She nodded. “Good thing I know just how to keep warm.”
She moved quickly before she lost her nerve, and hoping to catch him off guard, she climbed onto his lap. Face-to-face, she placed her knees on either side of his legs and settled herself into the juncture of his thighs.
He exhaled hard and let out a groan that vibrated through her. “Body heat,” she explained. But what she felt went beyond heat. More like a burning blaze and unlike anything she’d ever felt before.
She released any leg muscles that would have held her apart from him until his erection settled snug between her thighs.
He clenched his jaw, fighting the obvious pleasure brought by their intimate contact. “Do you always get what you want, princess?”
She shook her head. “Good try, but I’m not biting.” Grace recognized the ploy to place distance between them. No way would she let him use her weakness to push her away again.
“How so?” He raised an eyebrow and met her gaze, attempting to appear unaffected.
But she knew better. She’d caught the flicker of regret at his words in his dark eyes. “Let’s just say I may have been privileged, but I rarely got what I really wanted.” Fewer things and more caring. “On the other hand, I get the feeling you tend to get what you desire.”
“Not while I was growing up. We weren’t exactly in your league.” His jaw clenched tight.
“Not many families are, and believe me, you ought to consider yourself lucky. Did you have love?”
The word hovered between them.
He nodded.
“Then you were much more privileged than I ever was. And Ben, I should warn you—I may not have gotten what I wanted then…”
“But you plan to get it now?”
She nodded. “I most certainly do.”
His eyes smoldered with the same flame threatening to consume her, but instead of pulling her into the kiss she desired, he clenched his hands into fists at his sides.
She shook her head and admitted to herself she’d have preferred he too
k control and kissed her senseless, but by holding back, he was teaching her important lessons on experimenting and being bold.
She let out an exaggerated sigh. “I can do this the hard way or the easy way. With your cooperation or without it. Either way, I have no doubt I’ll eventually get what we both want.” She raised her hands and placed them on his bare chest.
That initial move was difficult, but now that she’d touched his skin, the rest came a bit easier. She shut her eyes for only a moment, savoring the feel of his heated flesh beneath her palms. Then, taking advantage, she grazed his nipples with her thumbs until they’d distended into hard peaks.
His hips jerked upward, and she sucked in a breath at the same time an unexpected rising swell of desire flooded through her.
New. The sensations he aroused were new and exciting. She dampened her lips with her tongue. “Before I go with the more aggressive approach, you’re going to have to tell me why you’re holding back.”
A smile twitched at his lips. “You’re telling me you can actually get more aggressive?” His hands came to rest at her hips. “’Cause from where I’m sitting, princess, this is as aggressive as it gets.”
She glanced down at their nearly joined bodies. “Yeah, it is pretty smart of me, isn’t it?” She grinned, pleased with how quickly she was learning.
His hands slid beneath her shirt and inched upward until his palms settled on the bare skin by her rib cage and his thumbs grazed the lower swell of her breasts. She knew he was attempting to scare her off again. Either that or make her give in to whatever pleasure he had in mind. As tempting as that thought was, Grace had her own agenda. By sheer strength of will alone, she kept her eyelids open and refused to give in.
“Smart women turn me on.” His hands moved higher as his fingertips brushed her nipples, a brief, teasing touch that left her wanting more.
“So, you like dominant women, do you?” She brushed a fingertip down his cheek and nearly lost herself in his seductive gaze.
“Oh, yeah.”
Taking a wild guess at what he’d like, she clamped her thighs together and pushed her hips forward, holding his powerful erection hostage to her whims. He groaned, and she discovered what he liked, she enjoyed, too.
“I can play the same game you can,” she said on a ragged breath and hoped she wasn’t lying. “I can tease and torment as long as you can, probably longer. And I will. Until I know why the push and pull. Why you’ve been fighting the attraction between us.”