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With him, I’m dancing right up next to the flames of everything I’m afraid of and I’m learning that I can actually enjoy the burn.
With him, I’m learning that I crave it.
Nick’s gaze is far too knowing as he slides his palm around to the back of my neck, his fingers strong and firm against my nape, yet infinitely tender. He makes a low noise in the back of his throat, then presses a light kiss to my brow. “We’ll save that conversation for another time. Come.”
He takes my hand and leads me back to the leather sofa, pausing to reach for a slim silver remote that closes the dark wood louvers on all of the room’s corridor-facing glass. That same remote apparently locks the door, too, the faint metallic whisper sealing us inside.
“Won’t your employees wonder what we’re doing in here?”
“No. And if they do, none of them will dare let on one way or the other.” He slants me a serious look. “I demand trust from the people around me as much as I demand excellent performance. I pay well for both.”
I feel a cold pang as I glance over at the bag of ridiculously expensive lingerie, which is not the only extravagant gift I’ve received from him. Nick has spoiled me with fine things these past few months. Incredible dinners at the city’s best restaurants. Romantic getaways. A long rope of exquisite pearls that must have easily cost him tens of thousands of dollars.
“Is that how you feel about the women you date too?”
He frowns. “That I expect trust and performance? Or that I’m willing to buy it?”
I shake my head, wishing I hadn’t spoken my thoughts out loud. “I don’t know. Both.”
A certain hardness moves over his expression. “What are you really asking, Avery?”
Too late to pull the words back, I hold his searching gaze. “Is that how you feel about me?”
Instead of answering, he cups my face in his hands and pulls me into a slow, bone-melting kiss. When our lips finally part, he doesn’t release me. His brows furrowed, he exhales a quiet curse and lowers his forehead to rest against mine. “That is how I feel about you. Never doubt that. Never doubt what we have together.”
I manage a nod, but that doesn’t seem good enough for him. Lifting my chin on the edge of his scarred hand, he searches my gaze. “Tell me you won’t doubt what we have together.”
“I won’t,” I promise, unsure why it means so much to him to hear it when he’s never promised me more than a moment. His eyes vow more than that, however. Right from the start, those fathomless blue eyes have promised me everything I dare to grasp. I need only to reach for it. “I won’t doubt you, Nick.”
His thumb traces the line of my lower lip. “Good girl.”
I meet his touch with the tip of my tongue. “I thought I was coming here to be a bad girl,” I say, hoping to steer us back to the playfulness I saw in him before I let my insecurities dampen the mood. “I’m surprised Sister Margaret’s habit didn’t catch on fire from all of the dirty things I was thinking as I passed you in the hallway.”
His voice drops to a thick rumble. “Is that right?”
I nod. “I have to admit, seeing you with a nun was . . . unexpected.”
“Really, why?” He sits on the sofa, but doesn’t coax me down with him. There’s a teasing glimmer in his eyes that I can’t resist. “Because I’m the devil incarnate?”
I give him an arch look, all too aware that my stance in front of him has now perfectly positioned my sex level with his face. “If you mean in bed, the answer is definitely yes.”
He grunts, running his hands up my bare legs and under my linen skirt. “Some would argue in business too.”
“I don’t know, Sister Margaret seems to like you well enough. She seemed downright charmed, if you ask me.” I suck in a gasp as his touch skims my inner thighs. “How often do you meet with her?”
“Only when we’re talking about plans for the children’s rec center I want to build.”
I freeze in his arms. “That’s the meeting you cancelled?”
Nick confided in me not long after we met that he’s been trying to get permits and construction approvals for a recreation center for impoverished inner city kids. It’s a pet project that obviously means a great deal to him, yet here he is, blowing off a meeting about it to mess around with me.
I seize his wandering hands from beneath my skirt and hold them still. “Why didn’t you tell me that’s what you were doing today? Jesus, Nick. I don’t want to interrupt your work on that project.” As important as the rec center construction is to him, it is me who’s become his singular focus at this moment. I can’t deny the thrill it gives me, even though I’ll probably go to hell for tempting him away from doing good, charitable work with Sister Margaret. “You should have told me
. I never would’ve agreed to come here like this if I’d known.”
“What makes you think I would’ve let you refuse?” Wry words, but the dark glimmer in his deep blue eyes is intense with meaning. “Need I remind you of our agreement, Ms. Ross? You know the terms.”
As if to emphasize his point, he brings his hands out from under mine to resume their upward slide under my skirt. His fingers move onto the curve of my ass and contract, kneading the bare mounds of my flesh. The thin fabric of my thong wedges into the crevice between my cheeks, making me hyperaware of every flex of his fingers, every caress that brings his touch achingly closer to my core.
