Power Trip(38)

She reached for the shampoo and soaped her hair, then spent long minutes rinsing the suds from her body. Their experiments had left the sticky smell of smoke on her skin, so she stroked his strong soap over her body, shaking her head as her own slippery touch aroused her. She’d turned into a pervert in twenty-four hours, playing in a dungeon, climaxing during a spanking and masturbating in the shower. She rinsed the soap from her body and eyed the removable showerhead, tempted…but not as tempted as she was to go find Cal.

Just the thought of being near him increased her arousal tenfold. She turned off the water, reaching for the huge fluffy towel he had laid out for her. She dried her skin and squeezed the water from her hair, then put her clothes back on.

The hall was empty and the house was silent. She wandered back to the kitchen where it looked like Cal had begun making dinner, but he wasn’t in the room. The basement door was open.

“Cal?” she called down the stairs.

More silence.

She descended. The dungeon was deserted, so she tried the door of the lab. Unlocked. She opened the door and found Cal bent over a table, wielding a pair of wire clippers with singular concentration.

Snip, snip, snip. The clippers flashed with blue light.

“Cal?” she said softly.

He didn’t seem to hear her. He dropped the clippers with a bang and grabbed a calculator, then dropped that and picked up the wire again, threading it through black leather. “Yes, that makes sense…” he muttered, intent on his project.

She couldn’t blame him for being obsessed with work when she was equally driven, but it stung that she’d been upstairs, getting hot for him again, while he had clearly switched into work mode. It was just her luck that the first man she found more interesting than her mice was even more Type-A than her.

Her soft huff made him turn around. “Hey, I only came down here for a second. I’ve got dinner started upstairs.” The guilty look on his face made her laugh. He moved toward her, but cast a glance back over his shoulder. “I don’t suppose…”

His pause asked the question for him.

“You don’t suppose I want to have a quickie before my brother arrives?” she joked.

He blinked at her. “Do you?” He truly looked torn and she grinned, flattered, before she let him off the hook. “I’ll cook dinner. You work.” It was better for both of them to stay focused on work. They were conducting experiments, not dating. He’d made it clear that their play existed within the confines of a scene, and she needed to keep that firmly in mind. You’re a workaholic, not a deviant nympho, remember?

“Maybe I don’t want to work now,” Cal said.

She put a smile on her face. “Right. And I don’t want you to buy me a centrifuge and a microscope.”

“I’ll buy you whatever you want,” he said instantly. “Just make me a list.”

So he’d give her an unlimited budget for lab equipment but deny her a kiss. Nice. A relationship with Cal would certainly redefine her ideas of romance. Lust must be making her crazy if she was thinking of him as a potential boyfriend anyway. Clearly, he was looking for a lab partner with benefits. Temporary benefits, if he kept to his pattern of short-term subs. She hoped he would let her stay until they figured out who was after her—and why. “I’ll let you get back to work. Just remember when I get my mice—I don’t like to be interrupted, either.” Although with the slick ache she felt between her thighs right now, it was hard to imagine turning him down for rodents.

He gazed at her breasts, making her aware that her nipples were pushing against her bra. “I never said you couldn’t interrupt me. If you don’t want me to touch you, say red, but don’t put words in my mouth. I might forget to eat and sleep when I’m in the middle of a project, but sex is an entirely different matter. I’ll take a ten minute break for you.”

He could spare ten minutes for her? She recognized the flash of anger for what it was—a defense mechanism. For a guy who couldn’t touch her, he certainly knew how to push her buttons. He moved forward until he was standing directly in front of her. She felt energy build in the inches that separated them.

His eyes blazed. “Red or green?”

She swallowed, trying to quiet her shuddering breaths. She wanted to lie, to say red, but she refused to drive a wedge between them with her insecurity. She craved him. Her desperate need was embarrassing, but she wouldn’t deny it. Cal didn’t seem to want her quite as much as she wanted him, but that unfortunate fact didn’t make her want him any less. God, she hoped it didn’t make her want him more.