Not completely.
She props her arms over her head, folding them against her hair, just rolling that ball of candy incessantly from side to side. Just like she wants to keep me focused on her lips.
Fuck me, it’s working.
And I wonder if I’m destined to get taken out of this world thanks to thinking with my dick.
Goddamn.
I’m at least ten years older than her.
At least ten years calmer, but hell.
I’m only an overworked, overstressed, morally tainted man.
Only human.
And her mouth is a tart little thing that looks like it’d sting so sweet to kiss.
“You won’t enjoy this,” I say, holding up the wine.
She smirks. “Oh, please. I’ve had better wines with diplomats twice your age. Don’t think I can’t handle my red. This stuff is weak as applesauce.”
That actually makes me grin. “I was talking about your candy. It’ll sour the taste.”
“Then it’s perfect.” She reaches out to take the glass and swirls it, inhaling with a practiced movement far too old for that pixie-cat face. “I like bitter things, Mr. Major.”
Do you? I wonder, a quirk in my lips.
But I keep that question to myself, settling in the chair and picking up my own glass of wine. “I told you why I was looking at you. Now why don’t you answer why you came looking for me?”
She smirks again.
It’s a one-sided thing. Every time she does it, she looks more fox than feline.
Whatever else Brin is, she’s an animal.
A sleek bombshell lioness, that’s for sure.
And there’s something purely carnivorous in the way she eyes me sidelong, her fingertip twirling around the edge of her glass, making it sing with a soft, almost ominous sound.
“Maybe I just wanted to know how you taste,” she teases, a husky edge in her voice. “Better than candy or bitter like chocolate?”
“Chocolate isn’t bitter,” I point out, though I’m drawn by that tone in her voice. Sad to say, I’m hard.
“The real stuff is. That syrupy-sweet artificial mess…no.” Her gaze drifts away from me, pensive, lidded, watching the skyline over her wine. “Real chocolate is bitter and dark and pure and delicious.”
“You’re not being subtle, you know, if it’s a metaphor for yourself.”
She laughs then, dry and self-mocking.
“Would I really be so obvious?” She throws me another sardonic look. “And would I really be so direct, telling you why I really want to talk to you?”
She seems so confident, so it’s something to realize why she’s holding back.
Brin doesn’t trust me.
She’s feeling me out.
For what?
The hair on the back of my neck fucking tingles.
Did Galentron send her? Is this actually a hit?
Does Durham already suspect I’m not as loyal as I seem? Is she here to put me down easy and make it look like a tragic accident?
Or does she suspect I’m not as loyal as I seem, and she’s desperately looking for an ally behind enemy lines?
I don’t say anything.
After a moment, she looks away, her expression going dead, an oddly canny twist to her flat-set mouth and snowy-silver eyes.
“Nice place,” she says, strangely casual. “Penthouse. A little small, maybe. I bet you could afford to buy this whole building on your salary. The company keeps you comfy, don’t they?”
“Like a prize pet,” I say, leaning back in my chair. “That’s all most kept things are.”
“Don’t I know it.” She tosses her wine back in a single gulp without ever disrupting that rolling flow of candy, then sets the glass on the table with a pointed tink of glass on glass. “How much did I just drink in a single gulp? Two hundred dollars? Three?”
“I’d say that glass was valued at about two grand,” I say casually—and she actually chokes.
I try not to laugh.
Rocking forward, she swats at her chest, and I realize she’s half-swallowed her candy. The soft, slightly panicked gurgling sound starts a second later. Damn thing must be lodged in her throat.
Bolting up, I round the table and start thumping her back.
I never even see her move.
One minute, I’m standing over her.
The next, she’s flowing around me like angry water, rising to her feet and spinning to hook my leg, catch my arm, then slamming me toward the balcony. The wind bites me in the face.
Oh, shit.
She bends me over it with her hand on the back of my neck, her leg jammed against mine to keep me off-balance, precarious. The railing presses hard enough into my chest to make my sternum hurt.
So she can throw me over to my death at any second.
“Disappointing. You made that too easy, Major,” she says, nearly purring in my ear. “I never choke on these things. Too small.”
“I suppose I did,” I whisper, still trying to figure out exactly what I’ve gotten myself into.
But I stay lax. Calm. Focused.
If she’s going to do it, she’s going to do it.
If she’s not, then I want to hear what she’s really after.