Love by Association

Her attachment to that night—their first official date, wanting to finish it—touched him. They’d reheated the chocolate in the microwave on the counter behind the bar.

And the things those fingers had done to his body with that chocolate—once it had cooled just enough for her to dip them...

Glancing from her hand to her mouth, remembering how her tongue had followed along behind her finger, licking and sucking the chocolate trail, he knew two things at once.

He was ready to make love to her again.

And she was awake. Watching him.

When their gazes met, her hand slid from his thigh to the hardness she had to have felt against her leg. Not the least bit embarrassed, Colin waited to see what she would do next.

Normally in charge of any physical relations he’d participated in, he wasn’t sure how long he’d be able to lie there, unmoving, but driven by curiosity and some unknown need to let her do whatever she wanted to do, he kept his hands still.

She stroked him. Slowly, softly, at first—and then with more vigor. He didn’t want this to be over so quickly. He wanted more of her. To share it with her. Reaching out a hand to stop her, he groaned instead.

He was too late.

* * *

IT WAS ALMOST eight the next time Chantel awoke. Colin had not only brought her to incredible climax with his hands, but he’d been ready to slip inside her by the time she’d finished and brought her to a second orgasm almost immediately.

She’d never known anyone like him. Reacted to anyone the way she reacted to him. She was in trouble. And after the night they’d just spent, the talking and making love, she couldn’t keep lying to herself.

Crazy as it sounded, she was falling for Colin Fairbanks. Maybe even like Max fell for his Meri. In a way that was stronger than self.

Leave it up to her to do so in a way that would never bring her happiness. Colin would throw her out of his life as fast and as far as he could if he ever found out about her subterfuge. And if he didn’t...she sure as hell couldn’t pretend to be Johnson for the rest of her life. More than a night or two at the Landau would bankrupt her.

Even if, by some chance, he still wanted her around after he knew she’d broken his trust, they weren’t going to work. He was an alpha male, a protector who, according to him, failed his little sister. And she was a cop.

And if that wasn’t enough against her—if Chantel hadn’t been so depressed she’d have chuckled to herself—she and Colin were nowhere near in the same league. She actually preferred her plain little apartment to the luxury of this room. Would much rather be in sweats and no makeup with her hair in a ponytail, in front of the TV with her feet on the coffee table, than walking on marble floors and sipping wine.

There was no future for them.

Knowing that didn’t ease the ache in her heart that morning.

He stirred. They were both going to have to go. He had whatever it was rich rainmakers did on Sundays to tend to. And she was on shift at noon.

Still, she didn’t lift her head from his chest. Or move her hands from where she’d fallen asleep holding him. His fingers threaded through her hair. Light little caresses, befitting of Chantel Johnson.

“I don’t want to let you go.” Her heart cried out to him. In Johnson’s cultured voice.

“There’s no need to rush on my account,” he rumbled against her ear. “I have brunch at eleven with a couple of investors brokering a deal, but it’s local so I’ve got some time.”

“I just...” She broke off, not knowing what to do. She rested her chin on her hands on top of his chest. “Promise me something...” She tried for low and sultry and sexy, when what she wanted to do was blurt out her fears and demand that he not hurt her any more than he had to. To tell him that he could trust her. Always. Except that she wasn’t who she said she was.

She couldn’t tell him. He was friends with Morrison and did not believe the man would ever hurt his wife. And she couldn’t tell him what she knew about the man’s past. Or his wife’s medical records.

And he was a protector. He’d never be okay with his woman taking on the most powerful men on the Santa Raquel California coast. Most particularly after he’d seen what those men had done to his baby sister.

He’d never understand...

“What do you want me to promise you?” His gaze was half-lidded, and she had a feeling that while she was lying there angsting her heart out, he’d been dozing on and off.

“That if there ever comes a time when you’re unsure about me, you give me the benefit of the doubt.” She chose the words carefully. She knew it was dangerous to say them, to even hint at the possibility that there might come a time when he couldn’t trust her, but she couldn’t hold them back.