CHAPTER NINE
“THIS ISN’T WHAT I seduced you for,” Ronan said as he picked up the envelope. After that mind-blowing sex, he wasn’t sure he’d seduced her for any reason but pleasure. He had never had as much in his life before he started having sex with her. “It’s just an envelope.”
With nothing but her name scrawled across the front of it. He didn’t recognize the handwriting, not that it was very easy to read since the thick black marker with which it had been written had smeared and bled through the orange paper.
“That’s what those documents were in,” she said. “Someone shoved it under my door. When I found it, I thought Bette must have slipped them to me.”
“It wasn’t Bette.” He accepted that now. She cared too much about Simon to put their practice at risk.
“No. I don’t know who it was,” she said with a sigh. “So I guess I haven’t given you what you seduced me for.”
“I seduced you so you’d go to the bar association and confess that those documents were forged,” he explained.
She laughed. “If I agreed to that, you’d be suborning perjury all over again.”
“I didn’t,” he said. He’d never had to coerce anyone into lying. They usually did it freely, on their own. But in this case, he hadn’t been aware of anyone lying but her. “I would never do that.”
He would never risk his license or the reputation of the practice. He’d worked so hard to get off those streets and help his partners form Street Legal. It meant too much to him. Hell, it and his friends were all he really had.
Muriel’s beautiful green eyes were intense as she studied his face, as if she was trying to discern if he was lying or telling the truth. “You freely admit that winning is everything to you.”
“In interviews?” he asked. “Press releases? We didn’t hire that PR firm to make us look like losers. Who’s going to hire an attorney who’s okay with losing?”
“Apparently not my ex,” she murmured.
“You hurt him badly,” Ronan said. He needed to remind himself of that, of how dangerous she was. She’d broken Arte Armand. He had to make sure she didn’t break him, too.
She shook her head, and her thick, black lashes fluttered as if she was fighting back tears. “I. Did. Not. Hurt. Him!”
Borrowing Simon’s gesture, he arched a brow to express his skepticism.
“I didn’t,” she insisted. “He hurt me.”
She wasn’t broken, not like Arte had been. She wasn’t sobbing. But her eyes were bright. He couldn’t be certain those were tears glistening in them, though. He couldn’t be certain that she was really feeling anything at all.
Was she still playing him? She’d already admitted that she had been.
“Why did you seduce me?” he asked. Not that he minded. He had quite enjoyed her seducing him. In fact, if he’d enjoyed it any more, he probably wouldn’t have survived.
She was an incredible lover. But more than that, they fit, as if their bodies were meant to be together. And their sexual appetites were the same—voracious.
He wanted her again. Even after just having one of the most intense orgasms of his life, he wanted her again. Hell, he needed her.
She stared at him blankly, maybe because of the abrupt way he’d changed the conversation.
So he reminded her, “You said you were seducing me, too. Why? What do you want from me?”
Hopefully more of what they’d just done—a whole lot more—because he wasn’t sure he was ever going to get enough of Muriel Sanz.
Her beautiful green eyes narrowed as she glared at him. “I wanted to seduce you into admitting that you coerced those people into lying about me.”
He shook his head. “I’m sorry I can’t give you what you want, either.”
Her full lips curved into a small, sad smile and she murmured, “Then I guess we both lose this time.”
He didn’t feel like he’d lost until she turned to walk out the door. He couldn’t let her leave, not like this. He reached out and caught her, wrapping his hand around her wrist to spin her back to him, back into his arms. Her breasts slammed against his chest, and the breath left his lungs. And as he stared down at her beautiful face, his heart began to pound fast and hard and erratically.
She felt so right in his arms, as if it was where she belonged. But that wasn’t possible. Nobody belonged in Ronan’s arms. He wasn’t the type who stayed to snuggle after sex. And he didn’t want to snuggle now.
That wasn’t why his arms tightened around her, why he pulled her even closer. He wanted more sex. That was all he wanted...
But there was a strange sensation in his chest, as if it was swelling and warming, and he didn’t like the feeling. He didn’t like feeling at all. Anything.
Lust. That was all this was, all it could be. Just attraction and lust...
* * *
Despite the warmth of his body pressed so tightly against hers, Muriel shivered. The look on his handsome face, with his clenched jaw, was so tense, so almost frightened, that it frightened her, as well.
“What’s wrong?” she asked, her voice soft and quavering with the fear she felt in him.
He shook his head. “It should be wrong,” he murmured. “But it feels so right...”
“What?”
“This,” he said, and he slid his hand from her back down to her hip. Then he rubbed the erection that was once more straining the fly of his jeans against her belly. “Us.”
“It is wrong,” she said. But she couldn’t deny that it felt right between them. There had never been an awkward moment, never any hesitation, never anything but passion. So much passion...
He shook his head again, as if he couldn’t accept it.
But he had to; she had to make him—and herself—see that this was wrong. “What would the bar association say if they learned you were trying to coerce me to withdraw my complaint against you?”
He tensed and a breath escaped his lips, as if she’d punched him. “Would you go to them and say that?”
She could. She’d once been so angry with him that she would have. But the passion between them, and the orgasms he’d given her, had eased some of her anger.
“I wasn’t trying to coerce you to lie to them,” he said. “I wouldn’t do that...”
And she was beginning to believe him.
“But you admitted that you want me to withdraw my complaint,” she reminded him.
“Yes, but I want you to withdraw it because you believe those memos were forged,” he said, “because you believe me.” And his dark eyes implored her to do just that.
She closed her eyes. She wanted to believe him. But she couldn’t. He’d pretty much told his friends that he was just playing her. So she couldn’t believe anything he said.
She shook her head now.
“Muriel...” His breath whispered across her earlobe as he lowered his head and nuzzled her neck. “Believe me.”
“I—I can’t,” she stammered, “any more than you can believe me.”
He groaned now and shifted against her again. “I don’t know what to believe anymore.”
She could understand that. “You don’t want to believe me,” she said. “Because then you’ll have to admit you were wrong.”
His brow furrowed. But he didn’t deny what she’d claimed. Instead, he lowered his head and brushed his mouth across hers in another of those soft kisses. If she hadn’t experienced it, she wouldn’t have thought him capable of such tenderness. But just as softly as he kissed her, his fingers slid down her cheek with a light caress.
“What are you doing?” she asked, her voice raspy as she struggled to breathe with the passion overwhelming her. “You have no reason to seduce me now. I’m not going to the bar association for you.” No matter how much pleasure he gave her.
But he must not have heard her because he continued to please her. His lips slid down her cheek to her neck, and he nuzzled it again, his breath hot against her skin.
She shivered as sensations raised through her. Then his lips were on her exposed shoulder. And she shivered again, but it was heat racing through her—straight to her core. Her nipples tightened, and a moan slipped through her lips.
His mouth moved to hers again, but the gentleness was gone. He kissed her deeply, hungrily. When he pulled away, she panted for breath.
Excitement filled her, making her skin tingle and her pulse pound like mad. Madness was what this was—this obsession that Ronan was becoming for her. It was a madness.
She’d lost her mind.
And her breath...
And her ability to think or move...
It was as if his touch paralyzed her. Her body was going so limp that she might have collapsed if he hadn’t lifted her up. This time he didn’t carry her far; he just put her on the edge of his tall desk.
He stripped off her clothes until she sat naked on his desk, atop whatever file he’d been reading when she’d walked into his office. So intent on whatever he was reading, he hadn’t even noticed her standing there.
But now he’d forgotten all about it. He was totally focused on her. He kissed and touched every inch of her skin, every part of her body.
His mouth moved to her mound, his tongue flicking across her clit. She arched off the desk and cried out as the pressure wound tightly inside her. She needed release, needed him. And suddenly the paralysis was over.
She reached for him, tugging at his clothes—tearing them off—until he was as naked as she was. With her on the tall desk, she was the perfect height for him.
She locked her legs around his waist, pulling him closer until he was as close as he could be. His body covered hers, and she was barely able to tell where she ended and he began. They moved together in a rhythm that was theirs alone, like their song.
It swelled to a crescendo, and they both shouted as they came. Her body shuddered and went limp again on the desk.
And his body began to shake, as if he was as overwhelmed as she was. He stared down at her, and she saw the fear again in his dark eyes.
He had been as overwhelmed as she was.
And she was overwhelmed. He made her feel so many things, pleasure most of all. No wonder she couldn’t get enough of him. No one else had ever given her such powerful orgasms, such strong releases.
He had a reputation for being an amazing lover. That was why his exes were so upset when he dumped them—because he left them wanting more.
Muriel understood that now. Because even though he’d just given her so much pleasure, she wanted so much more.
And now fear coursed through her. She scrambled down from the desk, knocking off that file as she did. She bent over to pick it up—but he was already there, grabbing up the papers and shoving them back into the manila folder.
So she reached for her clothes, instead. As she dressed, she watched him. He hadn’t dressed. He was naked and gorgeous and she wanted him all over again.
This obsession was dangerous, so dangerous that she was tempted to do what he wanted. She was tempted to go to the bar association and withdraw her complaint—even if she’d had every reason to file it.
And she had.
She couldn’t forget what he’d done to her in that courtroom and in the media. What he must have done...
No matter how much he denied it, he had to have encouraged those witnesses to perjure themselves. Or maybe she was just like him. She didn’t want to believe he might be telling the truth because then she would have to admit she had been wrong—about him, about people she’d once thought were her friends.
About everything...
Like maybe what she was beginning to feel for Ronan wasn’t just sex. Maybe there was something more between them than just attraction. Too scared to stay, she headed for the door the moment she was fully dressed again.
This time he didn’t stop her. He was too focused on that file again, as if he’d forgotten all about her.
That was what she needed to do: forget all about Ronan. They had no future. And because of their past, they never should have been together. She shouldn’t have let him touch her. Now she was worried that his touch was the only one she would want. She should have stuck with the vibrator. She didn’t have to worry about her mechanical lover betraying her like every other lover had.
Ronan had betrayed her even before he’d become her lover. She would never be able to trust him.