“Okay, all right, okay. But you have to admit you’re being a little petty. He probably feels terrible and maybe even a little creepy. There’s no telling what’s going through his mind, and you’re not giving him an opportunity to talk about what happened.”
Cassie really hated that Sasha was being logical. But how could Cassie face Ian now? It wasn’t as if she carefully orchestrated a seduction to pull him in with a sultry feminine show meant to fire him up. Nope, she just dropped her drawers and went at it. No teasing, tempting play. And working a man up into a frenzy was the best part. Well, one of the best parts. Cassie loved it when a man lost control and exerted his carnal, basic instincts. She didn’t want a knuckle-dragging Neanderthal, but there was something to be said for a man’s primitive reaction to a woman. The fact that Ian didn’t hold back was sexy as hell.
And how could she tell him she was both embarrassed and turned-on by what had happened? He’d think she was a total freak. A total flaky freak who didn’t know what she wanted.
“I know you’re right, Sasha. I’m going to eat some dinner and then respond to his email about the project. I’d rather touch base tonight than tomorrow.”
“Good idea. Let me know how it goes.”
Cassie rang off and ordered pizza while she read over the work Ian had done and contemplated her response. After the pizza arrived and she gorged herself on yummy pepperoni goodness, she took the bull by the horns and sent him a response, mentioning how great of a job he had done and that she’d get started on the white paper tomorrow since he was tackling the test plan. She was in the middle of talking herself into taking a much-needed shower—she’d skipped one this morning because she was too hungover to get out of bed—when her phone rang. She grabbed the receiver and sighed when she saw Ian’s name. His emails were sent to his BlackBerry, so he’d have known she was working. It wasn’t as if she could keep avoiding him. Besides, she’d rather have this conversation away from the prying ears lurking around cubicle land.
“Hello.” She was proud of how relaxed she actually sounded.
“Hi, Cassie. It’s Ian. I think it’s a great idea to get started on the white paper. I hadn’t actually thought about that yet.” He sounded like his regular, professional self, and she felt a little more at ease. “I, er, talked to the lead developer again after I sent you the status update, and he seems pretty confident that it’ll be ready for us to test in a couple of days.”
“Good.”
Uncomfortable silence. One second turned into two, three, four.
“I’m sorry,” he breathed.
Cassie shut her eyes. His tone was beyond apologetic. It was tortured.
“It’s not your fault, Ian. If I was too drunk to realize I hadn’t disconnected our call, then you deserved the little show you got.” She shook her head, playing with the imaginary lint on her pajama bottoms.
“No. I took advantage of the situation. That was not cool. I-I…shit, Cassie,” he sighed, and she could imagine he looked just as frustrated as he sounded. “I knew it was wrong, but I couldn’t stop myself. The thing is I told myself you might’ve known I was watching and you were doing it on purpose. Granted it was a very, very small part of me that had hoped that while the rest of me was screaming to disconnect, but if there was even the slightest possibility you wanted me with you when you…then I wanted to share it with you,” he whispered the last part.
He wanted to share it with her? Not just get off too? What was he saying?
“Look, we’d both been drinking—”
“I’d have done that with you cold-stone sober. Seeing your beautiful body was a very sobering experience anyway.”
How she could manage to blush from his words after what had happened last night, she didn’t understand, but that was definitely happening. Her face felt inflamed, and her hands started trembling. There was no way the west coast hottie could think she was beautiful. Sure, she’d had her fair share of admirers and felt pretty good about her looks. But feeling pretty good about looks was a far cry from thinking she could turn this sex god’s head when his sobriety wasn’t in question.
So why was she melting, slinking onto the bed with thoughts of what that hunk of man could do to her? She shouldn’t encourage this. She really shouldn’t…
“Is that so?” she breathed. So much for being smart about this.
A low groan filtered through the phone. “God, yes.”
“Yes, you’d have done that anyway, or yes, you think I’m beautiful?”
“Both,” he answered without hesitation.
She didn’t want to focus on the comment about her looks. She felt as if she’d be fishing for compliments if she asked him to explain. Besides, he could just be flattering her to ease his conscience. But she could definitely get the skinny on the other. “So you’ve had internet sex before?” She laughed at the thought of what they’d essentially done.
He chuckled. “Actually, I can’t say that I have.”
“Oh, we were both internet sex virgins, then.”
He laughed louder. “I haven’t been an anything virgin in a long time.”
“So you’ve done everything else already?” Cassie couldn’t seem to pull her decorum back from the gutter from where she’d dumped it.
“Define ‘everything else’,” he said cautiously.
“Oh no, my response might show too much of my dark side before I’m ready.” Plus he might think she was weak if she told him about the experience that came to mind—the time she submitted sexually to a man. It wasn’t a way of life for her, but it sure was fun to try, an experience she’d loved that she would be willing to do again with the right man. “How ’bout you tell me the kinkiest thing you’ve done.”
“Hmmm. You want me to
