Sweet Sinful Nights(58)



She knew him well. He was easy. He was simple in the best of ways. All he’d ever wanted was to know her. To understand her past, to help her, to be the one she could lean on. When they were together before, he’d struggled mightily with her need to keep some things buried. While she’d have to find a better time—when they had time—to serve up the story of how her life had capsized in a London hospital, she could give him this much tonight—these words, these feelings that had raced well beyond the physical and claimed a portion of her heart.

“I’m crazy for you, too,” she added.

Then she let him go, the sound of the door snapping closed sealing off the night. She’d replay it as she drifted off into bed. All of it. From the wow to the crazy for you, and every toe-curling, heart-beating, blood-pounding moment in between. Even their fight in the elevator. Because some things might change, but some would remain the same.

They were fire.

*

She woke up to a text message. A dirty, naughty one that sent a hot shiver through her body.

I can still taste you.

Then a sweet one. Text me when you wake up, sunshine. I have something for you.

She wrote back instantly. I’m up, and glad to hear you enjoyed your dessert last night.

As she pushed off the covers, his reply arrived. I could have you for dessert for every meal. Every snack. Every second of every day. You taste spectacular.

Then Brent texted her that she had an open tab at the Luxe spa to spend the day getting pampered. Massage, pedicure, hot stones, whatever it is that happens in spas that you like—it’s yours today. That sounded like a fantastic way to spend her Sunday, so she replied, You win. You’ve made it impossible not to like you again.

She hopped in the shower, luxuriating in the hot jets of the rainforest-style showerhead, and replaying the almost-sex with the man she’d wanted to marry. He could bring it. Oh hell, he could bring it every time. There was no B game from Brent Nichols. He fired on all cylinders all the time. A game only.

She turned off the spray, dried her body, reapplied lip gloss, and freshened her breath with the hotel toothpaste. She’d slipped back into last night’s dress when she heard a knock on the door.

When she opened it, she revised his grade. Make that A plus game—both in bed and in treating her like a queen.

Because, courtesy of Mr. Nichols, room service was delivering a bowl of fresh blueberries, a serving of steel-cut oatmeal, and a steaming pot of black coffee, one sugar on the side. Her favorite breakfast. Her heart grew wings and soared around the room like an animated bird.

A series of messages rained down on her screen, one right after the other.

The car service will be waiting for you as soon as you’re ready to head home.

No woman of mine is cabbing it after I come in her mouth.

Hard. Come hard.

Very hard.

Have I mentioned how absolutely divine your lips are?

Off to lunch. I trust your mood for Tuesday is going to be hot and bothered.

As she read them all, a rush of heat spread through her veins, remembering the night before when he’d ordered her to finish him off. She loved that commanding tone he’d used, just as it turned her on to no end when he called her woman of mine. She wasn’t sure precisely when she’d become his woman again, but after the last two weeks, she felt like his. Which scared her and thrilled her.

In equal measures.

As she left the room, she replied. Hot, bothered, and well fed, apparently. THANK YOU.

She’d closed out of her text messages when an idea hit her. Something she could give to him. She leaned against the hallway wall, and found a photo-altering app she used sometimes on her phone. She opened an image from her gallery, added a few details to it, then attached the photo to the thread and sent it off to him.

Then she did something she hadn’t done since college.

The walk of shame.

Her stilettos clicked loudly on the sleek gray floor of the lobby as she headed to the elevator bank that would take her to the spa level. She kept her chin up high and strolled through the hotel as if she owned the right to walk through it the morning after in the same dress, same shoes, same earrings, and a new big, fat grin.

Probably everyone there at the Luxe would be able to tell she’d had some seriously hot action last night. Come to think of it, she didn’t mind if anyone knew. The after-glow from a great orgasm was a damn good look. She could market a line of skin care products in that style. O Glow. She chuckled to herself, making a beeline for the elevators when her cell bleated loudly from her purse. Flipping open her bag, she reached for her phone.

Ryan Sloan.

Her shoulders tensed. She shouldn’t feel that way about hearing from her brother, but given their last conversation, she had a hunch what was on his mind.

“Hey Ry,” she said.

“Hey. What are you up to?”

She glanced around. Okay, fine. She might not care if strangers thought she looked like a woman who’d gotten some, but her brother didn’t need the details of her sex life, which would be obvious if she said she was leaving a hotel.

“I just finished breakfast. What about you?”

“Heading to the gun range for a little practice.”

She shuddered involuntarily. Even though she owned one, guns were not on her list of favorite things. Ryan was in the security business though, so he needed to stay sharp.

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