An hour after leaving the hotel, our town car pulled into Valentina’s driveway. The wind at the top of the hill whipped her hair around her face on her way up to her front door. Thank Christ my hands were full, because I didn’t think I could have stopped the urge to drive my hands through her hair and taste that mouth I’d been obsessing over the past few hours.

I held the door open and she immediately dropped down to greet the dogs. The back of her dress dipped lower, giving me a phenomenal view of the skin right above her ass. Fuck, did she even have anything on under that thing?

All I knew was I wanted to run my tongue over the dimples at the base of her spine and feel her tremble under my touch. Jesus, my greatest temptation had taken on the form of a dress.

Standing up, she closed the front door before reaching out for the bags. “I’ll set it up in the living room. I just have to shoot off that email first.” She shifted her weight from foot to foot.

She’d done a bang-up job of battling those heels all night, but her feet had to be killing her. She was more a gym-shoes-badass than stiletto-vixen, although she’d worked it like a pro.

“I got this,” I told her. “Go take off the stilts and do your thing.”

“Thank you,” she groaned, already reaching for one of the shoe straps. “Be right back.”

As she shuffled down her hallway, I brought the bags into the kitchen. Jesus, her home was insane. Black granite countertops ran two walls, the far side L-shaped with a bar counter that overlooked the living room. A huge-ass island sat in the middle of the kitchen with a rack hanging above it. The pots and pans were pristine like she never used them, yet still looked warm and lived in. Everything had its place and was immaculate.

I would’ve loved to see her lose that control she held onto like armor. I wanted to hear how her voice changed when she came. I wanted her fingernails in my goddamn back as I buried myself inside her heat—those toned legs locked around my waist, taking me deeper . . .

For fuck’s sake, it was like I hadn’t been laid in the last two months.

“You don’t want to eat in the living room?” she asked, her bare feet padding on the kitchen floor behind me.

“Let’s eat here and hit up TV after if you’re not too tired. That cool?” I had questions I needed answers to before I pressed this thing between us further.

Fact was, something about me unsettled her. I would damn well find out what the hell it was and squash that shit by the time I left this house.

She’d been comfortable with me all night. No problem with my presence or my touch at all, but that could have been the nerves. I had a different kind of touching in mind now, and I wasn’t sure if she’d be on board.

We sat down at the counter and I scooted my stool closer. Her gaze jumped to mine before dropping to my lips for a second. She did that a lot, and my blood pressure went strato-fucking-spheric every time. I knew desire when I saw it, but for the life of me, I couldn’t figure out why she wouldn’t give in to it.

I don’t know when I’d crossed over from keeping my shit contained with this woman to saying “fuck it” and giving it free rein. What I did know was she’d become something close to an addiction over the past month. She was a paradox I couldn’t figure out. I liked a challenge as much as the next asshole, but she was complex. I saw it in the insecurity behind her eyes every time she glanced away from me. A striking contradiction to her sharp tongue, iron will, and the confident businesswoman I’d witnessed in action tonight.

She’d hold eye contact with me until I said or did something to make her uncomfortable. I needed to know if it was a good or a bad uncomfortable.

Why? I wanted her. Straight-up.

Loading up one of the plates she’d taken down from a cupboard, I slid it in front of her.

“Thank you.” She glanced back at my mouth again before shifting her focus to the food.

I dropped a hand to her knee and squeezed. “You keep looking at me like that, and I’m gonna redefine your definition of dinner.”

She snapped her eyes to mine, her lips slightly parted. “Looking at you like what?”

I leaned in closer, her sweet cherry blossom and peach scent enveloping me. “Like you want me to kiss you, but you’re afraid of it.” I traced a circle around her knee through the slit of the dress. “For the record, that will happen, so you should get straight with it.”

“Oh!” She dropped her head into her hands. “Sorry. No. I didn’t mean to.” She glanced up at me, and for a split-second, something dark flashed behind her eyes. She gave a half-hearted laugh and turned away from me to refill her already full water glass, then situated her plate and silverware in front of her until they were perfectly symmetrical.

What in the good fuck . . . She was so fuckin’ anxious. My gut said not to push yet. But she’d been married almost ten years. Not like I was dealing with a virgin. How could she go four years without dating, without—fuck, without being with someone? Without fucking?

No question she was attracted to me—there was a serious attraction on both sides. It was in her body language, the way I’d catch her watching at me at times. She was fighting the hell out of whatever it was she was feeling and that shit needed to end.

Her avoidance had much less to do with hunger and more to do with the physical need I saw surface for a second. The attempt to ignore it by rearranging her dish, glass, and silverware about three goddamn times confirmed it.

The soft moan she let out after trying her food grabbed my attention, and didn’t do dick for any remaining good intentions I might have had.

“Oh my God,” she groaned. “I forgot how good Jane Paul’s garlic mashed potatoes are.” She shook her head and took another bite.

The fork took way too long to leave her mouth. If she were any other woman, I’d have said she was teasing me on purpose and she’d already be on her fucking back on the floor. But Valentina wasn’t. The rare thing was, especially at her age, I got part innocent, part locked up sex-kitten from her and I needed to release the latter.

“I love cheat night.” She moaned to me.

“You don’t cheat often, do you?” I asked.

“I don’t,” she admitted with a frown. “I’m rethinking that right about now. You?”

I served her more asparagus and the potatoes that had her moaning in a way I planned on being responsible for the second she’d let me. “When I have my kids. They’re sugar fiends. Can I ask you a personal question?”

That succulent mouth worked a bite of chicken as she nodded.

“Sex. How many partners?”

The choking stopped me cold. I spun toward her and ran a hand over her bare back.

Great timing, asshat.

Caught somewhere between choking and snorting, she took a long drink of water before glaring at me through wet eyes. “You genuinely have no filter. And I think you might be the most inquisitive male I’ve ever met.” She covered her mouth with a napkin and cleared her throat. “I thought men didn’t like too many questions either way. How did we go from sugar fiends to . . . sex? And why is this important?”

“No time for filters and I’m not most men. Take another sip.” I nodded at the water again. “It’s important, because I want to know you better.”

“You know enough about me.”

“Not even close.” I tucked her hair behind her ear. “You stay locked up fuckin’ tight.”

Her eyes widened and she shifted on her stool. “There’s not much to know. I’m boring.”

I didn’t even fight the urge. I reached up slow, giving her time to stop me, when she didn’t, I ran my thumb over her bottom lip. “You’re anything but boring.”

Taking my hand in both of hers, she rested it on her lap and turned her upper body toward me. “Jaxx. The real me would bore you.” She took a deep breath before continuing, “But to answer your extremely personal question . . . My ex-husband, Rick. Just Rick. My sexual history begins and ends with him. I got a late start on the sex front. I met him when I was twenty-five.” Her shoulders rolled forward and she glanced down at our interlocked hands. “So . . . one.”

Shock settled in the pit of my stomach like freshly poured concrete. She could have said she turned into a motherfucking werewolf on a full moon—that might have been easier to digest. Twenty-five? She was twenty-fucking-five her first time? No goddamn way. But her slumped shoulders, downcast eyes and—Jesus, if I wasn’t wrong—shame that shut her down screamed she was serious, and explained a hell of a lot about her anxiety around me.

“Wasn’t any good for you, sugar?” I rested my hand on her shoulder and ran my thumb along the indention there. I wanted her familiar with my touch, because I wanted to fucking touch her when I wanted and how I wanted, selfish prick that I was. I wanted her used to me on every level. I’d never wanted inside a woman like I did her, and not just her body. I wanted to crack that nervous, tough exterior. Crack it—not kill it. I wanted to unleash her.

“It was what it was,” she spoke softly and turned back to her plate, cutting an asparagus stalk into even smaller pieces. “You know how my marriage ended, so you have your answer.”

The bite in her tone—oh, yeah. We had some issues there, but I wasn’t about to give her an out or let her shut down on me now. “Not really. It confirms he’s an asshole, but doesn’t say shit about you. You’ve slept with one man and the word man isn’t worthy of him. No man does to a woman what he did to you. He mans the fuck up and ends shit first. That’s the way I see it. So, is it sex you’ve been avoiding for four years, or something else?”

When she shifted to fully face me again, the slit in her dress caught on the wood of the stool and pulled the material so both legs were exposed to the top of her thighs. She frantically yanked on the right side to entirely cover that leg.

It took every ounce of restraint I had not to swipe an arm across that counter top, lift her up, and rip the fucker off.

“Honestly, I’m not sure. Are we done with Q and A for now?” she snapped.

“Not yet. Tell me why it’s been four fucking years since you’ve had a man, Valentina. I’m having trouble wrapping my head around you being single so long.”

With a huff, she jumped off the stool, landing between my legs. As soon as her feet hit the floor, she teetered and I steadied her with my hands around her biceps. And something behind her eyes shifted. Went dead—fucking void. Her face tightened right along with every other muscle in her body. Both her hands flew to my chest.

“Hey, easy.” I ran slow thumbs over both biceps. “We’re just talking.”

“You’re . . . Let me go.” She pushed against me harder.

I loosened my grip. “Sugar.” I intentionally kept my voice even, not at all liking her sudden unease. I dropped my hands to my lap to give her space, but she kept hers on my chest.

For the longest time she just stared at me. Unblinking, she searched my face until finally she let her hands fall on top of mine. “What do you want to know?”

“Why so long?” I asked, widening my legs intending to give her more room, but she stepped closer to me. Unconscious or conscious, I didn’t give a shit, as long as she felt comfortable again and answered my question.

I caught the slight rise and fall of her shoulders. “Since the divorce, I haven’t met anyone I’ve been interested in enough to get to know on an intimate level. Sex wasn’t what I thought it’d be. A lot of it has to do with me, and I’m not being self-deprecating. There are . . . reasons. Do I want to have sex again? Yes. When it’s right. I’m not running off to join a convent, or anything.”

Thank fuck!

“Is the interrogation over?” She pulled back, and with her hands still on top of mine.

I moved them to her hips. As slowly as I possibly could, I led her closer to me, so close her stomach was almost touching my lead pipe of a cock. “One more question.”

A wicked little smirk slashed across her mouth. “That’s it, though. One more, and since we’re cheating, I want dessert.”

I found myself stumped. One minute she looked ready to go MMA on my ass, and the next demanding dessert like a kid. I let go of her, but she stood there and tentatively ran both hands up my arms to my biceps in a ghost of a touch. Total contradiction. One that had me turned the fuck on.

Before I turned caveman and killed the moment, I nodded to dessert sitting on the island. “Go, babe.”

She flashed me a thousand-watt smile and scurried around the counter into the kitchen.

As she was opening a drawer for more silverware, I stood and walked around the counter behind her. When she spun around, forks in hand, I blocked her getaway by leaning against the island and guiding her between my legs. Holding cutlery in one hand and plates in the other, her eyes sought mine. With her hands full, she couldn’t stop me.

“Do you know you have perfect lips? You should be kissed. All the fucking time.”

Her shoulders dropped and she backed away, leaning her ass against the counter behind her. “Do you always say exactly what you’re thinking?”

“Just stating a fact, but for the most part, yeah.”

A gradual smile spread across her pouty mouth. She swiveled around to set the plates and forks down on the counter. Stepping over my leg, she moved in front of the sink and began washing her hands. “As disconcerting as it is, it’s one of your best qualities.”

“Mmm. I know some people who’d disagree with you.” I stayed where I was, waiting to see what she’d do. “So, I have more than one best quality is what you’re saying?”

Walking back, she stood beside me, the outside of our thighs touching. “A few.”

“Babe,” I said.

Her eyes squeezed tight at the endearment.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing, why?” She glanced back at me.

“What’s up with the nerves then? You’ve been fine with me all night.”

“You just—you overwhelm me sometimes,” she admitted, in a low voice.

“Is that a bad thing?” I rested my hand on her nape.

She turned her head to me. “It’s unsettling.” Her arms tightened across her chest. “It’s not good or bad. It just . . . is.”

“Last question.”

“Okay.” She unfolded her arms and turned around, setting her hands on top of the island and looked up at me. “Let’s get it over with.”

“Do you want me?”