Rock Hard (Rock Kiss #2)(44)

While that wasn’t going to happen, not with her panic attacks shutting things down more effectively than a cold shower, she could be with him a little longer. Even if he was being bossy and all around provocative. Truth was, she liked that about him, liked that he always treated her as if he believed she had the strength to stand against him.

So she ate the rest of the food on her plate and tried not to think about all the things he’d said he wanted to do to her. It was hard. Especially an hour later, when she was alone in her bed, her skin flushed and her body aching with need. She hadn’t been this aroused in… ever. Not even after the erotic dream this morning.

Sticky and hot, she went to shove off the sheets so she could go have an actual cold shower when her hand brushed her breasts.

Charlotte whimpered. This was insane. He hadn’t laid a finger on her and her entire body ached with need. Unable to resist, she gently cupped her breast through her nightgown. In her mind’s eye, it was Gabriel’s much bigger, tougher-skinned hand on her flesh. He wouldn’t be this gentle, would hold boldly as he pressed her down into the sheets and thrust himself inside her, his body moving heavy and muscled above her own.

He’d be rough. The way he talked, the words he’d used, it all said he’d be rough.

Hard.

Relentless.

Breath coming in sharp, desperate pants, Charlotte pressed her thighs together and squeezed her own breast harder than she’d ever before done. Her back arched, a soft cry escaping her throat. When she came down from the shock of pleasure, it was to find her knees bent, her nightgown bunched at her upper thighs, and her hand still on her breast.

Blushing, she removed her hand, pushed down her nightgown, then wanted to kick herself. Why was she blushing? She was alone in her damn bedroom and she’d just given in to an erotic daydream. What was wrong with that? Nothing, that’s what. It was great. Today was the first time in years she’d been able to truly let go. If she’d imagined Gabriel in a compromising position, it wasn’t as if he hadn’t done the same with her.

Dirty.

That’s what he’d called his fantasies about her. Dirty. Breath turning shallow again as she thought about the office fantasy he’d described, the one that ended up with her screaming his name while he licked her between her splayed thighs, she got up and tugged off the nightgown, threw it to the floor, then lay back down. Her skin was too hot, her entire body aflame.

The fantasy continued to run through her head, her mind whispering that he’d called her “delicious.” Turning over flat on her stomach, she tried to imagine what it might feel like to have his hands under her thighs, pulling her forward, strong and demanding. To have that sexy, dangerous mouth on her. To hear him lowering his zipper before he pulled her down on his lap and onto his cock.

Moaning, she tried to control the movements of her hips, her mind filled with images so carnal she couldn’t believe they came from her. When her phone buzzed, she wanted to let it go, but its buzz kept intruding on the torturous pleasure of her imagined liaison with Gabriel. Finally grabbing it off the bedside table, she said, “Hello.”

“Ms. Baird, you sound breathless again.” Gabriel’s deep voice went straight to her nipples and the slick folds between her thighs. “Did I make you run to get the phone?”

“No, I’m in bed,” she said and barely bit back a groan at what she’d revealed.

“Ah. And breathless.” His voice dropped. “You better be alone or we’ll be having a very interesting talk the next time we meet.”

Her skin grew tight at the rumbling warning. Inhaling jerkily, she said, “Of course I’m alone.”

“Then the breathlessness becomes far more intriguing.”

Charlotte pulled up the sheet to cover herself, feeling exposed even though he was on the other end of the phone line. “I was just… doing something.”

“Good, keep doing it. I want to hear you do it.”

Her heart kicked. “No,” she said and hung up. Then she went and had that cold shower because she needed to think, needed to remember that no matter how much Gabriel thought he wanted her, he’d give up soon enough. A man that hot, that masculine, wouldn’t be happy with a woman who had panic attacks before he ever laid a finger on her.

The worst thing?

It was the fact her fear had nothing to do with sex.





18


GABRIEL IS (SINFULLY) INAPPROPRIATE





MIDMORNING THE NEXT DAY and Charlotte was staring morosely at her oven, trying to convince herself that baking a tray of cupcakes would make her feel better, when the phone rang again. Figuring it was Molly, she picked it up. The name on the screen made her heart kick, her nipples go to full attention against the thin red T-shirt she wore without a bra.

Thank God Gabriel couldn’t see her.

“Do I need to come in for work today too?” she asked.

While she occasionally vetoed Gabriel’s weekend demands on principle, she had fun with him when they worked Saturdays or Sundays. It was often only the two of them on the floor for long periods, and Gabriel was always more relaxed—to the point that it was on a weekend that she’d first heard him laugh.

At the end of her rope with his demands, she’d picked up her muffin on a violent urge to throw it at his head. Then he’d raised an eyebrow at her and she’d actually done it. Catching it easily in the air, as he’d once caught rugby balls thrown from lineouts, he’d bitten into it.