‘Mochi could do that with you.’
‘Yeah, but what happens if he sees a little kid and gets excited?’ she asked. ‘I’d be banned for life.’
‘So we need to work on you controlling him.’ He stopped. As he did so, June sat down, looking up at him for guidance. ‘Like this.’
Brooke looked down at June, then back at him. ‘How could you have possibly taught her that already? You haven’t even had her for that long. And she’s a stray.’
‘Dogs learn pretty quickly, especially if you’re consistent. This is pretty basic, really. Get him to walk with you, to stop with you. That foundation will help you to control him more when he’s around other dogs and people.’ He eyed Mochi, who was, to his credit, walking well. ‘This is already pretty different to the way he was walking when we bumped into you a couple of weeks ago.’
‘I think the two walks a day are helping with his energy,’ she admitted sheepishly. ‘I feel silly for not realising he needed it before.’
‘Don’t feel silly,’ Tyler said. ‘Just figure out what he needs. Do some research on his breed.’
‘He’s mixed.’
‘Well, he looks part collie to me, and that breed is notoriously energetic. Two walks are the bare minimum.’ At her stricken look, he laughed. ‘You play with him in the garden, don’t you?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, that’s another way for him to get out his energy. And the good news is he’s a smart dog. He’ll learn pretty quickly. Here—let’s swap and I’ll show you.’
He took Mochi from her and started with basic sit and stand commands. He’d brought treats for June, and Mochi was greedy, so it didn’t take him long to learn. And then they walked.
As he did all this, Tyler talked it through with Brooke. After a little while, he had her take Mochi. That required slightly more work.
‘You’re asking him to sit, not telling him.’
‘If someone just told me to sit, I wouldn’t feel very good about that,’ she argued. ‘But if they asked me, I would welcome it.’
‘Brooke,’ he said, mustering all his patience while simultaneously fighting a smile, ‘he’s a dog. He doesn’t want to be asked. He wants to be told and to be rewarded for doing what he’s told. You’re his Alpha.’
She narrowed her eyes. ‘Again with this Alpha business?’
He didn’t fight the smile. ‘It’s nature.’
‘Sure,’ she replied darkly. ‘Most things in the male understanding of the world seem to be based on “nature.”’
‘I’m pretty sure the right answer here is for me to apologise for all of mankind.’
‘Apology accepted,’ she said primly, but she offered him a small smile.
She put more authority into her tone after that. When it worked, she gave him a dark look, as if to say Don’t you dare say I told you so. He lifted his hand in surrender. He didn’t have to say it. The fact that he was grinning like a stupid person told her as much.
He preferred this to what had happened that morning. When her vulnerability had been so raw it hurt his heart as if it were nails on a chalkboard. Things seemed to switch effortlessly between easy and hard with them. If he were inclined to, he might say that was part of what made it special between them. But he wasn’t inclined to. Because her reaction that morning had reminded him of the stakes.
Oh, he’d been intent on charming her. The night before, when she’d been in his arms, once again displaying that vulnerability, he’d promised her they would be friends. He’d believed it would be a foundation between them for something else. Something bigger. But there were too many factors at play.
He’d left that function the night before even more confused about what he wanted to do. Well, no. He knew what he wanted to do. He was just conflicted about it. He couldn’t leave Tia and Nyle. No matter how much Brooke assured him it wouldn’t be abandonment, he didn’t believe it. Perhaps because it wasn’t her assurance he needed—it was Tia’s. And getting it would involve telling Tia about the business opportunity, which he wasn’t ready to do.
While he was dealing with all that he couldn’t lay a foundation for anything more than friendship with Brooke. Not only because he couldn’t offer her the certainty she deserved, but because if he left he would be leaving her, too. How could he do that to her? He wasn’t his father; he wouldn’t leave the people he cared about.
He’d told her once that employees and employers could be friends, and he believed that. Now he wished he didn’t. Now he wished he’d left his desire for her locked behind the pretence of professionalism. Now he wished he didn’t have any past with her complicating things.
They reached a break in the path and made their way to a bench in a small, open grassy area. He was thankful for the reprieve from walking. Maybe because he was hoping it would give him one from his thoughts, too.
‘This is probably a good place to turn around,’ Brooke said as she lowered to give the dogs water. ‘After a break.’
‘You need a break?’ He forced himself to tease her. ‘I could do this for ever.’
She stuck out her tongue, before taking off her cap and drinking some water herself. A bead escaped the bottle, trailing over her chin, down her neck, before disappearing into her cleavage. He’d done his utmost not to notice that cleavage when he’d got to her house that morning. In truth, it was perfectly respectable. Except he couldn’t look at her and respond in a perfectly respectable way.
He remembered too clearly the gentle swell of her breasts in that gold dress, the material hugging her curves, the colour seemingly designed for her skin.
He couldn’t only blame it on that though. Everything about her made his body react. She could be wearing a black bin bag and face paint and he’d still be dying to hold her in his arms, caress her. So the tight top meant to support her breasts as she walked would inevitably distract him.
He wanted to follow the trail of that water with his tongue. He didn’t care that her skin had a light sheen of sweat. She would taste of salt and Brooke and he couldn’t think of anything he wanted more.
He exhaled sharply, pulled his own water from his backpack and drank like a dying man. He felt as if he were dying. How else could he describe his response when he had only just thought about all the reasons he needed to have boundaries with her? When he’d been doing so from the beginning of their reunion?
‘Uh-oh,’ Brooke said softly.
His head turned. She was looking at his face, so it was unlikely she was noticing his body’s reaction. Good. He wouldn’t be able to explain that after he’d assured her they were only friends.
‘What?’ he said, once he’d got his thinking under control.
‘You’re having a Brooke moment.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘Well, it’s good that you ask because it could mean a number of things. The one I’m currently thinking about has nothing to do with the patriarchy—’ she gave him a small smile ‘—but with getting lost in your own head.’
‘I’m not—’ He broke off with a sigh. ‘I am. I thought about something and it unravelled quickly.’
‘That’s how it happens, I’m afraid.’ She patted his hand. ‘One moment you’re thinking about how cute a guy is, the next you’re remembering your deceased husband and wondering if he’d be okay with you thinking about how cute another guy is.’
‘Is that what happened this morning?’
‘Oh, no,’ she said, shaking her head with a laugh. ‘I’m not falling for that.’
He stared, but she didn’t elaborate. For a minute he deliberated about whether he should push, but her expression told him it wasn’t a good idea.
‘You’re really not going answer that?’ he asked.
‘Nope.’
‘At least confirm that I’m the cute guy?’
‘You’re not,’ she said. ‘I was ta
lking about the guy who helped take my groceries to the car the other day. He even called me “ma’am,” which made me feel old, but also made me feel kind of fancy.’
She twisted her shoulder in an endearing way and he smiled. How could he not be delighted by her? She drew him in—no, locked him in, really—and he was so enamoured that he’d handed her the key.
‘You should stop doing this,’ he said. He meant to tease, but his tone was serious.
‘What?’
‘Being so...so you.’
She studied him. ‘I would be offended if it weren’t for that look on your face. It’s telling me that you’re actually complimenting me.’
‘Yeah.’ His hand lifted to twirl the ends of her hair around his finger. He stopped when he realised what he was doing. ‘Sorry. I—’
He didn’t finish, and she reached up and caught his hand. ‘You know what I think would solve a lot of this tension? If we kissed.’
‘You... Excuse me?’
‘Get it out of the way. Out of our systems, you know?’ She barrelled on. ‘If we both want it, of course. If not, I’ll gladly never speak of—’
He was kissing her before she could finish.
CHAPTER TEN
GETTING DESIRE OUT of their systems might have been one of the reasons they were kissing, but Brooke knew there was more to it. For both of them. Though she was sure their reasons were different.
For her, it was the tension. It danced between them. Sometimes to a slow and lingering beat, almost harmless in its laziness; other times the beat was sharp and passionate, demanding to be heeded. Today, both those beats had played in her.
And then there was this.
An utterly irresistible rhythm that neither of them could ignore.
It didn’t seem to matter that she’d thought of a long list of reasons as to why kissing him was a bad idea. All of them were very much still valid, but she thought some of her problem lay in curiosity. What would it be like to kiss him? To kiss any man, really?
Though even as she thought it she knew that was a lie. It wasn’t her curiosity to kiss any man that was causing her internal conflict. It was her curiosity to kiss Tyler. To find out if she was ready to move on with him.
So now they were kissing.
A nice, simple way of sorting through her feelings.
How she was only figuring out that was a lie now, as she was kissing him, was anyone’s guess.
It was an overload of sensations. The gentle press of his lips against hers...the way he dropped her hand to cup her face... Their lips moved tentatively against one another. Testing, tasting, teasing. If somehow they’d been transported to the stream beside them, submerged in water, she wouldn’t have been surprised. Every single movement felt as slow and deliberate as if they were under water. Every breath she took felt hard-won, her lungs no longer working as they normally did.
But they seemed to be adjusting to this new reality. To being under water. Hell, she might be turning into a mermaid. If so, he would definitely be the prince she sacrificed her voice for. It was a choice she would gladly make if it meant she could keep kissing him.
Of course, when she was rational again, she would protest against the idea of sacrificing anything for the sake of a kiss. But he had just swept his tongue into her mouth and heat was curling in her belly and she was ready to do whatever she needed to do to keep these sensations coming.
Even if it meant losing her sanity.
A part of her was aware of what was happening. It was because of that overload of sensation. With the lick of his tongue, it was as if something inside her began to inflate, more and more, until she was certain she was floating up into the sky. It wasn’t a bad thing. At least, it didn’t feel that way right now. It felt like a gift. The way his hand moved down from her face to her neck, over her collarbone, down her arm... The way it moved to her hip, lingered on her waist, settled on her ribs.
Higher, she thought. But the bottom of her breast was already touching his hand and she thought she might lose her mind. She could only imagine what would happen if he actually touched her skin, stroked her like she wanted him to.
The heat in her belly would boil, overflow, trail a pathway down to her core. For the moment that ache between her legs was a pulsing need. It was as if her body had separated her desire into the heat in her stomach and the pulsing between her thighs. Probably to save her. Because the moment those things converged, she would lose herself completely. And if she did that she would do something insane. Like straddle him, placing his desire against hers and checking whether, together, they could sate their appetite for one another.
The thought was as good as a bucket of ice over her. She pulled back, leaning away until she was at the edge of the bench. Tyler did the same at his end. Both of them stared. With a trembling hand, she traced her lips. Why did they suddenly feel like the scene of a crime? As if they’d done something illegal and were waiting to be caught?
Mochi tugged at his leash, reminding Brooke that he was still there. She looked down, amazed that she had managed to keep hold of him when her world had completely and utterly changed.
‘Yeah,’ she said softy. ‘Yeah, let’s go.’
She stood, her legs feeling weak and unstable beneath her.
‘Brooke,’ Tyler said.
When she turned, she found him standing behind her.
‘Are you okay?’
‘Sure.’ She offered him a smile that she was sure wasn’t very convincing. ‘Are you?’
‘Yes. Except I feel like you’re lying to me.’
He lifted a hand and curled it around her ear, as if she had hair there. But she’d tied her hair up that morning, and she knew what he was doing was more to touch her than anything else.
She resisted the urge to close her eyes, to sigh. Instead, she moved back. Gently. It didn’t matter how she’d done it though, she realised as a flash of hurt crossed his face. His reaction would have been the same regardless.
‘I’m not lying.’
‘Brooke—’
‘Tyler,’ she replied deliberately. The look of expectation on his face didn’t change. She sighed. ‘Give me time, okay? I need...a moment.’
‘So you’re not okay?’
‘Are you?’ she challenged. ‘Because you pressing me now feels like an excuse to not face your own feelings about what happened.’
June whined, and Tyler gave her an absentminded rub on the head. ‘Maybe we both need time.’
‘Yes,’ she agreed.
Not waiting for him to say anything further, she began to walk.
By the time they reached the car they were both sweaty messes. At some point during their walk, the sun had got much hotter. They’d had to stop to give the dogs water often, and it had taken longer to get back than it had to get to the grassy area.
‘You can drive,’ Brooke said, throwing him the keys. ‘I’m not sure I’m capable of that yet.’
His smile was crooked and a little reserved. She understood. Hell, she deserved it. She had pushed him away, quite deliberately, and now she was pretending it hadn’t happened.
But some time during the walk back her fear had melted into something else. Guilt, mostly. She could have reacted better about the kiss. She should have. Except her legs had been shaking, along with some other choice parts of her body, and she hadn’t been able to deal with that and force herself to have a logical conversation.
But that wasn’t his fault. Well, her emotional reaction wasn’t his fault. The physical reaction... Her entire body clenched at the memory, as if somehow tightening her muscles would prevent the sensations from gripping her.
Without thought, she looked at Tyler. Part of her wanted to check whether he was experiencing these aftershocks, too. Apparently not. He seemed perfectly calm, his face holding a serene expression despite the turmoil of what had happen
ed before their walk back. Despite the slight sheen on his face and his body from the exertion of their walk.
She tried not to pay attention to the sweat that was still periodically rolling down her back and in between her breasts.
‘What’s wrong?’ he asked.
She frowned. ‘Nothing. Why?’
‘You’re looking at me and fanning yourself.’
She looked down. Saw that she had, indeed, been lifting her top as if she were fanning herself. It was all perfectly innocent, and yet it looked incredibly incriminating.
‘I was thinking that you look all cool and calm while I’m sweating buckets. The fanning was a thoughtless response.’
‘Hmm.’
She rolled her eyes at the disbelieving sound, but couldn’t help the tickle of a smile at her mouth. Because she could understand what he was thinking. If the roles had been reversed, she would have thought the exact same thing.
‘I work out a lot,’ was his next comment.
‘I figured.’ The flick of his gaze made her realise what she was saying. She didn’t bother hiding her reaction. ‘You look like you do.’
‘How do I look?’
‘Not falling for that.’
He gave a soft chuckle. ‘Looks aren’t exactly a good criteria for working out, but if we’re going to use them, I’d say you work out a lot, too.’
She refused to blush. ‘You’re trying to make me say something weird again, which is entirely possible, yes, but I’m not going to fall for it.’
‘It was a compliment.’
‘You know as well as I do that I do not “work out a lot.”’
‘How would I know that?’
‘One, I work too much for “a lot.” Two, that gold dress didn’t hide much.’
‘It didn’t, did it?’ He gave her a sly look. ‘It’s almost as if someone bought it with that very thing in mind.’
She laughed because he was teasing, and because she preferred this to the silence of their walk. It was unfair of her. How could she want him to be like this when she didn’t like where it led? Teasing led to flirting—hell, they might already be flirting now—and flirting led to touches, to kisses.
Awakened by the CEO's Kiss Page 9