Patrick had never been thrown by a kiss before. Every time his lips met a woman’s, it had been calculated. Planned. He’d never expected Cassie to kiss him. After how angry she’d looked, he’d expected her to spit in his face and tell him how repulsive she found him.

Instead her lips were sliding over his, her mouth open and wet and demanding. Demanding more.

In a move that was half reclaiming his footing, half dying to touch, Patrick found Cassie’s hips with his palms. Her soft moan was the cue he needed. He gripped her hard, mapping the curves he’d been aching to feel for far too long before his brain kicked into action.

What the hell? She wanted him?

Forcing himself to break off the kiss, Patrick opened his eyes. Cassie was breathless and glaring at him and hotter than fuck.

“I thought you didn’t like me,” he said, and damn if he wasn’t breathing heavily too.

“I don’t. I can’t stand the sight of you.”

But she was still clutching his collar. And her gaze was darting from his eyes to his mouth and back up again. This was what all their sexual tension had been leading toward. They’d been somewhere in between flirting and taking punches for months now. And if this was how she treated people she didn’t like, she could hate the ever-loving fuck out of him.

Wrapping his hands firmly around her waist, Patrick dragged her toward him until her body was flush against his. Her breasts were soft and full, her nipples tight beneath her blouse. He could feel her heat through his jeans.

“Well,” he said. “I can’t stand you either.”

Patrick covered her mouth with his and swept his tongue greedily along hers. Cassie’s hands went from his collar to the back of his neck, her nails biting into his skin, and he wrapped his arms around her until they were panting on a street corner like two teenagers. They were going to need to move this indoors, fast.

“As long as we’re on the same page—” Fuck. He could barely make himself stop kissing her long enough to talk. “—should we go to your place, or mine?”

She pulled back, her brows slanting. A pink flush had stolen over the apples of her cheeks. Her hair fell in dark waves over her face, her lipstick messy now that she’d been kissing him.

It was the hottest thing he’d ever seen. And she wasn’t even naked yet.

“My place,” she said. “It’s closer.”

Patrick clasped her hand in one of his and lifted her bag from the ground with the other. Slinging it over his shoulder, he hailed a cab. He could’ve called for a company car, but he didn’t have the patience to wait for it. He wanted her alone and undressed as soon as possible.

She climbed into the taxi’s backseat, and Patrick gazed at her perfect ass again. She’d known what she was doing when she walked out of the bar. There was no way in hell he wasn’t following her. He’d been compelled to, needing to see more of her, wanting to provoke her as hard as she was goading him. The glimpse of her cleavage was epic as he sat down next to her.

“Brookline,” Cassie said to the cabbie, then gave him a street address.

They started moving, and Patrick kissed her again. He’d never been much of an exhibitionist, but if the driver wanted to watch then so be it. He’d been waiting ages for this and he wasn’t stopping now.

Jesus. Cassie. Finally.

The reality of the situation slowed him down. She wasn’t someone he was going to be able to dodge after they saw this through. But she clearly wanted this, and he didn’t need to explain anything, since she knew his M.O. It was almost unsettling, how into this he was before giving his usual speech; a gentle, “Just so you know, I can’t stay the night” before things got started. It wasn’t the only sign he was way off his game. By the time he’d gotten this far with a woman, he’d clearly stated his intentions, and knew what she wanted once the clothes came off. Patrick didn’t have a clue with Cassie.

“Something wrong?” Her tone was low, taunting and tempting as fuck.

“You sure about this?” It was the only question he could manage through his lust-fogged brain. “I don’t know if…”

If that drink impaired your judgment. Or if you’re sure about fucking someone you hate.

She pulled back and studied him, blue eyes sharp and cautious. If she was doubting this and wanting to put the brakes on, she was smarter than him.

“I’m sure,” she said. “Are you?”

“Fuck yes.”

“Good.” He glanced outside to gauge how much farther they had to go. When was the last time he’d been this worked up on the way back to a woman’s home?

He knew when. But he wasn’t going there now.

The driver pulled up in front of her building. Patrick fumbled for his wallet, handed over some cash and yanked the door open. Cassie shimmied out and led the way inside. His pulse hammered as he hovered behind her, waiting for her to unlock the door. The second they were inside her front hallway, a narrow space that barely fit the two of them, he slammed the door shut and pressed her up forcefully against it. She dropped her purse and threw her arms around him, and then everything was a blur of hands and mouths. The sensation of her tongue gliding along his raced straight to his cock. Frantic, she went for his jacket, yanking it off him.

“Suspenders?” she asked, palming the elastic bands crossing his chest.

“What? I like the look.”

Whether Cassie liked them or not he couldn’t tell because she shoved them down and went for his shirt buttons like she couldn’t get him undressed fast enough. He wasn’t any different, all twisted up with sexual tension. The heat between them was insane. She wasn’t the cold woman he’d thought she was, and his mind was reeling instead of calculating his next move. He wanted every inch of her. Like he’d imagined for months. Had she always felt the same?

Shoving her backward, he held her still and growled, “How long?”

“How long what?”

“How long have you wanted me?”

Cassie narrowed her eyes. She opened and closed her mouth, then huffed out a breath. “Since April. Jack’s birthday.”

Her reply felt like triumph. Patrick grinned. “Me too.”

It wasn’t the truth. He’d wanted her from the minute they’d met. But she didn’t need to know that.

He attacked her again, his mouth on her lips, her jaw, her neck—hard, violent kisses set to bruise. He unzipped her skirt, loving the feeling of her warm skin and bombshell hips as the fabric slid to the floor. She kicked off her shoes, and he stopped kissing her long enough to hastily unbutton her blouse. He wanted to savor the moment of getting a look at her all disheveled in a black lace bra, but he was too worked up.

He needed to pounce. To touch and taste and bite. To get inside this infuriating woman, right the hell now.

Patrick kissed down her throat, sucking and biting as he went. Cassie jolted and arched against him, hand slowing as she tugged at the last of his buttons. He did it again, liking that he’d slowed her down, that he’d found a way to get at her without words. Between panted breaths and frustrated grunts, she finally got his shirt open and wrenched it off. Her hands roamed his chest until she pushed him backward and narrowed her eyes once again.

“Oh, fuck you,” she said.

Patrick followed her gaze down his chest. “Is that a compliment?”

Most women fawned over, even purred at the size of his chest, but Cassie seemed angry at what she saw. Her touch canvassed hungrily along pectorals he worked hard to keep in shape with tennis matches, his morning regimen of push-ups and holding himself up in lots of interesting positions.

“Yeah. It is.”

He was big in other ways too, something he would be half bragging, half warning her about if he weren’t so amused by her irritated distraction. Reaching a hand up, he traced a finger along the cups of her bra. “You’re not so bad yourself.”

Cassie was worlds better than not so bad. She was all curves and steel, sexy as fuck behind her tough-as-nails, fierce exterior. She was goddamn perfect, but he wasn’t going to tell her that, either.

His finger grazed her nipple. Cassie hissed and shoved him to the opposite wall. Patrick laughed in surprise, watching as she halted for a moment, as if she were waiting for something, then went for his belt. She unzipped his jeans, dragging them and his boxers down. His cock bobbed low on his abdomen, swollen and hard and wet at the tip.

“Oh, Jesus.”

Patrick smirked. “Too much for you?”

She palmed the tip. His breath hitched as she coated her hand in pre-come.

“Not at all,” Cassie said, then gave him a catlike smile and dropped to her knees.

“Hey, I thought kneeling wasn’t your number one—oh fuck.”

She took him into her mouth, and Patrick’s head knocked against the wall. He’d always had a thing for oral, but because of his size he rarely had it done well. Cassie however, didn’t seem to have any problem. She swallowed him easily, then sucked all the way up to his tip. He shuddered, watching as she made another openmouthed plunge. When she hit the underside of his cock with a tiny bit of teeth, Patrick’s knees went weak.

“Christ, your goddamn mouth.”

She popped her lips off him, and Patrick nearly moaned at the loss until she made a wet circle around his base with her fingers. She moved her hand in unhurried strokes, thumb hitting the sensitive spot that made him jerk involuntarily before she leaned in and lapped once at his tip.

“I said being on my knees wasn’t my number-one fantasy. I didn’t say I didn’t like it.”

She repeated the motion, a flick of her tongue before he was once again plunged into perfect suction, soft and wet and hot, and he was powerless to do anything but groan. Fucking hell, she was good at this. Good enough to finish him off embarrassingly soon, if she didn’t stop.

Delving his fingers into that silky-smooth hair, he tugged her off him, ignoring the aching protest in his balls.

Her complacent smile was messy, her lips shining. “Told you I could do more with my mouth than talk.”

Patrick practically snarled. He needed to get her back, to see her as weak with pleasure as she’d made him. Heaving her up by her shoulders, he got her to her feet. He stepped out of his shoes, kicked his jeans and boxers to the side and hooked his finger between the cups of her bra. Her nipples stood out under the satin, and he rubbed the stiff point of one with his thumb.

“Were you thinking about fucking me every time we argued?” Using the leverage he had, Patrick dragged her closer, enjoying her unsteady movements as she stumbled toward him. “Did you go home from our little spats wet?”

“No.”

“No?”

“You heard me.”

What a stubborn pain in the ass she was. But shit, he liked it. “I’ll bet you’re lying.”

“You’d be wrong.” She lifted her chin, defiant. “I’ve never gotten wet around men I don’t like.”

Patrick huffed out a breath in frustration. Clearly she was attracted to him, so was this a deliberate provocation? She took a step back, the move loosening his finger from her bra. When she gazed up at him with a glimmer in her eye and a wicked smile, Patrick realized what she was doing.

She was lying. And she was baiting him. Fucking baiting him.

It made him want to bare his teeth—to force the truth out of her until she submitted.

Shaking his head, Patrick went in for a kiss, but stopped when she leaned into him and grabbed her instead, shoving her backward against the wall.

“Why do you have to make everything so damn difficult?” he hissed.

Cassie let out a startled gasp, her shoulders hiking up on a full-body shiver. So this was how she liked to play. To tease and tussle and be shoved a little. He was suddenly overwhelmed by the urge to push this further—to see her helpless. Wrestling her around until her nose was pressed against the wall, Patrick trapped her with one hand on the back of her neck, the other gripping her wrists behind her and pinning her still.

“You don’t get wet around men you don’t like, huh?” he murmured into her ear.

She arched into him, making it easy for him to slide his cock along the curve of her ass and jamming her more fully against the wall. Her head lolled back, and Patrick released one of her hands and slid his now-free one between her legs. Her panties were sopping wet.

“Dirty, dishonest girl. You’re soaked.”

“I said I’ve never gotten wet. Past tense.” But her voice was strained.

“So it’s just because of me then?”

“Fuck y—” A grunt cut off her word as he mapped out her slit and pressed inward. Patrick chuckled again.

“That’s what I thought. Now stay put.”

He slid his fingers beneath the waistband of her panties and dragged them down her legs. He tapped once at her ankle, and she stepped out of the leg holes, obeying his silent command and bracing her hands against the wall. God, was that a sight to be seen. Reaching a hand up, he drew a line with his middle finger over the small, neat thatch of hair between her thighs, then eased it along her wet flesh. A single stroke over her clit had her going up on her toes and widening her stance.

“More,” she whined.

“You want more?” He stood and pressed himself against her. Slipping his hand between her body and the wall, he lightly tickled her clit again. “What if I don’t want to give it to you?”

She banged her fists, but she was smiling.

Grinning at her neediness, Patrick unhooked her bra and turned her around to face him. She was lust-drunk, her eyes hazy, face flushed. He took one taut, pink nipple into his mouth, and dipped a hand to her sex again. Lower. Circled her entrance. Pushed inside.

“Pa-trick.”

Her body bowed off the wall, her hips working in rhythm with the movements of his hand. Patrick tugged her nipple with his teeth, then released it, and gazed up to watch her face. Her mouth was agape, her head tilted back, eyes pinched shut. Seeing the effect he had on her made his dick painfully hard, but he never ceased the thrusts of his finger, searching for her—

“Fuck.” Her eyes flew open. “That. Yes.”

Patrick relentlessly stroked until Cassie gripped his biceps and cried out. Wetness splashed over his palm.

“Look at you,” he said, half in amazement. “You’re drenched.”

Her cheeks went red as she panted and squirmed. “How are you doing that?”

“Don’t tell me no one’s done that to you before.”

“Not like—” She gasped when Patrick rubbed that rough ridge of flesh a little harder. “God…I need…fuck.”

Yeah. So did he. “Where are your condoms, Cassie?”

She threw him a sideways glance. “You don’t keep a store of them in your jeans?”

Snarky even when she was being fingered. God, this woman. “I do. I just used them all up this week.”

Her pleasured smile vanished. Shit. He wouldn’t have wanted to picture her fucking someone else right now either. Patrick slid his finger free.

“I’m sorry. I’m kidding. I actually…haven’t.”

“Haven’t what?”

“Used any condoms. This week.”

“Is that a record for you or something?”

“Honestly? Yeah.” As a matter of fact, he hadn’t even done so much as gotten another woman’s phone number. Including the one at the bar tonight.

She examined him, like she wasn’t sure she believed him, then pushed off the wall. “Come with me.”

She led him through her kitchen and living room to her bedroom, then flipped on a lamp, illuminating the small room. Her bed took up most of the space, but it felt warm there. Comfortable and lived in. Patrick watched the confident sway of her hips as she walked toward a nightstand.

Goddamn, the curve of her waist. Her thick, solid thighs. He wanted to tell her how fucking beautiful she was, but his capacity for language was shot. He needed to feel. Taste. Smell. Take.

He followed her, sitting on the bed as she bent over to open a drawer. The enormity of the moment hit home as she retrieved a foil packet, ripped it open and glanced at him. He nodded once, keeping his eyes on her face as she rolled it over him. She was silent, focused, and he let her run the show as she climbed onto his lap, his pulse pounding so fast he could hardly breathe. She stayed like that, rocking against him and pausing like she had before.

Since when did Cassie hold back on asking what she wanted?

Unless she wanted him to take control.

Going on instinct, Patrick seized her hips, drew her above him and lined himself up. His cock nudged her entrance, and Cassie’s head dropped back on a moan.

“Not so much a spitfire now, are you?” he asked. “All talk.”

“Shut up and fuck me.”

That was more like it.

Inch by inch, he eased her down, relishing the grip of her hands on his shoulders. His grasp on her hips was equally as strong. God, she was tight. Snug enough that he had a feeling it had been a while for her even if he didn’t possess more girth than the average man. And fuck if he didn’t like that.

“Okay?” he gritted out when he was fully seated.

Her head jerked in a short little nod. Her belly flexed, hips rolling. “Please.”

Oh Christ. The sound of her begging was a tripwire, nearly setting him off before they’d even begun. Summoning his self-control, Patrick found a rhythm, their foreheads pressed together as he thrust up inside her and she pressed down. Within minutes they were both nothing but panted moans and sweaty thighs and arching backs, and he was getting perilously close to the edge. It was too hot, seeing her like this. Unraveled. Unleashed. Her hair damp on her forehead, her neck. Her body surging as she raced him to the finish line.

“I wanna watch you,” he said. “Wanna see you fall apart for me.”

“Not—yet.” Slowing the movement of her hips, she sat up a bit and squeezed her inner muscles around him.

Patrick’s body jerked with the immense pleasure. “What the fuck are you doing?”

It was like she was grabbing him, pulling him into her. The sensation was so intense he nearly lost control when she did it again. He growled in his fight to hold on.

“Aww, come on. Don’t tell me no one’s done that to you before.”

He hated her. He truly hated her. Because no one, in fact, had ever done that. Not one woman, in two decades of fucking, had been this good.

He heaved her upward and rolled her onto her back. She fought against him with a smile, her hands pushing at his shoulders. Patrick pinned her wrists to the mattress.

“Thrash all you want, sweetheart. I’m gonna fuck the fight out of you.”

Her head fell back on a groan. Bending down to lick the sweat from between her breasts, he started up a pace, deep and frenetic. Her hips met his, thrust for thrust. Cassie whimpered and closed her eyes.

“You gonna come for me?” he asked.

“Close.”

Whatever she needed, Patrick was compelled to find it for her. But he had moments left, if that. He took one of her hands and urged it between her thighs.

“Get yourself there, Cassie.”

Her fingers brushed against him as they circled her clit, and the idea it afforded was too much. Cassie rubbing herself because he’d told her to, the two of them working together to get her off.

“I’m gonna come,” he rasped.

“Me—” Cassie clenched, her orgasm stealing her breath before she could finish the sentence. Burying his face against her breast, Patrick groaned through his release as she shuddered beneath him. Her climax lasted, pulses that drew his out even more, her body tightening around him again until he sagged against her, his brow to her shoulder.

It took longer than usual for him to catch his breath. A lot longer.

When he’d finally recovered, Patrick lifted his head and asked, “Still don’t like me?”

Her giggle was a sweet, tinkling sound. He eased out of her and tied off the condom, tossing it into a trash bin beside the bed. She’d stretched out when he turned to look at her. Propping himself up on one arm, he explored things he hadn’t gotten to see before. A beauty mark at the base of her neck. The light golden tone of her skin. The soft crease of her navel. God, he could look at her for hours.

“Isn’t this usually your cue to make something up?” she asked.

He glanced up. “I’m sorry?”

“When the sex is over. Isn’t that when you usually find an excuse to cut out?”

“Usually.”

“Well, let me save you the trouble.” She sat up, reached over to her nightstand and retrieved an oversized T-shirt. “You don’t have to make up an excuse.”

“So I don’t have to pretend I have a tennis match in the morning, or a work obligation? Sweet.”

“Well, I know how you roll. You never sleep with the same woman twice, so what good would it be to hang on you?”

“None at all.”

He was mostly joking. He’d thought she was kidding too, but apparently not. She drew the shirt over her head, stood and went to her dresser. “Well it’s a good thing I’m not then.”

Stepping into a fresh pair of panties, she ran her fingers through her hair.

“Then I’m free to go, I guess,” he said, watching her.

“Totally free.”

She was giving him an out. Hot sex, with no pesky emotions required in the aftermath, no requests for a repeat performance. It shouldn’t have bothered him.

So why did it bother him?

“We’re on the same page with this.” She turned toward him. “Right?”

A sudden discomfort gripped him. For once, he didn’t want to run out the door, but he wasn’t about to admit the sudden change in his pattern now. “Totally on the same page.”

“And we’re not telling anyone about it.”

“Not a soul.”

“Perfect. Then we can go back to hating each other and no one will be the wiser.”

Patrick stood, and Cassie walked him down the hall. His clothes were scattered everywhere, and awkward didn’t begin to describe it as she helped him retrieve them.

“Thanks for coming over,” she said when he was fully dressed. “I had a nice time.”

“That’s usually my line.”

She stuck her tongue out. “Beat you to it.”

He laughed at her playfulness, and told himself to get with the program. He didn’t have to worry that he’d taken advantage of her, and Cassie definitely didn’t seem like her feelings were hurt.

No, she was making this easy for him.

Patrick checked his pockets for his keys, phone and wallet, and flashed her a laid-back smile. There was no reason for him to feel anything other than relief. Commitment wasn’t his thing, and now that he’d had her, he’d be able to move on.

“I had a nice time too.”

“I’m glad.”

Cassie opened the door. “Good night.” She didn’t reach in for a hug or a kiss. Which wasn’t strange, considering her behavior. What was strange was that he felt the urge to.

Patrick shoved his hands in his pockets. “Night.” He went down the stairs and out into the evening, ready to leave this night, and his lust for Cassie Allbright, behind him.