At the Stroke of Midnight (Naughty Princess Club 1)

I throw my hands up in the air in frustration, realizing I should probably just keep my mouth shut.

“Lesson number one: You have to be able to read your customers and know what they want so you can give it to them. Pretend I’m a customer. Look at me. Look at my face. What do I want?” he asks.

Seriously? How am I supposed to know what he wants when all this time I thought he might want me, and I was wrong?

“I just learned how to dress myself, and you expect me to read your mind now? I have no clue what you want. I thought I did, but I was wrong. I sent you that stupid text, and that was wrong. I tried to be all sexy and flirty at the gym, and I lost a bottle cap in my boobs. And then I saw the type of woman you’ve been with before and newsflash, I am nothing like her. And now you’re quiet and broody and mad and not being winky, and it’s confusing. You’re sitting there all casual and unwinky and it’s making me nervous, and I don’t like it!” I ramble.

PJ lets out a sigh and closes his eyes for a few seconds before opening them back up to stare at me again.

“You’re doing exactly what you accused others of doing to you. You’re looking at me, but you’re not seeing me,” he finally says. “You think I’m sitting here all casual, like I don’t have a care in the world? Look closer. I’m sitting because I’m trying really fucking hard to hide the hard-on I’ve had since you sent that damn picture of your lingerie, which got increasingly worse and more painful the minute you walked in here in that dress. I haven’t been able to stop picturing you in one of those items under that dress. And yes, Melissa was the type of woman I’ve been with before. In the past. Someone who looked good on the outside, but didn’t have any substance on the inside, which is why she’s in the past. I couldn’t even get up from that weight bench, and it was a struggle to string together complete sentences when she walked up because my dick was still hard from watching you rub that fucking cap over your lips, and I couldn’t stop wishing I was that fucking cap when you dropped it between your tits. You didn’t even notice how many men in that gym were staring at you, and it took everything in me not to kick all of their asses.”

My mouth drops open in shock at every word that comes out of his mouth, and butterflies start flapping around in my stomach when he keeps going, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees with his hands still clasped together between them, his eyes never leaving mine.

“I’m sorry my texts have been terse and unwinky, whatever the fuck that means. I was worried I might have come on too strong, and then when I got that picture from you, I was worried I’d scare you away completely if I replied with what I really wanted to.”

My tongue darts out nervously to wet my dry lips, and I hear him growl low in his throat as he stares at my mouth.

“What did you want to reply?” I whisper, taking a step toward him.

His eyes move back to mine, and the way he’s looking at me makes my stomach flutter like I just went down the hill of roller coaster. There’s no mistaking it this time—there’s definitely want and need written all over his face, and the next words out of his mouth confirm that.

“That I have never wanted to fuck someone more than I do you, from the moment I first saw you pass out in your front yard, to when I first spoke to you at the Halloween party wearing that ridiculous princess costume. I’m not just casually folding my hands in my lap. I’m cutting off the goddamn circulation in my fingers because I’m trying really hard not to rip that dress off of your body.”

I don’t even realize I’ve continued moving toward him while he speaks until I’m standing right in front of him where I can, in fact, see how tense the muscles in his thighs are and the whiteness of his knuckles. He sits back in his chair, keeping his hands clenched together in his lap, hiding the erection he mentioned that I suddenly want to see more than I want to take my next breath.

“You’re a very confusing man,” I whisper, trying not to shiver when he finally releases his death grip and reaches out to rest his palms on the outside of my upper thighs, right below the hem of my dress.