Perfect Grump (Bad Chicago Bosses)

“I couldn’t get it out of my head,” he growls. “That’s why I’m not sitting in the back anymore. Let them talk.”

My heart dives and comes back up again. I want to yell at him, to remind him we don’t need more problems, but when I see his emerald eyes and that smirk haloed by dark scruff that feels so decadent on my skin...

I’m all out of prayers.

“Are you in a hurry to pick Millie up tonight?” he asks, lifting my hand to his lips and kissing it.

“Not really. What do you need?”

“I wanted to show you a park. It’s a little ways outside the city. If you’re in a hurry, though, we’ll get the kid and go home.”

“Tiffany’s still on the clock for a few hours. We have time.”

“Head for Winnetka then,” he says sharply, rattling off a park name.

“Will do.”

I punch the name into Maps. Forty-five minutes later, we pull up a gravel road that leads through an open gate. The fence is covered in green vines that never withered away in the winter. I pull up on a rocky patch in front of a half-melted pond.

“Let’s go,” he says cryptically.

“What are we going to do?” I ask, surveying the place.

Then his hand grazes my cheek, and two firm fingers tilt my chin up, bringing my eyes to his.

“Reese, do you trust me?”

A shiver zings through me. It hits me just how hard I trust Nick Brandt with everything.

“Yes,” I whisper.

He gets out of the car, shutting the door behind him.

I open mine to follow his lead after a delayed pause, but find Nick already there. He opens my door and holds out his hand for mine. Clasping his fingers, he helps me out of the car and onto my feet.

It’s this strange, fairy-tale thing as his lips meet mine.

He traces them with his tongue, slower today, like he’s holding something back. I release a slow breath, arching into his sweetness, surrendering to the mouth that used to war with mine nonstop.

When his tongue slips in with a low groan, I’m delirious.

I melt against him, clinging to the hard shield of his body.

Time stops.

Here, it’s just me, Nick, and a kiss for the history books.

It’s just this wicked friction between us as his hand finds my hip and pulls me against his leg, his abs.

It’s just a drawn-out curse as he breaks away like he might die.

“Fuck, Reese. You know what you do to me?” He’s snarling, his eyes dense forests inviting me into their secrets. “Can you even fathom how many times I’ve come in my hand thinking of you?”

Holy crap.

My knees go weak, trembling by the revelation that he’s...imagined me that way. Apparently for months.

God.

His grip tightens on my hips. His lips part in a hint of teeth, drawing a frayed breath. He holds me still as he glides one hand up my leg, and I struggle not to pant like a wild animal.

He grabs the bottom of my coat with one hand, takes the zipper between his other thumb and forefinger and slides it down, peeling it off before he throws it in the driver’s seat.

“The coat stays.”

I remove his long, dark coat for good measure.

“Then so does yours. We freeze together.” I fling his coat into the driver’s seat on top of mine.

He grins. “Sweetheart, you’re dead wrong. There’ll be no freezing tonight.”

Oh. My. God.

What’s he planning? Every part of me tingles.

But am I in over my head?

Probably.

Whatever I am, it doesn’t involve stopping.

Not when he takes my hand, leads me to the back door, and pulls me in. “Can you kiss me like you did this morning?”

“For the record, I think you did the kissing.” My voice comes out in a squeak.

He chuckles, violent and throaty, then kisses my chin.

“You’re a terrible liar, but I can kiss you now if you want.” He holds my face between his hands, presses his lips to mine, then flicks his tongue against my mouth.

I open, deepening the kiss. Nicholas doesn’t dare disappoint.

His tongue slashes against my own with a possessive lick, then moves inward, marking the edges of my mouth.

Those rough hands of his slide from my face to my shoulders to my back, and he pulls me into his lap with a feral look, a volcanic shine in his eyes that warns, ready or not, here I fucking come.

I straddle him the way I did last weekend—I try—and just like on the balcony, his bulge is under me, insanely hard and throbbing for attention.

So, this is how I die.

I never thought it would involve the hottest forbidden sex of my life with my flipping boss, but if this is my fate...mama’s not complaining.

He moves a hand to my shoe and pops it off, tumbling it to the floor. He uses the other hand to get my other shoe, never dragging those molten eyes off me.