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She approved of the way part of his hair was pulled back from the sides of his face and banded with a leather tie at the back of his head. He looked tough. Dangerous and tough. The bad boy personified.
“Don’t worry, I won’t tell him you dragged me out for him. He might wonder why you cared. Hell, I wonder why you care.”
At that, he came to an abrupt stop.
He turned to stare back at her and she watched a battle rage in his eyes and wondered just what the hell it was he was fighting himself over. She’d seen that look in her brother’s eyes before. Watched him as he confronted his sisters and fought to try to protect them while still maintaining their love for him.
Like Dawg, Graham was an incredibly strong man with a sense of decency and a code of honor that likely only he understood, but that everyone else could definitely depend upon.
Whatever the battle was about, she watched as he finally made up his mind. Turning along another hall, he dragged her to the nearest room, opened the door, and pushed her inside ahead of him.
Shadows surrounded her, but there was enough light falling through the floor-to-ceiling windows to identify the room as a sort of living area. A television, couch, sofa, and two recliners took up the center of the room, while antiques appeared to occupy the space along the walls.
“What the hell are you doing here, Lyrica? I can’t believe you’d actually show up at a party like this,” he growled, following as she crossed the room to one of the huge, uncovered windows that looked out on the lake.
She watched his expression in the glass, her heart tripping at the hunger in his face, in his dark gaze. He was watching her as though he was dying for her.
“And what kind of party is it?” she asked. Barely admitted anger that he hadn’t visited, hadn’t checked up on her, ignited inside her.
She was crazy. She should have never allowed him to drag her up here.
“A free-for-all fuck night,” he threw back to her. “You know what kind of parties Collier has.”
“He’s as much of a head case as you are.” She curled her lips angrily. “Tell me, do you share your bimbos or just your taste for bimbos?”
“Don’t push me, Lyrica. You should remember what happens when I get too damned hungry for you,” he reminded her, his voice harsh. “Why are you here?”
She turned to him slowly, aware that his arms bracketed her, his palms flat against the windows as she stared up at him.
“I’m here for my free-for-all fuck night,” she said sweetly. “I wanted to try the bimbo role out before I actually accepted the position.”
Something flared in his eyes. Heat and hunger, anger, and male demand. And for a second, she wondered exactly what she’d managed to free inside the man whose control always seemed so tightly held, so intent.
—
Graham was being pushed too far, too close to the limit of his control. The hunger that raged through him was wearing at the determination to keep his hands off her. Watching her sitting there with Sam Bryce, the other woman watching Lyrica with the same interest and hunger men watched her with, had been too much for him.
Sam was a friend, a damned good friend, but if she touched Lyrica then she’d become an enemy he could never forgive, just as any man would.
Lyrica was his.
That thought shocked him. She was stronger than he was. Strong enough to say no, to stay away. And even knowing he should do the same, still he couldn’t quite shake the hunger raging through him.
The need for her only grew daily, dreams of her haunted his nights, and he swore his cock had been hard since the day he met her. Definitely harder since her far too short stay at his home.
“Lyrica, you shouldn’t be out like this, honey.” He sighed, trying like hell to keep from actually touching her. “You should be more careful right now and you know it.”
Shadows haunted her eyes at his statement, raged in the emerald depths, along with a vulnerable need that sank tender claws inside his chest.
She shook her head once. “They weren’t after me. The investigation . . .”
“Lyrica, don’t,” he whispered. “You know there was more to that, just as I do.”
“No. If there was, Dawg would have—”
“Put a tail on you just like he did?” He sighed. “Even I’ve seen your bodyguard, sweetheart. Dawg knows better. He simply can’t prove it.”
“Or maybe you just can’t accept the truth,” she said accusingly as she lifted her hands from her sides to push against his chest. Not that he moved, despite the strength she put behind her insistence that he do just that. “Sorry, Graham, I’m not so interested in being bimbo number twelve. Try me next time, why don’t ya?”
