Chapter Six
Perched on a barstool at his counter, Spence scratched absent-mindedly behind Furgus’s ears and stared at the aerial photos of the proposed forest once again, mentally replacing some of the mixed conifers and deciduous trees with fruit-bearing ones. Apples, obviously. At least three varieties that would ripen at different times, to ensure a longer period of visits from those wishing to pick. A few pear trees thrown in for good measure. Boscs? No. Bartletts were more popular around here. Walnuts. Sugar maples to tap in season. And was there a spot protected enough to try some peach trees?
Peaches had been his dad’s favorite. Gord had spent years experimenting in their backyard, trying different varieties in different locations until he hit upon the right combination that could survive even the bitterest of central New York winters. Spence could still remember the hot August afternoon when his father picked his first ripe Reliance from their tree and ate it right there in the yard, juice running down his hands and dripping to the ground while he exclaimed over the flavor.
Definitely a memory to hold close.
As close as you held Bree the other day?
He closed his eyes and breathed out, steadying his pulse, which had developed an annoying tendency to race whenever he remembered those moments. Or when he smelled mint. Brushing his teeth had become an exercise in torture for the past few days.
Bree . . . he had never bought the whole Ice Maiden thing she had going, but yeah, a part of him had kind of thought, book worm, perpetual student, probably way more into theory than practice. Hell, he wouldn’t have been surprised if someone had told him that she was still a virgin. Now he would more likely be dismayed at the waste of all that hot potential.
He was personally going to make sure nobody planted any mint in the food forest.
“At least now I know she was worth all the wondering, right, Furg?”
Furgus wagged his tail. In agreement, Spence hoped.
He sighed and turned back to the photos.
“Enough. I had my curiosity satisfied. Time to remember that she’s not for me and I’m sure as hell not for her, even if I don’t have to worry about her being on her dad’s side. Back to the things that matter, right, boy? Like drainage and sunlight. And where to put paved paths for wheelchairs.” He sketched lightly over the photo with a pencil, then frowned. “And what the hell is missing here?”
Because there was no denying that something felt off. Like there was a big piece he’d overlooked.
“It should be good,” he said to Furgus while running through his mental checklist. “Fruit trees. Paths. Berry bushes. The green and the fruit and all the things that will draw people in, and yet . . .”
And yet.
He tapped the eraser end of his pencil against the photo, searching, trying to see beyond the pixels to the real thing. He imagined walking from the entry through to the apple trees at the center, an empty bag slung over his shoulder, Livvy and the kids laughing at his side. They marched down the path toward the center. Max darted away and grabbed something—a pine cone?—to whip at Emma, who rolled her eyes like the teenager she was, then scooped the cone from the ground and threw it back at him.
“Little shits,” he muttered, knowing that that was exactly what Livvy would say, repeating phrases he’d heard her utter a hundred times or more. Maybe if he channeled her words . . . “They have so much energy. I can’t keep up with them. They need to run. Better make sure they stay on the path. If they see the playground . . .”
The playground.
That was what was missing. Not that Max and Emma would be into it, not anymore, but there needed to be some fun, some goofiness, some whimsy. He’d been so caught up in making sure the forest would have a practical and aesthetic appeal that he’d completely forgotten to mention anything about it being fun.
A vision of candy cane toenails swam in his memory.
“Uh-uh. Not going there again.”
Except he kind of already had.
And he had a feeling that it was those totally unexpected toenails that had got him thinking about fun in the first place.
“Damn it, Furg. It was half a dozen kisses. You’d think I was fifteen all over again.”
Maybe that was the problem—the fact that he had known Bree for so long and still in some ways felt like an awkward teen when she was around. She knew him in ways other people didn’t, and it left him unsteady, not certain as to what he should do or say next. No matter how hard he tried to play it cool around her, his inner teenager kept popping up to remind him that he wasn’t nearly as badass as he wanted people to believe.
“Yet another reason why I need to walk away and put her out of my mind,” he told Furgus, who promptly lifted his leg and began licking himself. Just the visual Spence needed to drive away the memory of a flushed and pliant Bree.
For fuck’s sake. He needed to do something about this. He’d never been much for one-night stands, but he might have to try his luck, just so he wouldn’t have all this need building inside him. Nothing erased the memory of a woman like another woman, especially when the first woman was one that he shouldn’t be thinking about in the first place.
There was the plan. Write up his thoughts about adding fun so he could present them at the next meeting, then have a shower and head downtown to see if he could get lucky.
Which should have sounded a lot more exciting than it did.
“Forest,” he told himself firmly. “Fun. Playground. Badass.”
Was there such a thing as a badass playground?
He was pretty sure there was no such thing for kids.
He was also pretty sure that the adult version would look a whole lot like Bree Elias when she had just been thoroughly kissed.
* * *
Bree sat at her information table the day before the task force meeting, smiling and chatting up students and doing her perky damnedest to get them interested in the thought of the food forest. But while many expressed initial interest, most of them took a quick look at the brochures, started shuffling their feet, and then realized they were horribly late for something. In thirty minutes Bree had gained only three signatures. Two of them were from students in her classes who undoubtedly hoped that a signature on her form would translate into a higher final grade.
That wasn’t going to happen. But she was almost ready to start offering homework passes like in high school. Or maybe gold stars would be more appropriate?
It didn’t help that she was here alone, feeling her smile slip as time dragged on. It really didn’t help that Spence had sent out an e-mail yesterday letting the entire task force know that he alone had gathered a good quarter of the signatures they would need.
Funny. She hadn’t cared—much—that she hadn’t heard from him since the day of the greenhouse. Fine by her, she told herself. She wasn’t racing to contact him, either, and anyway, this gave her time to make some sense of what had happened. Though she wasn’t sure if she wanted to make sense of it or pretend that nothing had happened . . .
Kisses that had left her needy for days, followed by total radio silence? No problem. But flaunting his signature number in front of the entire task force? All of a sudden the mere thought of his name had her back in high school, busting ass to beat him once more.
It seemed some habits died harder than others.
Damn it. If she had to resort to homework passes, she would. It was bad enough that she had to face Spence with the memory of . . . that . . . still so fresh. But to face him with a blank page instead of student signatures?
Thank God a cute young thing chose that moment to wander up to the table.
“Hi there!” Bree had to remind herself to slow down and not overwhelm the kid as she launched into her talk. She shuffled papers and handed over the drawings and discussed university-town relationships and shared resources and bridge building.
The girl’s polite interest soon faded.
“It’s a good idea,” she said when Bree had to stop to breathe. “But, you know, what’s in it for us? You know, the students who are here right now? By the time this is done, we’ll all be gone.”
Which was exactly what Bree didn’t want to hear.
“How about the satisfaction of knowing you helped make things better for future students?”
The girl smiled awkwardly. “Yeah, that’s important and all, but it seems like an awful lot of mess and trouble before it happens. I mean, I live off campus now with my fiancé”—her stress on the word and the enthusiastic wiggle of a shiny ring on her left hand told Bree how new this situation was—“but when I was a freshman, I lived over here, in Dalton. And I had to walk right through this area to get to most of my classes.” She traced a line across the northern tip of the proposed layout. “I don’t think I would have been too excited to have to make a giant detour around this while it’s being built, you know? Especially at this time of year.”
Bree glanced from the window overlooking the snowy quad to the girl’s boots that had definitely been chosen for fashion, not functionality, and completely understood.
Altruism wasn’t going to work with this crowd. She needed something that would appeal on a different level.
“Okay. So help me out here. You say you like the idea.”
“In theory.”
“Right. But you don’t see any personal payoff for all the inconvenience and mess and hassle.”
“Not to mention the noise,” the girl added with a tap on her ear. “I mean, dorms are loud enough already. Add in all that construction equipment, and boom, it’s a nightmare, you know?”
“Understood. But how would it feel if, say, you came back for reunions and you got to walk through here and . . .”
She knew she had lost the girl even before the telltale shuffling began. Long-term wasn’t working, either.
Bree had a sudden appreciation for the challenges faced by the alumni office.
“I don’t know.” The girl placed the drawing back on the table. “I think it’s good, yeah, but maybe someplace else would be better. Someplace that wouldn’t cause so much trouble for students.”
As she pulled her hand back from the papers, sunlight broke through the window and bounced off the tiny rock on her hand. Bree squinted.
And inspiration hit.
“What if there was a place to hold weddings there?”
The girl, who had been shifting her backpack higher on her right shoulder in preparation for flight, stopped and looked at Bree.
“You mean like a chapel?”
“Not necessarily. There’s already a chapel on campus—”
“And it’s a pit,” the girl said. “No offense, but I know I wouldn’t want to get married there. It’s like, I know they have to keep it simple so it works for everybody, but it’s just a step above a doctor’s office. Nobody I know ever talks about getting married here. Too bad, because I know so many couples who met here and would love to come back for the ceremony.” She pulled the drawing closer. “But if you put something out there . . . in the middle of all those trees, maybe with lots of flowers all around . . .”
“Maybe a pavilion,” Bree said, warming to the idea. “Or a gazebo.”
“With plenty of room for people to mingle. And you’d need, I don’t know, someplace for chairs and stuff. Probably electricity.” The girl’s lips curved into the beginnings of a dreamy smile. “And twinkle lights hanging from the ceiling. Lots and lots of twinkle lights.”
There wasn’t a twinkle light in the world that could shine as bright as Bree’s revived hopes when she saw the girl scribble her name on the sign-up sheet.
* * *
Bree arrived early the next day for the task force meeting. She told herself she wanted to watch the other members as they arrived, to get a feel for how their work had gone over the past month, but she didn’t even try to pretend that she believed herself. The truth was, she wanted to watch Spence walk in. She wanted to be seated and alert when he caught sight of her so she could both gauge his reaction and be braced for her own. She wanted to know if the extra care she’d taken with her makeup that morning might have any impact on him, and whether she’d been wise or foolish to reject the top Jenna had once given her as a Get Lucky charm: a demure white see-through chiffon blouse, worn over a lacy camisole when she was in public, or over just a bra—or nothing at all—in private. It was all very proper with the cami in place, but at the last second Bree had opted against it. For one thing, it would be just her luck to have the department chair catch her wandering the halls in a top that was a barely disguised invitation.
For another, she really wasn’t sure if she wanted to be issuing an invitation at all. It didn’t seem like the smartest thing to do. And if Bree clung to anything, it was the knowledge that she was the smart one.
So, no chiffon. Today was all about business and making a good impression and focusing on the future. Since Spencer James played absolutely no part in that future, she needed to make sure the only signals she sent were of the buttoned-up variety. So she purposefully topped her sensible gray wool skirt with a soft pink twin set that practically screamed 1950. Between that and her glasses and the throwback little pearl brooch she pinned in the middle of the cardigan, she couldn’t look less inviting.
Unless, of course, he had a librarian fetish, in which case, she might well be screwed.
Which really shouldn’t have sounded so appealing.
Hands folded primly in front of her, she sat in her chair across from the door and greeted the other members as they arrived, sparing an extra few minutes to talk to Alice, because, hey. Not only did she like the woman, but chairs could be valuable references.
Future, she reminded herself. Focus on the future.
It was a great motto that went flying out the open door when Spence walked in. Wearing, of all things, a suit. Not just a sport jacket with coordinating pants, which was about as formal as everyone but the administrators got here at DeMotte, but the real-deal navy blue pinstripe. With a vest. And a baby blue tie that she was pretty sure would match his eyes if she allowed herself to look, which she wasn’t doing, nope, no way.
She couldn’t recall ever seeing him in formal wear before. It looked good on him.
Too good.
She kept her face as bland as her poker-loving aunt had drilled into her as he surveyed the table and then—oh crap—ignored the abundance of empty chairs to take the seat across from her. Because that was exactly what would make it easier for her to concentrate, of course. And it was guaranteed to make her forget the feel of him pressed against her, sinking his fingers into her shoulders and his hips against hers and his mouth deeper into her kiss.
Not.
Alice called the meeting to order. Pleasantries were exchanged. Updates were given. The good news was that between them all, they had garnered enough signatures to prove support from the general community.
“The university, though.” Alice shook her head. “Faculty and administration are well represented, but if we want to be sure we can lock in funding, we need to have a better response from the students.”
As if being directed by an unseen hand, all eyes turned to Bree.
Okay. She was ready for this.
“It’s interesting that you should mention that, Alice,” she said, and launched into a retelling of her interaction with the sweet young thing who had given her a clue. She never even glanced in Spence’s direction while she spoke, but she was more than aware of his laser-like focus while she talked. It was as if someone was sprinkling itching powder over her. Except it was more of a tingle than an itch, making all her receptors light up and spark and undoubtedly send out some replies of their own. Which really wasn’t a good idea.
Though she wasn’t exactly certain she wanted it to stop.
She finished up with her recommendation that plans be amended to include some kind of gathering place that could be used for community events as well as student or alumni weddings. Heads nodded. Approving murmurs rippled up and down the table.
She risked a glance at Spence. His poker face was even more impressive than Annie’s, and she was the undisputed Elias Poker Queen, the only one to ever bluff Margie to the ground. Bree wasn’t sure what might be behind that blank slate, but she knew one thing: only some serious emotions could require that kind of cover-up.
The question was, in which direction did they lie?
Spence cleared his throat and tapped his pen against the table. All heads swiveled in his direction.
“That’s interesting, Miss Elias.” He unbent enough to nod in her direction. “I had a similar thought the other day, but my inclination was to go in a different direction.”
With that, he pulled pictures from his briefcase and started talking about playgrounds and funky bridges and sculptures, items of whimsy that Bree had to admit would add a lightness to the plan. Part of her wanted to agree with him immediately.
The rest of her zipped straight down memory lane to English class and debates over the symbolism of the conch shell in Lord of the Flies. Debates that she had always been determined to win.
“That does sound appealing,” she said as soon as he finished. “But the issue is that we need to get more signatures from the students. Interesting as it would be to have frog sculptures scattered around the grounds, I don’t see how that’s going to encourage students to offer their support.”
“Have you talked to them about it?” Spence asked.
Bree blinked. “Of course not. This is the first time I’ve heard of it.”
His smile was entirely too smug. “Then you might not want to dismiss it so easily. You never know what kind of results you can get from an experiment.”
Oh God. She shouldn’t have worn pink. It added color to her face as it was, and with that little dig—which she knew damned well was a greenhouse reference—she was certain that she was now redder than Taylor Swift’s lips.
Not from embarrassment, though. Oh no.
“Well, Mr. James,” she said with all the sweetness she could muster. “I suggest an experiment of your own. Let’s have some drawings made up. Some with a space suitable for weddings, others with a playground. Take them to the student union and park yourself down there for a few hours and see which one garners you the most signatures.”
“Interesting proposition,” Spence said. “But you’re the expert in conducting experiments.” His smile was pure taunt. “Me, I’m more a man of action.”
What the hell was happening here? Was he teasing her? Trying to make a point? Trying to get under her skin?
The heat pooling in her nether regions made it abundantly clear that under her skin was winning her vote.
This was insane. She still wasn’t even sure she liked Spence. She certainly didn’t approve of his past, though, okay, maybe it was time to chalk that up to youthful idiocy. But no matter. She definitely shouldn’t be entertaining fantasies of wiping the grin off his face by stripping off her cardigan and tossing it across the table.
But damned if her fingers weren’t fiddling with the buttons anyway.
Mercy Rodrigues coughed nervously. “Is there any reason why we couldn’t have both those facilities? They both sound like great ideas to me.”
Fred Gettman jumped in. “I agree. I like both of them. Why can’t we see about incorporating both?”
“Because there’s not enough room.” Spence reclined somewhat, his arm hooked over the back of his chair like he owned it. “To make this a viable food forest instead of just a park, we need to keep the emphasis on food: fruit trees, nut trees, berry bushes. We have room for some open space. Probably enough for one or the other of these suggestions”—he paused, no doubt for dramatic effect—“but not both.”
This was so definitely a walk back into high school. The weird part, though, wasn’t how familiar it felt to spar with Spence again, or how easily she fell into old patterns—it was that this time around, she kind of liked it. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d been pushed to articulate and defend her proposals this way. Well, other than when she was defending her master’s thesis, and that had been such a formality that she had barely had time to get into her answers.
This, though—this was different. She liked this feeling of being pushed. To her surprise, she realized she’d missed it. It had been a long time since she had locked eyes with an opponent and sent out a telepathic order to bring it, but that was exactly how this felt. Add in the buzz of arousal that hitched up a notch every time she looked at him, and—
Bree’s mouth sagged. Was this why she had secretly enjoyed sparring with Spence back in school—why she had been so fixated on beating him? Because she had been attracted to him?
Note to self: go home and find your yearbook ASAP.
“Well,” she said, “it seems we’re at an impasse. I doubt anything needs to be decided today”—she glanced at Alice, who nodded—“but I, for one, would be very willing to experiment and evaluate the results.”
The bastard pulled a pack of Tic Tacs from his pocket and shook one loose, filling the air with the scent of mint.
Her nipples tightened.
“Are we wedded to this location?” someone asked. Bree should have known who, but it was difficult to focus, what with the way all her energy was being directed at holding Spence’s bait at bay. She felt as if she were the starship USS Enterprise and Captain Kirk had just ordered all power to be directed to the shields.
If Spence hadn’t been watching her every move, she would close her eyes. As it was, she forced herself to stay focused on Alice, making a show of following the conversation as people discussed other possible locations for the forest.
But inside, the Enterprise was shaking.
* * *
Spence wandered the unfamiliar halls with determined steps. Did he know what he was going to say once he found his destination? No. But winging it had brought him this far, and he wasn’t going to mess with that now.
He stopped outside an office, checking the number he’d looked up on his phone against the one on the open door. Success.
There were no voices coming from inside. That, he decided, was most definitely a sign.
He knocked on the door, walked in, and closed it before Bree even finished telling him to come in.
She stood behind a standard issue metal desk in a room barely big enough to allow a fully grown human to take more than two steps in a row. Her hand went to her throat. She started fondling those damned buttons again, and with that, he knew she was absolutely feeling it, too.
The only question now was what they planned to do about it. And when. And where, too, though at the moment, he wasn’t feeling particularly picky. In fact, if this place were bigger . . . though now that he looked, that uncluttered desk seemed pretty sturdy . . .
“Mr. James.” She raised her eyebrows. “I wish I could say I’m surprised, but the fact is, I’m not.”
It wasn’t what anyone would call a warm welcome, but at least she wasn’t playing the innocent card. Nor had she stopped playing with her buttons.
And unless he missed his guess, her sweater looked pointier in a couple of very strategic places. Highly encouraging, since the room was anything but chilly.
“It’s the strangest thing.” She leaned forward, palms braced on the flat of the desk. “We’re making progress, but there’s still a part of me that isn’t sure I want to be in the same room with you. And a part that can’t help but feel like I’m sixteen or seventeen all over again.”
“Seventeen looked good on you.” No lie. He’d hauled out his old yearbooks the other night to check out what he’d missed all those years ago. Freshman and sophomore years hadn’t been her friend, but something happened after then that had left him squinting at her junior-year photo and wondering how the hell he had been so blind.
She dipped her chin and turned a little pink. Not as much as she had in their meeting, but he’d definitely hit the target.
“Seventeen was a long time ago,” she said softly.
“Funny thing. When we were in that meeting, going back and forth and trying to score points off each other, it felt like it was just yesterday.”
“It did at that.” She leaned back against the windowless wall behind the desk, arms crossed, eying him as if she was assessing his ability to navigate a maze. “I wonder if that has something to do with our relationship back then. Perhaps we were so focused on being adversarial because it was safer than admitting that—”
“That we had the hots for each other?”
She scrunched her eyes closed but didn’t deny it.
“It’s an interesting theory,” she said softly.
It was the breathiness in her voice that clued him in. She was as turned on as he was. And he would wager all the money her father had bilked out of his that she was scared shitless by it. The whole experiment line in the greenhouse . . . the way she started spouting about theories and the past . . . it was her way of hiding. It was as if she was trying to remind herself she was an intellectual, an academic. Trying to remember that she was above things like the many pictures his imagination was throwing out right now, all of them starting with peeling that sweater off her one hot inch at a time.
“Here’s the thing about theories.” He took a couple of steps closer. “Unless you test them out, you’ll never know if they’re true.”
She blinked. Slowly, like she was processing her thoughts. Maybe her reactions. Whatever the reason, it left her looking just bemused enough that he knew he needed to get her truly confused, then truly certain, then truly desperate. As soon as possible.
“Bree.”
Her fingers froze on the buttons.
“I’m not going to pretend I understand this any more than you do. Probably less, since you’re the one who can read people’s minds and all that.”
Some of the steel snapped back into her spine. “I do not—”
“Right, I know. Figure of speech, okay? Let me rephrase. You have insights that not all of us would share.”
She glared at him over her glasses but didn’t dispute him.
“But just because I don’t understand something doesn’t mean it isn’t real. I mean, look. I work with plants all day, but do I really know how they grow, or what makes them start sprouting? Hell no. Some things just are. And the best I can hope for is that they’ll do their thing their way, and that it’ll turn out the way I planned.”
“And how do you hope this will turn out?”
He could tell her. He could describe everything he wanted to do to her, do with her, and he could do it with words that would leave her so weak with wanting that she’d be clinging to that damned desk like a lifeboat.
But personally, he’d always been a fan of his English teacher’s advice to show, not tell.
So instead of answering with words, he moved. Around the desk. Against her. Moving forward until they were toe to toe, eye to eye, longing to longing. But he didn’t touch her.
“Here’s how I hope it will turn out, Bree.” He kept his voice low, leaning close, speaking directly into her ear without making contact. “In about, oh, two, maybe three seconds, I’m going to take another step. I’m going to press you up against that wall and feel you against me, and I’m going to take off your glasses, and I’m going to kiss that little hollow at the base of your neck, and then I’m going to work my way up. Or maybe down.”
She swallowed hard. He grinned.
“If that’s not how you want things to turn out, Miss Elias, then I suggest you walk away now. Because I promise you this: if this unfolds the way I think it will, it won’t take long until you won’t be able to.”
“Won’t be able to what?”
“Walk away.”
At that, a disbelieving look came into her eyes. “Very sure of yourself, aren’t you, Mr. James?”
“Not at all.”
She blinked.
“I’m very sure of you.” He reached for her then, hands on her glasses, but before he could tug them away she had sidelined him with a kiss that seemed to come out of nowhere. Seriously. One second he was touching the metal of her frames and the next thing he knew, her thumbs were looped over his waistband and her mouth was on his and she was the one moving him backward, weakening him with those lips that seemed to know exactly how to throw him off rhythm, pushing him until he was the one braced against the wall and she was the one pressed against him and everything in him was rising to meet her more than halfway.
“You should never tell a woman that you know what she’s going to do,” she said against his mouth. He would have protested—his masculine pride seemed to demand it—but her hands were sliding across his rib cage and her knee was between his and she was wriggling against him in all the right places. And if the sounds slipping from her mouth were any clue, she was feeling pretty all right, too.
This was insane. But he couldn’t seem to stop.
Not when she kissed her way down his neck.
Not when his hands moved lower, cupping her curves and hauling her even closer.
Not when she leaned back, blinked, then grabbed his tie and tugged him while she stepped back. Though since his mouth was still firmly fastened on hers, it wasn’t like he had much choice. Or resistance.
She let go abruptly. He opened his eyes in time to see her reach back, push, and boost herself onto—a filing cabinet?
But then she reeled him in again and the only details he cared about were that she was kissing him and her skirt had hitched and she was pulling him between her knees and those legs that had called to him from their first meeting were wrapping around him.
The piece of his brain that wasn’t busy trying to get as close to her as possible immediately recognized the benefits of the filing cabinet. It boosted her to exactly the height he needed for maximum Oh Yeah. Almost better, it put the wall at her back. Meaning she had support. Meaning she could lean back against the wall and push up against him from the tip of that pointy sweater to the tilt of her hips.
To think he would have wasted time against a wall or trying to get to the desk.
With her secure and supported, his hands were free to roam, and roam they did. Up her sides. Down her curves. Settling on the exposed length of her thighs, pushing her skirt even higher, stroking with his thumbs and wishing to hell it was summer so he would be feeling skin instead of pantyhose.
Then she tilted farther back, pressing against him even harder, and he grinned against her neck. Because now he knew how to use this to his advantage.
“Do you know what I would be doing to you right now if you weren’t wearing these?” He skidded his fingers over the pantyhose while he whispered against the soft skin below her jaw. Her answer was to sink her fingers into his shoulder.
“I’d be doing this,” he said, and walked his fingers higher, nudging her skirt out of his way and letting his thumbs drag slowly behind the rest of his hand, running them against the inside of her thighs. She wriggled impatiently.
He laughed. Low, so she would know that while there was desire behind it, it wasn’t from any wish to make her feel bad. No. He wanted her feeling better than she had ever felt in her life.
She fisted her hands in his shirt and pulled him in closer, not that he’d thought that was possible. Her fingers were at his buttons now, sliding them open, sliding her hands over his undershirt, molding her palms to his ribs. He brought one hand to her sweater and ran his finger up and down the row of pearl buttons, lightly at first, then pressing harder with a flattened palm that brushed the slopes of her breasts and had her arching against him and making it almost impossible to breathe, let alone think enough to plan a seduction.
“All through that meeting,” he said. “I sat across from you and all I could do was count these buttons and wonder what would happen when I undid them.”
Her eyes flew open, first in some kind of surprise—hadn’t he made it clear that he’d been imagining undressing her all through the meeting? But when her expression shifted to something that looked like satisfaction, he got the feeling that he might be the one who’d been played.
“You wore this on purpose, didn’t you?”
“I might have been”—she kissed the edge of his jaw—“experimenting.”
He popped the top button. “Aren’t you supposed to get permission before you do experiments?”
“Paperwork.” She nuzzled his neck. “Forms.”
He bent enough to breathe against the tiny vee he’d exposed. His mouth was still on fabric, a little shirt thing she wore under the sweater, but her heat reached him anyway. He kissed her through the fabric while one hand worked the next button and the other glided down to her thigh. She jumped at his touch. Made a small noise that he was pretty sure could turn into the sweetest music he’d ever heard. Let her hands slide to the sides of his hips and tried to tug him even tighter while her legs opened wider.
“I don’t remember any paperwork.” He opened the button. “What happens when you don’t follow the proper procedures, Bree?”
She looked straight into his eyes. Her lips curved up.
“The experiment could be stopped.”
“Wrong answer.” Seriously wrong answer. Which was the only reason he slid his hand between the layers of sweater to run his finger over the firm tip of her breast.
“Sanctions?” It came out more of a gasp than a word, a plea more than a statement, and even though he knew this was lunacy, they were in an office, for Christ’s sake, the thought of Bree Elias being needy and uncertain for once did things to him that pushed sense far down the list of things he wanted at the moment.
Instead, he slid his hand higher up her leg and over some intriguing curves until he located the seam of those damned pantyhose.
“Sanctions,” he said, and let his finger slide slowly down the seam, following it down the curve and into the valley, slow and steady and strong enough to send her arching back, pushing against him. He drank in the sight of her, flushed and open, her mouth an O of need, and knew that all he had to do was grab the waist of those pantyhose and give one good yank, and they could make this old filing cabinet rock hard enough to create a whole new alphabet.
Except he couldn’t. Not yet. Not when there was something between them that was a lot more important than a wisp of fabric.
But neither could he leave her like this. Bad enough that he was going to walk around the rest of the day in agony. He couldn’t do that to her, too.
He shifted his hips. Back.
Glazed eyes flew open again. “Spence?” She blinked. Something like awareness began to return to her eyes.
God, he wanted her.
“Shhh,” he said, and without giving her time to anticipate, he moved. His lips locked on hers while the hand on her breast teased and the hand between her legs pressed as deep and as hard as he could through the fabric, there, again, and he knew he’d hit home when she tilted against his hand and gasped against his mouth and froze beneath him, one, two, then shuddered so hard that he was pretty sure that the files were going to need some serious rearranging after all.
For one second, they stayed that way, locked but not joined, her suddenly pliant, him aching in ways he hadn’t since he was a kid.
God, he hated it when his inner nice guy decided to step up.