“You want to say yes,” Cameron whispered.
Audrey pulled back and crossed her arms over her chest. “And then what?”
Um…Did she need him to spell it out for her? Surely she wasn’t that inexperienced.
“We have some seriously hot sex,” he answered.
Audrey glanced into the living room as though worried his mother and Piper would overhear. “Okay. Then what?”
Cameron opened his mouth, then shut it again. He blew out a breath and scrubbed a hand down his face. “Damn, Audrey. I don’t know.”
She jabbed him in the chest again. “See, that right there. That’s what I’m talking about.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” he demanded.
She rolled her eyes like he was completely daft. “The fact that you don’t know what would happen next. You wouldn’t even know what to do, would you?”
“How the hell would I?”
She came closer and got in his face. Why was she always doing that? “Because there is no next with you, is there?” He opened his mouth to argue, but she beat him to it. “And I’m not talking about a next time in bed, either.”
“I don’t know what you want from me, Audrey,” he said to her.
“I just want you to be honest,” she responded. “I want you to admit that what you want is the conquest. The chase, the mystery, or maybe another notch in your bedpost.”
He shook his head. “That’s not fair.”
“Oh, come on,” she went on. “You’re going to tell me that you don’t have a string of satisfied women strolling around town?” When he didn’t answer fast enough, Audrey pushed away from the counter. “That’s what I thought.”
He snagged her elbow before she could abandon him, needing to set her straight. “What bothers you more, Audrey?” he said in a low voice. “The fact that I have a string of satisfied women, or the fact that you’re not one of them?”
Her eyes flared at him, and her arm jerked. For a moment, Cameron thought she was going to hit him, knowing full well that he deserved it for being an ass. Again.
“You want me to be honest?” he went on. “Then you need to start being honest too.”
She opened her mouth, probably to argue, and Cameron tightened his grip on her elbow to snag her attention. “I need to hear you say you don’t want me.”
Her breath huffed out of flared nostrils, which matched her dilated pupils and the fluttering pulse at the base of her neck.
“On second thought, don’t answer that,” he decided. Then he lowered his head and slammed his mouth over hers.
Cameron wanted to shout in triumph when Audrey melted against him and parted her lips. She just knew what he wanted.
Smart girl.
Someone squealed, and Audrey jerked away from him as though they’d been caught necking behind the bleachers. Cameron had done his share of necking in various places, and none of those experiences came anywhere close to this.
Audrey touched her lower lip, and Cameron couldn’t help a sly grin at how her fingers trembled. He’d done that to her. Not some other bastard who didn’t appreciate how beautiful and responsive she was.
“You don’t impress me,” she told him.
Whaaaaat?
Cameron lifted a brow to mask the incredulity coursing through his system. His ass, he didn’t impress her.
“I’ve dated men like you my whole adult life,” she went on. “You’re all the same.”
He took a step toward her. “I doubt that.”
She chuckled, but it was void of humor. “Do you? Because so far you haven’t done anything to show me you’re any different from dozens of other men who are too good-looking and only care about having a good time.” Her gaze ran over him. “You get what you want; then you move on to the next willing woman.”
He continued his advance on her, keeping one eye on his mother and Piper, just to make sure they still had privacy. “I won’t deny I like women,” he told her. “I like the way they smell. I like the way their hips always fit perfectly against mine.” He allowed his gaze to travel down her body. “And I like how they feel beneath me in bed.” He savored the intake of her breath with a growing smile. “And yeah, I like to have a good time. I get what I want from a woman, and I move on because it suits me.” He lowered his head to her ear and gripped her waist with a firm palm. “I like sleeping around and have always done so because none of them were worth any staying power.” He nuzzled her ear with his nose, his grin widening when she gasped. “Do you understand what I’m telling you, Audrey?”
He pulled back to make sure she got his message loud and clear: that she could be that woman.
Fourteen
Audrey had to drink two cups of coffee that morning and had gone through the rest of her concealer. Even three days after Sunday dinner, she still wasn’t sleeping. Every time she closed her eyes, she felt Cam’s lips on hers. How his hand on the back of her head had almost brought her to tears. The man was good. Too damn good for her, and each time she succumbed to his charm, she was reminded why she’d made a vow to stay away from men like him.
Only she wasn’t sure she wanted to stay away from him anymore. The more she was around him, the more she fell into those deep blue eyes, the more her resolve continued to crumble. Only a thin layer was left after last Sunday. After he’d kissed her senseless, joked around with his mother, and played with that damn cat.
Cameron Shaw was a good man. It chapped Audrey’s ass to even admit that, because it had been his initial self-centeredness that had made it easy to stay away from him. But she
