Once Upon a Rose(73)

Layla’s eyes narrowed a little. “Eternal optimist? Or are you just used to getting lucky?”

“It’s not that.” He turned his head, still pressed against the wall, to meet her eyes. “It’s just that—it’s my responsibility. To take care of you.”

She pulled her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around them, naked except for her panties. “Of course it is,” she said softly. “Everything’s your responsibility, isn’t it?”

“Will you give me ten minutes? I’ve got some at my house.” He winced. “That spoils everything, doesn’t it?” He closed his eyes.

She stood up, baring her naked body suddenly as easily as she sometimes bared her heart. “No, it doesn’t,” she said quietly and walked to him, sliding in under his bowed body and wrapping her arms around him, pressing her head against his chest. “You taking care doesn’t spoil anything at all. I like it.” I actually think I might be doing something way more than “liking” here.

His body curved around hers as the despair eased off his face into something intense and almost wondering. “Come with me,” he murmured, or that growly thing he did that passed for his murmur. “I’ll carry you all the way through the roses. You won’t even have to put your shoes on.”

“Oh.” She had been about to propose another solution, and now her original idea wavered. “That sounds incredibly romantic.”

“Really?” He looked completely surprised. “Not just desperate?”

She shook her head and went up on tiptoe to whisper a secret. “I have some, though.” She halfway wanted to not mention them, so she could get that ride through the roses.

He frowned a little.

She held up a finger. “Are you going to have a double standard?”

“No.” But that frown settled into a scowl.

“They were giving these out at a festival I was at in Paris.” She left him to dig around the edge of her still-packed suitcase until she found it. “And I thought the package was really funny, so I kept it as a souvenir.” She showed him the little packet of three condoms, stamped with the image of a very phallic Eiffel Tower covered with latex. J’aime à Paris.

He completely annoyed her by double-checking to see if the package had been opened and smiling when he found the box still sealed.

But he was so damn sexy standing there, with that light heating again in his eyes as he realized this evening could keep going, that her annoyance melted. “So you see,” she said. “Maybe once in a while, I know how to take care of things, too.”

He hefted the little package. “This wasn’t you taking care of things, this was your sense of play. And I got lucky.”

She folded her arms across her chest. “All right, if you’re going to start complaining about your luck right now—”

He growled and pushed her back on the bed. “No.” He came down over her. “No, I’m not going to complain about my luck.”

She turned her head away as snootily as she could. “I might be losing my sense of play.”

“Oh, no, you sure as hell aren’t. Let me fix that problem for you.” His hand ran down her body, leaving a path of pleasure and hunger in its wake.

“Maybe you can’t fix it,” she challenged, holding his eyes in provocation.

“Oh, don’t worry.” His eyes gleamed as his thumb taunted its way over that ticklish crease of her thigh, making her hips twist and jerk a little, half toward that tickle and half away. “I can fix anything.”

“Maybe,” she said haughtily, “you’ll get lost and need directions.”

Laughter and arousal leapt in his eyes in equal proportions. She loved the blend of it. “I never get lost.” His hand slid unerringly to exactly where she wanted it to go, proving his claim, a firm cup of her panties and a press of the heel of his palm against her clitoris through them.

She turned her head away, a resigned princess. “Well, I suppose if you do, we can always find an app for this on your phone.”

He laughed out loud, this great shout of happiness and desire, and she turned her head back to him, grinning with triumph. His eyes were alight with humor and arousal as he lowered his head to her. “You’re going to pay for that, you know,” he growled, removing his hand from between her thighs. Uh-oh.

“God, your voice should be illegal.” She hugged him hard, trying to crush his body to hers or hers to his.

“Don’t talk to me.” He began to drag his body down hers. “I’m concentrating on the road.”