The Real Deal (19 page)

Read The Real Deal Online

Authors: Lucy Monroe

“I need to go.” She turned back toward the house.
He could no more let her dismiss him right now than he had been able to leave her in the grocery store and his hand shot out to grab her shoulder. “Wait. I don't understand, baby. I didn't mean to hurt you with that question.”
“Don't call me baby,” she said in a choked voice without turning to face him.
He hadn't realized he had. It fit her though. So tiny. So vulnerable in ways others probably wouldn't notice. “It suits you.”
She shook her head, her long hair swinging against her petite back.
Taking her other shoulder in his free hand, he started pulling her back toward him. He didn't know what he planned. To comfort her, maybe, but as soon as her body was flush with his the idea of comfort took on a very intimate connotation.
He wrapped his arms around her front, locking them right under her breasts and nuzzled her shell-pink ear. He couldn't seem to help himself. Touching her seemed both natural and right.
She was in pain and he wanted to make it better. “I don't want you to hurt, Amanda. Tell me what I can do to make it go away.”
She'd gone completely still in his arms. He wasn't sure she was even breathing.
“Amanda?”
“You don't want me any more than he did.” The words were filled with so much pain, he winced.
He ignored her ludicrous assertion that he didn't want her. If she couldn't feel the erection growing against her back, he wasn't going to point it out to her and scare her half to death.
But the other part of what she said intrigued him. “Who didn't want you?”
“Lance.”
“Your ex-husband?” he guessed.
She nodded, causing her ear to brush against his lips, making them tingle. She gave a convulsive shudder.
“Are you crying?” He didn't know what to do with a crying woman, but somehow he couldn't just leave Amanda to her misery, whatever the cause.
“No.” The broken syllable gave lie to her word, but he didn't tax her with it.
“Tell me about Lance,” he said instead.
“I told you.” She sounded belligerent. “He didn't want me.”
Chapter 11
“B
ut he was your husband.”
“Yes.”
For some reason hearing her affirm it made his gut tighten uncomfortably. He hated the thought of any other man having claim to this woman.
She exhaled on a broken sigh. “And he did everything in his power to mold me into someone he could desire. It didn't work.”
What kind of eunuch idiot would want to change her? She was sexy, beautiful and perfect just as she was. “What? Was he gay?”
Her laugh was so far from humorous, it hurt to hear it. “No. He just couldn't force himself to make love with such an inadequate woman.”
“You believed that bullshit? That you were inadequate as a woman?” He knew he sounded angry.
He was. Furious, in fact. If Lance were within kicking distance, he'd be bruised and bloody right now. While the image gave him some satisfaction, he knew it wouldn't do anything to help the misery he sensed in Amanda right now. He didn't know what would.
She tore out of his arms and whirled on him, her expression feral. “Yes, I believed him! Why shouldn't I? You don't want me either! You made that obvious.”
“When have I made that obvious?” He'd told her he wanted to have sex with her. Did she think he made a habit of lying?
“Oh, please! Like you don't know.”
Her sarcastic words were the last straw and he stormed forward. She backed up, but he caught her with no real effort. They'd have to work on her fighting technique when an adversary had her cornered.
He grabbed her wrist, careful not to bruise her pale flesh, but with a grip she wouldn't be able to get out of easily, and pulled her forward. In a crude act that shocked him even while he was doing it, he placed her small hand against the much larger, irrefutable proof that she was wrong.
“Feel that? I don't walk around with a lead pipe in my jeans, so what do you think that tells you about how much I want you?” He let go of her wrist prepared to take a slap in the face for what he'd done. Or worse.
She didn't slap him, or kick him, or even scream at him. She didn't jerk her hand away either. Instead she pressed her open palm against his erection and stroked its length. His knees almost buckled.
Her tear drenched gaze lifted to his, her expression filled with wonder. “You meant it.”
He couldn't make his voice work, not with her hand still pressed against his sex. So, he nodded, but still could not comprehend why she acted so shocked by his arousal.
Her fingers convulsed, squeezing him and his eyes slid shut at the pleasure of it. “If you don't stop, I'm going to take you right here, in front of God, Jacob, and the seagulls.”
It wasn't the mention of God or the seagulls that did it, but when he said Jacob's name, Amanda forced her hand away from the physical evidence of Simon's arousal.
She felt exultant, like she'd just landed the deal of her career. Simon wanted her and he meant it. There could be no mistaking it this time. A man could not fake an erection, or get one on command. Lance had made sure she knew that. To get hard, a man had to be aroused and Simon was. Very aroused.
She wanted to shout hosannas.
He pulled her against him, letting her feel the hard length of his erection against her stomach. It was an incredible heady sensation and one she had never had before, this standing fully clothed against a man in a state of obvious sexual excitement.
His arms wrapped tightly around her. “You're so sexy. It's all I've been able to do not to lay you down in my bed and keep you there for three days straight.”
Bliss shivered through her at the thought. “So, why haven't you?” she asked into his chest with no thought of being coy or playing hard to get entering her mind.
He rubbed himself against her, his hands pressing into the small of her back to increase the friction between them. “I didn't want to cloud our relationship.”
“You mean because of the merger?” Remembering Daniel's crude advice for how to get Simon to agree to the proposal, she had to admit Simon had a point if that had been his concern.
“That, and the fact your life is in Southern California and mine is here.”
This evidence that casual sex did not interest him warmed her, but depressed her too. Because nothing could change the fact that their lives were lived in entirely different spheres.
“There's still the merger,” she said aloud. “We're business associates, not lovers.” Melancholy settled over her as she said the words. Simon might want her, but not enough to overcome the issues holding them apart.
His chin dropped against the top of her head and rested there. “Yes.”
Her heart lost its tenuous hold on a possible positive outcome and plummeted. “I guess that means making love would be a bad thing?” she couldn't help asking, even though she knew his answer before he gave it.
His heart sped up at her words, thumping loudly against his chest. With her face pressed against his sternum, she could feel it as well as hear it.
“Depends on how you define bad.” One big hand slid down to cup her bottom. “My definition of the word is changing with the speed of a sonic jet.”
He had such a sexy voice. She bet he could talk her to an orgasm if he put his mind to it. Just the thought had her growing damp and hot between her legs. “It is?” she asked in an embarrassing croak.
The hand on her bottom squeezed. “Oh, yeah.”
She heard his words, but her attention had been caught by his scent. She found herself nuzzling the denim work shirt stretched across his impressive chest muscles. Lance had never smelled like this. No other man in the world had Simon's scent. It was unique and it was intoxicating.
Her fingers lifted of their own volition and started undoing buttons. She wanted skin.
His arms tightened around her. “Keep that up and
bad idea
is going to lose all meaning for me.”
She undid two more buttons for good measure and then kissed the bronzed chest she had just exposed. “Really?” She wanted to taste him. Almost insanely and with a complete lack of her normal sexual reticence, she flicked her tongue out and licked delicately. Salty. Warm. She licked again. Sort of spicy.
His big body shuddered.
For the second time that day she found herself being swept up into his arms.
“
Simon!
What are you doing?”
Had she pushed him too far? Would he make good on his threat to make love to her outside? The thought intrigued her far more than it worried her. To have the ability to push her lover beyond his normal bounds of control was something she had never experienced.
She'd read about it though, and it sounded like a lot of fun, if incredibly far-fetched.
His laughter sent sensual shivers arcing through her. “I'm carrying you off to my lair to have my wicked way with you.” Suiting action to words, he started making ground-eating strides across the lawn toward the house. “To the victor go the spoils, or some such thing and I did capture you this morning.”
“You kidnapped me!”
He shrugged and she clung to his neck, not wanting to fall.
“Same thing,” he said.
“Are you saying you see yourself as some kind of conquering warrior?”
He smiled down at her, his eyes full of sensual heat. “You make an incredibly sexy and beautiful captive.”
A warrior?
She had no problem seeing Simon in the role. He'd struck her as innately dangerous since the moment they'd met. It was only now she was coming to appreciate the true nature of the danger involved. He had the power to stir her emotions in a way no other man ever had, not her few boyfriends and not even her ex-husband.
But her, sexy and beautiful?
Now that was a lot harder for her to wrap her imagination around.
Not so
captive
. Ooh . . . she liked that word. After the sexual debacle of her marriage, she was ready to indulge in a decadent fantasy. It might be the only chance she'd ever have. If she disappointed Simon in bed like she had Lance, he wasn't going to play conquering warrior for her again.
She shoved the depressing thought away. No matter what happened in the aftermath, for right now, Simon wanted her. So much, he was
carrying
her off to bed.
“I'm too heavy to cart all the way to the house and up two flights of stairs.” It was a half-hearted protest because she found the experience so delightful, but she felt it had to be made.
“Be quiet, captive.” His voice came out in a disconcerting predatory growl. “None of your arguments will gain you freedom.” His hold on her tightened. “You're mine now.”
It was just a game, but it seemed like there was an element of real warning in Simon's voice. She dismissed the thought as fanciful.
She was really getting into her role of captive
.
“Fighting would be a waste of effort,” she agreed, burying her face against him. She inhaled more of his scent, absorbing his essence skin to skin.
If she was dreaming, she'd kill the sleep police if they woke her up before Simon made love to her.
 
 
Simon's heart was trying to pound out of his chest as he laid Amanda down on his oversize bed. She looked so incredibly small laying there, her beautiful skin flushed with arousal, her eyes dark pools of sensual promise.
He started reefing off his clothes, stopping when all he had on was a pair of unbuttoned jeans. He didn't take them off. Not yet. He wanted her a lot more excited before he bared himself to her. He would expire from unsatisfied desire if she bolted after seeing his full erection. And it was
fully erect
, so hard it ached and pulsed with a need only this tiny woman could satisfy.
She hadn't taken anything off.
“If you don't undress, I'll rip your clothes off your body,” he said in his conquering warrior persona, but only half-joking. He wanted her so much that if he tried undressing her, that cute little cotton top would probably end up without any buttons left.
Those startled doe eyes looked at him, doubt lurking in their depths. “You want me to take off my clothes?” She sounded just like a nervous virgin.
Another shot of desire surged through him. He didn't know how much longer he could keep up the game. He'd started it on a whim, sensing a need to put their lovemaking on a less intense level for Amanda, but far from lessening the tension, the role-playing was increasing it. At least for him.
He mock-glared at her and started toward the bed. “Yes.”
Something shifted in her expression and she scrambled to her knees, her hands on the buttons of her blouse. Her eyes questioned him.
“Take it off.” Was that guttural voice his? He sounded like a primal male intent on subduing his mate.
Her fingers trembled, but she undid the top button.
He didn't want to scare her. Stopping at the edge of the bed, he reached out and covered her hands with his. “The game doesn't matter, sweetheart. I just want you.”
She swallowed. “I, um . . .”
He slipped his fingers under hers and undid the next button, exposing the top of her generous cleavage. He couldn't help himself. “What?”
She cleared her throat. “Simon?”
“I'm right here, baby.” He liked calling her that, he decided.
“Could we, um . . .”
He put his knee down on the bed and loomed over her, slipping the third button out of its hole and giving himself a view of creamy white mounds. She wasn't wearing a bra and for some reason that knowledge upped his excitement ten more notches. He had every intention of seeing her fully naked before long, but there was something about knowing that thin cotton was all that stood between him and her magnificent breasts.

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