding my arms back into it. I grab my panties and jeans, figuring we only have to cross the yard to get back to the house, and this shirt covers enough. Asher’s back in his slacks, shirt in hand, as we slide open the door, glancing down at the drop cloths scattered with our handprints.