“Well, since you won’t be living here next year, you can’t say I would be earning my keep if you provided it, could you?”
“Can you not consider it another scholarship?”
She wasn’t the only stubborn one. “No.”
“What are you going to do next year?”
“Get a job, or two, and find an apartment. I think one of the girls in my economics class wants to be my roommate.” She hated talking about the next year, when Tom would be gone.
It hurt to know that for all intents and purposes he would be walking out of her life as easily as he had walked in. While she had a horrible suspicion she would miss him forever.
“There is no reason why you cannot stay here.”
“There is every reason. It’s not my house.”
“It is mine and I want a caretaker.”
“No, you don’t. You want to give me charity and I won’t accept. Please stop pushing it.” She hated arguing with him as much as she hated thinking about never seeing him again.
He grinned, his expression flashing from annoyed dominant male to smiling confidence. “I am very good at getting my way.”
“I noticed. I have lived with you for a while now.”
He plucked her book out of her hand and tossed it to the end of the couch and then grabbed her wrists and tugged her up. “Then you should accept that if I want you to have dinner out with me tonight, that is the most likely scenario for our evening.”
She landed with a thud against his hard male body and gasped before scrambling as far back as his hold would allow. She tried to break it, but though he wasn’t hurting her in the slightest, there was no chance. “I need to study.”
“You need to eat. What can that hurt?”
“We’ll be gone too long. You never just go eat somewhere.”
“So, maybe there is a movie playing that I want to see…you need a break. I said so.”
“And because you said so it must be true?”
“Yes, this is true.”
She rolled her eyes. “You’re awfully arrogant for a man who isn’t even twenty-five.”
“I was bred to it.”
“I guess.” She never asked about his background because he made it clear it was not a subject he wished to discuss, but it didn’t take a rocket scientist to know he came from major wealth.
“Why don’t you ask one of your friends to go to the movie with you?”
“I am. I am asking you.”
“I’m your housekeeper.”
“You are also my friend.”
Maybe…but somehow she didn’t see them exchanging phone calls and Christmas cards after he finished graduate school and moved on. And that was what decided her. She had only a finite amount of time left in Tom Prince’s life. She needed to take advantage of it.
“All right. I’ll study when we get home. Please tell me the movie is an early showing.”
“Your wish is my command, little Maggie.” He sealed his promise with a kiss.
On her lips.
He’d never done that before.
The logical part of her brain told her that kind of salute was common for him, even if she’d always been adept at avoiding any sort of touching between them.
But her body had other ideas, and lips that had kissed only one other boy before him went instantly soft against his, parting in an invitation that was as old as time and equally unmistakable. Being the natural predator that he was, he accepted the deepening of the kiss with alacrity.
His tongue slipped between her lips and slid along hers. She’d dreamed of tasting him, but no dream could compare to the rich ambrosia of his mouth. His lips and tongue explored her with such effective mastery, she moaned in pure pleasure. He made a feral sound low in his throat that sent shivers throughout her body, and pulled her forward, tugging her hands around his hips.
Her fingers convulsed in his sweater, gripping it so tightly it would have ripped if it hadn’t been so well made.
His hands came around her and pressed against her tailbone, bringing her into intimate contact with his lower body. She felt his rigid length hard against her belly, but couldn’t quite work out in her brain what it meant. She was too busy being devoured by an expert kisser. And loving it.
Some small part of her sanity remained and the muffled voice of reason asked her what she thought she was doing, but she had no answer. A far more strident voice, that of unrequited love, told her she would never have such a chance again. It urged her to experience all of him that she could.
Her heart and her clamoring body demanded compliance to that voice.
Tom did something with his hand against her back and her knees buckled.
Suddenly she was tumbling backward and he was going with her. She landed with one hip on the sofa and one hip off. Her equilibrium wasn’t up to keeping the balance and she and Tom tumbled to the floor. She landed on top of him, but amazingly he’d kept their lips locked together. He growled and flipped her under him, his hard thigh settled between her legs. She went utterly still, feelings rushing along her nerve endings that made her tremble and yank her head away from his.
It was too much.
She clamped her lips shut on a tiny whimper, but it escaped anyway.
He looked down at her, the angles of his face drawn with an emotion she did not recognize. “Did I hurt you?”
She shook her head, unable to speak.
“You whimpered.”
She stared up at him, mute, her legs separating just a tiny bit in an involuntary gesture that she immediately tried to rectify, but could not. He had settled more firmly between her legs and pressing her own back together only had the effect of hugging his masculine thigh tighter to her.
She gasped and closed her eyes against the disgust she knew would be in his. She’d promised never to do this, but it was as if her brain had lost control of her body and it had a definite will of its own.
The fact that it was following her heart did not help her self-control.
“Open your eyes, Maggie,” he demanded in a tone she doubted many people would have the strength to disobey. “Look at me.”
She steeled herself to deal with his anger and opened them. “I’m sorry,” she managed to whisper.
Far from being angry, his eyes were heated with a look he’d never directed her way before. “Why?”
Her gaze slid to his lips before returning to his eyes. “For kissing you.”
“I kissed you.”
But she had invited more. She’d been the one to open her mouth. She simply shook her head, unwilling to put her culpability into words.
“You want me.” He sounded as if the thought had never once occurred to him, but she could still see no evidence of anger that she had broken their agreement. “Since when?”
She turned her head away, her pride refusing to give him an answer. The sofa was so close she could see the grain of the leather, but as a distraction from his presence it failed miserably.
He tugged her chin with implacable fingers until she was once again looking at him. “I want you, too.”
“You do?” she asked in utter shock. “That’s not possible.”