But his offer comes laced with the hint of danger that whooshes the blood through my head in a rush. And I’m confident I can take him. I wonder how many times he’s used the I’ll call the shots line. I wonder if anyone ever turns the charmer down. I wonder if he used it on the late Mrs Faulkner, a woman whose legacy appears far-reaching, as if Kit literally drags it behind him like Marley’s chains.
That we’re negotiating sex like a cold, unemotional transaction isn’t romantic. But I don’t need romance. He’s started a chain reaction inside me, luring me towards the recklessness I crave.
Testing where his head is at, I say, ‘Or perhaps you’re trying to tame the wild girl, eh?’
Perhaps now would be a good time to tell him of my rebellious teens, my reputation as a wildcard...
Kit smiles but it’s feline. ‘You and your command of your sexuality brought this up, Ms Abbott. Just because I like things a certain way doesn’t mean I don’t respect your choices and your right to say no. I’m fully into mutual consent while we explore our mutual pleasure.’ His eyes dip to my mouth. ‘You can take it or leave it, Mia.’ His lips caress the phrase mutual pleasure like they’re already on my skin, my nipples, my clit.
I press my thighs together, stymieing the burn. My head screams one thing while my hormones stage an intervention.
But he’s also given me a bargaining chip. With a rush of exhaled air, I make my decision. I will take it, because Kit Faulkner turns me on more than anyone I’ve ever met. But more so, because I’m up to the challenge. Any challenge. Especially one where the boundaries are so clearly demarcated and the taste of victory already lingers on my tongue.
Kit wears the casual-sex-only vibe like some men wear overpowering cologne. He’s safe. I can concede to a few of his sexual demands without risk, but I have a stipulation of my own.
I shrug, while my blood pounds through my belly. ‘It’s all good—whatever your kink. But I have a condition too.’ My breathing accelerates, a chemical cocktail flooding my bloodstream.
He leans in, waiting, his lips parted and his midnight eyes dancing between mine.
I swallow, ensuring my voice will be clear and controlled when it emerges because the parts of me affected by the hormonal maelstrom inside jerk and jitter like chattering teeth. ‘You can call the shots sexually, but I want full creative direction over my work—no negotiations. No wasting my time or trying to influence the process, and no interfering.’
I wait, breath held in my throat while I stare him down.
Some sort of battle rages inside him—his nostrils flare, his eye actually twitches and his chest rises and falls, telling me he’s used to controlling every aspect of his life, including work. And now I’m burning with curiosity about his dead wife. What happened to her? Has it made Kit the way he is? It would destroy this fiercely controlled man to have such a momentous part of his life turned upside down.
Breath stutters back into my chest in a rush. In that moment I want to reach out to him, to kiss him, more than I want the oxygen that breath delivers to my gasping lungs. He’s the last thing I should want—his privileged, conventional lifestyle, his naturally demanding nature, his disregard for social pleasantries are warning bells rattling my skull.
But he’s safe.
The fact he’s still deeply and desolately in love with his wife is stamped all over him from the creases in the corners of his eyes to the tension he carries around his beautiful mouth and the control he seems desperate to exert on all areas of his life.
My scalp prickles as I wait. I fight the urge to climb into his lap and finish this now, today. Monday. Just to show him life, free will, is about choices. But losing his wife would have already taught him that harsh lesson and perhaps I simply want to watch him shed the battle-scarred armour, even for a few uninhibited seconds.
Wednesday might as well be next year. He’s ramped up my hormones tenfold by making me wait and now my anticipation is stretched taut.
We’re still staring, still breathing in unison, still flooding the space with a pheromone mix more potent than the spirits stocked in the car’s minibar.
I lick my parched lips. His eyes dance over the trail of my tongue.
I’m frozen, but every nerve in my body urges me to take the leap.
At the last second, his pupils dilate and we lunge in unison.
With a small growl his hands slide into my hair and he cups my face and pulls me onto his kiss. I meet him halfway, my hands gripping his shoulders as wave after wave of relief pounds through me.
He’s changed his mind.
We’ll dump the boring play, go back to his place and I can start work afresh tomorrow with this...inconvenient distraction nicely tucked away.
Done and dusted. Kit Faulkner put in his place. Back to being Mia.
His kiss is bold, open-eyed, almost defiant, but my body responds—muscles softening and heart rate accelerating, forcing heated blood around my arteries, delivering the hormones that allow me to ignore all the reasons fucking my kind-of boss isn’t a good idea.
Firm lips direct my mouth open. His tongue surges inside—sublime, possessive, unapologetic. As good as I’d guessed. I clasp his wrists, clinging on for dear life as I meet his stare, even though my corneas are on fire and my mind screams at me to close my eyes. To block out the carnal, almost cruel intensity in his eyes. As if kissing me today, a Monday, is a dare and he hates every second.
To compensate I kiss him like it’s my last second on earth, my mouth a frantic slide on his, my tongue a match for the duel of his, and then I suck on his bottom lip.
He pulls away, his stare savage, breath gusting across my face, and then drags my whole body into his lap, his fingers digging in and a hoarse grunt leaving his throat.
My blood surges, delivering the endorphins to every cell in my body. Perhaps we won’t make it back to his place. Perhaps we’ll finish this right here in the back of his fancy car before we make it to the Shaftesbury.
I straddle his lap and rise up over him to slant my mouth back over his. I was right about the hair. It’s silky and long enough to twist between my fingers. But I don’t get to enjoy it for long because he grips my wrists and directs them behind my back with firm, insistent pressure that tells me he’s a man of his word. He wants to control this... Well, he can try.
I continue to plunder his mouth as he traps both my hands in one of his, and then his other hand is at my breast, kneading and tweaking and making me moan loudly enough to alert our driver, who sits behind the privacy screen, of what is afoot.
Kit pulls on my wrists, breaking the contact between our frenzied mouths. His stare is almost black with desire, a wildness dancing there that steals my breath and banishes any residual hesitation I have for wanting him.
I do.
Desperately.
Now.
He dips his head and his mouth covers my breast, through the fabric of the silk dress that probably cost him more than my flight around the world.
He’s not gentle. His lips clamp my nipple, pulling and tugging while his tongue flicks at the nub. I cry out, the sensation burrowing deep into my belly, sending pulses of fire between my legs.
I knew the second I walked into his office