Page 183 of The Wild Card

“You need to leave,” Crew says flatly. “Go to town, or something.”

Foster, still laughing, says, “We brought champagne—”

Crew repeats, “Go. To. Town.”

Next, I hear Sadie. “Is Emmie—oh. Oh. Are you guys in the middle of—”

“Sadie,” Crew warns.

“Yep. Going to town,” she says with an awkward little chuckle. “Love you both. Congrats on the engagement and the, uh, the—”

“What’s with the plant?” Foster asks.

I hear the unmistakable sound of what I think is Crew’s wallet hitting someone in the chest.

“Lunch is on me. Don’t come back for at least an hour.”

Foster makes a low whistling noise. “An hour?”

“Make it two.”

Foster, laughing now. “You absolute animal. Congratulations, Jensen.”

The door shuts.

I hear the car start, the tires crunch, and the sound of Foster’s laughter fading down the drive. Through the window, I catch a glimpse of Sadie in the passenger seat, fanning herself and mouthing “OH MY GOD.”

Crew reappears in the hallway. Still holding the fern. Naked and slightly breathless. His expression is somewhere between murderous and desperate.

He sets the fern down on the bookshelf.

Looks at me.

I’m leaning against the wall, naked, arms crossed, one eyebrow raised. Partly because I wanted to see his face when he came back, and partly because my legs are still not fully operational.

“Two hours?” I say. “That’s ambitious.”

“I have a lot of lost time to make up for.” He closes the distance between us in three strides—those long, purposeful strides that remind me he chases people for a living—and his hands land on my waist like they belong there. Because they do.

“If one more person drives down that road,” I murmur, “I’m installing a gate.”

“Already on the list.”

“With a lock.”

“With a lock.” His mouth finds my neck, and I feel him smile against my skin when my breath catches. “No more interruptions.”

“No more interruptions.”

He picks me up, and I wrap around him, legs locked at his back, arms around his neck. He carries me through the hallway and into the main room, and I’m expecting the wall again—but he walks past it.

He sets me on the dining table.

The wood is cool against my bare skin, and I suck in a breath, but then his mouth is on mine, and I stop caring about temperature. He kisses me like he’s been starving for it—like the last four hours were a desert and I’m water—and I pull him closer by his hips until there’s nothing between us but heat and want and the absolute refusal to be interrupted a third time.

Then he’s pressing me back onto the table, one hand braced beside my head, the other sliding up my thigh.

“You okay?” he asks, looking down at me. His voice is low and rough, and his eyes are dark, and I will never, ever get tired of the way Crew Jensen looks at me when we’re like this—like I’m the only thing in the world that makes sense to him.