“Come here,” he whispered.
It was as if lightning coursed through her at his words. She had a heightened awareness of every part of her body that his eyes touched, and it made her tremble.
“Come here, Ivy,” he whispered, his voice gruffer.
She rose to her hands and knees and crawled unsteadily toward him, stopping a couple of inches away. He was breathing fast as he reached up with a big hand and scraped a finger over her jaw. When he cupped her entire cheek, engulfing it in his warm palm, Ivy’s lungs became paralyzed. Suddenly his free hand curled slowly around a piece of her camisole and dragged her a couple of inches closer, and fire licked painfully through her insides.
She shuddered as his fingers slid from her jaw to the back of her head, while he continued pulling her by the camisole. A tremor began in her very center, hot and strong, rendering her helpless against his magnetic force, tugging her forward until she stopped a hairsbreadth from his mouth. He was surprisingly gentle with the hand on her nape, but his grip on her camisole was firm. He tightened it harder as he lowered his head, their noses brushing.
Her throat closed with need; she was attracted to every inch of him.
She sensed as his plush lips went lower, and she wanted them so much, her eyes blurred. The moment his mouth touched hers, a rush of sensations burst through her. Her eyes slammed shut as he pushed her lips open with his, and she instantly yielded. He shuddered and let out a sound from his throat, a rumbling groan that blended with her own breathless moan.
Shivers of need ran through her as he thrust his tongue into her mouth and rubbed it hungrily against hers. She could feel the coiled tension in his hands, which trembled against her as he tried to maintain control. She dropped to her knees on the carpet and slid her fingers up his hard abdomen, aching to touch all his muscles, to soak up his strength.
With a pleased grunt, he grabbed her hips and dragged her onto his lap as if she weighed no more than air. Her legs slid around his hips as he deepened the kiss, and within seconds, they both went animal, making deep, hungry moaning noises and groping each other, her nails raking his biceps as she ground against his hardness. She sucked his tongue and he bit her lower lip, and she burst to life as sensations tingled down her bloodstream, her nerves, her skin.
The growl he released made her pussy water as he lay her down on the carpet, spreading his enormous weight over her and tangling his legs between hers.
The heat of his chest seeped past her camisole and warmed her skin as his hands rasped over her hips and slid under the material while their ravenous mouths tasted each other more and more.
His dark voice spilled into her ear. “You know I’m going to fuck you, don’t you?” His fast breath tickled her skin, sending a rush of heat down to her center as he bent his head and bit her nipple through her bra.
She moaned, because this couldn’t happen no matter how much she wanted it to. “I don’t have sex on the first date.”
Which was why she’d never really gotten a lot of sex in the first place. Still, that didn’t stop her from undulating greedily against him.
His arms went like steel bands around her waist and his lips claimed hers again. “This isn’t a date.”
He rocked his hips purposely against hers, and she arched by instinct, the talons of some indescribable need deeply sunk into her womb, her body quivering for him to take her hard enough to break her.
“I still don’t have sex with strangers…”
“Then let’s get on more intimate terms.”
He fingered the clasp of her bra behind her and unhooked it without preamble, then he briskly yanked both bra and camisole over her head. She cried out, sat up, pulled them back, and scowled at him.
Cade’s eyes flashed silver, and his nostrils flared as she hooked up her bra and quickly put on her camisole.
“Ivy.” He halted her with one hand, looking at her. “I’ll forfeit the fucking game. You take your two million. I want you naked and under me. Now.”
She shuddered at the animal need in his eyes, and she wondered if he could even control himself. He looked positively ravenous.
“Please don’t try to pay me for sex.” Sucking in a breath, she edged back to her place on the carpet a safe distance from him, her skin broken out in fever. “Let’s finish the game first, please.”
He slowly crooked his finger, calling her back. “After I have you, Ivy.”
“The game first,” she stressed, breathlessly scowling at him. “Regardless of the outcome, I don’t have sex on … first dates.”
It felt like a lie. Even her tongue tripped as she said it, and she knew that if Cade was as smart as she believed he was, he could clearly see her nipples were puckered under her bra. She ached so badly, was so aroused, she feared he also knew her panties were soaked and that every cell in her body screamed against this rude awakening where she wanted something she had never really had. She was by no means a virgin, but she had never, ever, felt so aware of her body before. Aware of her body desperately wanting something.
Him.
This angry, lonely man. His rawness, his power, his anger—she wanted him so much, she was only in a camisole, bra, and panties, and she was sweaty and baking inside her skin.
Jaw clenched, he shuffled the cards across the carpet from her, and in exchange for her kiss, which had been her opening bet, he opened with every chip he had.
Which only magnified her arousal.