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“I need to be able to focus on my job, and with you doing work for Franzetti, that makes it a conflict of interest. I think we already learned that lesson the hard way, didn’t we?” Drowning was a hard fucking lesson.
He tilted his head to the side slightly as he mulled over her response, trying to determine if she was being fully honest with him. “I’m taking care of that.”
Layne wasn’t fully convinced. “Oh, is that right? Well, so am I.”
He dropped his hand from her chin, but still kept her close. “I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you. About us.” It was a rare moment of truth and honesty in Joey’s thirty-seven years.
“There isn’t an ‘us’.” Layne corrected him. She shook her head, sidestepped around him, and began to spout off one difficult truth after another.
“You’re the one who said you aren’t a country club and caviar guy. You’re the one who said you were going to get your rocks off and then I’d never see you again.”
“I know what I said. That was before.”
“Before what? Hm?” She pulled the blouse up and over her head and hastily tossed it onto a hanger inside out. Her hands began digging through the rest of the clothes searching for the shirt she had arrived in. When she looked over at Joey, he had it hanging off the tip of his finger. She reached over and snagged it from him.
“Before I realized how much?—”
Layne cut him off, “—of a good fuck I was?”
Exasperated, he began to lose what little patience he was clinging to. “Damnit, Layne! Yes, but it’s more than that! It’s the way you look at me with your eyes, even when you’re pissed off. It’s the way you think you own a room even when the odds are stacked against you. It’s everything you do. To think that I would never get the chance to experience all that again would either drive me insane or send me into a homicidal rage.”
As he explained himself, she found herself forgetting how to handle just the basics of getting her shirt on, fumbling it in her hands. Mick’s words echoed in her head about being distracted, this mysterious project no one knew anything about, Franzetti’s move to eliminate her, and then there were just the basic day-to-day things in her life.
When she looked up, Joey had moved closer to her and cupped her face in his hands. The warmth of his skin on her cheeks made her want to tell him she could ignore everything inside of her head.
Layne shut her eyes trying to find the words she should say and not the ones she wanted to say. “I don’t do commitments, Joey. My life is too sticky for that.”
His voice was gentle. “Not asking you to.”
She opened her eyes back up hoping for a little more clarity to come to her on if she should listen to her head, her heart, or her carnal desires. “You’re a stubborn ass.” A small chuckle passed through her lips as she fought back a smile tugging at the corners of her mouth.
His boyish grin spread across his face before capturing her mouth in a feral kiss. His hands dropped away from her face as he wrapped his muscular arms around her waist, lifting her up from her feet.
Layne’s legs wrapped around his waist while her tongue intertwined with his. Joey backed Layne up against a wall as the heat between them began to simmer.
A couple of text messages dinged on her wrist. Capturing a peek at them pop up on her smartwatch she groaned at the inconvenience of timing. Trying her best to break the seal of the kiss for more than a quick breath, Layne managed only a word or two at a time.
“I have…to leave…to get ready…for…a meeting.”
His arms pulled her up against him tighter at the thought of her leaving so soon. Pulling back his mouth he gave her a wanton gaze. “Skip it.”
“It’s my dad, I can’t just not go.”
He pressed his forehead against hers. “In that case, guess you’ll owe me one.”
She indulged in a few more kisses from him before regaining some self-control over her actions and dropping her legs down from around him. Once he settled her back on her feet, she slowly got her top back on.
“Come find me when you’re ready to cash in that favor.” Her hand lightly patted his chest, trailing her fingertips down across his stomach as her smile lit up her face.
Layne left the privacy of the dressing room before she risked losing all her damn senses.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
When she arrived at O’Reilly Manor later that evening, Liam walked in through the front door moments after her. Their dad had summoned them both here but hadn’t disclosed the nature of what he wanted to talk about.
“Aren’t you supposed to be out getting your nails done or something?” Liam quipped.
“Aren’t you supposed to be out getting laid by a hoe or something?” She fired back.
