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My lips curve and my cock hardens, pressing against my zipper when I want it pressing between her thighs. Holy hell. I’ve wanted those thighs wrapped around me from the moment this woman pissed me the fuck off in the coffee shop. It made no sense then. Nothing with this woman does, but it doesn’t have to. One and done.
The elevator dings and I hold on to her. I don’t want to let her go. I want to take her upstairs, when that is not a place I welcome women, not ever. And yet I brought her to this elevator. It’s a realization that has me releasing her arm, and not because I’ve changed my mind about my one and done. But because I want the control this woman has taken from me. She doesn’t get to hide behind my choices and my decisions.
“Come upstairs with me,” I say, and while the words are not a question, I back away and lean against the inner frame of the elevator, holding the door open, forcing her to make the next move. To change the dynamic with her actions. She stares at the car, not at me, seconds ticking by before her gaze finds mine, her green stare piercing. I arch a brow in question.
“What’s upstairs?”
“The top floors are residential. I own an apartment here.”
She laughs without humor. “I had a meeting with Dan in your building.”
“Yes. You did. And for the record, he knows I live here.”
“You thought I knew.” She doesn’t give me time to respond. “You thought—I didn’t know.”
I want to believe her. Too fucking much. I want to fuck her. Too fucking much. “Come upstairs with me, Cat.”
She answers by walking to me and joining me in the doorway, but she doesn’t touch me. She tilts her delicate little chin up, but there is nothing delicate about her will when her eyes once again meet mine, as she says, “I did not plot against you. I did not ever plan to write a book with Dan. I do, however, regret not texting you about this meeting, when you don’t deserve that regret right now. And I meant what I said. I really am going to bow out of this book deal. If you really don’t believe those things, I need to go home.”
“Why does it matter what I believe if we’re just fucking?”
“Because you just told me to make you believe it, and that is a clear statement that you are fucking me just to prove to me and you that I can’t hurt you. I have no impact on your life whatsoever. I’m just a fuck. And that’s fine. I’m just a fuck and so are you to me, but that’s supposed to equal an escape that feels good.”
My hands go to her waist, and I walk her into me, her legs now pressed to mine, her hands forced to rest on my chest, where I want them willingly. “Sweetheart,” I say, “I promise you that I’m going to make every lick, kiss, and touch as good as the moment before you orgasm.”
“I don’t doubt that you’ll make me feel good in the moment, Reese. I don’t doubt that this will make you feel like you won in some way I don’t fully understand. And I think you might enjoy that feeling in the morning. I don’t think I will. And not only does that defeat the entire premise of a one night stand, but I just talked myself out of this.” She presses against my chest and tries to move away. I don’t even think about letting her go. I don’t just want her. I crave this woman.
Voices sound in the near distance, and I react instantly, not about to create a moment that embarrasses Cat or loses her. “I was an asshole,” I say, and my hands come down on her hips. “I judged you.” I maneuver her into the elevator and into the corner. I punch in my code to the elevator and focus on what matters. Cat. My hands go to her face. “I’ll make it up to you.”
“You were an asshole.”
“I’ll make it up to you,” I repeat, pressing my cheek to hers, my lips at her ear, as I say, “I promise you, sweetheart, that every kiss, every touch, every lick, will be as good as the moment before your next orgasm.”
Her fingers curl around my lapels, and I can feel the subtle softening of her body as she replies with a raspy, “Does that promise include the words ‘I’m sorry’?”
I ease back to look at her. “I’ll say I’m sorry, Ms. Manners,” I assure her, “if you’ll say please.”
“You have a reason to say I’m sorry,” she counters. “You haven’t given me a reason to say please.”
And there it is. Yet another challenge by this woman that stirs ten levels of heat in my blood. The elevator dings and the doors begin to open. I lace my fingers with hers and tug her against me. “You do know that you can’t issue a challenge like that one to a man, and not give him a chance to make good on it, don’t you?”
“I’ll stay, but you do know that ‘please’ is a word that, when used in this particular context, has performance implications, I assume?”
I laugh, and my cock twitches. “We’ll let your manners decide my performance.”
“I guess we will,” she says, and it’s officially game time: The kind where she’s naked and eventually I will be, too. After she says please.
Chapter ten
Cat
Time and mistakes have taught me that success and winning don’t equal control, as my father and my two of my three brothers would have me believe. Making your own choices is what gives you control. Owning those decisions, and your own happiness, your own pleasure: That is control.
As Reese and I walk down the long hallway to his apartment, and he pulls me close with his big, powerful arm, I’m aware of where we’re headed. I know that the warmth pooling in my belly and the heaviness in my breasts is a prelude not just to sex, but to me willingly allowing him the kind of control that enables him to make me say please. That’s my decision. That’s me owning my pleasure. And despite Reese being everything I don’t want in a man: Arrogant, rich, and powerful, and too good looking to live amongst us real humans, somehow he is exactly what I need. I don’t analyze why. I don’t have to understand.
It’s one night.
And that is what I want. It’s freedom from inhibitions and complications, and yet as we draw to a halt at his apartment door, and I watch him unlock it, nerves flutter in my belly. I never get nervous with men. Not since law school, when winning mock-courtroom battles had meant finding a comfort level in my own skin and on my own. The problem is perhaps that I’ve let Reese get too far under my skin as well. I know him. I’ve talked to him. I’ve enjoyed engaging conversations. I’ve looked forward to our little encounters and exchanges. And since I’m still talking to myself in my head, I tell myself that all of that was just foreplay, the lead-in to a good show. Nothing more.
