“Why not?” he asked, wrenching back as if she’d offended him.
“Don’t know. It just seems sort of warm and cuddly.”
He rolled his yes. “This from the woman who won’t spend the night. This from the woman who keeps me at arm’s length.”
“Isn’t that the length you prefer?”
He shook his head. He didn’t know why, but the guilt that normally clawed at him was absent right now. It had slinked off, like smoke curling away. He felt stripped bare, but he didn’t mind her knowing how he felt, because somehow she was working her way past all those barriers he’d built to protect people from himself, and she wasn’t even trying to knock them down. She simply did it by being herself. By talking. By asking. By wanting to know him.
Their conversation today seemed to be a stepping stone to something more. To closeness. It should have scared him. Should have sent him into preservation mode, both for his sake and for hers. But it didn’t. It only made him want more of her. He hoped this feeling wouldn’t lead to an impossible choice down the road. Or even in two weeks, when their thirty nights ran out.
He didn’t want to focus on that, though. He wanted to exist in the moment with her.
“With you, I don’t mind less than arm’s length,” he whispered, then brushed his lips against her hair, burying his face in the soft strands and bringing her even closer. “And I want you to spend the night with me. I want to see you in the mornings too.”
She pulled back. “I don’t know.”
“Is that you protecting your heart again?”
“Yes,” she said, and he liked that she didn’t hide the truth. She simply admitted it.
“But I make amazing scrambled eggs.”
“Well, in that case,” she teased, as she finally unknotted his tie, “I’ll take it under advisement.”
He looked down his nose at her handiwork, her hands tap dancing on his chest.
“If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were trying to get me naked.”
“Maybe I am,” she purred.
“But I’m working,” he said in a playful voice, as her fingers undid his buttons. The afternoon was shot. He didn’t care anymore. He had other things on his mind.
“I think work is over for you today.”
“Do you want me to do bad things to you?”
“What do you think?”
He nodded. “All signs point to yes,” he said, giving her an 8-Ball answer. He didn’t need a fortuneteller or tarot cards to tell him she was going to enjoy all the bad things he’d do. Her body made it clear.
He reached for her hips, lifted her off him and set her down on the edge of his desk. He stood up, zipped his pants and held her face in his hands, and moved in to plant a bruising kiss on her lips. She gasped the second he made contact and he kissed the sound away, feasting on her lips, turning everything playful into something hot and hungry once more.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Dirty Inquisition
The moment shifted in a nanosecond. She’d held the power when she’d sauntered into his office, costume on, plan in hand. Now he had the reins and she was quivering with want from the way he devoured her lips, as he spread her legs easily with a strong nudge of his thighs.
His tongue swirled against hers, his lips crushing her mouth, her head gripped tight in his strong hands. She held on to the edge of his desk. If she didn’t, she might topple backwards. When he broke the kiss, she was dazed. But maybe that was the point. Jack might be content with a little role-playing, but his favorite role was dominating her.
“Stay like that,” he said. Turning around, he reached for a shelf behind his desk, and grabbed a black box with the letter J embossed in silver on the front. She shivered; just the look of the box was arousing.
“Open your shirt,” he said, his voice husky, laden with power.
She steadied herself, and began unbuttoning her blouse down to her waist, his eyes staying on her the whole time as she spread open the fabric. She wore a black lace push-up bra.
He drew a sharp breath, and ran his tongue over his teeth as he opened the box. “Don’t take the bra off. Just push it down, and free your tits,” he told her.
She did as she was told, her breasts tumbling free, resting on the underwire, framed by the lace. Heat spread fast through her body, whipping through her veins as he opened the box, and dipped his fingers inside. He lifted out something that looked like earrings. Each had a gold chain and red hearts on the end.
“What’s that?” she asked because she knew they weren’t earrings.
Pressing one hand on the desk, he cupped a breast with his other hand, palming her. A moan escaped her lips as he rolled her nipple between his fingers. “Nipple clamps. May I?”