Not Just the Boss's Plaything(5)

As if there was no close enough.

And he kissed her, again and again, with a ruthless intensity that made    her feel weak and beautiful all at once, until she was mindless with    need. Until she forgot her own name. Until she forgot she didn't know    his. Until she forgot how dangerous forgetting was for her.

Until she forgot everything but him.

When he pulled back, she didn't understand. He put an inch, maybe two,    between them, and then he muttered something harsh and incomprehensible    while he stared at her as if he thought she was some kind of ghost.

It took her a long, confused moment to realize that she couldn't    understand him because he wasn't speaking in English, not because she'd    forgotten her own language, too.

Alicia blinked, the world rushing back as she did. She was still    standing in that club. Music still pounded all around them, lights still    flashed, well-dressed patrons still shouted over the din, and   somewhere  out in the middle of the dance floor, Rosie was no doubt   still playing  her favorite game with her latest conquest.

Everything was as it had been before she'd stumbled into this man, before he'd caught her. Before she'd kissed him.

Before he'd kissed her back.

Everything was exactly the same. Except Alicia.

He was searching her face as if he was looking for something. He shook    his head slightly, then reached down and ran a lazy finger over the    ridge of her collarbone, as if testing its shape. Even that made her    shudder, that simple slide of skin against skin. Even so innocuous a    touch seemed directly connected to that pulsing heat between her legs,    the heavy ache in her breasts, the hectic spin inside of her.

She didn't have to speak his language to know whatever he muttered then was a curse.

If she were smart, the way she'd tried to be for years now, she would    pull her hand away and run. Just as he'd told her she should. Just as    she'd promised herself she would. Everything about this was too extreme,    too intense, as if he wasn't only a strange man in a club but the  kind   of drug that usually went with this kind of rolling, wildly    out-of-control feeling. As if she was much too close to being high on    him.                       
       
           



       

"Last chance," he said then, as if he could read her mind.

He was giving her a warning. Again.

In her head, she listened. She smiled politely and extricated herself.    She marched herself to the nearest exit, hailed a taxi, then headed    straight home to the comfort of her bloody laundry. Because she knew she    couldn't be trusted outside the confines of the rules she'd made for    herself. She'd been living the consequences of having no rules for a    long, long time.

But here, now, in this loud place surrounded by so many people and all    of that pounding music, she didn't feel like the person she'd been when    she'd arrived. Everything she knew about herself had twisted inside   out.  Turned into something else entirely in that electric blue of his    challenging gaze.

As if this really was a Shoreditch fairy tale, after all.

"What big eyes you have," she teased him.

His hard mouth curved then, and she felt it like a burst of heat, like sunlight. She couldn't do anything but smile back at him.

"So be it," he said, as if he despaired of them both.

Alicia laughed, then laughed again at the startled look in his eyes.

"The dourness is a lovely touch," she told him. "You must be beating them off with a stick. A very grim stick."

"No stick," he said, in an odd tone. "A look at me is usually sufficient."

"A wolf," she said, and grinned. "Just as I suspected."

He blinked, and again looked at her in that strange way of his, as if    she was an apparition he couldn't quite believe was standing there    before him.

Then he moved with the same decisiveness he'd used when he'd taken    control of that kiss, tucking her into his side as he navigated his way    through the dense crowd. She tried not to think about how well she    fitted there, under his heavy arm, tight against the powerful length of    his torso as he cut through the crowd. She tried not to drift away in    the scent of him, the heat and the power, all of it surrounding her  and   pouring into that ache already inside of her, making it bloom and    stretch and grow.

Until it took over everything.

Maybe she was under some kind of spell, Alicia thought with the small    part of her that wasn't consumed with the feel of his tall, lean frame    as he guided her so protectively through the crowd. It should have been    impossible to move through the club so quickly, so confidently. Not  in a   place like this at the height of a Saturday night. But he did it.

And then they were outside, in the cold and the damp November night, and    he was still moving in that same breathtaking way, like quicksilver.    Like he knew exactly where they were headed-away from the club and the    people still milling about in front of it. He led her down the dark    street, deeper into the shadows, and it was then Alicia's sense of    self-preservation finally kicked itself into gear.

Better late than never, she thought, annoyed with herself, but it    actually hurt her to pull away from the magnificent shelter of his body,    from all of that intense heat and strength. It felt like she'd ripped    her skin off when she stepped away from him, as if they'd been fused    together.

He regarded her calmly, making her want to trust him when she knew she shouldn't. She couldn't.

"I'm sorry, but..." She wrapped her arms around her own waist in an    attempt to make up for the heat she'd lost when she'd stepped away from    him. "I don't know a single thing about you."

"You know several things, I think."

He sounded even more delicious now that they were alone and she could    hear him properly. Russian, she thought, as pleased as if she'd learned    his deepest, darkest secrets.

"Yes," she agreed, thinking of the things she knew. Most of them to do    with that insistent ache in her belly, and lower. His mouth. His clever    hands. "All lovely things. But none of them worth risking my personal    safety for, I'm sure you'll agree."

Something like a smile moved in his eyes, but didn't make it to his hard    mouth. Still, it echoed in her, sweet and light, making her feel far    more buoyant than she should have on a dark East London street with a    strange man even she could see was dangerous, no matter how much she    wanted him.                       
       
           



       

Had she ever wanted anything this much? Had anyone?

"A wolf is never without risk," he told her, that voice of his like    whiskey, smooth and scratchy at once, heating her up from the inside    out. "That's the point of wolves. Or you'd simply get a dog, pat it on    the head." His eyes gleamed. "Teach it tricks."

Alicia wasn't sure she wanted to know the tricks this man had up his    sleeve. Or, more to the point, she wasn't sure she'd survive them. She    wasn't certain she'd survive this as it was.

"You could be very bad in bed," she said, conversationally, as if she    picked up strange men all the time. She hardly recognized her own light,    easy, flirtatious tone. She hadn't heard it since before that night  in   her parents' back garden. "That's a terrible risk to take with any    stranger, and awkward besides."

That smile in his eyes intensified, got even bluer. "I'm not."

She believed him.

"You could be the sort who gets very, very drunk and weeps loudly about    his broken heart until dawn." She gave a mock shudder. "So tedious,    especially if poetry is involved. Or worse, singing."

"I don't drink," he countered at once. His dark brows arched over those    eyes of his, challenging her. Daring her. "I never sing, I don't write    poems and I certainly do not weep." He paused. "More to the point, I    don't have a heart."

"Handy, that," she replied easily. She eyed him. "You could be a killer, of course. That would be unfortunate."