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A smirk slices the side of his mouth. “Oh, I know.”
He’s on one side of the elevator leaned back against the wall and I’m against the other. You couldn’t charge the air between us more even if you were to hook us up to electricity. His arms are folded, one lazy ankle crossed over the other, head tilted, eyes fixed on me.
I’m mirroring him while we calculate each other. Considering briefly all the ways we might royally screw up each other’s lives if we act on the impulses zipping under our skin and it turns out to be a mistake. The thing is, I’ve never felt more certain that this is not a mistake. Not this time around.
And when those ice-blue eyes of his land on me and linger, I feel like I’m free-falling into a pool of bliss. They leave my face briefly to trail down my neck, across my collarbones, over the curve of my shoulders and chest and abdomen. He looks at me as if he’s devouring me little by little.
God help me, I want him to.
His gaze catches mine again and he doesn’t look in control anymore, he looks desperate.
The elevator dings and a man steps in between us. Derek and I don’t move. The poor guy is caught in a dangerous crossfire, and he knows it. He taps his foot anxiously as the elevator advances us. He’s the next stop and no sooner than the doors open does he dart out with a nervous look over his shoulder.
The doors shut and I grin.
Derek’s jaw flexes. “There’s two rules left…” He pauses and I encourage him with a lifted brow. He continues in a voice like black silk, “Two left we haven’t broken.”
“Only two?” I feel oddly accomplished that we managed to break eighteen out of twenty rules since working together.
“Only two,” he repeats, holding up two lazy fingers.
I immediately know which two are left:
Rule number 3: No friendship.
Rule number twenty: No sex.
He crooks his finger twice. “Come here.”
“Not a chance,” I say, wrapping my hands around the railing at my back to anchor me. “You come here.”
“Always have to win, don’t you?” he says with a pleased grin.
“And you can’t keep yourself from competing.”
The elevator is almost to our floor, and the look on Derek’s face has my heart racketing against my sternum, trying to crack my ribs. “All right, then. What are your parameters for this competition?”
I bite my lip just as the elevator doors open. I can’t believe we’re going to do this, and yet I’m helpless to stop it. No, that’s not true. I don’twantto stop it. He has been a magnetic force in my life since the day I met him at that party in college—Idon’t want to overthink it. I just want to be with Derek tonight and hope that I get all the nights after it too.
I step out of the elevator and Derek prowls closely behind as we walk down the hallway to our suite. I’m hyperaware of my skin. Of the way my clothes hug me. The sound of our feet against the luxurious carpeting. Of his hungry expression in every mirror we pass.
“It’ll be like the question game,” I say over my shoulder, and then face forward again. “Mixed with strip poker.”
I’m aware of Derek’s steps faltering slightly behind me. But by the time we reach the door and he holds the key card against it, he’s completely composed. More than composed, in fact—his confidence is radiating from his large form like he’s the origin of all seduction. If there is anything Derek excels at—it’s this.
A thrill twirls through me. This particular dance has never been more fun than with the man holding the door open for me.
“Okay,” he says, his voice a low gravel after we’re both closed inside the room. “So, if I answer the question you take a piece of clothing off, and if I don’t answer it, I have to?”
I nod. “Whoever is naked first loses…and they have to make the first move.”
He stares at me for a beat with a wolfish smile. “I’m in.”
Oh.He knows exactly how good he looks with that slanted halfsmile—and yet he has no mercy on me. He drops his gaze to his wrist, where he unlatches his watch and tosses it on the couch. “A freebie,” he says in a tone that makes my thighs clench.
I can’t help but feel he’s too far away and too close at the same time.
I’ve very quickly lost the upper hand. He’s so much better at this game of seduction than me.
