A tremor of hope slipped through her belly at the thought. One she ruthlessly pushed aside.
“What is this?” she asked, waving a hand between them.
He shook his head, an almost bewildered look on his cocky face. “It’s hot.”
It was more than hot. “It’s distracting. I can’t think.”
“Good, agree to give me three months.”
But before she could even contemplate giving him three minutes, his mouth was over hers again, his tongue sliding between her lips in slow, seductive thrusts. Once again tempting her reservations to abandon their posts.
Heart racing, breath ragged, she shook her head, forcing her hands to center at Connor’s chest and then giving him a small push. She couldn’t agree to anything. Whatever state she’d been in last night, at this moment, the impairment of her judgment was at record level.
“Megan,” he murmured, watching her from beneath heavy lids.
Oh, hell, that look. She swallowed, taking a step back. And then another. She needed to get away. Needed space to breathe. To think.
“Come on, baby. Don’t run away. Let’s sit on the couch and talk.”
Her gaze shot to the couch. Within a blink, it had become fodder for more scenarios than her experience could justify—a den of seduction, rife with erotic potential.
She had been reading a lot lately.
“I’ll keep my hands to myself,” came another low, rumbling assurance, pulling her focus back to Connor. Standing where she’d left him, the shirt she’d been trying to free him of spread wide to reveal the hard muscles banding his abdomen and the perfect discs of his nipples.
Her mouth watered as another couchside scenario accosted her.
“Sure you will.” Fine, maybe he would. Maybe it wasn’t his hands she was worried about.
“Don’t believe me? You could always tie my hands.” Connor grasped one end of the tie hanging loose at his open neck, let it twist around his finger as he held it out in offering. His wicked smile pushing new limits. “Unless you’d prefer—”
“No!” Okay, it definitely wasn’t his hands she was worried about. And with what she was thinking, she wasn’t sure she’d ever be able to sit on any couch again, let alone that one.
She forced her feet to move one after the other until she’d cleared the stairs and made the master suite again. Arms crossed, she gripped the hem of her dress and pulled it over her head. Stepped into the shower and jerked the tap to cold, bracing for the crush of clarity she prayed the icy deluge would bring.
“Agghgh!” she half shrieked as arctic needles fired against her overheated skin, coating her body with the cold wash of reason returned.
She’d been about to agree to...anything.
Marriage.
Moving across the country.
And God help her, even with the chill of reality raining down over her...all she could think about was the way his kiss had all but consumed her.
A low groan of reluctant need slipped past her lips, and she positioned her face beneath the pounding spray, waiting for the cold to beat its way through her thick skull and to snuff the smoky thoughts in her mind and the fire blazing through her veins.
“Damn, Megan. I like it when you make those sounds.”
The lock. She hadn’t even thought about it.
Blinking the running water from her face, she turned to look out the clear glass of the shower stall to see Connor leaning against the wall across the room. His half smile was at full strength, seductive and hungry.
“What are you doing in there, sweetheart?”
“Trying to clear my head.”
One brow arched and he pushed off the wall, his predatory gaze sliding over her body.
Why wasn’t she embarrassed by his obvious perusal? Not that there was anywhere to hide. The clear glass was more a display case than any kind of shelter from searching eyes. And yet, his eyes on her felt natural. Easy.
Not at all the way she’d felt with other men, but then, she’d been working outside the norm from the word go that morning. She should stop making the comparisons.
“Hmm. Clarity looks good on you. Maybe I could use some too.”
This time it was Megan’s mouth that tipped. Definitely. This guy needed to have the fire inside him doused. “You think?”
Connor’s hands were on his half-open fly, finishing the job she’d started down in the entryway. And then he was stepping out of his tuxedo pants, leaving them in a heap on the floor as he took a step toward the shower.
Megan’s mouth dropped open as she realized just exactly what she’d been inviting.
Was her brain ever going to work right again?
His hands moved to the black boxer briefs straining atop the force of his erection. Those went next, and then he was completely, mouthwateringly naked. His body more beautiful than her fantasies could have imagined. And he was closing the distance between them. Coming for her. Opening the glass door, his eyes blazing hot enough to make her body burn even under—
“What the—?” he barked out as he hopped into the far corner of the shower.
Megan knew she probably shouldn’t have laughed, but there was something decidedly satisfying in, for once, not being the one caught off guard. And the stunned confusion etched across the frozen mask of Connor’s face was simply too irresistible.
The rapidly thawing mask of confusion.
“You did that on purpose,” he charged, maintaining his position beyond the stream of water.
“You said you wanted the clarity,” she answered, her body going alert as his focus narrowed on her breasts and then lower. They were both naked. Standing at opposite ends of the oversize stall. The second Connor grabbed for her, she darted out the door, laughing. “Who was I to stop you?”
A deep growl sounded behind her as she reached for the plush warmth of the robe folded over the lip of the tub. Wrapping up, she turned back to the shower and froze. Hands flat against the wall above the tap, muscles flexed and straining, Connor, braced beneath the spray as the cold beat over his body. Then with a shake of his head, he focused on her where she stood beyond the glass.
“I’ll be honest, this doesn’t work as well as I’d expected it to.”
“My thoughts exactly,” she answered, half mesmerized by the picture before her.
“Megan, I’m trying really hard to stay where I am right now, but if you don’t walk out that door, I’m going to walk out this one and put you against it.”
Her mouth fell open.
First the couch. Now the door. It was as if he had seductive superpowers with his ability to infuse the most mundane household objects with deviant potential.
“Or maybe that’s what you’re waiting for.” The promise in his voice was what had her feet moving past the threshold, where she dared one glance back at Connor, who stood watching her, his expression dark, smile wiped clean from his face.
* * *
Connor’s palm hit the tile with a wet smack as he swore under his breath.
Tempted as she was, she wouldn’t take the risk.
Grabbing the soap, he scoured his body with rough strokes, using the task to give himself the time he needed to work through his options.
But damn it, none