Scandalize Me

And then Hunter simply reached down, took the hem of her skirt in his remarkably agile, hard and calloused hands, and began to ease it up her legs.

“You can’t— What are you—”

She was stammering, and the worst part was, she didn’t care the way she had a few moments ago. Now it was the least of her worries.

“Worshipping you.” Hunter’s voice was a low growl that made her skin tingle, the hair at the back of her neck stand on end, and gooseflesh prickle into life in all the places she’d gone red. “All good surrenders begin with an act of worship, Zoe. Everyone knows that.”

And for a moment, she only stared down at him, stunned. Frozen. Doing absolutely nothing while this man pushed her skirt higher and higher, holding her gaze all the while.

For a sizzling moment, they only stared at each other.

Then Hunter slid one hand around the back of her right thigh, holding it still while the rest of her shuddered. He held her gaze for another endless moment—and then he bent, put his lips to her flesh, and sucked. Hard.

It hurt. It was like a spike of fire, punching into her, from that spot high on her thigh to the melting heat above, then outward to every lost and yearning part of her, making her entire body his, not hers. It was like nothing she’d ever felt before.

It was, she realized from some great distance where her brain worked despite the clamor and riot of all of this, a fucking hickey. He pulled back, his hands still in dangerous places on her thighs, his mouth in a smug crook, and that sting stamped into her skin.

He’d marked her.

And now he looked up at her again, unrepentant and determined, his hands moving up again, deliberate and slow. His next goal obvious.

So obvious, she thought she might drown in her own fire.

So deliciously, heatedly obvious, she knew that if she let this go on for a single second more, he would own her. She would be lost forever, and he would know that with a simple act like this one, he could have whatever he wanted from her.

That was what did it.

Zoe pushed away from the desk, too aware that he let her bat his hands away from her skirt, from those whisperlike touches to the tender skin above her knees that she told herself meant nothing, did nothing. She stepped away from him in an undignified hurry that almost made her trip over her own feet, moving behind the desk in what she hoped looked like temper.

Because she didn’t know what she’d do if he saw the depth of her panic. If he knew how close he’d come to destroying her, and worse, how close she’d been to letting him.

She wasn’t sure he hadn’t.

“You can stay on your knees, Mr. Grant,” she bit out, as if calling him that could erase what he’d done, or allow her to believe in her own strength again the way she wanted—needed—to do. “It suits you. Maybe you’ll learn a little humility down there.”

“It’s unlikely.”

He rose with that innate, athletic grace that reminded her what feats of strength he was capable of performing, if he chose. He was like some kind of warrior, easy and something like beautiful despite the solid, heavy width of his shoulders, the smooth power he wore so easily, the capacity for all of that brutality in every hard line.

When had she stopped finding him disgusting?

“If you touch me again,” she told him, holding his gaze so there was no mistake, no possible misinterpretation, and hoped her gaze was clearer than her head, “I will not only launch a campaign to ruin you even further, I’ll be tempted to report you to the proper authorities.”

He laughed, and it swept through her like a new kind of fire, swallowing everything in its path.

“Nothing like a complete overreaction to prove that you’re not quite as cold as you’d like me to think, Zoe.”

“You manhandled me. This is an underreaction.”

“Then you should have told me to stop.” His gaze hurt, it was so hot. “You didn’t.”

And for the first time in as long as she could remember, Zoe couldn’t find the proper retort to slap him back into place. She simply stood there, the city behind her and the life she’d built all around her like so much set dressing, staring at the man who was supposed to be a tool she used, not...this. Not a certain path to her own destruction.

She could see it. She felt the mark he’d left on her body, like a sweet hot burn.

Like shame.

“If you won’t tell me why you want me, I’ll have to assume this is a particularly creative campaign to get into my bed,” he said, folding his arms over his broad chest and looking entirely too male and arrogant and self-satisfied. Smug, she thought. “And I like sex, Zoe. A lot. So I’m happy to crawl around on the floor if that’s what it takes. What do I care? But if I do, you’re going to have to admit that you want me just as much. That this is all a complicated ploy to get naked with me.”