Aussie Rules. Jill Shalvis

then.”

      “On what?”

      Again a swipe of his thumb over her wild pulse. “On how bad you want me.”

      She slapped his hand away but in a lightning-quick move, he snagged her wrist, and then her other, the one that held the letter opener. He eyed the steel point with curious amusement, then squeezed until it clattered from her fingers to the floor. “You might want to work on that, too. That temper you clearly have smoldering for me.” He tsked. “Dead giveaway on that wanting-me-bad thing.”

      “You are delusional.”

      “Why?” His gaze met hers. “Are you taken?”

      “Taken?”

      “Committed.”

      “No. Not committed.” Not that she had anything against the idea in theory, but though she’d had lovers here and there over the years, she’d always discovered some fatal flaw and broken things off before anything too serious began. Char called the phenomenon the Anderson Chronicles. Dimi called it pathetic.

      Closing the gap between them, Bo pressed his body to hers. Her nipples had gone hard at the beginning of this little discussion, and now they bore into his chest. Could he feel them? She thought maybe by the look on his face that he could.

      “So you don’t want me,” he said a little hoarsely. “Not even a little.”

      She had to clear her throat to talk. “Not even a little.”

      “Prove it,” he whispered, lowering his head so that their mouths were only a fraction apart.

      “I don’t have to prove anything—”

      He clucked like a chicken.

      “This is so juvenile.” Her hands came up between them, her palms open on his chest. To push him away, she told herself, only she didn’t push so much as hold on like he was her lifesaver and she was going down. “I am not going to kiss you just to prove I don’t want you—”

      “Shut up and do it, darlin’.”

      “You know what? Fine.” Grabbing his ears, she yanked his face closer and laid one on him. Only the joke was on her because the moment she felt his warm, delicious mouth touch hers she forgot that this was supposed to be about making her point and instead got sucked into the hot wave of lust that washed over her, drowning out all good sense.

      His good sense, too, apparently, because she got much more than she bargained for. He met her halfway, kissing her hungrily, possessively, then deeper still, pushing her back against the desk, his thigh pressing up between hers, his hands—God, his hands.

      She might have let him do whatever he wanted, possibly even have stripped her naked and begged him to touch bare flesh this time, because she was lost in the sensations, one hundred percent lost.

      But then the radio crackled, and Charlene’s voice filled the air. “Mel? Bo’s got an incoming. He still in there?”

      Her heart pounding, pounding, pounding, nipples hard, thighs quivery, damp between them, Mel stared up at Bo.

      He was breathing just as heavily as she was. “It’s, uh, about a vintage Stearman PT-13D I’m thinking of buying.”

      Mel nodded, cleared her throat again, then lifted the radio to her mouth. “Thanks, Char, I’ll tell him.”

      Bo, having apparently proved his point, gave Mel one last long look filled with heat and some other stuff that made breathing difficult, then simply walked out.

      She let out a long breath. Well. If that wasn’t the cruelest thing he’d done so far, making her like him, making her want him. With a shaking hand, she stroked the hair from her face. One of them wasn’t going to survive this, and at the moment, body humming, buzzing, aching, she wasn’t sure who’d be left standing in the end. She sagged back against the desk, thankful for its durability, because, wow.

      Just wow.

      Seemed she wanted more than for Bo to simply go far, far away. She wanted him to do her first. Which solved it, really. She wasn’t lost, she’d merely left reality and had driven right into insanity.