Wildfire (Fire 3)

“Where do you think you’re going?”

She could stalk naked from the room in dignified outrage—she couldn’t stand around having a civil conversation. She doubted she could do anything civil with this man.

You can do anything you have to, she reminded herself, and turned, her social smile in place. “Leaving you to get some well-deserved rest,” she said lightly.

“You’re not going anywhere.”

She stared at him like an idiot, and then her temper reasserted itself. “I’ll go anywhere I damned please,” she snapped.

“Tomorrow,” he said.

“It already is tomorrow.”

“Don’t be technical. After we get some sleep. And we won’t be sleeping for a while.”

She was still so fixated on his seeming rejection of her that she didn’t understand. “What are we going to be doing?”

He tilted his head, giving her a pitying, you must be kidding look, and realization flooded her. She didn’t know whether she was relieved or furious at the game he was playing. Probably both. “But Archer’s not here. We don’t have to convince him.”

“Archer wasn’t out on the balcony when you went down on me either,” he pointed out lazily.

It was a good thing the power was out, she thought, as heat flooded her cheeks. She wasn’t nearly as good at hiding her reactions from this man as she was from Archer and his henchmen.

“Get back in my bed, Sophie,” he said, his soft voice not belying the steel beneath it.

She was starting to feel cold while at the same time heat was building inside her. “Do I have any choice in the matter?”

“You always have a choice. But you want it and I want it, and it would be a waste of time to pretend otherwise. Life is short, and the good things are few and far between. You don’t get too many chances at them, and you’d be a fool to ignore it when it may not come again.”

Cryptic and to the point, she thought, discomfited. “That’s quite a seduction technique,” she said caustically. “You get a lot of girls with that line, do you?”

“I’m not seducing you. We’re well past that point. Get in my bed before I put you there.”

So much for free will, she thought. It didn’t matter that that was exactly where she wanted to be. She’d been Archer’s victim—she wouldn’t be his.

“Make me,” she said, defiant. The moment the words were out of her mouth she wanted to groan.

“Glad to oblige,” he said, stalking toward her.

She was just deciding whether to run when she found herself scooped into his arms and then tossed back on the bed, and he was on top of her, pinning her down. She didn’t struggle, didn’t argue. She simply looked into his face, his clear green eyes, waiting.

He didn’t move either. A sudden hush had come over the room, despite the storms raging outside. They simply looked at each other, and Sophie could feel her body soften beneath his, welcoming his touch, reveling in the feel of his smooth, sleek skin touching almost every part of hers, and she wanted to melt into him, and then a shiver ran across her body, followed by another.

“Jesus Christ!” she said. “You’re freezing.” Without thinking she pushed at him, and he landed on his back beside her in the bed as she started pulling the covers around him, up to his neck. “What did you do, pour ice cubes over your body?” His skin was cold to the touch, when she was used to heat pouring from him. She tried to tuck the covers around him, to warm him up, but he simply batted them away and pulled her body against his.

“The ocean’s a cold place tonight,” he said. “And you’ll warm me up faster than anything else.”

She was too caught up in worry to respond to that. “Why the hell were you walking around the house naked if you were so cold? I realize there’s no chance of a hot shower, but you should have at least . . .”

He reached behind her neck and pulled her down to his mouth, stopping her spate of words. His mouth was cool and delicious, tasting of the ocean, and she sank into his kiss, her body warming, heating his. She tried to rub his muscled arms to get the circulation going, but he caught her wrists in his hands and pulled them away. “That’s not the way to warm me up, sweetheart,” he growled against her mouth. He rolled her beneath him again, and she could feel the heat coming back to him. His cock was still iron hard, pressed against her stomach, and she frowned.

“How can you have an erection when you’re so cold?” she said, distracted. “I thought being cold disabled men.”

He laughed, and there was no darkness in it this time. “Sweetheart, if you’re around I could have a boner in Antarctica,” he said.

She looked at him in surprise. “Is that a compliment?”

“Take it as you want.”