Commander in Chief (White House #2)(8)

“Everything.”

My stomach feels as if I’m riding a roller coaster, so many dips and tugs I can’t stand still as Matt waits for my answer.

I’ve never been able to lie to him, and I don’t think I ever will be. “I don’t want you to stay away from me.”

“I asked you a question. Do you want everything I can give you?”

God. The pull he has on me, his magnetism tugging at me. The pain in his eyes only reminding me of my own.

He’s the president now, but he’s still Matt. My first crush, my first love. And I know that after Matt, I’ll never want or love another man again.

“I don’t know what ‘everything’ means. I want to start slowly,” I begin.

“How slowly?”

“Slow, Matthew,” I say.

He exhales, his eyes softening.

“It’s too much. You’re too much,” I groan. “But I don’t care about anything else. I don’t want you to stay away from me.”

His gaze is alive with heat as he gazes down at me.

“I just don’t see how this can even work without a media explosion I don’t want,” I add. “It’s too close to the campaign—people will think we had an affair all that time.”

“We did.”

I feel my cheeks heat at both the memory and the gruffness in his voice.

The times I spent with him are too valuable to me to willingly give them up as fodder to the media. “Yes, but those were our moments.” I flush even more at the look in his eyes, as if he remembers too. “I don’t want the world to use them against you. Or me.”

He’s silent for a moment, simply staring at me, everything about him making my mouth water—his achingly familiar espresso eyes, warm and liquid as he looks down at me. And when he lifts his hand to hold me by the chin, my whole body jerks in response. Wanton. Aching. Swaying toward him. “Come to the White House. Be my acting first lady,” he says, his voice husky.

“Matt, I couldn’t possibly.”

“You can very possibly.”

I’m stunned to realize he means it—his eyes steely with determination and certainty.

“You can do whatever you want with the role, it’s self-defined.”

“But your mother would be so much better at it,” I insist.

“And yet I’ve got my eye on you for the part.”

“Why?”

That lovely playful sparkle I remember so well appears in his eyes again. “Because you look good on my arm.”

“Haha.” I’m suddenly smiling, I can’t help it.

His lips are curved too, but his stare is deathly serious. “Because I can’t see any other woman standing next to me. And because no one could do the job that you could.”

My heart flips in my chest.

“We’ll figure this out. You try the role on for size. Let me date you out in the public eye without hiding this time. We’ll take it as slow as you need.”

“The media will begin to speculate.”

“They can speculate all they like. As acting first lady you sleep in the White House, you’re on the president’s arm, and you can do so many things, Charlotte. I want to see you spread your wings and fly high, and I want to give you the platform to do it.”

“I don’t see myself as one of those ladies. I’m not posh enough.”

“You’re a countess; your grace is innate.”

“Stop flirting with me. You’re a cad, Mr. President.”

He laughs, and I scowl, and then he reaches out. “I’ll take this”—he leans over and pecks my lips—“as a yes.” He sets his forehead on mine. “A team will stop by to get your belongings, set them all in your room in the White House, and your new detail will pick you up tomorrow and bring you here.”

“I can’t move, Matthew—”

“Listen, I know you don’t want a media circus outside your apartment building every day for four years. I want you to be safe, and you’re safer with me.”

“I . . .” I can’t even think of an argument, and I definitely don’t think my neighbors deserve a media circus and Secret Service around 24/7. “Well, see, that’s something I really don’t need, a detail—”

He interrupts me as he crosses the room to leave. “We can talk more tomorrow. Expect them early.”

I watch him step outside to a trail of Secret Service agents behind him. I stay back for bit until he disappears out the door—and, it seems, until that moment when I can finally breathe. When I start to follow, he suddenly fills the doorway again.

“I forgot something—wait a minute.”

He pulls me back into the room, and then his lips are pressing firmly down on mine. I gasp at the contact, having missed it too much. Him too much. His taste, the way his tongue massages mine. And it’s massaging mine so wickedly as I open up instinctively, a moan leaving me and muffled by him as our tongues rub, tangle, twirl. Taste. Taste. Oh god, his taste. It’s divine ecstasy when he kisses me. Impulsively. Ravenously.

Head slanting, going as deep as he can go in the precious minute the kiss lasts. He groans as he pulls back, my face engulfed by both his warm hands as he drops his forehead on mine, his tone fierce.