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‘If you’d wanted to stay, you could have.’ A little petulant, still unforgiving.
He shook his head. ‘Responsibilities, Bella. People were relying on me.’
‘Priorities. Choices.’ She’d been relying on him. Unfair of her perhaps, but she’d fallen—just like that. And she’d wanted him by her side. She’d enjoyed having him as a buffer between her and her family. But even more, she’d just wanted him at her side again—inside.
‘I had every intention of calling you. I tried to call you.’ He paused. ‘You were the one who made the choice to stop that from happening.’
Humiliation at her exposure rose. Yes, she’d deliberately sabotaged any chance he might make contact because she’d been so sure he wouldn’t and she didn’t want to keep on hoping for ever that he would. Because she would have hoped—hoped and hoped and gone on hoping for evermore. And at the same time she’d been so sure he wouldn’t. She didn’t want to be that much of a loser any more.
His fingers were gentle but quite firm on her jaw as he turned her face back to him. He spoke very clearly. ‘What you have yet to learn, Bella, is that I let very little stand in the way of what I want.’
‘And what do you want?’
‘You.’
She was melting inside, every bone liquefying.
‘And the thing is …’ he inched closer ‘… I get the distinct impression that you want me too.’
She was about to puddle at his feet. ‘Owen—’
‘Now why don’t you do what you’ve been thinking about? Because that’s exactly what I’m going to do.’
Her breathing skittered as he stepped closer again.
‘I’m going to touch you and kiss you and feel you and watch you.’
She’d forgotten to blink and her eyes felt huge and dry.
‘I want to watch you, Bella.’ He was so close now. If she moved less than a millimetre, she’d be touching him.
‘Do you know how expressive you are? How wide your eyes go when you want something? How pink your cheeks and your lips go?’ His voice dropped as he whispered in her ear. ‘How wet you get?’
She sucked in a breath. Shaken and very, very stirred. Did he know how wet she was now?
‘Do it, Bella,’ he urged in that low, sexy whisper. ‘Do it.’
Her hand lifted and she spoke without thinking. A whisper, softer than his. ‘Take your shirt off.’
For a moment their eyes met and she trembled at the flare of passion in the blue of his.
His hands moved to his top and with a fast movement he whipped it off, tossing it in a direction similar to her phone. He glanced down. The sweat had tracked down, slightly matting the fine layer of hair.
‘I should shower.’ The first hint of self-consciousness she’d ever seen in him.
‘Not yet.’ She placed the hand she’d raised on his chest, spreading her fingers on the heat, liking the dampness. She leant forward, licking the hollow at the base of his throat, tasting the salt. She liked him like this—raw, his body already primed for action. The run had just been the warm-up.
His breath hissed out.
Glancing down, she saw just how much he did want this—how much he wanted he
r. She looked back up and saw he’d seen her checking him out, and his smile had gone sinful.
His hands slipped down, pushing the old tracksuit pants from her waist and down. She kicked them off as he unclasped her bra, then he pulled each strap down her arms so it fell from her. Underneath the tee shirt her breasts were now free.
‘Tell me, the other day when you barged in on my meeting wearing this gorgeous old tee shirt, were you wearing panties beneath it?’
Bella hesitated. A smile slowly curving her mouth. ‘What do you think?’
