“You’re going to have to help me out with what that means,” he said when he thought he could speak. “Cohosts might have a totally different connotation in Australia than it does here.”
“I’m doing okay,” she murmured. “With you. Here. Naked. It’s good. You don’t have to be so…careful with me. This should be about you, too, not just me.”
Understanding filtered through the sexual haze that had saturated his brain. “You mean, you’re okay with it if I do some things that you didn’t verbalize. That I have permission to be creative.”
She nodded and something bright filled his chest. He’d done what he’d set out to do—get her comfortable with him. How fantastic. And brave. There’d been no guarantee that they’d ever get to this point, no matter what he did, and even less of a guarantee that she’d tell him so.
All at once, his throat closed as he internalized the magnitude of the gift Tilda had just handed him. Instead of telling her, it seemed appropriate to show her. It worked out well that he wanted to dive back into her, anyway, and talking wasn’t high on his list of bedroom activities.
Warren took a moment to shed his briefs and Tilda watched him, her eyes bright, rewarding that decision with a sound low in her throat.
“I don’t know why you ever get dressed,” she muttered. “It’s almost sinful to cover all that up.”
The grin spreading across his face might have been a little sloppy. “I take it I meet with your approval.”
“And then some. I used to think I liked you in suits. Now I’m wondering what I was thinking.”
“You were thinking we had a professional relationship?” That was a dumb thing to bring up. The last thing either of them needed were reminders that they still had to work together tomorrow. But on the flip side, they did work together, so maybe it was okay to be real about the situation. “That doesn’t have anything to do with what’s happened here at home. We can keep them separate, right?”
“No. Absolutely not.”
His heart ground to a painful halt for a half second until she continued.
“I like it when you use your boardroom voice. It’s sexy.”
He had to laugh at that. “You mean my boss voice?”
She wasn’t the first woman to express a similar sentiment. But she was definitely the first one who had needed to be in full control.
Once again, he was flying blind. The only thing he could do was pay attention to her cues. Easier said than done. But he was doing okay so far tonight. Much better than he’d expected when he’d suggested the idea of her coming to his room in her robe.
He wouldn’t apologize for the bone-deep desire to erase prim and proper from Tilda’s vocabulary.
“Maybe talking isn’t the right approach to take here,” he murmured. Distance was the only way he could guarantee no one would get hurt, and all the conversation wasn’t helping.
He rolled closer and resettled her into his arms. She came willingly and all her gorgeous skin snugged next to his. The heat dialed up a notch, not that it had cooled all that much in the first place.
Naked Tilda eclipsed all his fantasies and he still couldn’t quite believe she was here, in his arms. The sexy lingerie had been nothing more than a precursor to the main event, and he was not sad that she’d asked him to remove it. Catching her mouth in his, he dropped them both into a kiss that quickly grew intense.
His first inclination was to touch more of her, but even though she’d said she was okay with creativity, he’d prefer some guidelines.
He lifted his mouth and murmured, “Did I mention how thoroughly hot it was when you told me the things you wanted me to do to you?”
She shook her head. “It was a turn-on for me, too. Surprisingly.”
“You’ve never—” He bit that back. Of course she’d never had a man clue in that she’d needed that or they wouldn’t be here right now. She’d needed him to pull it out of her, just like she’d needed him to come up with the idea of playing out her fantasies.
What else did she need that he hadn’t discovered yet? His curiosity exploded.
“We’re not finished letting you explore that,” he advised her and shut up in favor of kissing her.
Her sweet mouth opened under his and he groaned. So trusting. It was beautiful how responsive she was after almost no time. Tentatively, he set himself into exploration mode, swirling his tongue forward, but she met him halfway, thrusting into his mouth with no fear. She arched against him and he had to check his urge to roll her under him in order to increase the contact.