When I'm with You (Because You Are Mine #2)(47)

What was he thinking? It wasn’t time for this yet. He had coached himself not to become bowled over by her thousands of times, but the taste of Elise made logic a feeble thing.

“Get dressed,” he said, purposely avoiding looking at the flushed, naked splendor of her as she lay there with her legs parted. She was a sex-mussed, unmade bed that he wanted to spend about a week in . . . for starters. He needed to gather himself. He’d almost lost control several times tonight, come so close to throwing himself wholesale into the inferno of her.

“I’ll start to pack your things.”

“Pack my things?” she repeated, shock ringing in her voice. She sat up slowly.

He glanced at her. His cock lurched against his trousers, the stab of arousal a sharp pain. He looked away, hiding his wince, and opened the closet door.

“Yes. You can’t think I’d allow you to stay here,” he said as he pulled a suitcase from the closet.

“I didn’t think you had a say one way or another!”

“Again, you thought wrong. You’re coming with me,” he said, his tone brooking no argument as he tossed the suitcase on the bed and opened it. “Get dressed, Elise.”

From the periphery of his vision, he saw her rise and move toward the dresser.

“Where are we going?” she asked, her incredulity now replaced by amazement.

“To my place.”

When she didn’t reply, he turned. She stood before the dresser, a T-shirt clutched in her hands, the material covering part of her belly and her mons, but little else. It took him a distracted moment to realize she looked utterly floored.

“You want me to move in with you?” she asked, her voice sounding hollow with shock.

“Yes,” he said, his matter-of-fact tone belying his wariness about the plan. He began tossing the items on her bedside table into the suitcase. “You’ll stay at my place until we decide what to do.” He frowned as he picked up a bottle of her signature perfume from the dresser top—Hermès Perfume 24, Faubourg—and rolled it up hastily in a silk bathrobe. “It’s an . . . unusual circumstance, but we’ll have to make do.”

“Where do you live?” she asked breathlessly. He glanced back and wished she’d put on the T-shirt.

“Near Lake Shore and Astor. Not far from where we met at the market the other day.” He located a plastic bag and walked over to the closet, where he began scooping up loads of designer shoes and shoving them into it.

“That’s a very nice area. But . . .”

“What?” he asked, his irritation growing when she continued to stand there, frozen.

Naked.

Lovely.

He raised his eyebrows in impatient expectancy when she didn’t immediately reply.

“Well . . . don’t you want to . . . finish?” she asked, staring at the bed and then down to his heavy cock.

His body leapt into full, throbbing readiness once again as he stared at her naked beauty and experienced the graphic fantasy of him laying her on that sagging bed and sinking into the glory of her. It was because of her uncertainty—what he could only call shyness—that he found his strength. How could such a flagrant wild child seem so naïve at times?

“I will not make love to you for the first time in this hellhole, but on my terms and in my place of choosing,” he stated simply.

He saw her throat convulse as she swallowed.

“And Elise? The time will be of my choosing. Never think otherwise.”

Rebellion flashed in her eyes, but she quickly cast her gaze downward, hiding it. Much to his surprise, she contained her pique sufficiently not to reply. She dressed fleetly before helping him pack up her belongings.

* * *

His condominium was everything Elise expected it to be, given it was Lucien’s lair—sensual, rich, masculine décor set within the ideal backdrop of the lake facing the east, and the labyrinth of sparkling high-rises to the north and the west. Of course, since it was Lucien, he was on the top floor of the building, occupying the premier penthouse.

When they first arrived in the hushed, luxurious residence perched high above the city, Lucien took the suitcase she’d been rolling along with the one he’d been carrying. “Why don’t you relax for a moment here in the living room,” he said, nodding toward the large, breathtaking expanse of space before floor-to-ceiling windows. “I’m going to get your room ready for you.”

“My room?” Elise said, startled.

He studied her from beneath hooded eyelids. “I told you, we will do this at my pace. Are you willing to accept that?”

She bit her lower lip, trying hard to disguise her disappointment. She’d been hoping to lie next to Lucien’s body, absorb his heat, his strength, tease him until he couldn’t deny her the delicious explosion of his male power. She longed to be taken, to be claimed. She craved having her fill of him—of letting him take his fill of her—of falling into an exhausted sleep only to awaken and begin all over again. . . .

She’d never been so hungry, so starved for a man in her life.

When she noticed he waited, his eyebrows raised, she nodded reluctantly. Apparently, Lucien had different ideas as to how he wanted things to proceed.

“Say you accept that we’ll do this at my pace,” he said, and she realized he expected her to put the promise into words.