Chase Me (Paris Nights Book 2)(12)

He tried to focus on the city, all the lights shining off its wet pavement and buildings. Aww, she was—that was kind of sweet, actually. She was taking him on the Seine. Cutting left toward all these gloriously glowing buildings, a fountain leaping in front of a magnificent old palace—“L’H?tel de Ville,” she said, and it looked and felt so different when she was saying it than when he was studying the layout of the city as part of a mission briefing.

He started to…not relax into it, exactly. When pretty much every atom in his body was focused on crawling into her pants, relaxed wasn’t quite the right word. But to enjoy this part, too—the view. The ride.

Maybe he’d been a little harsh on this city. In certain lights, in certain conditions, it was a hell of a view.

Bridges arching over dark water, building after majestic old building glowing magically against the dark. She crossed one of the bridges and slowed for a light, Notre-Dame in their sights, the ancient view oddly…moving. Hell, Grandma, you should get on a plane just to see this, you’d love it.

Vi pulled her form-fitting leather sleeve back to check her watch. “Oh, only fifteen minutes before it goes out,” she said, and shot them left across a bridge and left again and then just bent into the handlebars and gunned it.

In the scarce traffic of the after-midnight weekday streets, she raced so fast he ducked into her and held on, all the already overstimulated cells in his body revved even higher and hotter by the speed. God, she had control of that Ducati. Cutting slick and sleek through what traffic there was, blazing past the long, stately Louvre, the streets sparkling up at her headlight as they sped toward the Eiffel Tower.

They reached the esplanade across the river from the Tower just as it went out. But—“Made it!” Vi exclaimed, jumping off the bike and heading toward the parapet, taking her helmet off as she strode.

Boots on stone. Long, ground-eating stride. Leather. The Eiffel Tower snubbing him by going out just before he got to it, in forty-degree weather in July.

Life was good.

Also, if he got more aroused, he might honestly start trying to talk her into public sex. So there were dozens of tourists around and they’d end up on YouTube. So his career would be shot. Was that the end of the world?

And just then the black Tower started sparkling like someone had laced champagne with gold leaf flecks and shaken up the bottle.

He rested his hands against the wet parapet beside her, giving himself something solid to hold on to. The sparkles just danced and danced against the shadow of the Tower. Hell, that Tower made him think of…himself, actually. The sparkles would be his sense of humor, and the shadow would be…

He looked away from that shadow down at his own personal, honest-to-goodness Bond girl. Who was pressing her black-gloved hands against the parapet and gazing at the gold-dancing Eiffel with a pride and pleasure that made her look like a teenager. “Damn,” he said. “I should have proposed here. Can I do it over again?”

She rolled her eyes and didn’t even bother to glance up at him. So he had to nudge his body into hers, of course, to get back all her attention.

She slanted a glance up at him, adding ten more degrees to his already overheated blood. Her eyes still sparkled from the Tower, and yet they held this speculative wickedness.

Hell, she was thinking about it.

He’d already gotten lucky tonight, just by her throwing knives at him, but she had a look like he might get Super Duper A-Meteor-Must-Be-About-To-Hit-Me Lucky.

He nudged her some more, using his bigger body to bump her gently around until he could close her in against that parapet. Jesus, he was going to go out of his mind. Even that much contact just sizzled through his brain and entire body and made him want to see if he could rip leather with his bare hands. “I give you full permission to tie me up,” he said.

She blinked. Then she got this smile on her lips that flooded him with red heat and made him want to kneel at her feet and beg.

“If you need to slow me down,” he said.

“Now why would I want to do that?” she purred.

Oh, holy hell. Oh, yeah. Yeah.

“I’m kind of, maybe”—he took deep breaths—“rushing you.”

“That’s the only way to do a one-night stand, isn’t it? Rush into it and enjoy every second?”

A one-night—? His lips parted, and then his dick just roared up in dragon-rage at his brain. Shut the hell up. Just go with it. Don’t argue with a damn thing.

“Definitely enjoy every second,” he breathed, letting his hips settle against hers. Finally. And hell but that was not enough.

She stood on tiptoe, which dragged her body against his as she brought her mouth to his ear. The dancing Eiffel lights behind her turned starry red. Or was that his brain? “You’re very sure of yourself,” she murmured, with that brushed pure-sex accent of hers. He was pretty sure the Rs just reached down and physically started stroking his dick. “Are you that…cocky in bed?”

“I—I can—” Speak. Think. Complete a full sentence. Breathe. “Take direction, too.”

She brushed her lips down the side of his throat. Oh, hell. She really might need to tie him up. It was so hard not to just grab her butt and grind himself against her, the muscles of his arms might snap in the fight against himself. “I’m fully convinced of your ability to come in two seconds as soon as you see my panties,” she murmured.