WhereDangerHides

by Desiree Holt

  He unwound the scarf from her throat and then carefully undid the buttons on her jacket. She stood like a child as he removed first one item of clothing, then another, including the lacy bra. When she was down to her pantyhose, he picked her up and carried her to the couch, then rolled the hose down her legs with great care.

  “You need to start wearing the ones that only come to the top of the thigh.” His voice wasn’t quite steady, an unusual indication of his frayed control. “Makes life a lot easier.”

  “I don’t… I can’t…” She struggled to find words that wouldn’t come but the sheer power of the sexual pull between them left her tongue-tied and rattled her brain.

  Propping her against the pillows, Noah spread her legs and just stared at her cunt. Lust flared in his eyes and he lazily ran one fingertip down the length of her slit and back up again, a movement that was becoming a habit with him.

  Taylor lay there as if drugged and perhaps in a way she was. In the middle of her debut at Arroyo Corporation, with the wolves nipping at her heels, she let this man she still didn’t understand strip her naked and made no protest.

  She had one startled moment when he removed his jacket and she saw the gun tucked into his waist at the small of his back.

  He looked over at her. “I want you to be protected at all times. We’re not playing with amateurs here.”

  The thought that whoever was doing this could get at her even in the Arroyo headquarters almost killed the desire rippling through her. But then Noah shed the rest of his clothes and was kneeling before her and the shards of electricity were stabbing through her again.

  “You make me lose my mind,” he ground out. “I can only keep my hands off you for so long.” He moved her thighs further apart and with his thumbs spread her labia as wide as he could. “You have the most gorgeous cunt I have ever seen. Pink, soft. And slick.” A self-satisfied look rolled across his face. “Oh, yes. Very wet. You’re as hot as I am, aren’t you.”

  “Yes.” She could hardly get the word out. Touch me. Fuck me. Do something. She felt as if every nerve in her body had sparked, sending electricity shimmering through her. Hurry, hurry, she wanted to scream. Don’t just sit there doing nothing.”

  He touched her clit and she jumped. “If we had more time today there is so much I want to do with you.” He brought his face close to hers, capturing her eyes, his own filled with shifting light. “You are so new to this, little girl. You have no idea the things I’d like to do to you. You’d run back to Tampa as fast as your legs could carry you.”

  She thrust her chin up at him, fighting for some kind of control. “Are you so sure? How do you know what I’d do?”

  He shook his head. “A woman who’s never pleasured herself with her own hand? Never used a vibrator? I didn’t think there was one left in today’s society.”

  “Some of us have to keep too tight an emotional rein on ourselves.” She wet her lips, then blurted out, “That doesn’t mean I wouldn’t want to. I’ve…thought about it.”

  Noah’s eyes narrowed. “Thinking about it and doing it are two different things.”

  She studied his face, a slight blush heating her cheeks. “Do the other women you… I mean, do they…”

  “Use a vibrator?” The heat in his eyes was almost palpable. “Yes. Many types. They use them to pleasure themselves and me.”

  “You?” Her eyes popped open. “But how…

  He bent closer to her. “They know I love to watch them build their desire, see what happens to their bodies. Watch their pussy lips glisten as their juices flow. See them writhe in the throes of an orgasm, made greater because they know I’m watching them. Would you like to do that for me, Taylor? For us?”

  Her breath was trapped in her throat by the images his words created. “I don’t… I haven’t…

  “No. You haven’t. What we did in that hotel room? That’s just a taste of what I like. You don’t know how I really like my sex, Taylor. I promise you this isn’t the kind of stuff you imagined in your little girl dreams.”

  Taylor managed to reach her hands out to cup his face. It took her two deep breaths before her voice had a semblance of normalcy. “I wouldn’t be afraid with you.” Much. But I want to do that. Whatever “that” is. With him. Because something burns inside me to explore everything with this man who turns me inside out sexually, enticing me to follow forbidden paths.

  “Don’t be so sure. And don’t mistake this for anything but sex. There can’t ever be anything else for us. Ever. I’ve lost my fucking mind to go this far.”

  His jaw tightened and his eyes lost all their fire for a moment. Then he bent his head to her pussy and caressed every inch of it with his tongue, licking it inside and out. His teeth nibbled at her clit and his tongue stabbed in and out of her throbbing vagina. When he teased at the flesh between the entrance to her vagina and the pink rosette of her asshole she shivered all over and tried to thrust her pelvis at him.

  Need gripped her, a desperate desire for him to put something inside her—his fingers or his cock. Oh, please, his cock. He hadn’t even touched her breasts or her nipples yet they throbbed and ached, demanding an attention they hadn’t received. In desperation she lifted her hands and began to pinch her nipples herself. Noah raised his head, a look of satisfaction on his face.

  “God.” The word escaped on a long-held breath. “The things I want to do to you.”

  He held her in a grip like a vise while his mouth and tongue explored every inch of her cunt inside and out. She was trembling with need and begging him in a low voice to give her release. He slide two fingers into her sopping sheath, teasing the sensitive flesh. Without warning he withdrew them and pressed one against her anus. She jerked.

  “Do you want this, little girl?” His voice was thick and hoarse. “If you want my cock in here, take my finger first.”

  He waited and when she nodded her head, long past the ability to speak, he pushed one finger inside her dark heat one inch at a time. She heard him suck in his breath when the finger was in to the last knuckle but she couldn’t hear anything else. She was too lost in a fog of sensation and the roaring of her blood in her ears. Every inch of her skin felt inflamed, the dark tunnel of her ass the hottest of all. Noah’s finger felt enormous yet her muscles began to relax and accept it. He stroked his finger in and out in a slow, teasing rhythm, the proof of her arousal pouring from her pussy.

  She felt the orgasm beginning to build low in her belly, tightening the muscles in her thighs, racing along her spine. Just as the tight coil of need began to unwind he pulled away from her and she wanted to weep. “No,” she cried. “Please, no.” She felt empty, bereft, her body screaming for fulfillment. She wanted his hands and his mouth on her, bringing her toward that leap into space. Her hands kneaded her breasts hard enough to leave marks but the pain only increased her arousal.

  Then he was back, sheathed in latex. Opening her wide again he entered with one long thrust and was in to the hilt.

  She climaxed at once, hips thrusting, legs locking around his waist, fingers rolling and pinching her nipples, her head thrown back and her neck arched. He rode her through it, then began the drive to his own release. He stroked her steadily, in and out, slow then fast. Sweat dripped from his body and his breathing turned ragged. Taylor met him thrust for thrust, using her ankles as levers to pull him into her tighter and tighter. Finally as his balls tightened and his ass clenched, she exploded again around him and his cock spurted into the condom. His body shuddered above hers, his lips drawn taut in a grimace. Then he collapsed on top of her, dragging air into his lungs.

  Long minutes later he pulled himself off her body and looked down at her.

  “What’s happening with us?” she whispered, not even sure she wanted to know the answer. She had to believe it was just sex. He wasn’t offering her anything else. But in the secret places of her mind she was afraid of what was really growing between them.

  Noah reached out a hand to help her rise. Something
she couldn’t define shifted in his eyes. “Too much. Way too much. But damn it, I can’t seem to stop it. Look at us. Do you think I make a habit of fucking people in my office in the middle of a business day? Or any other time?”

  “I don’t know,” she answered softly. “Do you?”

  Anger flared in his eyes. “I’ll pretend you didn’t say that. Taylor, if we go on with this, you’ll be putting yourself in my control. You said you didn’t want that, remember?” His voice with taut with tension. “And I didn’t lie to you. There can’t ever be anything between us but this. And even this is too much.”

  “Why? What is it you won’t tell me? What is so damn terrible that you keep it hidden away where nobody can find it?”

  A look of the most intense pain shone in his eyes but just briefly, then it was gone.

  He pulled her close to him skin to skin, his big hands stroking her spine. “Just be warned you may be biting off more than you want to chew.” He sighed. “Damn my soul anyway. This can’t have a good ending.”

  She wrapped her arms around him and pressed her face to his chest, loving the feel of his chest hair against her cheek. “I don’t know what’s wrong, Noah. I don’t even know how we got to this point. But it’s like you said before. I can’t turn away from you anymore than you can from me. If I have control everywhere else in my life, maybe giving it to you in the bedroom is what I’m supposed to do. So maybe we’ll both be damned.”

  “You may regret saying that.” He kissed the top of her head. “We’d better get dressed. Give me a minute in the bathroom and then it’s all yours.”

  Fifteen minutes later they were seated at the table eating stuffed chicken breasts and Caesar salad as if they hadn’t just fucked themselves blind. Taylor had an urge to laugh hysterically. If she didn’t know better, she’d think she was an actor in a bad movie.

  She looked at the man sitting across from her, moisture seeping from her just at the sight of his bronzed body, his very masculine face, his bottomless black eyes.

  What is his secret? What troubles him so much? And what did Josiah Gaines do that Noah pledged such loyalty?

  “You’re thinking again.” His voice interrupted her thoughts.

  “Just remembering what you said a few minutes ago.” She put down her fork and took a swallow of her wine. “Noah, I’ve lived my entire life in the equivalent of a cold cell with an unyielding warden. In less than twenty-four hours I’ve stepped into a life so different from anything I’ve ever known I might as well be on another planet. And I’ve learned a lot of things about myself.”

  His face was unreadable. “Oh? And those things are?”

  “The main thing is I can pretty much handle whatever comes at me and not turn tail and run. So whatever you think is going to scare me off…”She paused, keeping her eyes on him. “Whatever it is, I don’t think it will.”

  “Don’t be so sure.”

  She gave him a trembling look, aroused just by the stimulation to her imagination. “You keep saying that but I have no idea what you mean.”

  “And when you do…” He shook his head.

  “Why don’t you tell me?” She felt herself getting wet again, just from the conversation. God almighty.

  His silence indicated that avenue of conversation was closed. At least for now.

  “I’m curious about something. You’ve stressed image as far as Arroyo is concerned yet you seem to be willing to take risks with us. What if someone had come in just now?”

  “Won’t happen. Tomas and I have the only codes. He knows not to use them unless I tell him it’s an emergency.” He crumpled his napkin onto the table. “I wouldn’t be down here with you, fucking our brains out, if I thought someone would walk in. Trust me. I’m not that big a risk taker.”

  “Don’t you worry that people will find out about us? You told me yourself you wouldn’t do anything to put me at a disadvantage.”

  A muscle jumped in his cheek. “All you have to do is tell me no.” When she didn’t reply he said, “I thought so.”

  Taylor felt he creep over her face. She filled her coffee cup from the carafe on the table, taking time to compose herself. “Let’s talk business a minute.”

  “Afraid of discussing sex with me?” Noah’s voice was low and deep, filled with unmistakable meaning. “Didn’t seem like it a few minutes ago.”

  “No. Yes.” She flapped a hand in the air. “I just want to get a handle on things.”

  “You don’t trust me to get you through this?”

  That wasn’t true. She studied his face, wondering what he’d say if she told him she trusted him everywhere but in bed, the place where she was the most vulnerable. “That’s not true. But I have some questions, okay? If Josiah hadn’t gotten the proxies from the board, what would have happened?”

  Noah pushed his plate away leaned toward he. “This is still Josiah’s show and no matter what, you hold sixty percent of the stock. No matter how they vote, he still held all the cards. Now you do.”

  “I should have asked this before but there was so much to absorb. What if he didn’t have an heir?”

  “The stock was to be used to establish a foundation. Whoever was chosen as director, just like the new CEO, would end up voting the lion’s share of the stock.”

  “That could make for a tricky situation.”

  He shook his head. “But it’s a moot point now that you’re here.”

  As soon as they stepped off the elevator Noah buzzed for Carmen, who hurried in with her notebook and folders that held Josiah’s personal files on his executive staff. A schedule of appointments was attached to the top one.

  “I called Mr. Rivas but he was out of the office, so I left a message for him to return the call.” She gave Taylor a hesitant look. “I left both your cell numbers in case the call comes in after hours.”

  “That’s fine.” Taylor said. A secure Arroyo cell phone had been included with the goodies Noah had given her.

  “Maybe Howard can point us in some direction,” Noah said.

  “Let’s hope so. At the moment he’s our best starting point.”

  “The board is here,” Carmen reminded them. “I told them you’d be right there but they don’t look like a patient lot today.”

  Taylor dug into her purse and repaired her makeup. Snapping her compact shut she smiled at Noah. “I believe I’m ready.”

  Chapter Six

  Noah watched Taylor during the board meeting with a mixture of pride, surprise and admiration. He and Carmen had prepped her on each member and now it occurred to him as she went through her paces that these were people no different from the clients she’d handled at Clemens Jacobs. Having lived with money all her life—although miniscule compared to Josiah’s—and handled millions of dollars on a daily basis, the people sitting around the table didn’t faze her. She was composed, controlled and knowledgeable.

  She carefully avoided looking at him except when necessary and her voice when she spoke to him was even and controlled. There wasn’t a trace in her manner of the real nature of their relationship. This woman was a consummate actress. From what he’d learned of her life, she’d had to be.

  He easily saw traces of Josiah in her posture at the table, her gestures, her attitude with the board members. If they asked a question she didn’t know the answer to, she made a note on the pad in front of her and promised to get the information. She gracefully avoided answering personal questions, focusing instead on her personal credentials.

  He found himself in a position that tested his personal control. For the past ten years he’d been able to handle personal relationships with women in one manner—there weren’t any. That wasn’t to say he’d gone without sexual partners but that was all they were. One night, sometimes two if they were particularly accomplished. His brand of sex didn’t appeal to everyone so he tried to choose his partners carefully.

  Taylor Scott was a whole other ball game. The night he’d gone to the hotel to get a sense of her for Joshua, some part
of her had invaded him and he couldn’t get her out of his system. Being around her was a challenge because almost anything—a look, a word—could make him hard. In two days he’d fucked her three times at inappropriate times and in inappropriate places, like a horny teenager who couldn’t handle his raging hormones.

  That had to stop. For one thing, they were walking a tightrope in a delicate business situation where one misstep could mean disaster for both of them. For another, he didn’t need gossip about their relationship. There was no future in it, not when she learned the truth about him. Nor was he willing ever to trust a relationship again. And who knew where either of them would be when this whole situation was resolved, anyway?

  He’d always been able to remove himself emotionally when he needed to. Why couldn’t he do it now?

  Taylor rose and he realized the meeting was over. She stood at the door shaking hands with each person as they departed. Noah stationed himself at her side, ready to run interference if some question came out of the woodwork.

  “I’m impressed,” he told her when they were back in her office.

  Taylor raised her eyebrows. “Another compliment from the silent sentinel? I’ll have to mark it on my calendar.” Then she smiled, to ease her words. “Thank you. I’m just glad to have gotten through it.”

  They spent the afternoon with Carmen checking Josiah’s files he’d left on his desk, discussing the phone messages and going over the last annual statement the company had issued.

  His watch read five thirty when Taylor tossed her pen onto the desk, loosened the tight twist she’d wound her hair into and raked its length back from her face. “I think I’m ready to get out of here.”

  Noah rose and held out a hand to her. “Come on. Let’s head back to the ranch.”

  * * * * *

  Taylor was more than ready to leave. Telling Carmen she’d have instructions for her in the morning, she let Noah lead her to the elevator down to the garage.

  Throughout the day Tomas had been a quiet presence wherever she’d been. Now he and the man who’d been with him that morning were waiting by both cars.