She closed her laptop and set it aside. She couldn’t tell if he was going to fire her for kissing him or rip her clothes off. And worse—she didn’t know what she wanted to happen. “I see.”
“It’s when people break their word to me, that’s when the trouble starts. People make promises to me and then they break them and I won’t stand for it.”
He spoke with such conviction. Surely he wasn’t trying to sound erotic, but heat spiked through her. He was barely holding himself back. She should probably be afraid of this display of anger—of power.
She was totally turned on. “You can be ruthless. That’s your reputation.”
“I have to be.” It came out anguished, as if it wounded him to sue people back to the Stone Age. “Kill or be killed.” Even from twenty feet away, she could see the white-knuckled grip he had on the frame. But he didn’t take another step into the room. “I was engaged. To be married.”
“You were?”
“To Diana Carter.” The admission seemed to hollow him out a bit.
The name rang a bell. Nate Longmire v. Diana Carter. The court case. The rumors that maybe there’d been something else between them, rumors that could be neither confirmed nor denied because the court records were sealed. “Wait. Isn’t that the woman you sued over the right to the SnAppShot code?”
He nodded, a short crisp movement of his head that did nothing to dislodge his grip on the door frame. “She was there tonight. I try not to think about her, but I realized tonight that because of what she did, she’s affected everything that I do.”
This time, Trish stood. When she did—when she took a step toward him—his head jerked up and he got that ferocious look on his face again. “What did she do?”
“We were engaged. I took her home to meet my family and she slept with my brother.”
Her mouth dropped open in surprise. Not what she was expecting to hear. “She broke her promise.”
“And then claimed half the company was hers, since we’d been together when I started it.”
“And tonight?” She took another step toward him. And another.
“She wanted to start over. But I can’t trust her.” He swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing above his bow tie. “Not like I trust you.”
She considered this. “Do you? I mean, we haven’t known each other very long.”
“I trust you with my niece’s life. That’s far more important than a stupid piece of code.”
She took a few more steps toward him, closing the distance between them. His head snapped up. “Don’t come any closer.”
“Why not?”
“Because I keep my promises. And I promised you that I would not have sex with you. That I would not take advantage of you just because you’re beautiful and intelligent and I’m as comfortable with you as I’ve ever been with any woman, including Diana. Just because I trust you.” She took another step forward and he actually backed up. He didn’t let go of the door frame, but his feet were now in the hall. “And if you come any closer, I’m not going to keep my promise.”
The words ripped out of his chest and seemed to hit her in the dead center of hers. She put her hand over her heart to make sure it was still beating.
“All those women tonight, trying to catch my eye,” he went on. “Lola and Diana and the rest of them, looking at me and seeing a prize they could win. And all I could see—all I could think about—was you. I wanted to take you because I wanted you there with me. And since that couldn’t happen—since Jane is upstairs—I came home.”
“Will you keep your promise to me?”
He swallowed again, looking haunted. “I have to. Three more weeks, right? I’ll hire a new nanny and you’ll move out and then...then I’ll ask you to dinner. That’s how it has to be. I can’t kiss you. Not like I did earlier. Not like I wanted to since I met you. I gave you my word.” He sounded like he was ripping his heart out with that last bit.
A promise. A promise he intended to keep, no matter how much it hurt him. She didn’t know too many men who kept their promises like that. Hell, she didn’t know too many women. People lied and cheated and did all sorts of horrible things to each other in the name of love all the time with very little thought to how it might affect others. Just like her mother had.
Just like her father had.
But not Nate. He’d given her his word and he’d keep it, even if it killed him.
That made all the difference in the world.
She didn’t give him the chance to back away any farther. She closed the remaining distance between them so fast that he didn’t have time to react. She stepped into him and put her arms around his neck and refused to let him go.
He tensed at her touch. “Don’t.” It was half order, half plea.
“Because you’ll break your promise?”
He closed his eyes. He was back to his white-knuckle grip on the door frame, doing everything in his power to not touch her. “Yes.”
She loosened her arms from around his neck and trailed her fingertips until she had the ends of her best bow tie in her hands. “I made no such promise, did I?”
Nate jolted against her—hard. She swore she heard the crack of wood giving way. “You don’t sleep with people. You said so yourself.”
She pulled on the ends of the tie, slowly loosening it until it hung down against his tuxedo shirt. “People in general, no.” She slipped the top button free. He had a nice neck. The next button came loose.
“Trish,” he groaned. His eyes were still closed but his head had started to tilt forward—toward her. “What are you doing?”
She undid another button. “Making sure you keep your promise.”
His eyes flew open and he stared down at her in true shock. “How?”
“By seducing you.” As the third button gave, she leaned up on her tiptoes and placed a kiss against the exposed skin of his neck, right under his Adam’s apple. She could hear his pulse pounding through his veins. “If you want me to.”
Then—and only then—did he relinquish his hold on the poor door frame. His arms swung down and surrounded her with his strength. She wanted to melt against him, but she didn’t. Not yet. There’d be time for that later.
She toyed with the pointed tips of his collar. “Do you want me to?”
“This doesn’t have anything to do with money or charities or anything, right?”
She leaned forward and kissed his neck again as she worked another button free. His pulse jumped under her lips, a wild beating that matched her own heart’s rhythm. She was doing this, seducing Nate Longmire, the Boy Billionaire.
Except, she wasn’t, not really. She wasn’t seducing one of the most eligible Billionaire Bachelors. She was just seducing Nate. Beautiful, geeky Nate, who always kept his promises.
“No.” Then she skimmed her teeth over his skin and felt him shudder. His body’s response did things to her. Sweet, glorious heat flushed her breasts and spread farther. She was doing this to him. And he was letting her. “This is between you and me. That’s all I want. Me and you.”
“Trish,” he groaned.
“I take that as a yes, then.” She pushed him back, but only so far that she could slide his tuxedo jacket off his shoulders. It hit the ground with a whoosh and then she was working at his buttons again.
He didn’t touch her, didn’t try to lift her T-shirt over her head. He just stood there as she undid the rest of his buttons, his chest heaving with the effort of not touching her.
He had on a white undershirt, which was irritating. Formal clothing had so many layers. She slid her hands under his tuxedo shirt and stepped in again. This time, she kissed him proper.
And this time? He kissed her back. His arms folded around her again and she was pressed against his massive chest.
Oh, yes. Trish didn’t
actually know much about the art of seduction, but even she knew that was a good thing. The heat focused in that spot between her legs and the only way she could think to ease the pressure was to lift one leg and wrap it around Nate.
But it didn’t ease the pulsing heat. Instead, when Nate grabbed her under her thigh and lifted her higher, it brought her core in contact with something else—something long and thick and—
“Upstairs,” she demanded, her back arching into that thick length.
She wasn’t sure what she’d expected him to do. Turn and race up the stairs, maybe. That’s what she would have done.
But she wasn’t Nate. He hefted her up and leaned her back against the poor, misused door frame and kissed the hell out of her. She really had no choice but to put her legs around his waist, did she? And when she did, his erection ground against her. “Oh. Oh!”
“Mmm,” he hummed against her mouth as he devoured her lips. Then he shifted his hips and heat exploded between them. Her body shimmied under his.
She could have stayed like that forever, except the door frame was exacting its revenge on her back. “Take me to bed, Nate. Now.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said.
And then Trish was floating through the air as Nate carried her up the stairs as if she weighed nothing, as if each step weren’t driving his erection against her, as if she weren’t on the verge of climaxing when he bit down on her shoulder.
Oh, yes.
Then they were in his room and he was kicking his door shut—quietly—and he’d laid her out on the bed. He started to strip off his shirt, but she sat up and said, “No, stop. That’s my job.”
His hand froze on his cuff links. “It is?”
“I’m doing the seducing around here,” she replied, pushing his hand away and undoing the offending cuff link herself. “That was the deal, right?”
“Absolutely,” he agreed.
So Trish got to her knees on the bed and undid his other cuff so that she could push the very nice shirt off his shoulders and then strip the undershirt off him and then finally she could see the massive chest.
“You are built,” she whispered as she ran her fingers over his muscles.
She skimmed her fingertips over his nipples and was rewarded with another low groan. His only other reaction was to clench his hands into fists, but he held them by his side. He didn’t say anything. The last of his self-control, hanging by a thread.
He had a smattering of dark brown hairs in the space between two nicely defined pecs and a treasure trail that ended in the waistband of his pants. She followed it with her fingertips, then hooked her fingers into his waistband and pulled him into her so she could kiss him.
“Trish,” he moaned into her mouth. “You’re going to kill me.”
She responded by running her hands over the huge bulge in his trousers. The heat pouring off him was electric. He was electric, setting her nerves on fire and threatening to overwhelm her. He shuddered under her touch.
“Oh, my, Nate,” she whispered as she stroked his length through the fine wool of his trousers. He was built in so many ways. “Oh, my.”
“Please,” he begged.
“You have condoms?”
“Yeah. Somewhere.”
“Go get them. Right now.” Because once those pants got unbuttoned, there’d be no stopping, no turning back.
She might be doing the wild and crazy thing of seducing Nate Longmire, but that didn’t mean she wanted to get carried away. She wanted to enjoy this night, this time, with him without having to deal with the consequences.
He pulled away from her so fast she almost toppled off the bed. She caught herself and sat back on her heels, watching him. She hadn’t spent much time in his room. She’d seen it only when she’d tied his now-crumpled tie. It was the whole side of the house, with the bathroom in the back. The room was done in cool grays and blues, with a more modern touch than her room.
And the bed itself? She had no idea how they’d gotten a California King into this house but they had. And she was going to make good use of such a large bed.
He checked a drawer in the bedside table, then went around to the other side. “Got them,” he muttered.
He came back to where she was waiting and stood there, an unopened box of condoms in his hand, like he wasn’t sure what should happen next.
“Okay?” she asked. She had him shirtless and he was definitely interested, but now that he’d had a moment to think, a hint of doubt had crept into his eyes.
“Yeah. Yes,” he repeated with more force. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “It’s just...been a while.” Then he opened his eyes and cupped her face and kissed her, soft and sweet and full of promise. “You?”
“You could say that.” He lifted an eyebrow, but she didn’t elaborate. She had no room in her life for antiquated notions of virginity, anyway. She’d already raised nine kids—ten, if she counted Jane. Her virginity was completely irrelevant to the situation.
But she could tell he was trying to figure out the best way to ask that question, so she went back on the offensive. She pulled him down into another kiss as she let her hands move over all those muscles.
“Shoes,” she murmured. “Take them off.”
He kicked off his shoes and peeled off his socks, but when he went for his waistband, she grabbed his hands. “Wait,” she told him. “Watch.”
Then, because it seemed like the thing to do, she stood on the bed. Slowly, she peeled her T-shirt over her head. Nate made a noise in the back of his throat that was part groan, part animalistic growl as he stared at her simple beige bra.
Then she undid the button and slid down the zipper on her jeans. As the jeans slipped past her hips, she wished she had a pretty matching set of underwear instead of ones of cheap cotton. She wanted to be sexier for him.
Not that he seemed to mind her mismatched set. As the jeans slid free of her legs and she kicked them off, his mouth fell open. “Trish,” he groaned again, his arms held tight at his side, his hands fisted. “Look at you. You’re stunning.” His voice shook with raw desire.
And just like that, she felt desirable in spite of her under things. She walked over to where he stood. The added height of the bed meant that, instead of having to crane her neck up to look at him, she was a few inches taller than he was. She draped her arms around his neck again.
Stunning. She hadn’t often felt beautiful. She’d had some people try to compliment her, but the best she usually got was “striking.”
“And you, as I believe I noted before, are incredibly attractive.”
He grinned up at her, the doubt gone from his eyes. “Can I touch you now or are you still seducing me?”
“I didn’t say you couldn’t touch me, did I?”
In response, his hands skimmed up the back of her thighs, over her bottom. He moved deliberately, trailing his fingertips along the waistband of her serviceable panties, over her hips, and along the elastic of her leg bands.
She couldn’t help it. She closed her eyes and let her skin take in his every movement. She tingled under his touch, little shocks of pleasure wherever his fingertips caressed her.
“You are so beautiful, Trish,” he whispered against her chest. Then he pressed his lips against the inner curve of her breast, right above the bra cup. “Let me show you how beautiful you are.”
He turned his head and kissed the other breast as he began to unhook her bra. A moment of panic flashed over her—what was she doing? Having sex with Nate? Was she crazy?—but then the bra gave and he pulled it off her shoulders and she moved her arms to let it fall helplessly between them and he—and he—
He licked her left nipple like he was licking an ice cream cone. As his tongue worked her into a hard, stiff peak, he glanced up at her. “Watch me,” he ordered and then he closed h
is lips around her nipple and sucked.
“Nate!” she exclaimed in a whisper at the sudden pressure. She wanted to cry out and scream his name, but she didn’t want to wake the baby. She laced her hands through his hair. “Oh...”
“Good?” he asked, his voice muffled against her skin.
“Yes,” she said. In response, he sucked again, harder. “Oh...” she managed to say again. Her legs started to shake.
One of his hands slid down her back again, tracing her bottom before coming between her legs from behind. The position locked her body to his. Softly—so softly—his fingertips rubbed over the thin fabric of her panties. The sensation of someone that wasn’t her touching her there was so overwhelming that she couldn’t even make a noise.
“Open your legs for me,” he whispered. “Let me show you how beautiful you are.”
Despite the way he had her legs pinned with his arm, she managed to scoot her knees a little farther apart without losing her balance.
“Mmm,” Nate hummed as he licked her other nipple. His fingers rubbed in longer strokes, so close to hitting that hot, heavy weight in the front.
So close—but not quite. He was going to drive her mad with lust. Her! Trish Hunter, who had always been above such base things. With Nate’s mouth on her, his fingers against her—
She ground against his fingers as she held his head to her breast. “Nate,” she moaned when his teeth scraped over her nipple. “Oh, Nate...”
“Like that. Just like that, Trish.” His voice was low and deep and sent a shiver up her back. “Oh, babe.”
She wasn’t doing the seducing anymore. He’d taken the reins from her and she was only too happy to hand them over. She really didn’t know what she was doing, after all. But Nate?
He knew. He knew exactly what he was doing to her.
Then his mouth left her nipples and he kissed his way down her stomach. He hooked his thumbs into the waistband of her panties and slid them down. And then she was nude before him, nothing between them but a pair of tuxedo pants.
She had a moment of panic—she hadn’t exactly prepped for this encounter. As Nate drifted south and she lost her grip on his hair, she fought the urge to cover herself.
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