Keep (Command #2) (9 page)

“What?”

“How you’re being nice to me. I don’t like it.”

He blinked. “I’m sorry, you’re asking me to be mean?”

“No, just treat me like you used to. I can’t handle it when you come at me all… sideways.”

“Sideways?” he said, a small laugh escaping him. “Are we in combat?”

She scowled.

He exhaled and then gave her a large grin, and she could see it in his eyes. The game was back on. He finally moved, but it wasn’t how she wanted it to go. He had on the smallest pair of boxer briefs she’d ever seen, and they clung to every inch of him.

“Want to take a closer look?” he asked, looping a finger under the waistband.

“God, no!” She spun in place, turning her back on him. Why had she asked for this? She was so stupid. It didn’t matter what version of him she got. The result was the same — she wanted him all the same. She breathed easier when the bathroom door shut and he was gone.

The wardrobe choices in her suitcase were growing small and she had dressed in basically the same outfit she’d been wearing the day he’d come to her office. The gray pencil skirt and black silk top with a matching gray suit coat. It had been a bit of a calculated move. If she dressed in her work clothes, she could wear her heels and be almost the same height as him.

She’d just happened to pack her sexiest heels that were fire engine red. Perfect for walking all over him, she told herself. Yeah, maybe in her dreams. He appeared from the bathroom in a stone-colored dress shirt and black slacks, shaved and his hair damp. It was annoying how good he looked. His gaze lingered on her shoes for a moment.

“Those aren’t exactly inconspicuous.”

“Am I going somewhere?” she muttered. His expression said she had a point.

Once they were dressed, it was too late for breakfast. He ordered lunch from room service. They sat on the couch and ate at the coffee table, talked about simple things over the meal, purposefully avoiding the fact that Jason and Laurel’s lives were in danger and that Kara had potentially killed a man.

After Shawn set the dishes outside the room, he sank down beside her on the couch and his phone chimed for the millionth time.

“Does that thing ever shut up?”

“I was supposed to be in the New York office today.” He scrolled through the emails and tapped out a response. “An issue with the drivers union has come up.”

She nodded, resigned. “Do you need to go?” She asked it just as sincere as she’d meant it. He ran an enormous company. It seemed unlikely he was in a position to drop everything.

“No, it’s fine. My mother stepped back in her role when she turned sixty, but still sits on the board.” He shot her a lazy smile. “Gisela Osterhägen couldn’t let all that control go at once. She’s happy to fill in for me if needed.”

Kara had yet to meet Gisela, but from what she’d heard from Laurel, this wasn’t surprising. The Osterhägen gene was one that liked to be in charge, and obviously the Dunn DNA had done little to dilute that.

“What’s the issue with the union?”

He gave her a strained smile. “Sorry, I don’t have a non-disclosure on me.”

When she rolled her eyes, his lit with amusement. “I wasn’t asking for specifics, I was trying to make conversation.”

“They want to renegotiate contracts because there’s been some theft recently.”

“How does your loss of product impact the drivers?”

Now his amusement shifted to pleasant surprise. Like he was thrilled at how quickly she’d cut to the problem. “Because the theft has been of an entire load of product, including the truck itself. Since the drivers own the truck, they’re victims of the theft, too. Carrying Osterhägen product is a risk to them, and they feel they should be compensated for taking that risk.”

“What are you going to do?”

He brushed a hand over his face in a contemplative gesture. “I’ll try to show them that this was an isolated incident. If they’re not satisfied, I suppose I’ll walk. I’m not interested in renegotiating million-dollar contracts because a few trucks went missing.”

Her eyebrows lifted. “A few trucks? Maybe your head of security should look into that.”

“Believe me, he is.” His expression morphed to one of concern, signaling he was about to change the subject. “I’m struggling to understand why your place was trashed. I don’t know which I find more worrisome.”

Her breath caught. “Meaning?”

“The man with the knife showed up five minutes after we did, and you arrived hours earlier than you were supposed to. The only way he knew we were there was if he was watching your place.” His brown eyes pinned hers. “That, on its own, is bad, but from what you told me it sounds like he was watching because he expected Juric to be there. Why?”

Her throat closed up. She struggled with the same question. “Can we… not? Let’s find something else to talk about.” She wasn’t ready to think about it.

The corner of his mouth lifted.

Oh, no.
When she took that discussion away from him, it was like she’d punched the “GO” button on his desire to pursue her. “Very well. How exactly were you and Paul incompatible?”

She swallowed hard. “It’s none of your business.”

“I disagree.” His determined expression made her pulse jump. “Tell me. I want to know.”

“Paul and I wanted different things.”

Her hopefully generic answer only opened the door for him. “What did you want that he didn’t?”

She had wanted to feel desired. For there to be a different goal than the one Paul always had. In the end, it had become so routine he didn’t notice that she wasn’t mentally there beneath him. A hand abruptly was warm on her knee, just where her skirt ended, and Shawn’s action forced a response.

“He didn’t like to touch me.”

His eyes widened, giving her a great view of the circle of warm brown that hung at the edge of his irises. “How is that possible? I can’t keep my fucking hands off of you.”

“I’ve noticed.” It was meant to sound strong, but it didn’t. The hand inched upwards.

“What else did you want that he wouldn’t give you?” Shawn leaned over, his lips brushing the shell of her ear. “Tell me, so that I can.”

The shudder seized her whole body. The hand crept up further, buried beneath her skirt. “He…” She couldn’t bring herself to say it, but the pads of Shawn’s fingers were on her inner thigh now. His power was too great. “Paul didn’t like when I enjoyed it. It made it difficult to continue if I got too loud.”

His hand tightened on her skin while his mouth dropped open. There was only her rapid breathing between them.

Shawn’s face soured. “What the fuck was wrong with him, to think giving a woman pleasure is a turnoff?” The blacks of his eyes dilated and slowly filled with desire. “You know he has that backward, yes?”

She didn’t have a response. Her focus was on his hand and the look he gave her, the one that made her insides melt.

“Let me show you how wrong he was,” he said.

Kara flushed that gorgeous red again, the one that matched her “fuck me” shoes.
That’s exactly what I have in mind.

She climbed from the couch, taking a few wobbly steps away from him, her nervous hand pushing a strand of blond hair behind her ear. It, like this room, was the same honey shade as his beer. He wanted that hair in his hands. In his face as she rode him. Spread out on his bare chest afterward.

He came up off the couch to stand, awaiting her answer with held breath, her icy gaze trapping his.

“Okay,” she said on a whisper.

He had expected a
no.
In his excitement, he surged forward, even when she stumbled backwards, running from him. He smothered her with his mouth, his body flattening hers roughly against the wall.

Her soft, hot mouth was addictive and he was lost in it, drinking up her desire. It didn’t matter if this was a ploy, if she was going to give him a new ultimatum in five seconds. Whatever she wanted, he’d give it to her. It made sense to go slow, but he struggled. He wanted to prolong it, to make it last… but he was crazy with lust.

There were steps to turning on a woman — he’d learned to work his way down. But he skipped right over that. Instead he grabbed her skirt in fistfuls, pulling up until her black panties were exposed to him. To give him the access he craved.

Her eyes went wide with surprise, but he slammed his lips on hers the same instant he touched her, massaging the fabric covering her most sensitive spot.

“Slow down,” she ordered in a shaky voice.

“We haven’t even started.” They still had all their clothes on, after all. He continued until he drew a soft moan from her. Then he pushed her damp panties to the side and touched her completely. She gasped, but did nothing to stop him. If anything, she moved to allow. To
encourage.
She wanted his touch as much as he wanted to touch.

It wasn’t enough and he was too impatient. The past three days had been all foreplay, and he’d gone too long without satisfaction. So he sank to his knees in front of her trembling legs. Her hands were on his shoulders, in his hair, but he couldn’t tell if she was trying to pull him back up or not. Her eyes were cast down on him. Begging him to slow down yet demanding that he continue.

Her skirt was bunched in his hands at her hips, so when she tried to jerk away he used it to pin her back against the wall, trapping her there. His tongue traced the edge of her panties as his shoulders worked to ease her knees apart. And then he pulled the panties down her long legs.

“What are you saying?” she demanded, breathless.

He’d been telling her all the things he was about to do to her in German.

“That I’m going to put my tongue here.” In one swift move he leaned in and swept his tongue on her flesh, then plunged it deep inside her. Her whole body shuddered, but he kept her upright with his hold on the skirt.

“Go back to German,” she cried, forcing a laugh from him.

He stayed quiet after that, listening to her heavy breathing as he tasted and teased her. Her back arched as a quiet, strangled moan rang out above him. He lifted his eyes, and caught hers staring down at him, and she glanced away, her face as red as he’d ever seen it. She was embarrassed that he’d caught her watching. Maybe she felt too vulnerable, but he’d done this partly to give her power. He was the one on his knees.

Fingertips tangled into his hair, trying to pause him. “I don’t want to have sex.”

He froze. “What do you think we’re doing?”

“You go down on me, and… I’ll go down on you,” she said, unable to catch her breath. “Can that be enough?”

He sat back, his hands bracing her hips against the wall, utterly confused. “Enough?”

“You seem like the type of man who’ll take it personally when I don’t….” she could barely look at him, “when it doesn’t happen.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I know my body.”

“You do?” he said. “Well, this is my body now.” He let go of one side of her skirt, then slid a finger inside her, asserting his control, his mouth returning to the tender spot where it had just been. He wasn’t offended. This wasn’t about him. This was about the man who had trained her to not enjoy it. Shawn was going to show her what he was good at.

It took even less time than he’d thought. He studied each ragged breath she took, every sigh of pleasure as he used his hand and tongue to bring her to the brink. A look of shock and confusion washed over her face.

“Are you close?” he asked, drawing his mouth away, but not his hand. It continued to move in her wet heat.

She nodded, unable to speak.

“Tell me.”

“I’m… really close.”

He returned to stand in front of her, kissing her roughly. He kept her lingering there for another moment and then took his hands off of her completely, stepping backwards.

Her eyes flew open. “What —?”

“I want to fuck you. If you don’t want to, that’s fine, but I want this to be fair.”

The silver eyes went wide. “Fair?”

“You don’t get to come if I don’t.” He had to make sure she wouldn’t say no, and this was the only way he knew how. He couldn’t tolerate anything less. It was inevitable, no reason to fight it. He always got what he wanted.