The Right Swipe (Modern Love, #1)(76)

He snaked his hand under her body and pulled her upright, so there wasn’t any space between their bodies, and gave her short, fast thrusts. She cried out. “Yes, perfect. More.”

His thick arm tightened around her breasts, his heavy breaths tickling her ear. “Look.” He nudged her with his forehead. “Look at us in the mirror.”

She turned her head and almost came right there and then. The full-length mirror on the wall gave her a perfect view of the two of them in profile, his much bigger body tight against hers, penetrating her. No one had ever called her a woman of small stature, but right now she looked tiny, caught up in his grip. Helpless.

He pressed his forehead to her shoulder, his pained expression reflecting back at her in the mirror. Or he was the helpless one.

Or they were both helpless.

He kept one arm around her breasts to plaster her to his front. With two fingers he opened her up to rub his thumb against her clit. A kiss glanced off her ear. “You close?”

“Yes.”

Samson guided her back down to the bed. She pressed her cheek to the pillow so she could keep watching in the mirror, gasping when he held his hand gently but firmly against her neck to keep her pinned down while he hoisted her hips higher. The biological function of sex became a cinematic masterpiece, each muscle contraction in the side of his ass and his thighs hypnotic and amazing.

The orgasm hit her hard and fast out of nowhere and she shuddered. His thrusts grew harder, rougher. She was still shivering when he groaned loudly and pushed deep inside her a final time.

Rhiannon couldn’t budge, not even when he moved off her and collapsed onto his back. All she could do was lay there in a ball of wasted energy and limp muscles as he got off the bed and dealt with the condom.

It was only when he returned to the bed that she lifted a finger, and it was mostly to sleepily let him arrange her so he could big-spoon her. His hand coasted up her arm. He had calluses that teased the hair on her flesh. “Your skin is so soft, Rhi.”

Rhi. He didn’t slip up anymore. He’d respected her demand immediately, even when he hadn’t known the story behind how Peter had tarnished the thought of a lover using her full name.

He was a good guy. The fragile bloom of hope dug its way out of the frozen ground of her heart, and she almost whimpered.

He stroked her back, settling her. There were things they needed to talk about, logistics for the morning to plan out. As if he could read her mind, he kissed her ear. “Go to sleep. I’ll wake you up early, and we can sneak you back into your room at Aunt Belle’s house before breakfast.”

“I asked for breakfast in my room.” She’d wanted to psych herself up before her pitch. The best way to do that was to be alone.

“Before anyone else wakes up, then.”

“Thank you.” Rhiannon meant the thank-you to apply to everything. Coming to her rescue, bringing her to his home, sharing why he’d been so distant. Fear and worry trembled awake under her contentment, but his arm flexed and she fell right back into the warmth of his grip.

It’s okay. Tonight, she’d let him hold her and protect her.

And then tomorrow, she would win. All by herself.





Chapter Twenty-Four


RHIANNON WASN’T going to win Matchmaker.

She could see it in the slightly bored look in Annabelle’s eyes, in every doodle William made on his notepad. She had scrapped the PowerPoint, but she still had to give Annabelle her numbers and projections, didn’t she? Speaking from the heart sounded cute, but it couldn’t tell the woman cold hard facts about the terms of her deal.

Rhiannon crossed her legs. They were doing their pitches in the library. Unlike the rest of the house, which was light and airy and open, the library was darker, with navy walls and heavy furnishings. She’d been in more masculine, stuffy enclaves than this, but that didn’t mean she liked them.

Rhiannon sat in a wing chair facing the big windows, open to the lovely garden on the side of the home. Annabelle and William sat opposite her, behind a desk. Annabelle’s chair was larger than William’s, almost thronelike, so the man appeared smaller than his boss.

Rhiannon wondered how he felt about that. It was a power move, one Rhi might copy one day. But then again, odds were low that she’d ever hire someone like William.

“As far as employee retention goes—” Rhiannon broke off midsentence when William covered his mouth to hide his yawn. She couldn’t blame him, she was boring herself, and this was her presentation.

She rethought her entire presentation and decided to go with her gut.

This is another performance, another show. Imagine you’re up on that CREATE stage again, and kill it.

Only this time, the stakes were so high. She had to be successful. “Annabelle, may I go off script? Why don’t you ask me what you’d like to know about me? Get to know me better.”

The older woman straightened. “I love going off script.” She picked up a piece of paper in front of her and ripped it in two, tossing the scraps in the air. “Scripts are for fools.”

Ah, jeez. Rhiannon wondered what important section of her proposal the woman had just destroyed. She forced herself not to dwell on that and refocused when Annabelle spoke. “Tell me about yourself. From the beginning.”

An open-ended question Rhiannon often asked her prospective employees. “I was born and raised in western New York. My mother was a housekeeper, my father was a groundskeeper. He died when I was young.”