“You could just leave them on the side table by the door.”
Shaking his head, he tamped down the impulse to take her by the shoulders and shake a sense of self-preservation into her. Instead he shoved his fists into his pockets, making it obvious he wasn’t taking her keys. “You make a habit of giving these out to strange men?”
Hip cocked, she narrowed her eyes. “Only the ones I’ve already invited into my body and who rescue me two days in a row.”
Invited into her body… Yeah, he’d been there. Was fast on the way to a mental return even as she stared him down. Forcing his jaw to unlock, he blew out a strained breath. “Look, when are you going to be back?”
“About three hours.”
That ought to be enough time to get his head screwed on straight. Especially if he ran for half of it. Looking Elise over in all her casual disarray, he amended, Ran hard…for most of it. “I’ll keep Bruno and we’ll meet you back here then.”
* * *
Her mind was officially in the gutter. And it was wholly Levi Davis’s fault.
Never, in all her years of yoga and Pilates, had Elise had the difficulty she’d experienced in maintaining her focus through her classes today. She’d been an utter charlatan, preaching that yogic breathing, or pranayama, promoted clarity of mind and balanced emotions, while revitalizing the entire body.
Ha.
From the minute her hands and knees hit the floor for Tabletop, through every Forward Extension, Downward Facing dog, Plow, and Bridge, Levi had been in the studio with her. A sensual phantom infusing her every stretch and held position with tantric potential.
By the close of the second session she was about as far from clarity of mind as she was from purity of thought. It was bad and she wasn’t any better by the time she’d gotten home.
Levi wasn’t supposed to want her again.
He was supposed to be the kind of sexy commitment-phobe she could count on, post one-night, to gently but firmly maintain an arm’s-length distance between them. Just in case she couldn’t quite manage it herself. Not show up at her apartment ready to play along with whatever absurd scenario she’d concocted to get him there.
Huffing out a breath, she scanned the deserted sidewalk from her perch at the front window. Once they were in sight she’d jog down to meet them at the street. Thank Levi and say goodbye. He’d probably want to bring Bruno back inside himself, but that wasn’t happening.
The man tempted her in ways she’d never had to ignore before, and, while she wasn’t interested in a “real” relationship, she didn’t think she could handle the kind of casual on offer.
One more go—just for the heck of it—wasn’t her style.
And she couldn’t really imagine what more would have brought Levi back. Sure, the sex had blown her mind, but Levi’s experience was vast.
Two hard knocks sounded at the front door. Stumbling back, she hissed at her own stupidity. She’d literally been staring out the window waiting for him…and hadn’t seen him coming.
That kind of distraction was dangerous.
Didn’t matter. She just wouldn’t invite him in.
“One sec, I’m coming.” She’d lay it out straight. Apologize for the misunderstanding. Thank him again for helping out. And then a no-touching goodbye.
Swinging the door just wide enough to put herself between the gap, she opened her mouth for the straight talk and no-nonsense dismissal—only to find Levi, propped on one strong arm against the frame, mere inches away. He’d changed out of the track pants and athletic shirt from earlier and into a pale blue oxford open at the neck and rolled at the sleeves, and a pair of worn, asset-hugging jeans like the ones he’d been wearing that first night. His hair was slightly damp, falling in the kind of tumbled half-curls that indicated a quick shower and even quicker towel dry.
Wow, this guy was trouble.
And he wasn’t just handing off Bruno’s leash.
While she’d been standing there ogling him, Bruno had pushed past her legs and Levi’s wide palm covered the curve of her hip as that cocky smile loomed closer.
“How was class?” he asked, those dark eyes intent
on hers.
Somewhere in the back of her mind, warning sirens were sounding loud, and yet, when he closed that last distance between them, bringing the mass of his chest into brief brushing contact with hers, she’d long since spent whatever breath it would have cost to protest.
The pressure at her hip guided her back a step, just enough for Levi to continue past her into the apartment.
So much for her plan.
“Kitchen this way?” he called, already halfway down the hall. “Bruno got some water at my place, but we had a pretty good run, so he might need more.”
The tap sounded and then a few low-spoken words of praise before her short reprieve was over and Levi was headed back.
Tall. Strong. Overwhelming the narrow width of her hall and sucking the oxygen from the air between them so no breath she took seemed enough to fill her lungs.
Bruno followed him halfway down the hall, before stopping and stretching out on the floor. In the blink of an eye, he fell asleep. It was enough to break that slow-building connection and bring Elise back to the here and now, and Bruno all but collapsing beside her.
Focus shifting between man and beast, she remarked, “I’ve never seen him conk out like that.”
Levi shrugged. “We ran awhile.”
Guess so. “Thank you, very much, for helping me out today.”
“Yeah, well, I was here.” Levi’s mouth pulled to the side, wry humor tingeing his words. “And, apparently, you really needed it. So, I’m glad I came.”
This was the point to tell him to go. She could see in the slanted gaze he’d fixed on her—he was waiting for it. Only when she opened her mouth to say goodbye, she found herself asking instead, “Why did you come?”
Running a palm over his jaw, he shook his head. Good question.
He didn’t like to lead women on, so he’d generally made it a rule to leave one-nighters at one night. But with Elise…it just hadn’t been enough. And when she’d provided such a perfect excuse…when he’d seen a way back in without having to think too much about why he wanted to get there…he’d taken it.
“The dog thing.” He laughed. “With the offer to pay me. That was…unique.” It was also only part of the answer. The rest, he didn’t want to examine too closely, but suspected had a lot to do with the way the air seemed to hum with a kind of energy between them.
“The money?” She half gasped, chin pulling back in an expression fast on its way to horror. “You came back because it…excited you to be paid?”
“What?” Whoa, had that squeak come out of his mouth? And she couldn’t really be asking if he— Only the look on her face said that was exactly the conclusion she’d jumped to.
Like that, the humming energy shorted out, leaving a sort of vacuum in its stead.
“Oh, God, were you playing out some kind of a fantasy?” She looked as if she was about to choke, only the damn words just kept coming. “Like you’re a gigo—”
“Elise, I’m begging you. Stop.” Desperation ran thick through his words. “Just close your mouth before you say another word.” Before she ground the last bit of his masculine pride into the hardwood beneath her little bare foot.
She was a verbal train wreck. How could he want her like this?
It was physical. As she’d said in the park.
That crazy, bendy body had gotten under his skin, was all. It couldn’t be the twists and turns of her mind getting him so tied up in knots. Half the time it was as if they were speaking different languages. And the other half…hell.
But even with the way her mouth ran when she got nervous, he wanted another night. A whole night. He wanted her to stop spewing ego-shriveling assumptions and get her head back in sync with his.
Her mouth popped open again, making his gut clench. “You should just take the twenty—”
; Enough! He’d crossed to her before her next breath, preempting the completion of her thought by catching her around the shoulders and surprising a sharp “Eep!” from her.
“Damn it, it’s not the money, Elise.” Looking down into those smoked-glass eyes, he searched for that same heat that had been there the first night. Found only confusion. How was he blowing this so badly? “It’s just…hell, it’s just you. You’re different. I don’t know what it is. But I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you since last week. And seeing you yesterday—” His jaw clenched. “It was all I could do to walk out of here, but I did because I’m just as wrong for you as I was that first night. I’ve already got one foot out of Illinois, the other one ready to go. I don’t have anything real to offer you. And whether you want one right now or not, you’re still a real relationship kind of girl.”
He should have left it at that. Said goodbye and gone. Only his hands were already on her, his thumbs brushing over the bare skin of her upper arms, and he knew he wasn’t going anywhere. “Aren’t you?”
She stared up at him—pupils dark and wide, an erratic flutter at the hollow of her neck—leaning in with each shallow breath. Her gaze dropped to his mouth and the pink tip of her tongue wet her bottom lip.
His heart kicked hard as that connection between them began to untangle. Smooth and pull taut.
Her eyes slid closed. Her next pull of breath drawing him in with it—bringing him closer to those bare naked lips. Parted, ready for him to take—
“I’m seeing someone.”
CHAPTER FIVE
LEVI froze a quarter inch from her mouth as something icy cold and distinctly unpleasant slid through his veins.
Not possible. He’d heard wrong.
“What?” He looked up, finding one anxious gray eye fixed on him, the other squinched shut.
“I’m seeing someone. Sort of.” Elise let out a tremulous breath, slipping from his hold. “I shouldn’t do this. I can’t do this.”
Because of another man.
Because of the kind of person she was.
He got it. Had understood from the start and known it had to be a fluke to find a woman like her outside a relationship. Figured it was only a matter of time— So what the hell was tightening his tendons and pulling his fingers into fists? Jealousy?
It couldn’t be. He didn’t get jealous. Ever. And besides, it wasn’t as though he had any claim over her. They’d had one night. And an afternoon at the park. Less than a handful of hours combined. She wasn’t his…only somehow that handful of hours must have been enough to screw with his head, because even as he closed his eyes to blot that pretty face from his sight, the images of lithe-bodied, little Elise in his bed were brighter than ever.
Hell, he could still feel her wrapped around him. See the smoke in her eyes thicken as he pushed her closer. Hear his name, all breathy and hot on her lips when she came.
His name.
What the hell was wrong with him?
She wasn’t his.
He didn’t want her.
No, that wasn’t true. He wanted her. Bad.
What he didn’t want was the complication of what being with her meant. He didn’t want her getting the wrong idea about what he had to offer.
But more than any of that…he didn’t want some other guy doing the things to her that Levi couldn’t stop thinking about doing himself.
“Seeing someone, since when?” Any effort to modulate his tone into something casual failed miserably as the words ground out through his clenched teeth.
It had only been a week from that first night, so maybe whoever this chump about to get dumped was hadn’t had a chance to make much of a move.
Damn.
It didn’t matter. Right. Keep telling yourself that.
Elise blinked up at him, those pearly white teeth sinking into her lush bottom lip as if she’d figured out just how very much it was mattering to him at that very second.
“When?” Less gravel and broken glass in that one.
“Tomorrow,” she whispered, backing across the room.
Tomorrow?
Elise, Elise, Elise. Not a nice thing to do. And definitely not enough to make him back off. His conscience didn’t swing that way.
The corner of his mouth twitched as relief pumped hot and fast through his veins, roaring past his ears, and pushing his feet to move. “How’s that work? Exactly?”
“Ally, my sister, set me up on a blind date.” She was watching his every move as he closed in—watching his mouth, his eyes, his chest and, oh, so briefly, lower. “She won’t cancel it for me.”
Which meant she’d tried to get out of it.
Yeah, that date wasn’t happening.
Levi nodded his understanding, doing his best to keep the possessive satisfaction beating its chest under wraps. This guy hadn’t even laid eyes on Elise, let alone a finger or anything worse.
And more than that, his little Elise was the kind of sweet thing who didn’t want to cheat on a guy she hadn’t even met.
They were face-to-face, but it wasn’t close enough. Stepping into her space, he crowded her against the back side of the couch, leaning closer still until she’d pushed herself on to the ledge.
A better man might have let her be, given her the space she’d asked for without words. But then a better man probably wouldn’t have backed her up there in the first place. A better man wouldn’t have wanted to get her off balance and caged in so she had no choice but to reach out and hold onto him.
She could have a better man after he left town.
Reaching for one hand and then the other, he rubbed his thumbs against the pale skin of her wrists, felt the racing of her pulse beneath, and then brought her palms to his chest. “What’s she doing setting you up?”
Her gaze was fixed on the spot where her hands rested against him, her breath coming in shallow pants. “It’s her version of an intervention because of what happened with you. She thinks I’m…lonely…desperate…something. Doesn’t believe me when I tell her I don’t have time for a relationship right now. She feels…sort of responsible for me. It’s not right, but, whatever. So she called a guy she knows, a ‘nice guy’ looking for something serious, to save me from myself.”
Bowing closer, he let his words wash over her temple. “Do you need saving?”
Her breath caught, but not her hands. Slipping over the back of the couch, she landed on the seat cushions with a startled gasp. Only too quickly, she saw her opening and was on the move. Levi followed her over, hitting the cushions as Elise slithered to the floor—her slinky, back-crawling escape making him want to catch her all the more.
Just not quite yet.
Eyes wide, she shook her head. “I don’t know what I need.”
Not a problem. “I do.”
It was written all over her face—in the spots of color high on her cheekbones, the smoke swirling in her eyes, the rise and fall of her chest…and the tight knots of her nipples pressing through her yoga tank. And if that wasn’t enough, there was that electric current spiking through the air between them. “And I think maybe you do too.”
Oh, God. He was grinning. Not some jovial nonthreatening expression of benevolence and friendship either. Not even close. This was predatory. Relentless. A warning of seductive intent that teased her senses toward a heightened state of awareness.
It made her hot. Scared and excited all at once.
It made her want to get reckless in a way that wasn’t part of her makeup.
“Levi,” she pleaded, arms and legs working in a sort of crablike scuttle to put distance between them. “This can’t be a good idea.”
He prowled after her in slow, shoulder rolling pursuit. Stalking on hands and knees across the hardwood…that seductive gleam in his eyes…the promise of pleasure stretching in the air between them drawing her toward him even as her hands and feet pushed her away.
“It’s not.”
No apology. No justification. No reassurance.
&
nbsp; “Then why?”
“Because deep down, Elise, I’m not a nice guy.” Eyes dark as storm-tossed seas held with hers. “And I want you too much to do the right thing.”
A shudder tore through her, halting her retreat as need spilled warm and thick through her belly. “Oh, God, that’s good.”
To be wanted enough that the right thing didn’t matter.
And then she realized: that was how she wanted him.
Waiting, she trembled as Levi closed in—crawling over her until his head was even with hers, his arms braced at either side of her ribs, and one knee was positioned between her legs while the other rested beside her hip.
His mouth curved into a wicked taunt. “Quitter.”
“I don’t think I want to run from this. From you.”
That dark gaze raked over her body beneath his, a breath away from contact. “Don’t want a nice guy after all, then?”
She shook her head. Nice guys were overrated. It hurt so much worse when they let you down, because you never saw it coming.
With one arm still braced at her side, Levi wrapped the other around her back. Taking her weight, he closed the distance between them with the hard press of his lips against her own.
Safe in the strength of his hold, she threw her arms around his neck. The demand of his mouth increased, and she opened beneath him. Clung to him as his tongue swept past her lips in a deep, delicious invasion that was all confidence and claim. Nothing tentative, nothing questioning.
Fingers bunched into the fabric of his shirt, she took the hot thrust of his tongue with a moan, tasted the wet caress of his hunger, and met it with her own.
No one had ever kissed her the way Levi did.
It was all consuming. Possessive. Intense.
And worth anything her conscience had to pay to have it.
Nudging his knee between her legs, he leaned forward, bringing them into closer contact.
Breath ripping from her lungs, she cried out as the thick slab of his muscled thigh flexed against her sex. Satisfaction rumbled from deep in his chest as he palmed the globe of her bottom, angling her hips to meet him again and setting a rhythm of advance and retreat with the rocking of their bodies and wet tangle of their tongues.
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