In Bed With the Boss

‘Yes.’ His tone was savage and when he turned to face her again his eyes blazed dark. ‘You made that mistake with me, last night.’

It was the first reference to the night of stormy passion and she felt her whole body heat at the memory. ‘I don’t consider last night to be a mistake.’

‘No?’ He looked at her then, his dark eyes hard and his mouth set as he forced her to confront the truth. ‘And yet you didn’t hear the words you wanted to hear, did you? You didn’t hear love or gentleness. You didn’t hear promises or talk of a future together. Last night was all about sex, Grace. Hot, primitive sex. Are you willing to admit that?’

Her heart was hammering against her chest. ‘Yes.’ What other answer could she give? She wasn’t going to admit it was about love, was she? Even she didn’t understand these feelings that had rushed up and engulfed her. How could she expect him to—this man who didn’t even think that such things as love existed? This man who was so damaged that he expected the worst from every woman he met.

He stepped closer to her and this time his arms gripped hers as if he wanted to be completely sure that she was paying attention. ‘I thought you were guilty, Grace. I thought you were guilty as hell, but I didn’t even care because all I was interested in was your body under mine and your unquestioning surrender.’

And that was what she’d given him, of course. Her unquestioning surrender. She’d given him everything he’d demanded from her.

She didn’t flinch under his gaze. ‘Are you trying to shock me?’

‘No.’ His fingers bit into the soft flesh of her arms. ‘I’m trying to remind you who I am so that there’s no mistake.’

‘There’s no mistake, Rafael.’ Grace said the words softly. ‘It’s true that I’ve made mistakes but last night wasn’t one of them.’

‘You’re deluding yourself.’

‘No.’ And she wasn’t. Even if he sent her home within the hour, she’d have no regrets about what they’d shared. How could she, when the night they’d spent together was the closest to perfect that her life had ever become? And suddenly the heat pulsing between them and the wicked pull of temptation drew her onto her toes and she dragged her lips over the roughness of his jaw.

‘No.’ He tried to step back from her but she slid her arms round his neck and pressed her body against the hardness of his.

‘I want you, Rafael.’ She whispered the words against the warmth of his neck, feeling the strength and power of his shoulders under her seeking hands. ‘If last night was a mistake, then it was a mistake that I intend to repeat.’

With a soft curse he curled his fingers round both her wrists, clearly intending to remove her arms from his neck, but then he seemed to think better of it, his hands sliding down her body and settling in the centre of her back. ‘A better man than I would probably stop you, but I’m not that man.’ He hauled her roughly against him and there was a fire in his eyes hot enough to burn both of them. Suddenly she found that she could hardly breathe.

‘I’m glad you’re not that man.’

His mouth hovered tantalisingly close to hers. ‘I’m not a good person.’

‘You’re the only person I want.’ And she wanted him now. She wanted him so badly that she was afraid her entire body might melt under the intense heat of her sexual longing. ‘Can’t you feel it?’

He hesitated for a moment longer and then, with a low growl, he brought his mouth down on hers.

Intoxicating excitement immediately engulfed her and she clutched at his shoulders, knowing that without the support of his firm hands holding her she would certainly fall.

He drove her backwards with his powerful frame, until she felt the edge of his desk pressing against the backs of her thighs.

In a decisive movement he lifted her, pushing her thighs apart and then sliding his hands over the curve of her bottom with a groan of masculine appreciation. His mouth devoured hers and he yanked her against him so that her soft feminine core was pressed against the hard ridge of his manhood.

Shockingly aroused and unaware of anything except the touch of his hands and the erotic slide of his tongue in her mouth, she reached for his shirt, ripping at the buttons in her attempt to get closer to him. His shirt fell open and her fingers encountered silky male chest hair and hard male muscle.

And then his hand was between her thighs, and his clever, seeking fingers dispensed with the totally inadequate barrier of her panties and slid into the hot, moist warmth that awaited him.

Grace felt her body explode in an instantaneous reaction that was as shocking as it was powerful and she cried out his name as her body pulsed around the determined stroke of his fingers. But somehow that glorious release didn’t give her the satisfaction that her body craved and she moaned in desperation, her trembling hands reaching urgently for the zip of his trousers.

Without lifting his mouth from hers, he covered her hand with his, speeding the task, and she gave a soft whimper as she felt the velvety brush of his arousal against her inner thigh.

He pushed up her thighs, positioned her to his satisfaction and then thrust hard into her sweet, welcoming warmth.

Excitement rocketed to unbearable proportions and he drove into her again and again with almost explosive force. She strained against him, completely swept away by his primal possession, his ferocious sexual hunger, and then her body erupted in a climax so intense that for a moment she lost all sense of time.

As the world splintered around her, she heard him mutter something harsh against her neck, felt his hands anchoring her hips, and then he powered into her for a final time, his fingers digging hard into the curve of her bottom as he reached his own completion and his body emptied itself into hers.

CHAPTER NINE