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That wasn't pale ice; it was pure pale blue flames. White-hot. Possessive.
"As long as I'm here, you're mine," he growled. "Do you understand that, Mikayla?"
She shook her head slowly. "I'm not yours, Nik. At the moment, I choose to be with you. Just as I chose not to be with Steve."
Nik stared down at Mikayla in shock. This wasn't what he expected. This wasn't the reaction she should have given him. She was to agree she belonged to him. She was to accept that, not disagree with him.
Setting her slowly on her feet, Nik backed away; the urge to pick her up and carry her away back to her bed was nearly overpowering. He wanted to show her, wanted to prove to her, that she belonged to him well before they arrived on Steve Gainard's doorstep. Before he had to face the man who would most likely attempt to pick up the pieces of his relationship with Mikayla once he left.
"You'll be leaving," she whispered, standing in front of him, petite and determined, so strong, and yet so fragile. "Don't ask more from me than you're willing to give, Nik."
She turned and left him standing there. Dressed in butterscotch silk slacks, those sexy-as-hell high heels, and a matching butterscotch sleeveless knit top, she looked as sweet and fragile as the sunrise, but what he repeatedly forgot was the fact that she was just as strong and just as endearing as the sunrise as well.
And damned if he didn't feel as though he had just been put well and truly in his place.
Later, later, though, he promised himself, his time would come. Tonight, when he had her beneath him, when she was screaming his name in pleasure, then he would make certain she realized exactly who she belonged to.
Mikayla remained silent as they made the drive to Steve's home outside Hagerstown. The two-story glass and steel home he had built several years ago rested on the side of Sideling Hill, staring out on the valley below.
The winding blacktopped road was hell in the winter when ice and snow hit, but Steve, Mikayla knew, was rarely there in the winters.
He was home often in the summer, though, and the sight of the black Bentley parked in the drive as Nik and Mikayla pulled up to the house assured her Steve was there today.
She waited until Nik rounded the truck and opened the passenger door before turning and allowing him to help her from the vehicle.
Her hands gripped his powerful lower arms, and a quick peek into his face assured her that her last comment to him had struck home. Unfortunately, it had only served to increase the distance he placed between them.
She covered the hurt that caused, hid it deep inside, and fought against it. She didn't want promises from him, she reminded herself, but she was woman enough that it hurt to know that he expected her to give all she was to him while he was holding a part of himself back.
She considered it highly unfair that he would even consider it. He knew he was leaving her when this was over; she knew it. Did he have to demand everything when she 180
knew he would lay it at her feet, return it to her, and walk away?
She had no regrets, she told herself. That didn't mean she didn't have her pride as well as her determination to ensure that she survived this little affair.
"Tell me about Gainard," Nik demanded as he closed the truck door and touched her arm to keep her from moving ahead of him.
So why hadn't he asked that before they arrived?
Frowning, she stared up at him. "He's thirty-nine, a very successful architect with a firm in D.C. He's never been married and he has no children. We dated for about six months."
"Why didn't you go to bed with him if you dated that long?" Ice dripped from Nik's voice. "A man isn't going to waste six months on a woman he's not sleeping with."
"You don't think I'm worth getting to know first?" she asked, unable to hide the fact that it hurt. "I guess not. You found it pretty easy to get me there, didn't you?"
"That wasn't what I meant, Mikayla." His voice deepened, hardened. "I'm asking you why you waited when it was obvious he was interested in more than sex."
"It's not just about the sex, Nik," she snapped in irritation. "I wasn't ready; that didn't mean he wasn't."
"So why didn't you marry him?" The questions were going somewhere, she knew they were, she just wasn't certain where.
"What does this have to do with Eddie Foreman or Maddix Nelson?" Mikayla demanded as she glared back at Nik. "My personal relationship with anyone has nothing to do with why you're here."
Nik couldn't argue that, but he was damned if he could get it out of his mind. She had dated this man for six months, he had asked her to marry him, yet he hadn't slept with her. She hadn't slept with him, but Steve Gainard had thought he held enough of her heart to ask her to marry him.
It was eating at Nik, and he knew it shouldn't. He had no right to demand anything from her, just as he had no right to worry about what she did when this was over, or who she did it with.
But it was burning inside him. Like a steady, pulsing flame it was searing his guts with a possessive fever he couldn't seem to control.
