“Not in my book.”
“Fine, I’ll rephrase. Every time he loses at your table, he takes it out on his son. His eight-year-old son,” she added for emphasis.
“Fuck.”
She really needed to learn to use that word. It conveyed so much with so little. “I’ll thank you not to use that language around me.”
This time the look she got wasn’t so sympathetic. She didn’t push, just waited. After a minute he said, “I’ll do it on one condition.”
She knew better than to say “anything.” “What’s your condition?”
“I want a kiss.”
“A kiss?”
Pushing off the wall, he took a step closer. She took one back.
“Just a kiss.”
The wall brushed her shoulder. She melted against it, her gaze hopelessly dropping to his lips. Just.
The word with all its implications lingered in her mind. Just the feel of his breath on her skin. Just the touch of his lips to hers. Just that slight pressure. That gentle parting. Just that hot claiming...
Ace reached out, and she flinched. He smiled, a devil’s smile that promised so much as his finger grazed her temple in a featherlight caress. In a rough drawl, he murmured, “Don’t.”
Such a soft, seductive order. A shiver snaked down her spine. When she would have leaned away, he shook his head and issued another. “Stay.”
She did for no other reason than he was the one who issued it. He increased the pressure ever so slightly—just enough—drawing his fingertips down her cheek and along her jaw, finding the sensitive skin of her neck. She gasped as sensation gathered. Goose bumps sprang up. His nostrils flared. She didn’t move and, for an instant, neither did he. They just stood there in the alley with the warmth of the sun heating the air between them. “What do you say, schoolmarm? Do we have a deal?”
“I think you want a lot.”
He shrugged. “You’re asking a lot.”
Placing her hand on his chest, savoring the flex of hard muscles and the soft hiss of his indrawn breath, Petunia stood on tiptoe, intending to kiss his cheek. He shook his head and smiled, and that finger, that oh, so tantalizing finger, traveled to the corner of her lip, teasing the delicate skin there, coaxing forth another airy gasp and more goose bumps.
“I want a real kiss.”
The raspy tone melted into the heat of his touch, melted into her. Her gaze dropped to the sculpted beauty of his mouth. That mouth with those full lips she’d always fantasized about sliding over hers, parting hers. Oh, yes, a real kiss... She wanted that, too.
With a subtle pressure, he tipped her face up. She didn’t resist. Why would she?
“Like you mean it,” he added.
That jerked her gaze to his, and she caught something in his expression that challenged everything feminine in her. Doubt. He didn’t think she’d do it, she realized. He probably thought she was too prim, too proper, too much on the shelf to kiss a man. He probably assumed she didn’t even know how. He probably thought he was scaring her. With a shake of her head, she leaned back and smiled.
He had another think coming. Ace Parker was one heck of an inspiration.
HE WAS TOO old and too experienced to shudder at the touch of a woman’s hand, any woman’s hand, but when Petunia’s settled as light as thistledown against his chest, Ace did just that. Desire started deep in his gut and climbed upward right along with her fingers, rolling like thunder through his resistance, making a mockery of the dare he’d laid before them. This wasn’t a game. This was real. And he didn’t want it. Not the desire. Not the weakness. Not her.
But it didn’t matter what he didn’t want as her skirts swished about his ankles, and her weight leaned against him in sweet enticement. He wanted her, had since the first moment he’d seen her step off the stagecoach two months ago, self-contained, graceful, elegant. A lady. The one thing he could never have.
“You’re going to have to bend down.”
The soft whisper joined the thunder, adding to the volume. Her hands slid up his chest, tucking behind his neck. Lightning flashed on the edges of his control. She tugged. He didn’t go. That wasn’t who he was, how he’d allow it to be between them.
Sliding his hand down the delicate line of her back, he demanded, “Why?”
He wanted it put into words, to hear it from her lips. She blinked up at him, confusion and desire deepening the blue of her eyes. “For that kiss you wanted.”
Who did she think she was kidding? This wasn’t about any goddamn deal. This was about the attraction that neither of them wanted. This was about them. As natural as his next breath one hand settled into the hollow of her back. The other, her shoulder. She was tall. She fit his embrace as if she were made for it. Fit his hands as if she were made for them. His voice rasped from his throat, more growl than seduction. “Ask me nicely.”
He felt the tremor that shook her head to toe, but it wasn’t fear that had her pupils dilating and her tongue sliding over her lower lip in soft pink enticement. His cock thickened painfully within the restriction of his pants.
“Please...” She cleared her throat. He adjusted his stance. “Please, lean down.”
Knives couldn’t cut more cleanly than that simple compliance. The barrier he kept between them tore free in the aftermath. His fingers slipped down her arm, chaining the delicacy of her wrist between his fingers while he urged her closer. The soft plea whispered like a siren’s song in his head, bringing forth the side of him he kept hidden. She watched him carefully as he brought her hand down between them. He liked her eyes on him. Her world narrowed to him. Her other hand naturally followed the first.
“That’s it,” he whispered as her fingers spread over his heart. “Feel me. Feel what I want.”
“A kiss.”
“Yes.” Yes, he wanted a kiss. A kiss was a beginning to so much more.
A kiss could be everything. He leaned down, but not so far she didn’t have to stretch that delectable body up the length of his. Her hands against his chest kept him from feeling the fullness of her breasts, but he could imagine how they’d feel in his hands, hard-tipped and delicate just like her. Her hand slipped down into his. Curling his fingers around hers, he pressed it to his chest, struggling with the want to press her closer, the utter need to drag her hands overhead, to pin her with his hands and body, to kiss her until the walls she’d built so well came tumbling down, and there was just him and her and the truth between them. Until she gave him what he needed.
Surrender.
Ace gritted his teeth, loosening his grip, controlling the wild impulse, forcing himself back to even breaths, to what was.
Pet was a good woman, not a whore. She was going to kiss him to pay a debt that wasn’t even hers because she thought it was the only way to save a boy. Fuck. He was a bastard. He took a step back. She went with him, following as naturally as he could desire. His good intentions took a hit. Before he could regroup, her lips touched his, and that fast, all thoughts of right or wrong drowned under a wave of lust so strong, it stole his breath. Her lips parted, catching it, linking them in a moment fraught with danger. With promise.
Why? he asked silently. Why this woman? Why now?
The answer came in her soft moan as her lips nibbled at his. Because she wanted him. And lust didn’t need any more explanation than the proximity of two compatible bodies. Or so he told himself as her lips moved gently