The tight sound of my breathing seems to fill the room. Tiny, carnal sparks nip my skin and eat away at the inside of my belly. With each shock, my heart seems to stop, then start up again.

Am I imagining the wildness on Owen’s face? The wanting, the famished look of a beast waiting at the door?

“You were very rude to me earlier,” he says, his voice a prowling purr. “Your comments and behavior distracted me from the work I tried to get done at the office.”

This is the last greeting I expected. He’s chiding me, and his words chafe.

I tug the bed sheet over my breasts. The tips of them are pebbled from desire, pressing against the silk of my chemise, and all he had to do to make me this way is show up at my door. I hate that. And right now, I hate him for owning me in this way, for making me wait for him and react like a desperate little thing for him.

My anger gets the better of me, and with a small shrug I say, “It’s not my fault you couldn’t concentrate on your work.”

He raises one eyebrow, but I don’t think he’s amused at my sass.

God, I’m walking a thin line here. I can’t afford to be sent away. I don’t want to be. So I try once again to lighten him up.

I let the sheet slip down, along with my guard. His intense gaze devours the sight of my nipples beading against the silk, but he only steps into the room and softly shuts the door behind him. A gush of cream coats my pussy, and my clit beats mercilessly.

Then he stares at the clothing and towel I dropped so thoughtlessly on the floor earlier. He tenses up, then sets his sights on me again.

“Do you usually leave this kind of mess behind?” he asks in a guttural whisper.

“Not all of us are as tidy as you seem to be.”

I brace myself for his retort, but something comes over his expression, something hot and primal that I can’t read.

I struggle to breathe as he slowly takes off his tie, folds it, then saunters to a vanity table to neatly lay the silk down.

“If I didn’t know better,” he says, “I’d say you’re the dirtiest, most careless girl I’ve ever hired. Is that what you are? A dirty little girl?”

What he’s saying sounds so naughty, and my clit knots up.

“Yes,” I say, surprising myself. “I guess I am.”

A mixture of that familiar fright and excitement bolts through me as he turns away from me, hiding his reaction as he takes off his jacket. He painstakingly drapes it over the back of a chair.

I swallow, not knowing what he has planned for me. Only knowing that my temperature is rising, my pussy pumping in anticipation.

I can’t stand the silence anymore, and I offer an olive branch, a version of How was your day at the office, dear? Maybe that will put everything back on track with him.

“What did your work involve?” I ask.

“That’s none of your business.”

Once again, anger whips through me, and frustration overcomes me just as it did earlier on the tour.

“Then fuck you,” I say.

The words echo through the room. He turns his burning gaze to me, and it sears, it consumes, it has me clutching the sheet again.

He’s pissed. But then something tells me that he’s also a little turned on.

Or maybe a lot turned on.

Before I can decide which it is, the tense moment between us breaks open and he surges toward me. I only have time to take in a stunned breath before he’s across the bed, pulling me to him, crushing his mouth to mine.

I claw at his shirt, but I’m also kissing him back, breathless and dizzy, a chemical explosion simmering between us. I feel it inside of me, too, bubbling and smoking as he ravishes me with his mouth, his fingers tightly threaded through my hair.

Our kiss is wet, wild, unstoppable, and as I grapple with his shirt, I feel the hard muscles underneath—streamlined, smooth, all man. All mine for this moment…

As I make a small sound of need against his mouth, he growls, lightly pulling me back by the hair so I’m looking up into his dark eyes. I see how far gone he is, how he’s lost his grip on his steely control, and my clit responds with a twisting pain that has me hot and drenched for him.

“We’re going to see just how dirty you are,” he grits.

My clit pounds along with my raging heartbeat.

“Pull up your nightie,” he whispers, his breath hot against my face.

I can feel how my juices have already bathed my thighs, and as I reach down to inch up my chemise, wicked fear takes me over. This is the first time a man has seen all of me, and I never would’ve thought one would see me like this. I followed Owen’s pre-meeting instructions by using some of my cash advance from Highest Bidder to get myself waxed, and I’m neat and prim down there for him.

That is, except for my excited creaming. Except for the clear proof of how much I’ve been looking forward to him coming home.

As I expose my pussy to him, his gaze goes completely unfocused. I don’t know what comes next—all I know is that I’m melting for him, stimulated by how much bigger and more powerful he is than I am, a giant with rock-hard muscles, a domineering animal who has me gasping for my next breath.

He takes his time reaching down between my legs, and when he smooths his finger over the landing strip of my pubic hair, I wince with sharp yearning.

“You followed my directions,” he says. “That’s a good start to the night.”

He slides his finger between my folds, and I arch in a burst of ecstasy, biting down on my lip so hard that it stings.

“Sopping wet,” he whispers. Then he presses his mouth to my ear. “Dirty and sloppy for me. Fuck, Red, that’s an even better start.”

Red.

I think that’s what he’s going to call me tonight as he breaks me down with every stroke. Red for my hair. Red for my burning hunger. Red for the hot blood that’s beating for him.

I can hear just how turned on I am as he smears my cream around my pussy, making my hips impulsively respond in gyrating need. He circles his thumb around my clit, then presses it, making me rock against him. A ruthless laugh chops out of him just before he removes his hand and tugs me down to the mattress with him, his back to the bed as I straddle his belly. I feel his hard muscles beneath my pussy, and I clench so hard inside that a surge of electricity nearly tears me apart. I shut my eyes and cry out softly.

When I open my eyes to look down at him, he’s got the brutal hint of a smile on his face, but his eyes are still foggy with lust.

He knows that I’m on my way to exploding for him, and I’ve never done that for anyone before.

“Unbutton my shirt,” he says.

Like a starving creature that’s just asking to be ravaged by a predator, I do what he says, fumbling with his buttons then spreading his shirt apart to reveal his ridged abs, his firm pecs—the stone-cold body of a cruel god. I can’t wait to hear him say dirty things again, can’t wait for him to take me in every way, even as my belly clenches in fear about whether I am truly ready for this experience.

The conflicting emotions battle for supremacy within my mind.

Fear and desire, making a heady cocktail that’s got me drunk and halfway delirious.

“Slide up me with your pussy,” he says roughly. “Get your wet cunt all over me.”

Rocked by his command, I tentatively slip up him, spreading my cream over his belly. My clit sings with the friction, and as he takes me by the hips and guides me to slide up and down his skin harder, faster, the more delight builds in me.

I slip, I slide, and the heat rises, picks up speed, pumps and burns and screams until it suddenly blasts through me.

I haul in a seemingly endless, shattering breath. As I break apart little by little, it feels as if I’m shimmering inside, destroyed in a small way, hot and cold and satiated all over.

I just came, and he likes it. The feral glow in his eyes tells me so.

“That’s your first one,” he says, his grip on my hips tightening as he urges me to rub against his skin some more. “Get me real dirty, Red. Come like that again, because I like to watch your face as you do it.”

As I rub against him, painting his flesh with the juices of my pussy, he reaches between my legs and works my clit with his thumb. More pressure builds on top of the first orgasm as I undulate over him. My mind starts to go blank as I pick up the speed again, rubbing, reveling in the pressure of his thumb on my clit, ferocious strokes that only grow faster and faster—

I approach another edge, and he pulls me forward until I find myself straddling his face. Stunned and heated, I collapse, bracing my hands on the low, padded headboard. His fingers dig into my hips, and he bares his teeth right before he brings my sex to his mouth.

At the feel of him against my most private spot, another flare of desire cracks through me, and my sight goes completely black. Pale slashes rip through my brain, then flash down through the rest of my body as he works me with his mouth, his tongue, laving me, kissing me with growling pleasure. He sucks on my clit, teases my opening with his tongue, brings me to another peak that just keeps rising and rising…

I scratch at the headboard, I mewl, I pant. I can’t take this anymore, this soul-splitting ecstasy, this fire that’s shooting through me and killing me until, finally, I pulse into the air, bursting into a million different pieces that scatter everywhere, lighting up the darkness and then fading.

But I’m still burning for him, and the next thing I know, my eyes are open, I’m aflame. I’m his dirty girl, sliding back down him and grappling with the fly of his trousers, not knowing what the hell to do next but knowing I want this. Want him.

When my vision clears, I see his expression—consumed with a need that matches mine.

A moment of reality stops me from unzipping him, and our gazes lock, my heart beating all over my body, overtaking me. I want to do this, but I’m not sure what to do.

He must see the absolute inexperience on me, and he unzips his trousers for me. When he takes out his long, thick, hard length, I suck in a quavering breath.

“Just put your mouth on me,” he says tightly. “That’s all you have to do, Red.”

He sounds possessive of me, and I like that. I want to please him, so I do what he tells me to and kiss the tip of him. He’s damp with beads of cum, and there’s a slightly salty taste to him.

“Use your tongue to get me off,” he says. “Now.”

I swirl my tongue over his head, and he groans so forcefully that I feel it in my veins. A tremor wracks me as I wait for more instructions.

“Lick me up and down,” he growls. “Fuck, you already know what you’re doing anyway…”

A flame of confidence lights me up, and I eagerly comply. I bathe him up and down, exploring his hard shaft. The braver I get, the more chances I take, whirling my tongue around him and even slipping him into my mouth.

Mmm. I’m in heaven. And I think he is, too, judging by the rough sounds he’s making and how his fingers are gripping my hair to keep me going.

“Goddammit,” he grits. “Goddammit…”

His fingers tighten in my hair just before he jerks, blasting into my mouth. I take him in as best as I can, drinking him up, still holding his shaft until he spends himself.

I look up at him. He seems savagely sated, as if all the tension has left him. But as he watches me wipe his cum from my lips, there’s something else in that dark gaze that I don’t think I’ll ever understand. Is it longing for something else?

It can’t be. This is Owen Gregory, the coldest man I’ve ever met, and any minute he’s going to go back to being that way.

He laughs quietly, then tucks one arm behind his head. With the other hand, he crooks his finger at me. My heart bends in my chest as I crawl to him, then lay down beside him. He watches me with that intense, mysterious gaze that rips me up inside.

“That was a very good start,” he says. “But things haven’t gotten nearly as dirty as they’re going to get tonight.”

I smile, because I’m already addicted to this new erotic experience.

I’m already addicted to him.