just… wow .”
She growled and tried to excavate herself from his lap, but he only held her harder.
“Just a minute. Stop trying to get away from me.”
“Haven’t I embarrassed myself enough?” She gave up her struggle and accepted the fate of being trapped across his lap.
“I’m so sorry, love. It just came as such a shock to me. How does someone go that long without sex?”
She growled again, really wanting to scratch his eyes out. “It’s not that big of a deal. It’s not like water or food or some necessity!”
He shook his head as if in disbelief.
“Darlin’, for some people it very much is a necessity.”
She wasn’t sure how she felt about that statement. It wasn’t as if it had been a conscious decision exactly, and there wasn’t any changing it at this point, but she had the very real impression that by some people he meant himself. Cleary he was a very sexual man, which she’d recognized from day one. She could never satisfy a man like that, and she knew it! Why she was there setting herself up for disaster was something she couldn’t understand, and the war within her over that very subject was starting to suffocate her.
“Well, for women…we’re different. We have our kids and activities and friends and…I had a busy life!” she finished, sounding strained and distraught.
“Okay. Okay.” He stroked her hair as if she were a puppy. “I reacted badly. Let’s start this conversation over again, okay?” He ran his hand over a rough five o’clock shadow covering his chin and the sexist cleft she’d ever seen.
“I told you, sex and I aren’t on the best of terms. Can I ask you something?” She chewed the corner of her lip and pushed her hair behind her ears nervously while awaiting his agreement.
“Tell you what, for you, and you alone, you can ask me anything, and I promise to answer honestly. Deal?”
She narrowed her eyes at him. “For it to be a deal, don’t I have to give something, too?”
His smile grew. “Oh right, you are correct. Well now, let me think.”
He allowed his gaze to scan the ceiling, and she felt like punching him.
“I know.” He moved so fast she wasn’t sure what happened, but suddenly she was on the bed, flat on her back, and he was positioned in the rather vulnerable spot between her legs.
“Every question you ask, I get to see, touch, or kiss, somewhere on your body…my discretion.”
She tried to sit up, but he had his arms wrapped around her legs and when she rose even half way, he tugged, knocking her back down.
“Somehow I think I’m getting the raw end of this deal.”
“Oh honey, on the contrary, you’re getting the sweet end.” He winked at her. “I promise you that.” He pushed his hands up under her dress and ran his thumbs on the inside of her thighs making her wriggle. “Now, ask your question.”
“I don’t remember what it was anymore.” It wasn’t a total lie, but she wasn’t sure she liked this deal he’d bartered.
He inched the skirt of her dress up her thighs. She tried to bat his hands away, but all that did was make him take a bite of her left thigh, causing her to squeal, then moan in a fashion that spoke nothing at all of stop .
“Ask me.” He held her gaze in the moonlight while he ran his lips along the skin of her thigh. He wasn’t really kissing or doing anything other than moving along it, but good lord, combined with the heated look in his eyes, it felt lethal.
“You’ve been with a lot of women, right?” She swallowed hard.
“Sure.” He stayed vague.
“You infuriate me.” She sighed.
“Would you rather I be the type of man to kiss and tell? Because I work with a lot of guys, and the story of tonight would make great…”
“No!” She slapped her hands down on top of his. She didn’t even want to think about his sharing her insanity with all the men she saw every single day.
“Okay, then ask your question.” He started to blow across her skin, then run his fingers
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