“I trust you. But-damn it! I wasn’t objecting to you because you’re a woman, Rosie. Well, yeah, it’s sort of because you’re a woman. Aw, hell, you’re reading this all wrong.”
“For all your bullshit about equal opportunities, it’s still just bullshit. You want to be a big macho he-man who guards the ‘little woman’ but God help you now it’s the other way around.”
“Rosie-Ms. Ramos-”
“I’ll stay until Chad can get someone else over here to replace me, but then I’m out of here. And not just this assignment but D.C. I refuse to work for someone who doesn’t respect my abilities. I’ll expect you to approve my transfer first thing in the morning. Because if you don’t, then I’ll file a lawsuit for sexual discrimination.” She stopped talking, the words clogging her throat. Oh Lord. Fifteen minutes ago, she was feeling so proud and now she was about to walk away from the job she loved.
“Goddamn it, I don’t want you to leave Hauberk, Rosie. I didn’t want you guardin’ me because I can’t guarantee I’ll be able to keep my hands off you!”
The breath whooshed from her lungs. Of all the excuses he could have given her, that was one she wasn’t expecting. A blast of heat, of desire, filled her veins, headed straight for her nipples, her pussy. “You-”
“You drive me crazy, woman!” Heavy hands landed on her shoulders, spun her around. “All you have to do is walk by and I get hard. I’m so hard right now it hurts.”
A glance down proved him correct.
Her traitorous eyes refused to return to his face, instead they sent a message to her knees to drop down to the floor, to her hands to cup him, caress him, free him. Her traitorous tongue flicked out and licked her upper lip in anticipation of taking that impressive erection into her mouth. Luckily enough, a part of her mind retained just enough control to override those urges.
“All I can think of is getting you out of those clothes and beneath me, Rosie. I know that you could slap me with a sexual harassment suit just for saying that. But it’s true.” He muttered something about the difficulty of herding cats-whatever the hell that meant-then moved closer, the heat from his body like a blast from a foundry. “I can tell when you’ve been in a room by the scent of your shampoo. That’s all it takes to stop my brain from workin’. Then my dick takes command.”
Just like her pussy heated and creamed whenever she smelled his aftershave. Or heard his deep chuckle floating through the office. Just like her breasts ached watching him roll his cigar between his fingers, wishing it was her nipples he was touching.
So why did her chest hurt hearing him say what she’d fantasized about for months? Because he was lying. For all his smooth words, he was trying to find some lame ass explanation to weasel out of having her as his lead op.
“That’s why I asked Chad not to assign you. Not because I don’t trust you to guard me. But because I don’t trust myself to leave you alone.” His voice dropped an octave. “I want you, Rosie. And not as my bodyguard.”
“I don’t…I don’t believe you.” Why wouldn’t her knees support her? What had happened to all the oxygen in the room?
“You want proof?” He pulled her until her breasts mashed into his chest. Before she knew it his lips were pressing against hers in a hard hungry kiss.
His tongue lightly stroked the seal of her lips. One of his hands cradled her head, holding her in place, his thumb toying with the skin below her ear, rhythmically stroking, calming her. His other hand kneaded her behind, pressing her against his erection. “Do you feel what you do to me? Do you believe I’m not lying when I say I want you?”
The hoarse entreaty melted all her objections like they were snowflakes at a Fourth of July barbeque. The moment she relaxed, he slipped his tongue between her lips. As he plundered deeper, he made a sound deep in his throat, of approval, of desire, of need. His hand dropped from her neck and slid to the front, brushing the side of her breast.
When his thumb flicked across one nipple, it was her turn to moan.
“Rosie,” he whispered. He moved the hand cupping her behind to between her thighs, his fingers stroking her clit through her jeans, setting off a firestorm of sensation. “Do you know how many times I’ve imagined going down on you, how I’ve wondered what your sweat cream tastes like? Did you know that after I watched you doing your stretches in the gym this morning I had to go back to my shower and pretended my cock was inside your pussy instead of my own palm.”
While her head was screaming to run, reminding her of the thousand ways this would come back and bite her in the ass, her hips arched into his touch.
She wasn’t aware he’d moved at all but she found herself laying down on the bed, with him kneeling over top of her just like she’d fantasized. Except this was real. She hoped it was because if it was a dream, her vibrator would need a new set of batteries by morning.
To her surprise, her blouse gapped open, exposing her lacy beige bra.
When had he undone her buttons?
He broke their kiss, his warm breath heating the side of her neck, the roughness of his beard abrading her skin. A tug at the clasp of her bra, and he exposed her breasts, their cinnamon nipples cinched into tight points.
“Baby, you’re so beautiful.” His tongue laved one, then the other in a tender stroke. Seconds later he latched onto one and pulled it into his mouth, suckling it deep.
This wasn’t supposed to be happening. She had to stop him. She had to… Oh, sweet Lord, it felt so good.
Her fingernails dug into his shoulders when his fingers unsnapped her jeans, drew them down over her hips. His fingers, long and blunt, snaked beneath the thin band of her thong and teased her labia apart, setting fire to her as her juices drenched him.
One finger penetrated, stroked deep inside her while he sucked harder on her breast. Another finger joined the first.
The hell on him stopping, she had to help him. She had to have him inside her. All of him.
He was murmuring now, telling her what he wanted to do to her, what he wanted her to do to him. Things she’d never before thought she’d wanted. Things she’d never considered. Things she now had to try. With him.
The heat built as his fingers pressed deeper, his thumb whisking over her clit. The room darkened as she squeezed her eyes shut, concentrated on the sensations building within her. She arched her back, moaning as he teased her, tormented her by bringing her to the edge before slowing his movements, taking away the precipice she wanted to plunge over.
“Please.”
His lips left her breast and feathered over her stomach. They lingered on the spot right above the thin patch of hair before tasting first one hip, then the other. Her breath left her in a rush when his lips fastened onto the spot his thumb had been avoiding. His teeth rasped over her sensitive clit, his tongue licking on either side. Slow and then fast. Her body tensed as everything focused on where he touched her, inside and out.
“So sweet, just like I knew you’d be.” His words set a vibration through her tissues that rebounded until they touched the aching spot teased by his fingers.
She pushed his head back down and changed her “please” from a request to a demand.
Whether he touched her with his tongue or his thumb she never knew but the full body orgasm that erupted drove her breath from her and sent every muscle quivering.
She drifted off the bed, out of the room, floated high in the sky, among the stars that exploded on the back of her eyelids and left her to flutter back down to the soft silken covers beneath her.
Chapter Eight
Rosie’s sigh as her body relaxed was a soft caress and a damning slap to Sam’s conscience.
“Damn.” He retreated several steps, one broad hand splayed over his temple briefly before dropping it. “God damn, I’m sorry, Rosie. I didn’t mean to take it that far.”
Her eyes shot open and with a look of horror on her face, Rosie grabbed the pillow and covered herself as she
