Dinner took a totally unexpected turn—and I love where this is heading. When I greeted her at the office earlier, I thought this would be the longest two and a half weeks of my life. I couldn’t imagine being close to Ella every waking moment yet not succumbing to the urge to seduce her. At least not without losing my mind. Now, I’m pretty sure the second we cross the threshold of my pad and shut the door behind us, we’re going to be naked, entwined, and busy.

Hallelujah!

It sounds odd, but from the moment I saw her again, I’ve felt as if my to-do list would never be complete if I didn’t get the chance to do Ella Hope. Over the phone, I had the impression she was prim, maybe even a bit shy sexually. I could call the woman who felt up my hard cock with her wriggling toes under the table in a restaurant a lot of things, but I’m scratching shy off the list. God knows I can’t look at her flushing cheeks, gleaming eyes, and the outline of her hard nipples through that silky blouse for much longer without stripping her down and tasting her all over.

She’s gripping the armrest of her door, foot tapping the floorboard, as I make the last few turns and lurch into the complex I’ve been renting an apartment at until I get Sweet Darlin’ in order. Then I’ll focus on putting down roots and buying a house.

For now, I careen into the nearest parking spot and throw the car into park. “We’re here.”

But she’s already out the door. Ella seems almost as eager as I am. I love the fact that she coyly teased me through our abruptly shortened dinner. But now that the moment is here, she’s not toying with me at all.

She slams her car door. I reach in and grab the food, then lock up the car behind me. “I’ll get your suitcase later.”

After I’ve had an hour or two inside her, I might be able to leave her for a few minutes without the craving for her hitting me so hard I can’t function. Maybe.

“Much later.” Ella gives me an impatient glance, silently asking me to lead the way.

I envelop her hand in mine and all but drag her toward the building on the right, then up a flight of stairs. At my front door, I shove the key into the lock and turn it. “Get ready. This is going to be fast.”

“I hope so,” she mutters, relief all over her face when the door gives way and admits us into the silent, shadowy apartment.

With a hand on the small of her back, I guide her inside and shut the door behind me, locking it. I pocket the keys and take a handful of ground-eating steps to the kitchen. I shove the bags of food in the refrigerator, then turn back to her as the door swings shut. I’m already tearing off my tie, stripping out of my shirt.

Ella stands at the threshold of my kitchen, watching, breathless.

“Come here, little girl.”

She raises her chin. “I’m a grown woman.”

“And I can’t wait to feel every inch of you. I’m going to swallow you whole.” I toss my tie on the floor, then yank my shirt off my shoulders, not bothering with the cuffs. The buttons ping off. Fuck them. I’ll worry about that later.

“You can try.” She saunters forward, kicking off her shoes and reaching behind her to undo the button of her skirt at the small of her back.

I hear the hiss of her zipper falling. My skin tightens. My heart revs. My cock screams.

Finally, Ella is within reach, so I grab her around the waist and lift her onto my kitchen island. She weighs next to nothing. I settle her in the middle, pressing one hand to her abdomen to lay her back while using the other to shove the houndstooth that falls to her knees up around her hips.

When I catch sight of her panties, I freeze. Stare. Blink. Forget to breathe.

To call her underwear a scrap of fabric would be generous. It’s white and feminine. It taunts me with the fact it’s almost sheer…but not quite. The lace at the front is shaped like a butterfly and it barely covers her pussy. Two strips of fabric, dotted with tiny, winking pearls, wind around her hips.

I have to see the back of this confection designed to make a man drag his tongue and lose his mind.

Without warning, I yank her to her feet, tear the skirt from her body, and spin her around to bend her over the island.

Two wide strips of nearly transparent lace stretch from each hip down, lovingly cupping her sweet ass, then disappear into the musky shadow between her legs. From the highest point at each side of the undergarment, silky ribbons entwine like the strings on a corset, playing peekaboo with the cheeks of her ass.

I can’t think of a sexier sight than Ella Hope wearing nothing but a tease and a smile.

“Holy fuck.”

“I like lingerie.” Her shaky voice almost sounds defensive. “Buying it is my guilty pleasure.”

“I’m glad.” Does she realize just how thoroughly I’m going to fuck her until she can’t move, can’t think, and can’t imagine ever leaving my bed? “And you have more like this?”

“A suitcase full. Some racier.”

I grin. This might be the best surprise ever.

I smooth my hand down her spine, over the small of her back, and cup her ass possessively. When she gasps, I smile. Oh, she has no idea what I plan to do to her luscious body.

But I’m about to show her.

“Your hands are hot on my skin.” Her whisper is choppy and soft.

Yeah, she’s aroused.

I skim my palm around her hip to touch the wings of her protective butterfly. The closer I ease to her center, the damper her lace is.

“And your pussy is wet under my fingers,” I mutter in her ear.

Her back arches. Her breath catches. She gives me a jagged nod. “I’m on fire.”

I grip both of her hips and align my distended dick with her crease, pressing into her ass as much as her panties and my slacks allow. I deeply resent my zipper. I’d give anything to be stripped down and gloved up right now so I could simply slide inside her and feel just how tight, wet, and ready Ella is for me.

Instead, I grip her hair in my fist. “Tell me what you like.”

“E-Everything you’re doing.”

“I haven’t done anything yet.”

She lets out a breath and wriggles her hips, twisting against my cock, pressing forward, futilely seeking some relieving pressure from the edge of the island. “You’ve done more to excite me than I’ve ever imagined.”

Smiling, I bend to press kisses across her shoulder and up the crook of her neck before I nip at her lobe. “I’m going to do so much more.”

Without giving her time to speculate what, I slip my hand under her blouse and skim my way up her soft stomach. I need to reach her bra. I need to feel the garment so I can imagine it. And figure out how best to get it off.

My fingers trace the lace-coated underwire, then I flatten my palm to cradle the weight of her breast in my hand. Her flesh fills most of my wide palm. I’m stunned by not only that but the fact there’s no fabric covering her nipples. The silky draping of her blouse disguised everything well. “Oh, sweetheart.”

I’m a boob man. I don’t deny it. And when I whip my free hand up to her other breast and cradle them both in my palms, I realize she’s really damn gifted…and I’m so fucking lucky.

Ella tosses her head back to my shoulder. “Carson…”

She’s begging for something. Pleasure. Pain. Ecstasy. I pinch her nipples between my thumbs and forefingers. She hisses from clenched teeth and writhes back against me once more.

“If you value that blouse, I suggest you get it off now.”

“Y-Yes.”

I don’t know whether she means she wants the blouse intact or whether she wants me to rip it off. But I feel her fingers tugging at the garment. It goes slack around my arms still shoved underneath. Her fingers brush mine. Then suddenly the sides flutter away from her body, and I yank it free.

The two little straps of her white bra stretch over her shoulders. Three hooks hold everything in place along the back. But I want to see the front. I want to see the little candy points I’m about to have in my mouth unfettered by fabric. I want them bare.

I skim my lips over her ear. “Turn around, Ella. Show me your nipples.”

She nods slowly, her breathing picking up pace. “Then you’ll take your pants off and fuck me?”

“Sweetheart, I may only wait long enough to unzip.” I’ll worry about taking them off later.

With a sigh that sounds as if she’s relieved, she draws her shoulders up, wrapping her arms around herself, as she twists around in the limited space I’ve allowed her between the island and my body. When the edge of the counter is tucked into the small of her back, she glances her way from my pecs and up my neck, lingering on my mouth, before meeting my stare. She’s got each of her hands wrapped around her opposite elbows, arms covering her nipples. But the cleavage is insane.

“Ella…” I warn. “Show me.”

She licks her lips. “You want to see now?”

“Yes.”

“You want to touch me?”

“Yes,” I growl.

“You want to taste me?”

She’s taunting, and I love the way she draws everything out, makes me impatient with the heat and the need to have her. I’m sweating. I can’t remember ever wanting a woman the way I must have this one right fucking now.

I grab her wrists. “Move your arms to your sides or I’ll do it for you.”

Slowly, she releases her elbows. Her palms skim across her forearms, still pressed against her breasts. Just when I’m sure she’s going to show me everything, she covers her mounds with her palms. The idea of her being able to hide her spilling flesh behind her small hands is laughable and so fucking arousing I feel as if I’m about to lose my mind.

But she’s enjoying the tease. She wants to torment me, make me crazy for her. I want to let her. I’m so jacked up on desire right now it’s like a drug jetting through my bloodstream. I can almost see every flutter of her lashes, hear each one of her jerky inhalations, feel all the goose bumps on her skin.

“You sure you really want to see?”

I grunt. “I can count down from three or just take you now. Your choice.”

I’m calling her bluff. I’m limiting her options. I’m letting her know I’m at the end of my rope.

“Count,” she whispers with a tempting grin.

“Three…”

She presses a kiss to my jaw, then runs her tongue down my neck, to my shoulder, where she sinks her teeth in. Then she soothes that little spot with her tongue. I have no idea why that turns me the fuck on, but I have to drag in a deep breath and lock my fingers around her waist to keep myself from lifting her and impaling her in the next heartbeat.

“Go on.”

“Two…”

I’m already holding my breath, wondering what the hell she’s going to do to me next, but she doesn’t keep me guessing for long. Her lips trail up my neck, to my chin, then to the corner of my lips, where she presses light kisses all around my mouth…but never directly against it, where I need her most.

“Yes,” she breathes against my skin.

I swallow hard. “One…”

“Ready or not, here you come?” She taunts me as her hands leave her plump breasts, exposing blushing pink nipples above a naughty quarter bra I barely have time to appreciate before she braces her hands on the counter behind her and lifts herself up, spreading her legs and hooking her heels on the edge.

I gape for a long moment, drinking her in, watching her breasts rise and fall with every panting breath. Then I snap out of it.

“You better fucking believe it.” I reach in my wallet for my emergency condom I haven’t needed for months, then chuck the billfold and the wrapper on the counter behind me. Then with one hand, I lower my pants. With the other, I caress my way up her thigh, then hook my finger inside those minuscule, tease-me panties.

Jesus, she’s soaked.

I want that. I want her. I want to taste her, fuck her, own her. Right now, I don’t ever want space between us again. I just want her and me and an endless amount of time to explore every pale, satin curve she’s exposed to me.

A little moan escapes her when I graze her clit. It’s hard. She’s definitely ready.

I should be a gentleman, wait, and give her a few orgasms with my fingers and tongue. And I will. Oh, believe me, that’s on my agenda. But right now…

With one deft hand, I roll the condom over my cock. “I need to fuck you. Take your panties off.”

They’re delicate and complicated, and as juiced up as I am for her now, I know they’ll dissolve in my hands if I try to remove them.

“No time,” she insists with a frantic shake of her head as she reaches up and slips a fingertip under the front butterfly and pulls it aside, exposing most of her slick folds.

Her pussy is bare.

Ella just keeps getting better and sweeter. If I could have conjured up a woman who tripped every trigger in my body and made me ache for long nights of sweaty, amazing sex, I would have pictured this one. I’ve always been partial to brunettes. I love her big eyes, big tits, big sense of sexual adventure.

“Good thinking,” I praise as I part her folds with one hand and align the head of my cock to her opening with the other. “You sure you’re ready?”

She wriggles on my crest until it dips just inside her. “Why? Are you worried you’re not?”

I have to smile at her taunt. I’m more fucking aroused than I’ve ever been, and still she doesn’t stop tempting me. She’s not grasping the fact that she’s created a beast who will happily spend the next forty-eight hours inside her wringing one orgasm after another from her and still be greedy for more.

“Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

In one move, I grip her hips, lift her against me, and impale her on my cock. My tug and good old gravity work magic. Seconds later, I’m buried deep inside the sweetest clinging, fluttering, gripping pussy ever. She gasps as she steadies herself on my shoulders, hanging on for dear life. All that’s great. More than spectacular, actually. But when she raises her head to me, her big black lashes lifting so she can drink me in and her lips parting in an electric moment before our stares meet? Shit, the connection reaches into my chest and squeezes hard. It does the same to my balls. This isn’t a simple screw. This isn’t a normal fling. She’s doing way more than scratching my itch.

Fuck, I could fall for this woman.

I don’t know how or why I’m sure that’s true. We’re barely acquainted with one another. But that knowledge is simmering in my brainpan. I don’t doubt it any more than I doubt my ability to spell my name or recite my date of birth.

Ella Hope could be lethal to my heart. And that still doesn’t stop me from digging my fingers into her hips and arching up into her body and squeezing another inch into her tight clasp.

“Carson…”

The way she whimpers my name is the sexiest sound I’ve ever heard.

“Feel good, sweetheart?”

“Yes.” She wriggles against me, clenching, adjusting, gyrating with a frown like she’s dealing with a torment just shy of pain. “I need—”

“Friction?”

She wraps her arms around my neck, breathing hard against my lips. “You.”

Somehow, whatever is happening between us has gone from teasing to dead fucking serious with one thrust. Now that I’m inside her, I don’t know how I’m ever going to leave. That’s provided I’m ever going to want to.

I cup my hands under her ass and lift her up every one of my aching inches. The drag of my sensitive skin through her wet flesh has me gritting my teeth to hold myself together. Fuck me, this woman is going to undo me fast.

“You got me.” I brace my palms on her hips and yank her down every electrified inch of my dick again. “All of me.”

As I bottom out, her head falls back. Her mouth gapes open. A high-pitched wail falls out. My neighbors are probably getting one hell of a passionate soundtrack to their evening conversation, and I don’t give a shit.

Ella wraps her legs around my middle and digs her fingers, nails and all, into my shoulders. As I lift her up for another thrust, she tries to help, clenching her thighs and using the leverage of all her limbs to work up my throbbing shaft. It’s so good…but I need more of her now. Faster. Harder. Deeper. What I don’t need is her help.

At the apex of her rise, I slam her back down every inch of me. I don’t give her time to adjust or react before I do it again. Again. And again.

Fuck me, after a handful of strokes, the pleasure is beginning to overwhelm. The tight clasp of her is unraveling my control. I could go blind from this pleasure. I grit my teeth to stave off the growing, gnawing ache. Ella doesn’t make it easier when she presses those amazing breasts against my chest, brushes kisses over my jaw, then makes her way to my ear.

“God, that’s so good…” she moans in my ear. “You’re big inside me. I have to stretch to take you, and it’s the best kind of burn. The ache behind my clit is hot and growing. I don’t know how long I’ll last. Carson…”

Holy shit, she just keeps getting sexier. Her body gives me so many clues about her arousal, but her words…yeah. That’s the icing on top of the sweet confection of her body that’s already so smooth and melting on my tongue.

“Don’t hold back for me,” I insist. “I’ll fuck you through every orgasm, sweetheart, and start giving you another one in the next instant. But this tight little pussy is mine to pleasure, to use…” To own.

I raise her to the tip of my cock again, then shuttle her back down, reveling in her response that’s somewhere between a breathy gasp and a strangled whimper. And there she is, tightening around me even more, breathing harder, nails digging in farther.

Under that button-down blouse and her professional exterior beats the heart of a temptress. This really isn’t a great time in my life to start thinking with my dick, but that’s not going to stop me. I’ve been around the block enough to have memorized all the usual speed bumps—drama queens, narcissists, gold diggers, clinging vines, Madonnas, whores, girls with daddy issues… You name it. Ella seems like a woman I can simply be myself with.

When I drag her down my cock again, a groan tears from my chest. I’m on fire. I want deeper. I need her under me. I have to take every part of her in every way. Right now.

Laying her flat against the island again, I watch as her eyes flare. She hisses and her body bows at the cool granite chilling her back, but this position leaves her legs spread, pussy open, clit exposed. I look down at her flushed face, dazed eyes, and breasts that bounce with every thrust—and I know I won’t be able to hold out much longer.

Caressing my way up her thigh as I bend my knees just enough to take another long, deep glide through her slick flesh—and dragging against her most sensitive spot—I settle my thumb over her clit and rub in small circles.

Her body tenses. She grips the edge of the counter. And then she screams my name in a wail of impending climax. “Carson!”

She’s close, and I’m so attuned to her that the tension mounting in her body is the same tension gripping mine. I flick my thumb over her distended bud faster, watching her mouth fall open, the flush spread across her chest, her nipples harden to steel points.

“Ella.” Her name is a groan that rips from my throat. I swallow. I have more to say, more to demand of her, but the ecstasy begins to swarm my head. Everything except her and the orgasm we’re about to share fades away.

This woman turns me on like no one. It’s been months since I’ve relished sex, and I’ve never felt as if I could plunge into one woman, anchor myself deep, and stay forever. Pleasure brews in my blood, tingles at the base of my cock, and rushes to the head, especially when she claws at me and clamps around me so tight I can barely move.

Oh, shit. There’s no stopping the freight train of this pounding satisfaction.

As I manipulate her clit with swirling strokes using the last of my sanity, her entire body arches and jolts. A scream spills from her pouting lips. Her pussy clenches and releases, gripping me unrelentingly.

That’s it. I can’t wait. Pleasure jets as I grip the far side of the island above her head and surge into her roughly over and over until I’m coming with her, emptying myself of weeks of grief, stress, and uncertainty. I pour into Ella, leaving a part of myself inside her. As my strokes slow, peace steals over me, and my heartbeat seems to sync up with hers.

Our breathing slows and our eyes meet. Something in my chest clutches.

“What just happened?” She asks exactly the question I was thinking.

The best sex of my life? I swallow the simple answer. None of this feels simple at all.

“No idea,” I manage to mutter.

A warning voice in my head tells me I should withdraw—literally and figuratively—and keep our relationship to exactly what we agreed to on paper before Ella ever stepped foot on the plane. But she wraps her arms around my neck and settles her pillowy mouth over my lips for a lingering kiss, and I fear very much that option is off the table for good.

“Me neither. But I think we should do it again.” She gives me a sly smile. “You know, just to study it.”

The monumental orgasm I had three minutes ago is a memory when I feel my cock stirring again. How is that even possible?

“Food first?” I ask.

Maybe reheating and eating will give me some time to wrap my head around why this woman seems to make an impact on me that’s on par with a mile-wide meteor.

She wriggles underneath me. “I vote for later. You got round two in you?”

Her voice is a challenge I can’t not respond to. “Oh, yeah.”

Ella gives me a mischievous grin as she wraps her legs around my middle even tighter. “Then I want you to take me to bed and not let me up until morning.”

Smart or not, it’s so on.

“All right,” I growl as I kick out of my pants. Then I lift her from the island and walk with our bodies still entwined across the apartment, kicking the bedroom door shut behind me. “And come tomorrow, when you’re hungry, exhausted, and sore, I want you to remember that I gave you exactly what you asked for.”

“Seriously?” I ask just before Carson forks another warm bite of tender fillet into my mouth. I shouldn’t be relishing this…but I do. The juice. The flavor. The way he takes care of me…

“I said I was going to feed you.” His voice teases and chides me at once. “Sit back and let me do it.”

With a sigh of surrender, I lean into the stack of pillows at the head of the rumpled bed. After hours of amazing, spine-tingling, downright athletic sex, I don’t have the energy to do anything but open my mouth and let him have his way. As I dozed off for a few minutes, he disappeared, only to return with a tray of steaming food. I have no idea how he reheated everything from the steakhouse to perfection, but the orgasmic bliss he sent humming through my body earlier has now made its way to my satisfied tongue.

“I assumed you meant that you were going to take me out for a meal, not hand-feed me every morsel.”

He shakes his head. “You know the old saying about assumptions?”

I know quite well. I won’t make the same mistake about jumping to conclusions with Carson Frost again. “Touché. You really don’t have to personally lift each bite to my mouth.”

“But this way, I know you’re actually eating.” He dips the fork into the potatoes au gratin and lifts it again with a steamy, cheesy heap. “And I’m enjoying it.”

My head tells me to demand that he stop now…but my taste buds are having a party. I’ve been living on kale salads, vegetable smoothies, and grilled chicken for years. Besides, Carson and I have been so busy, we must have burned off at least a thousand calories. Not to mention the fact that I’ve never had such an attentive lover. “In all honesty, I’m enjoying this, too.”

He gives me an indulgent smile. “Seriously, you have no reason to watch your weight.”

“I appreciate that. The truth is, my drama coach in college told me that, at my height, if I ever weighed more than a hundred and ten, I would never make it big. Sadly, my experiences have proven her right.” I’ve actually been fighting my body since puberty. Short of starvation or a strictly liquid diet, my frame simply refuses to shed much weight. I always carry about twenty pounds more than I want. Some days, I’m exhausted by the never-ending battle.

So, after a dozen years of frustration and deprivation, the indulgence Carson is sliding onto my tongue is a downright thrill.

“Want me to open a bottle of wine?”

With sleepy eyes, I slide a glance over at the clock. “It’s almost three in the morning. Aren’t you tired?”

He shovels some of the steak into his mouth, followed by a forkful of potatoes. Then he unwraps another covered dish, and the scent of the lobster macaroni and cheese almost has me swooning.

“A little. But between you and our amazing leftovers, I’m getting my second wind. It’s only midnight for you, West Coast girl. What’s your excuse?”

I laugh. “I’m usually in bed by ten so I can be ready for early morning auditions. You’ve kept me up a lot longer.”

Carson lifts the sheet away from his lap, then shoves it aside. His cock—every bit as big as my toes discovered—is standing tall. “You’re keeping me up, too.”

I can’t believe he’s hard again…and I can’t say I’m unhappy about it.

“Are you always this insatiable?” I’ve barely finished the question before he’s plying my taste buds with the creamy, soft goodness of the macaroni. I bite into a chunk of the lobster and moan.

“No. That’s all you,” he says solemnly.

“That’s amazing…”

He quirks a golden brow at me. “My stamina?”

“That, too. But I meant the orgasm in the takeout tin over there.”

When I laugh, he does the same. “Well, I’ve got more—of whatever you want.”

Then he sets about tugging at the sheet covering my naked breasts, exposing my well-loved nipples and the flesh slightly rosy from orgasmic glow and whisker burn.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” I promise with a catch of my breath.

He sets his food aside for a moment, then leans in to kiss my lips, my neck, my shoulder, the swell of my breast… My eyes slide shut for a luxurious moment. I know where this is headed. We still haven’t managed more than a few bites of food. We haven’t retrieved my suitcase from the car yet, either.

I slide a hand between my flesh and his mouth before he can suck my nipple and make me lose my mind. “You promised to feed me before you tumble me to the bed again. And didn’t we discuss a shower?”

Carson grimaces and backs away. “Yeah. Sorry. I lose my head with you. I have to be in a meeting in five hours. And right now, I just don’t care.”

“You should. You’ve done a lot to save Sweet Darlin’,” I point out. “But you surprise me. You’re not as driven as I thought when we first talked.”

“What do you mean? I’m ambitious.”

He is. If he weren’t, he never would have assumed the helm of Sweet Darlin’ or found himself engaged to Kendra Shaw. “But you’re not the kind of workaholic who forgets there’s another person in the room. You’re not the sort to disregard the people around you.”

At that observation, he scowls. “Have you dated someone like that? If so, he sounds like a terrible prick.”

In a weird way, that’s actually sweet of him to say. Normally, I wouldn’t share much about my past with a boss or a date. But Carson is different. “No. I’m talking about my parents. My dad was a reporter for the ABC affiliate in Los Angeles. My mom was a costume designer who worked for various TV shows. They both worked incredibly long hours. When Dad was home at all, he was forever on the phone or leaving in the middle of dinner to meet an informant or chase a crime scene. Mom was around more, but she always had her head stuck in a sketchbook or was cozying up to her sewing machine. Sometimes, my younger sisters and I felt invisible.”

His face softens. “I’m sorry. My mom and stepdad had their faults—they were human, after all—but they were great parents. I know how it feels to be invisible and irrelevant, though. I spent a lot of time growing up wondering why my own dad never wanted me, why my mom had to marry someone else to find a guy who gave a shit about me.”

I nod. It seems as if he truly does understand. “I had to become an adult to realize that my parents weren’t awful or uncaring or neglectful on purpose. They simply picked occupations they were so passionate about that sometimes they would forget everything else. In some ways, they saw the work they did as a public service. My dad gave truth to the community. My mom added beauty and authenticity to the world.”

“But it would have been nice if they’d remembered to be parents more often, too, right?”

I nod. “Exactly. I can’t complain much. I grew up in a nice house, went to good schools, had awesome friends. No one beat me. I never went hungry. I shouldn’t complain.”

“But everyone wants to be loved,” he says softly.

Maybe I’m just tired. Or maybe my emotions are raw because in the last few hours, this man has opened my body to him in nearly every conceivable way. All I know is that my eyes well with stinging tears.

“Yeah.” I sniffle, determined to lighten the suddenly heavy mood. “And love in return, so could you give me another forkful of those heavenly potatoes?”

With an understanding smile, he hands me the round tin and my fork, then sets about inhaling his own dinner. “God, everything tastes amazing. I was starved.”

“I was, too.” Not just for the food but for the toe-curling sex, affection, and understanding.

We both eat up, and I decide that I’m just not worrying about calories anymore today. He’ll go to work in a few hours, and I’ll pay penance with a lean breakfast, a long stretch of yoga, and a good hour on the stationary bike I noticed in the corner.

Finally, we both finish scarfing down our steaks and all our side dishes with gusto. Once we’re done, Carson groans and lies back on the bed, wrapping his hand around my ankle and skating his fingers up and down my calf. “This is the happiest I’ve been since I moved here. I gave up all my friends and dived into a company I only had a passing knowledge about. Half the management staff has been against me from the minute I walked in the door, and I don’t have just cause to fire them. So I’ve had to work hard to slowly change their minds. Juggling everything has been a bitch and a half.”

“It sounds like a lot of work. Did one of the existing executives want to assume responsibility of the company?” I shrug. “If so, why not let them?”

“Because my biological father’s last wish was for me to take the reins. Part of me wonders if he did that in death because he wasn’t with me in life. A few of my friends said that sounded like wishful thinking. Maybe it is. But this company meant everything to him. Now that I’ve been here almost six months, I understand. Think about the number of people who enjoy their candy with a favorite movie or fill their kids’ Easter baskets or eat something Sweet Darlin’ has cooked up because it reminds them of their own childhoods. I get mail every day from average people and employees alike who thank me for not letting their favorite treats die with my biological father. My cousin Jagger ran the organization for a few months, between Edward’s catastrophic head injury and the day he was removed from life support. He was cutting costs because that’s what he learned you should do in the one junior college business administration class he’d taken, but that meant he was cutting quality and employee pay. He didn’t know anything about running an organization, much less one this size. When I figured out what he’d done, I was angry on my biological dad’s behalf. I didn’t know Edward well, but I’ve learned a lot about the man he must have been by reading his notes, files, and correspondence. I understand how he would have wanted Sweet Darlin’ run, so that’s what I’m doing.”

I admire Carson all the more for it. I know how easy it would have been to be bitter toward the parent who hadn’t spared you any time as a kid. But he’s risen above it and given himself a new purpose. “I’m sure you’ve made him very happy. What you’ve done can’t be easy. Between the grief of losing the man you’ll never know well and the responsibility he left behind, a lot of people would have caved already.”

He gives me a thoughtful nod. “It’s been a lot of effort. I haven’t taken a day off in months. But tonight, being here with you…this has been everything I’ve needed. Thanks, Ella.”

“Stop. You’re making me blush,” I tease him.

Then a sly grin creases his face. “I can do more to make you blush, sweetheart. Come here…”

That voice I now know so well makes me tremble. It’s deep and low. It’s full of mischief and possession and sin. “What if I refuse?”

I can’t resist teasing this man. Taunting him. Tempting him. In response, he delivers the sexiest threats. We fell into this pattern so quickly and easily, and I’m addicted to knowing that I can start unraveling this big man with nothing more than my words, my voice, my expression. It’s a turn-on. Heck, he’s a turn-on. All I want is more.

“I’ll make you come here, little girl. And once I get you where I want you, I’ll make your torment so much worse…”

I roll closer to him, press our torsos together, and throw my leg over his. “Is that so?”

He glides a hand down my body, starting at my shoulder and working his way to my back and over my ass, cupping one cheek and bringing me closer. “Yes. Did I stutter?”

“Not at all.” I grin at him. “But you’re still feeling me up instead of getting busy, so I can only guess that you’re not really serious. What a shame…”

“Are you’re challenging me, woman?”

“Maybe.” My smile widens. “Does that make you quake in your boots?”

“First, I don’t have any boots,” he growls. “Second, if you’re serious, sweetheart, I’m so ready.”

My playful expression turns completely smug because he’s going to give me exactly what I want…except he doesn’t. Instead, he bounds off the bed and marches out the bedroom door. “Carson?”

“Get ready,” he calls as he retreats.

I hear a drawer open and close in the kitchen, followed by an electronic beep of the oven. What is he doing? The clatter of plates tells me nothing. As I hear him stomping back to the bedroom, I sit up and push my tangled tresses from my face. I already caught sight of myself in a mirror earlier. Ugh. There’s a reason people call it “sex hair.”

“For what?”

No answer.

I smell heaven before I see it. A moment later, Carson struts through the door stark naked—which, believe me, is a to-die-for view on its own—carrying a plate piled with the bread pudding he ordered at the steakhouse. It’s covered in creamy sauce. It almost looks like vanilla, but the slight caramel tinge and smell of hazelnut tell me it’s way more amazing.

“Are we going to eat that in bed?”

He sends me a challenging glance. “No. I’m going to eat this off your body. Lie back.”

I shouldn’t like his bossiness or his commanding tone. But right now, I do. In fact, I feel as if I’m flushing from head to toe and my heart is chugging pure anticipation through my bloodstream.

“All right,” I murmur as he sets the plate on the nightstand, yanks out a condom, and rolls it down his still-impressive length. Will I ever stop wriggling when I see him eager and ready?

“You’re not moving,” he points out. “I’m waiting. Or is this just too adventurous for you?”

His smirk and his taunt tug me from my visual pleasure and get me focusing on what comes next. I drape myself across the bed and part my legs enough to tease him. “Of course not. This what you had in mind?”

He simply smiles and stabs the fork into the middle of the bread pudding, heaping it onto the tines. The warm sauce drips on my thigh and hip as he lifts the dessert toward my chest. He unloads it in the valley of my cleavage, reaches for the plate again, and retrieves a smaller bite.

“What are you doing?”

He cups the back of my head with one hand and lifts me enough to meet the fork waiting with a scrumptious bite in the other. I open my mouth and let him slide the dessert onto my tongue because this looks like the kind of epic sugar concoction that will never cross my lips again. One bite can’t hurt that much, right?

“I’m feeding you before I feed on you.”

My taste buds are in ecstasy. It melts on my tongue, dissolving into a cloud of pure delight, moistened by the creamy, rich sauce that’s sunken into every nook and cranny and made the consistency something close to heaven. I moan, and it’s not ladylike or delicate. This is a full-on groan of utter bliss. “That is amazing!”

“Glad to hear it. But I’m not going to take your word for it, Ella.”

Those words might have been slightly ominous if he didn’t break off part of the warm dessert nestled between my breasts and smear it over my nipples. The warmth hits my sensitive flesh first. It’s sticky, and if you had asked me yesterday if I wanted Carson Frost to smear stale baked bread mixed with liqueur all over my boobs, I would have laughed before I answered with a big hell no. But in these amazing hours before dawn, the only thing that seems important is the way we make each other feel. If he wants to eat off my body, I’m more than game. I’m excited.

In the back of my head, I realize I’m giving him a lot of myself, and that in a little over two weeks I’ll be packing up and heading home, probably never to see this man again. But that’s so seventeen days from now, and I have a suspicion we have a lot more pleasure to find together. When this assignment is over, maybe the glow I’m feeling with this surprising attachment will have dimmed. After all, what are the chances that the guy who hired me to jilt him would be my soul mate? And…I admit it, everything between us now feels too damn good to stop.

For Carson, I arch my back and lift my breasts to him. “I don’t think you should take my word for it. Why skip dessert when you’ve gone to all this trouble?”

With a snarl that lights me up, he pounces on me, practically inhaling my breast. With a low groan, he thoroughly licks it up one side, then drags his lips back down the other. He circles my nipple a few times, inching closer and closer to the aching tip without actually touching it. A whimper escapes my throat.

“Impatient, sweetheart?”

“Yes. Hurry, Carson.” In the fuzzy part of my brain, it occurs to me that, as much as he enjoys toying with me, he’s not going to give me what I want simply because I whine for it. He’s going to make me suffer, make me wait. He’ll make me earn it.

I’d never admit this aloud, but I wouldn’t want it any other way.

“But you have another breast covered in bread pudding that I haven’t even touched. You can’t expect me to rush through this. Dessert is the best part of any meal.”

He shifts his attention to my other mound, nibbling around my sensitive crest, laving my flesh as he increases my ache. I wriggle restlessly, but he won’t let up. He eats away at his dessert in an unhurried savoring that’s breaking down my composure. I really didn’t think he could arouse me again this much tonight. I lost count of the number of orgasms he’s already given me. I was certain I was totally sated.

I was wrong.

Finally, he decides he wants the next part of his sexy sugarfest, so he leans in and drags his tongue over one nipple, then the other, before sucking each deep onto his tongue in an unhurried, alternating rhythm. I gasp at the feel of his hot mouth enveloping me and frantically grab for strands of his short hair, trying to hang on to this seemingly endless descent into pleasure. It’s astonishing, the things he makes me feel. I never believed my nipples were sensitive until now. I never thought marathon sex was my thing, either. I have a bad feeling Carson has forever changed that—and me.

Once he’s licked clean all traces of the bread pudding, except one last heap between my breasts, he starts shifting his way down my body, dragging his lips as he sidles his way between my legs.

Oh, my god. I’m so aroused now that if he puts his mouth down there, I’m going to explode. “Carson…”

“You have to stop trying to come between a man and his dessert, sweetheart,” he teases.

Before I have time to say another word, he scoops up the last of the sugary-cakey goodness and spreads it across the pad of my pussy. Then he burrows his arms under my thighs and lifts my hips until my slit is inches from his mouth.

And he waits, licking his lips, staring at me with hungry blue eyes.

He wants me to offer myself to him or beg or something that I would normally never do. But Carson can wring me inside out sexually and make me behave in ways I normally wouldn’t.

Panting, my heart a harsh thud against my chest, I spread my legs a little wider. “You’re right. I should let you thoroughly enjoy everything you find sweet…”

With a shark’s grin, he nods. “I intend to.”

Then, as if words now bore him, Carson stops talking and starts feasting. At first he does nothing but lick the soft bread pudding from the apex above my slit. I feel the gentle nip of his teeth on the fleshy part of my pussy, my skin slicked by Frangelico and my own juices. But inevitably, he delves lower, sliding first his fingers, then the tip of his tongue over the hard button of my clit. It’s throbbing before he ever makes direct contact, and by the time he sucks it into his mouth to savor the last of his dessert, I’m squealing in delight, nearly bolting off the bed—and rocketing to an orgasm that blows my mind.

The last of the pulses have barely finished when he shimmies up my body, lips and fingers busy, then slams inside me completely, stealing my breath and wrapping himself around my heart as if he means to make away with that, too.

It’s too late to try resisting the pull between us. The time for that would have been before dessert. Hell, before I even got off the plane. This man is definitely going to be dangerous to my peace of mind and my skittish heart. And right now, he’s filling every space inside me, scraping my nerve endings and my emotions raw. I can’t seem to do anything but let the inevitable happen. My need climbs. His thrusts quicken. Our passion swells. He’s going to give me another head-spinning climax. I can feel it coming…

And I can’t do anything to stop the fact that he’ll take my soul with it.

Even knowing the truth, I open to him, wrap my arms around him, and give him everything. If he decides there’s nothing meaningful between us at the end of this job, I’ll at least know I couldn’t have tried harder to give him every part of myself.

That’s my last thought before pleasure rips me open, bursting wide, leaving me utterly exposed and bleeding out love.