A wicked smile lifted his lips. “And if that isn’t enough to drive me crazy, I imagine what it would feel like to be inside you, as deep as I can get, and hear my name on your lips when you come…”
A surge of liquid warmth pooled in her belly, and lower. Her mind spun dizzily. “Austin…” she moaned raggedly.
“Yeah, just like that, Teddy.” His voice vibrated with husky gratification, and he moved back slightly. His eyes, however, had no qualms about seducing her. “I’m not even inside you, not even touching you as intimately as I’d like to, but just thinking about having your legs wrapped around my hips and fucking you makes me hard enough to go off like a horny teenager.”
She had a clear view of just how hard and impressive that part of his anatomy was beneath the faded denim of his shorts. Swallowing the thickness gathering in her throat, she pressed her knees together in a valiant attempt to ease the throbbing need he’d cleverly ignited. The attempt was useless.
Her gaze traveled upward, to his face. “So, you really don’t hate me?” For some reason, having him confirm that was important to her.
He shook his head, his gaze honest. “No, I don’t hate you, Teddy. I think you’re nervous about what you feel for me and how fast our attraction has grown…and where it might lead.”
She bit the inside of her cheek, unwilling to admit how accurate he was. She’d never planned for this, for him, and she feared she’d never be able to balance a career, and relationship—and that ultimately, she’d have to choose between the two.
“Then will you come with me to my parents’ on Christmas Eve?” This time, she wasn’t talking about a business arrangement. She wanted him to accompany her, and be a part of that special, magical evening before Christmas—and hopefully, his presence would banish the loneliness that always threatened to overwhelm her when she left her parents and realized that she was the only one in the family who didn’t have anyone to share the holidays with.
Pure Christmas melancholy, she knew, but the desolate feeling never failed to creep up on her and hang on through the first of the year. Maybe this year would be different.
“If I say yes, I don’t want any pretenses between us this time,” Austin said, clasping his hands loosely between his knees so that he was no longer touching her. “Just you, and me, and whatever happens from there. And if all this leads to just friendship, then I’ll accept that.”
She found his terms more than fair. “All right.”
A devastatingly charming grin transformed his features. “You brave enough to put your promise where your mouth is?”
She swallowed hard, knowing she was playing with fire…but she found Austin’s brand of v
irile heat impossible to resist. The dare in his eyes spurred the recklessness she tried to keep buried.
Dampening her bottom lip with her tongue, she reached out, curled her fingers into the material of his shirt and pulled him down for a kiss the same time she sat up and met him halfway. Her lips crushed his, parted with immediate warmth, skipping all preliminary foreplay and going straight to the heart of the matter. The kiss was a hot, lusty, tongue-tangling mission to drive him as wild as he made her.
But something changed during the course of her provocative goal—an internal realization that overrode the pleasure of his generous mouth surrendering to her whims. She’d missed him. Two days apart, and she longed to see that wicked glint in his eyes, ached to experience the special way he made her feel, and especially craved the effortless way he made her body, her soul, come alive.
It was a frightening, overwhelming sensation.
With a low growl that rumbled in his chest, he grasped her hips in his hands, pulling her up and out of the chair and between his thighs. His large palms smoothed over her bottom, anchoring her intimately close. Her belly encountered the stiff ridge of his erection, and her heart slammed against her ribs. She moaned into his mouth as a very urgent, naughty thought crossed her mind, of pressing him down on his desk, hiking up her skirt and finishing what he’d started with his erotic monologue a few minutes ago.
It was Austin who ended the embrace, slowly pulling back and letting his lips slide from her mouth, to her jaw. “Oh, yeah, Ms. Spencer,” he growled into the curve of her neck, where he nuzzled and pressed damp, open-mouth kisses on her skin. “That’s a fantastic start to making good on your promise.”
A delicious shiver rippled down her spine and she stepped back, until he had no choice but to let her go. Meeting his fiery emerald gaze, and witnessing his cocksure grin, her heart gave a tiny flip-flop of realization. It was useless to deny that what had transpired between them was anything less than powerful, and nothing even remotely close to resembling friendship.
And that meant trouble for her. Big trouble.
Chapter Eight
He’d played dirty. Austin had acknowledged that fact minutes after Teddy left his house Monday evening, but three days later, he still didn’t regret his unabashed behavior in prodding her to admit there was something between them. Her admission hadn’t been verbal, but that mind-blowing kiss she’d initiated spoke volumes.
At first, he’d been annoyed that she’d had the nerve to ask him for yet another favor, but during the course of their conversation he’d seen glimpses of contradicting emotions, of her wanting him as much as he wanted her, and a latent fear that kept her from completely opening herself to him. It had been that honest vulnerability that had softened him. Though he’d accepted her invitation for Christmas Eve, he’d been the one to establish the rules. No pretenses. So far, she’d adhered to his personal request, accepting and openly responding to the intimate kiss he’d greeted her with when he’d arrived at her condo to pick her up.
The woman was an inherently sensual creature, and despite her reservations, she certainly indulged wholeheartedly in kissing him, and took pleasure in the way he touched her. The low-cut, clingy red knit dress she’d worn in celebration of Christmas had tempted his hands to skim those ultra-feminine curves of hers—from the sleek line of her spine, over her bottom, and up and around to her hips, her waist, to just below the gentle slope of her breasts where his thumbs brushed along those full, soft mounds.
She’d moaned in acquiescence and arched toward him for a deeper, more provocative contact, but he’d resisted the invitation. Satisfying the hunger he’d tasted in her kiss would take more than the few minutes they had before leaving for her parents’. The woman was in need of personal attention, emotionally and physically, and he planned to give her as much as she could handle, and then some, until she came to the realization that what was between them was worth pursuing.
Satisfied with his plan, Austin glanced over at Teddy sitting in the passenger seat of the Mustang as they drove to her parents’ house in Pacific Heights. She was rummaging through her purse for something, and he switched on the overhead reading light for her. She smiled her thanks and withdrew a tube of lipstick.
“So, how are things with Louden?” he asked, curious if his presence at the company Christmas party had made any difference in her boss’s attitude.
Flipping down the lighted mirror in front of her, she uncapped the tube and covered her kiss-swollen lips with a slash of cinnamon color. “Just fine,” she said too brightly.
He frowned as he made a left-hand turn onto the street Teddy had indicated. “Is he leaving you alone?”