Silence descended as they both sat there, broken only by their rapid, shattered breaths.
Jax moved first, gently shifting her as he dealt with the condom, then began putting his clothing right. She did the same, shifting so she could pull her dress down.
“Wait.” Jax was looking down at the curve of one buttock. “Let me see.”
“What?”
“There are marks …” He reached out, his fingers brushing her skin.
“Well, of course there are. You spanked me.”
His gaze lifted to hers, opaque as blue glass. He stared at her for a long minute. Then abruptly he got to his feet, adjusting the rest of his clothing. “I’d better get back to work.”
“It’s nothing, Jax. I wanted it, remember?”
He didn’t say a thing. Only turned and left the room.
Chapter 9
Jax paced restlessly in front of the windows of his office, New York glittering at his feet. He couldn’t concentrate, but then that was nothing new. He hadn’t been able to concentrate since Pandora Garret had come into his life. This time, though, was different.
This time not only had he crossed the line, he’d set it on fire then danced on the fucking ashes.
Jesus. And he’d been doing so well. Holding himself back, determined to hold on to his detachment—even keeping himself out of her bed. Yet all it had taken to push him over the edge was her in that sexy white dress, with her long legs outstretched, that challenging look in her dark eyes.
He’d thought telling her about Sean, about his mother, would have been warning enough for her to back off. But apparently not. Apparently that had been waving a red cape at a very angry bull.
She’d pushed him and he’d lost it. Turning her over his knee, spanking her. Then screwing her hard enough to make her scream. And it didn’t matter that she’d virtually demanded he do it to her, that kind of behavior was exactly what he’d been trying to avoid for the past five days.
He’d hurt her. The red marks had been there on her pale skin, and he’d hated that he’d been the one who’d put them there.
Bullshit. What you really hate is that you enjoyed every fucking minute of it.
Jax came to a halt, scowling. “No, I did not,” he said to his empty office, as if saying it aloud would make it true.
It wasn’t supposed to be this way. He wasn’t supposed to be this way. And he didn’t know how she managed to get under his skin, but somehow she did. Passionate and honest and brave. He’d never met a woman like her before. She was … addicting.
But he should have been stronger. He should have been more in control.
Dammit, he really had to put the pressure on his personal investigator to dig faster into Nick Garret’s dealings. The sooner the guy found something on him, the sooner they could break this engagement, the sooner she would be out of his life.
Are you sure that’s what you want?
Jax shut down that thought hard.
“I like it,” an amused voice said from behind him. “You always did an excellent Heathcliff impersonation.”
Jax turned to see Donovan strolling into his office and perching on the edge of his desk, eyeing him with a certain amount of speculation.
Christ, he needed to get a grip. “What do you want?”
Donovan raised an eyebrow. “Uh, you were the one who called me up here.”
Ah, shit. So he had. Fuck, he really had to get a grip. Jax thrust his hands into his pockets. “How are we doing with the engagement publicity?”
“Excellent, if I do say so myself. I’ve organized dinner for two at the 2nd Circle. Discrete, exclusive, but you’ll be noticed, never fear. Also I’m putting together an engagement party that will have people wanting to murder their own mothers for an invite.”
Typical Donovan. His old company used to be famous for the parties it organized. “Fine, but don’t get too carried away. Don’t forget this is only for show. We won’t be going through with it.”
His brother folded his arms. “Hey, I do have an actual, honest-to-God reason for it. If you build enough buzz, people will be excited. And if they’re excited about a party, they’ll be less likely to look disapprovingly at your choice of fiancée or said fiancée’s unfortunate family connections.”
His brother had a point. “That makes sense.”
“Of course it does.” Donovan raised a brow. “The city’s been pretty excited by the engagement news so far. I don’t think you have anything to worry about Pandora’s background affecting Morrow negatively.”
It was true. The engagement even seemed to have taken the heat off the docklands scandal, which was something.