Jules
Sexual frustration festered all night long, making sleep an elusive bitch. I finally fell into a restless slumber three hours before I had to get up for work, so I’m a hot, emotional mess when I barge into Cash’s office the next morning. I’m also steaming mad. I shut the door, resisting the urge to slam it, and launch my anger at the brooding suit sitting behind the desk. It’s barely 8 a.m., but he’s already shed his jacket and rolled up his cuffs. I grit my teeth against my too-female response to him, because he doesn’t have a right to look that gorgeous when I’m this pissed at him.
“What was that last night?” I demand, dropping my bag into the chair in front of his desk.
He shifts in his seat, leaning back as his gaze roams over my curve-revealing ensemble. It’s still warm enough outside to get away with spaghetti straps. Between the fitted creme top dipping low in the front, and the flirty pink skirt begging for his fingers to lift the hem and discover what’s underneath, I dressed to kill this morning, and the appreciation in his eyes tells me he knows it.
“I didn’t think it was possible for you to be more gorgeous, but you are.” The corners of his mouth turn up as he gestures at me. “When you’re fired up like this.”
“Well that’s the problem. You lit the fire and didn’t put it out. I don’t like mind games.”
“I don’t like them either.”
I cross my arms, and his gaze drops to my cleavage. “You can’t deny you were angry, Cash.”
“Yes, and now I’ve cooled down.”
I almost scoff at that. He appears far from cool—if anything, he seems as edgy and aroused as I am. “Well that makes one of us. You didn’t even give me a chance to explain.”
He rises from behind the desk. “What’s there to explain? I have eyes. I didn’t just see you kissing him, but I saw the hurt on your face when you pulled away.”
“That’s not fair.”
“I know it’s not. I’m aware that we both have baggage. I knew it going in. Doesn’t mean it didn’t hurt like hell.”
“So you get hurt and tuck your tail and run? I thought we were in this together.”
“God, Jules.” He levels me with the intensity in his eyes. “I want nothing more than you and me in a sentence that includes the word together, but let’s face some facts here. You’ve still got feelings for your ex, and I’m still as married today as I was yesterday. No matter how much we want this, we can’t ignore reality.”
His words physically hurt, and I fight the urge to claw at my chest, as if I can yank out the knife he just buried there. “You said you were willing to fight for us.”
“I am.”
“I sense a but.”
“But fighting for you means fighting for your happiness too. I remember how heartbroken you were on that plane. How can I ask you to walk away from your second chance if that’s what you want?”
“What makes you think I want that?”
He rakes a hand through his hair, the motion a jerky, frustrated one. “The two of you have a history together. If you need to find closure, or…whatever it is you’re looking for with him, I…I won’t stand in your way.”
“Stop being so pig-headed! I want you.”
“If that were one-hundred percent true, you wouldn’t have freaked out when he proposed. You sure as hell wouldn’t have kissed him back last night.”
Did I kiss Chris back? I can’t remember, but the fact that Cash is using it to put a wall between us is digging at the facade of calm I’m clinging to.
“You’re a fucking coward.”
A tick goes off in his jaw, and I fight the urge to retreat. “Ask yourself why you were kissing him knowing I could show up any second.”
“Ask me why I was wearing lingerie I bought just for you,” I fire back, tone brimming with challenge. “Ask me if I’m wearing it today.”
Grabbing at his tie, he clears his throat. “You’re fighting dirty.”
“Get used to it.”
“Christ.” The vulnerability in his expression is a weapon. Slowly rounding the desk, he drags a hand down his haggard face. “I’ll go fucking crazy if I have to watch you go back to your ex because you changed your mind.”
“I won’t change my mind,” I say, tugging him closer by the deep blue tie around his neck. “I want you. Only you.”
Resting his forehead against mine, his eyes shutter as he expels a breath. “I’m so in love with you, Jules.”
His declaration sends my heart soaring, and I shutter my eyes against the sting of tears. “I feel the same way,” I whisper before pressing my lips to his. He slides a hand along my cheek and tilts my head back, deepening the kiss.
I clutch at his shirt, going weak in the knees. His kiss touches me to the center of my soul, sucks the last of the anger from my bones, makes any remaining feelings I have for Chris obsolete. When Cash kisses me like this—like he’ll die if our mouths and tongues don’t meet—I’m powerless to resist. Someone could barge into the office, and I wouldn’t notice.
Eventually, he inches back. “Are you really wearing lingerie for me?”
“Yes. I went shopping yesterday after work.”
His fingers creep beneath the hem of my skirt, caressing my thigh. Slowly, he trails a fiery path up to the edge of soft lace, but he stops before touching me there. “What color?”
“Pink,” I say on a stuttered sigh.
“You’ve caught on to my weakness. Cotton, or something sexier?”
“Sexier.” The kind of sexy that doesn’t leave much to the imagination.
He finishes the journey to my sex, sliding beneath lace to burrow between my thighs, and I whimper.
“Are you trying to seduce me, Jules?”
Pulling my bottom lip between my teeth, I nod. “Is it working?”
“Hell yeah, it’s working. You seduced me the second you walked through the door, all riled up and letting me have it.” He trails his lips to my ear. “Does it make me an ass for admitting how much I want to fuck you right now?”
“The only ass move you’ve made is assuming I’m not completely in love with you.”
He sucks in a breath. An instant later, his mouth is on mine, tongue devouring as he yanks my head back for a better angle. I can do nothing but submit and whimper and let him claim me with every demanding lick of his tongue against mine.
“These sexy panties you’re wearing for me,” he says, breaths hitting my damp lips in rapid bursts of desire. “Show them to me.” Ownership pulls at the corners of his mouth, hinting at a seductive smile. He whirls me around, and I gasp as he bends me over the desk.
With the exception of last night, the dominance inside him is subtle, maybe even in full-blown hibernation, but now it’s running rampant, and I’m having trouble reconciling my first impression of Cash on that plane with the absolute alpha standing behind me, shoving me onto his desk as he kicks my feet apart with a curt order to spread them.
I palm the surface, and my golden locks cascade around my face in waves, obscuring my vision, heightening the crackling awareness between us until there’s only the hard desk underneath me and the warmth of Cash between my legs, his fingers trailing down the small of my back, sending shivers down my spine. Biting back a needy moan, I arch into him as he slips a hand under the hem of my skirt and lifts the material until my thong-clad ass is bared.
“Jesus, there’s something so damn innocent about you, but this right here,” he breathes, dipping a finger beneath the back of my thong and snapping the scant material against my ass, “is hot as hell, knowing you’re wearing this just for me.”
“You like it?” My voice is practically gone, held hostage by the desire thickening my throat.
“I love it,” he says, and my head spins again as he pulls me upright and turns me to face him. “And I love you. So damn much it terrifies me. You’re under my skin, and there’s nothing I can do about it.”
“I feel the same way. You have to believe that.”
“If there’s one thing you should know about me it’s that I have a mean, jealous streak, and I won’t apologize for it. Not with you, Jules.”
“He caught me by surprise—”
“I don’t need an explanation. I only need to know it won’t happen again.”
“It won’t.”
“What about us?” he asks, gripping me by the ass. He sets me onto the desk and wedges his torso between my thighs. “Are we happening again?” Leaning down, he nips my lips, then softens his tone. “And again.” Another kiss, another whisper. “And again?”
I inch back, meeting his challenging stare head-on. “You’ve got me on the edge. What the hell are you waiting for?”