“So good.” His breath fluttered in her ear as he read her mind. “Open for me.”
To demonstrate, he widened her hips, nestling himself even closer to her.
Slowly, more slowly than she’d thought possible for a man on a mission, he drew her mouth to his and laid his lips against it. Savoring. He explored her as if they had all the time in the world, and as if she wasn’t about to scream, and just as she thought she’d come out of her skin if he didn’t move, he thrust his hips, driving deeper inside her.
She gasped and the rush overwhelmed her, pounding in her chest, at her center. Her vision darkened as he slid home again and again, and then his thumb found the true center of her pleasure, swirling against it with exactly the right pressure to set her off like a lit stick of dynamite.
The release rolled through her thickly, gathering power as she exploded over and over. She slumped against his chest as he cried out her name hoarsely, tensing through his own climax.
He held her gently, wrapped tight in his arms as if he never planned to let go. She sank down into the ocean of Gage. He surrounded her and she couldn’t kick her way to the surface. Didn’t want to. This was sheer bliss and it wasn’t just due to the sex.
It was Gage. Only him.
“That was amazing,” he murmured into her hair. “Now can we go to my hotel?”
“No.” She snuggled deeper into his embrace, her nose against his neck where it smelled the most like well-loved man. “Take me home. And stay.”
A mistake. He’d cracked open something inside her that should have been sealed shut.
Except she was so tired of pretending she didn’t feel anything. So tired of bottling up her emotions and trying to prove she had it all together when in fact, she didn’t.
Gage didn’t care. He was leaving soon anyway, so why keep up pretenses? It was kind of freeing, knowing how it would end. She didn’t have to worry about him breaking her heart because she wasn’t going to give it to him. He didn’t have to know she harbored all these feelings for him.
“That sounds like an idea I can get behind,” he growled. “Or on top of, in front of, against the wall, in the shower. All of the above.”
Too late to take it back now. And besides, she should have had the presence of mind to invite him deliberately. Because what better way to keep tabs on him than if they were together around the clock? That’s where her mind should have been at.
“Stay the weekend. I know you have to go back to Austin Sunday night but until then? We’ll order lots of takeout and never get dressed.”
“That’s a deal, Ms. Claremont.”
His slow, sexy smile felt like a reward and she planned to grab her spoils with both hands. She’d spend the weekend enjoying herself and, as a bonus, she’d make solid progress on investigating Gage’s involvement in the leak, just like she’d promised her partners. With the man in question in her bed, surely she could sneak a glance through his phone or keep an ear out in case he talked in his sleep. It was the best of both worlds and she didn’t even have to feel guilty about it because she was looking out for Fyra first and foremost.
The other stuff—the emotional knot—wasn’t a factor. She wouldn’t let it be. She had to buckle on her armor a bit tighter while around Gage, that was all.
Gage untangled their clothes, hair and bodies, helping her resituate everything and then climbed back into the driver’s seat. Fortunately, the park was still deserted or that would have been a helluva show.
She had one short weekend to get results on her quest for a name...before the other girls made a motion to relieve her of her position as head of the company she’d helped build from nothing.
* * *
Gage stopped by the hotel to pick up Arwen and his luggage, then checked out while Cass waited for him outside.
When he got back to the Hummer, he opened the back to stow his bags and waved for Arwen to hop in. That’s when he realized this was not going to go well. She sat on her haunches and stared at the sky, the ground, a bug flying by. It was her way of saying she wasn’t riding in the back like chattel.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” he growled. “There’s a human in the front seat. You’re a dog. Ride in the back. That’s what they make this part of the vehicle for.”
Nothing. He shook his head. They both knew she wasn’t just a dog and this was one of the worst times in recent memory for her to remind him of it. He treated her like she was human, and she lapped it up as her due in true lady-of-the-manor style. Just because Gage had a real human to spend time with for a change didn’t alter the fact that he’d spoiled her rotten due to his own lack of companionship over the years.