A weekly feature hosted by The Broke and the Bookish
Most of you probably thought this week would be a piece of cake for me, but I actually had a tough time trying to give these boys the credit they deserve. It is no secret that the eye candy of the book can make or break it for me. I’d consider docking a book’s rating by at least a star for failing me in this area. I am not ashamed to say that a HOT GUY is a requirement for me. I love kissing books. I love swooning. I love getting all hot and bothered over the fictional men in my life. It’s fun– so ladies and gents, if you are shaking your head or rolling your eyes… see that X at the top of the screen… it has your name on it. :) For the rest of you… you might want to go turn your heat down because it’s about to get really hot in here!!! I was going to tell you in my own i̶n̶a̶p̶p̶r̶o̶p̶r̶i̶a̶t̶e̶ words how I feel about these guys, but decided to let them speak for themselves.
In no particular order…..
“And now I’m looking at you,” he said, “and you’re asking me if I still want you, as if I could stop loving you. As if I would want to give up the thing that makes me stronger than anything else ever has. I never dared give much of myself to anyone before – bits of myself to the Lightwoods, to Isabelle and Alec, but it took years to do it – but, Clary, since the first time I saw you, I have belonged to you completely. I still do. If you want me.”
“His eyes softened. “But it doesn’t change what we are to each other. It’s like there’s always been a piece of my soul missing, and it’s inside you, Clary. I know I told you once that whether God exists or not, we’re on our own. But when I’m with you, I’m not.”
“I’m just saying that I think I chose to act the way I did in part because of you. Since I’ve met you, everything I’ve done has been in part because of you. I can’t untie myself from you, Clary – not my heart or my blood or my mind or any other part of me. And I don’t want to.”
His mouth came down on hers. And that was it. All the self-control he’d exerted over the past weeks went, like water crashing through a broken dam. Her arms came up around his neck and he pulled her against him… His hands flattened against her back… and she was up on the tips of her toes, kissing him as fiercely as he was kissing her… He clung to her more tightly, knotting his hands in her hair, trying to tell her, with the press of his mouth on hers, all the things he could never say out loud…
“Before you, Bella, my life was like a moonless night. Very dark, but there were stars-points of light and reason… And then you shot across my sky like a meteor. Suddenly everything was on fire; there was brilliancy, there was beauty. When you were gone, when the meteor had fallen over the horizon, everything went black. Nothing had changed, but my eyes were blinded by the light. I couldn’t see the stars anymore. And there was no more reason for anything.”
“I thought I’d explained it clearly before. Bella, I can’t live in a world where you don’t exist.”
“For almost ninety years I’ve walked among my kind, and yours … all the time thinking I was complete in myself, not realizing what I was seeking. And not finding anything, because you weren’t alive yet.”
“You are the most important this to me now. The most important thing to me ever.”
“If leaving is the right thing to do, then I’ll hurt myself to keep from hurting you, to keep you safe.”
“I’m not going to kill you now because it would upset Bella. But, if you ever kiss her again, I will break your jaw for her.”
He whispers, “You have no idea how much I’ve thought about you. How many times I’ve dreamt”-he takes a tight breath- “how many times I’ve dreamt about being this close to you.” He moves to run a hand through his hair before he changes his mind. Looks down. Looks up. “God, Juliette, I’d follow you anywhere. You’re the only good thing left in this world.”
He smiles a small smile. His lips twitch like he’s trying not to laugh. His eyes soften as they study my own. “There’s very little I wouldn’t do for you.”
“She’s not crazy. And she’s not deaf, asshole.”
“It’s been me and you against the world forever,” he says. “It’s always been that way. It’s my fault I took so long to do something about it.”
My fingers are tugging at the hem of his wet clothes and his eyes widen for only a second before he rips the material off himself. He grabs my hands and lifts my arms above my head pinning me against the wall, kissing me until I’m sure I’m dreaming, drinking in my lips with his lips and he tastes like rain and sweet musk and I’m about to explode.
“Please Mia,” he implores. “Don’t make me write a song.”
“If you stay, I’ll do whatever you want. I’ll quit the band, go with you to New York. But if you need me to go away, I’ll do that, too. I was talking to Liz and she said maybe coming back to your old life would be too painful, that maybe it’d be easier for you to erase us. And that would suck, but I’d do it. I can lose you like that if I don’t lose you today. I’ll let you go. If you stay.”
“But I’d do it again. I know that now. I’d make that promise a thousand times over and lose her a thousand times over to have heard her play last night or to see her in the morning sunlight. Or even without that. Just to know that she’s somewhere out there. Alive.”
“My first impulse is not to grab her or kiss her or yell at her. I simple want to touch her cheek, still flushed from the night’s performance. I want to cut through the space that separates us, measured in feet-not miles, not continents, not years-and to take a callused finger to her face.”
“Her hands were freezing, just like they always were, so I warmed them, just like I always did.”
“We stand there for a moment, staring at each other, savoring it. And then all at once, we slam together. Mia’s legs are off the ground, wrapped around my waist, her hands dipping in my hair, my hands tangled in hers. And our lips. There isn’t enough skin, enough spit, enough time, for the lost years that our lips are trying to make up for as they find each other. We kiss. The electric current switches to high. The lights throughout all of Brooklyn must be surging.”
“He turns toward me. I want to touch him, but I’m afraid of his bareness; afraid that he will make me bare too.
‘Is this scaring you, Tris?’
‘No,’ I croak. I clear my throat. ‘Not really. I’m only…afraid of what I want.’
‘What do you want?’ Then his face tightens. ‘Me?’
Slowly I nod.”
“I have something I need to tell you,” he says. I run my fingers along the tendons in his hands and look back at him. “I might be in love with you.” He smiles a little. “I’m waiting until I’m sure to tell you, though.”
“That’s sensible of you,” I say, smiling too. “We should find some paper so you can make a list or a chart or something.”
I feel his laughter against my side, his nose sliding along my jaw, his lips pressing my ear.
“Maybe I’m already sure,” he says, “and I just don’t want to frighten you.”
I laugh a little. “Then you should know better.”
“Fine,” he says. “Then I love you.”
“He gives me a conflicted look and touches his lips to my forehead, right between my eyebrows. I close my eyes. I don’t understand this, whatever it is. But I don’t want to ruin it, so I say nothing. He doesn’t move; he just stays there with his mouth pressed to my skin, and I stay there with my hands on his waist, for a long time.”
“He slides his hand over my cheek, one finger anchored behind my ear. Then he tilts his head down and kisses me, sending a warm ache through my body. I wrap my hands around his arm, holding him there as long as I can. When he touches me, the hollowed-out feeling in my chest and stomach is not as noticeable.”
“Hot is really not an adequate enough word for this guy. He is crazy beautiful. And it’s more than his looks—the intentionally messy waves of his dark hair; the strong eyebrows that make his expression a bit serious, even when he smiles; his eyes, which I notice can look emerald in one light and hazel in another; the sweetly sculpted angles of his face; the curve of his full lips.”
“But he’s like a god. You worship the gods but you don’t go out with them. You only like guys like that from a distance.”
“It’s like he has the ability to take on some of my pain. I feel so much better around him. Stronger. And he is willing to take my pain. He wants to bear it with me. I can see it shining in his eyes. I’m more than a duty to him. I’m more than his literal dream girl. I’m so much more.”
“I love you,” he murmurs. “Can you feel that? You. Not some destiny I think I’m called to. You. I’m with you. My strength. My soul. My heart. Feel it.”
“He bent to put his cheek against hers. His breath against her ear made her shudder with each deliberately spoken word. “I have wanted to do this,” he said, “every moment of every hour of every day that I have been with you since the day I met you.”
“If love is great, then it is worth fighting for.”
“He was still stroking the inside of her wrist, his touch doing odd delicious things to her skin and nerves.”
“Tess.” He touched her hair gently, pushing the tangled locks behind her ears. She felt pulled to him, like iron filings to a magnet. Her arms ached to go around him, her head to rest in the crook of his shoulder…. ”I would never let anyone touch a hair on your head. You know that, don’t you, Tess?”
For a moment their mouths pressed hotly together, Will’s free hand tangling in her hair. Tessa gasped when his arms went around her, her skirts snagging on the floor as he pulled her hard against him. She put her hands lightly around his neck; his skin was burning hot to the touch. Through the thin wet material of his shirt, she could feel the muscles of his shoulders, hard and smooth. His fingers found her jeweled hair clasp and pulled at it, and her hair spilled down around her shoulders, the comb rattling to the floor, and Tess gave a little cry of surprise against his mouth.
“I tried to be a better person for her– but it was to impress her, to get her to want me. But when I’m around you, I want to be better because… well, because it feels right. Because I want to. You make me want to become something greater than myself. I want to excel. You inspire me in every act, every word, every glance. I look at you, and you’re like… like light made into flesh. […] You have no clue how beautiful you are or how brightly you shine.”
“He shouldn’t have said that,” repeated Adrian, eerily serious. He leaned his face toward mine. “I don’t care if he’s not the emotional type or the complimentary type or what. No one can look at you in this dress, in all that fire and gold, and start talking about anachronisms. If I were him, I would have said, ‘You are the most beautiful creature I have ever seen walking this earth.”
“He reached out and pulled me to him, one hand on my waist and the other behind my neck. He tipped my head up and lowered his lips to mine. I closed my eyes and melted as my whole body was consumed in that kiss. I was nothing. I was everything. Chills, ran over my skin, and fire burned inside me. His body pressed closer to mine, and I wrapped my arms around his neck. His lips were warmer and softer than anything I could have ever imagined, yet fierce and powerful at the same time. Mine responded hungrily, and I tightened my hold on him. His fingers slid down the back of my neck, tracing its shape, and every place they touched was electric.”
“He kissed her slowly. Everything went slowly so he could follow her temper, and search into her eyes. When they joined, her scent was brave and strong and certain. Perry took it into himself, breathing her breath, feeling what she felt. He’d never known anything as right.”
“That was my first kiss,” she said. “My first real one.”
He brought his head close, resting his forehead on hers. Blond waves fell around her face, soft against her cheeks. His chest rose and fell as he drew in a breath. “Felt like the first real one for me, too.”
“He watched as she pressed the berry to her lower lip. He kept looking at her mouth after she’d done it. He knew he should look away, but he couldn’t. “Right. Good. If there’s no stinging, you’d put it to your tongue.”
Perry shot to his feet before he finished the words, nearly tripping over himself. He ran a hand over his head, feeling skitty, like he needed to laugh or run or do something. He picked up a stone and tossed it into the creek, trying to get the image of her tasting the berry out of his mind.”
“Roza, my self-control is ten times stronger than yours.”
I opened my eyes, shifting to look into his. I brushed his hair back and smiled, certain my heart would expand and expand until there was nothing left of me.
“Oh yeah? That’s not the impression I just got.”
“Wait until next time,” he warned. “I’ll do things that’ll make you lose control within seconds.”
“No. If I let myself love you, I won’t throw myself in front of her. I’ll throw myself in front of you.”
“Do you think I’m pretty?
I think you’re beautiful
Beautiful?
You are so beautiful, it hurts sometimes.”
Before he realized what was happening, I kissed him. Our lips met, and when I felt him kiss me back, I knew I was right. He pressed himself closer, trapping me between him and the wall. He kept holding my hand, but his other one snaked behind my head, sliding into my hair. The kiss was filled with so much intensity; it held anger, passion, release….
ENCORE: Love Notes
Jace – I am 100% sure that I am not your sister. ;)
Edward – Let me be your heroin.
Adam – Let’s write our own chapter 62.
Adam – My hands are always cold and I will listen to you rock talk all day long.
Four – Simulation or not, I’m all yours.
Christian - I would never make you sit outside my window..
Adrian – Come check out my aura.
Perry – You can render to me any day.
Will – I think I left something in the attic. Can you help me find it?
Dimitri – Ready and willing to lose control.
