She laughed out loud, sucking in a breath when he licked one thrusting nipple and drew it into his mouth. The areola tightened and throbbed. ‘Yes, but do you have seven different settings?’ she demanded on a breathless sigh.
He blew softly on her aching nipple, lifting his head when she groaned. The confidence in his gaze was as arousing as the expert stroke of his fingertips on the slick wet flesh between her thighs. ‘Sugar, when you’re as good as I am, you only need the one.’
She was still laughing as he stroked her over the edge.
TWELVE
In the blissful days that followed, Gina worked hard to create a magnificent new website and excellent media strategy for the Price Paper Consortium. She worked even harder at fulfilling every prurient sexual fantasy she had ever had about the consortium’s CEO. And harder still at ensuring her emotions didn’t get in the way of the good time she was having, and the even better sex.
But as the days passed a hitch appeared in her plan that involved an unfortunate discovery. Carter Price was as irresistible out of bed as he was in it.
And if she didn’t know better, she could have sworn he had orchestrated that giddy glide into romance, almost as carefully as he had orchestrated their red-hot ride into lust.
Why else would he have organised an evening watching classic Hollywood movies at the retro cinema a ten-minute walk from his home—and then made her heart flip-flop by necking with her in the back row? Why else would he have insisted on holding her hand during their lazy afternoon stroll through the redevelopment of trinket shops and parkland on River Street? Or whispered wicked suggestions in her ear to make her laugh as they browsed the antiquarian delights in a dusty basement bookshop?
Even at the mill, where she insisted on them maintaining a respectable distance in front of his employees, his sharp, insightful and always enthusiastic comments about her ideas had become as seductive as all those casually possessive gestures and throwaway displays of affection. She felt as if she’d been caught in the silken web of his friendship—become a prisoner to all that charm and charisma and affability, powerless to resist the steely determination that lurked beneath.
Dating Carter Price was certainly unlike any of her other dating experiences—which, although not nearly as prolific as most people believed, fell into two distinct categories: the standard ‘hot, short and sweet’, or, on those rare occasions when she didn’t end the affair soon enough, ‘hot, short and not-so-sweet’. Carter should have fallen easily into the first category. That had been the plan. But he wasn’t hot, he was scorching, and as the day approached when she would have to leave Savannah and return to her single life ‘short and sweet’ was becoming ‘short and potentially sticky’. Sticky in a way that confused and disturbed her, because the single life she loved was starting to seem boring and even a little lonely simply because it wouldn’t have Carter in it.
Gina stretched limbs pleasantly sore from the night-time’s activities and rolled onto her side to contemplate the man lying next to her in the generous tester bed—and all the reasons why their fling was starting to bother her.
She frowned. And that was another thing. They’d relocated to his palatial bedroom in the main house after their first night at the pool house, Carter insisting that the queen bed was way too cramped for them to explore each other properly. Given the scope of exploration he’d had in mind—which even she, with her suitably filthy mind, hadn’t anticipated—she had to concede he’d had a point. And staying in his room, with its solid, intricately carved mahogany furniture and the wide French doors that opened onto a charming balcony overlooking the square, hadn’t exactly been a chore.
But as the morning sun streamed in, illuminating the handsome face that had captivated her a decade ago, she also had to concede that moving into the main house was just another in a long line of concessions she’d agreed to without putting up much of a fight. Right from the moment he’d looked at her across the bar in The Standard Hotel with that dangerous allure in his eyes, she’d been giving in to him over and over again—and that was bothering her too, almost as much as her reluctance to walk away from him in a few days time.
She searched his face for clues as to how he’d managed to slip under her guard—and make her crave his attention. She studied the dark brows, that tempting dent in his chin and the small creases of amusement at the edge of his mouth that he wore even in sleep. She blew out an unsteady breath. No wonder she was captivated—and behaving like a rabbit caught in the headlights of an oncoming freight train. The man was a total studmuffin, just as Reese had described him—and that was without even factoring in the effect of those killer blue eyes that could tempt a saint into fornication when he was awake.
He shifted in his sleep, mumbling something before a heavy hand came to rest on her hip. An errant curl of dark hair fell across his forehead. She smoothed it off again with a fingernail and his eyelids snapped opened. She snatched her hand back. Too late. She was already trapped in that penetrating blue gaze.
‘Hey there,’ he growled. His fingers tightened on her hip and he eased her closer, the familiar morning cuddle something she’d got too accustomed to as well. ‘How you feeling, this bright and beautiful morning, Miss Gina?’
Not as safe as I’d hoped. Why do you have to be so irresistible, Carter Price?
Swallowing down the solid object lodged in her throat, she lifted the sheet to inspect the equally solid object nudging her belly. ‘Not as perky as you, obviously.’
He yawned, and stretched through a rumble of self-satisfied laughter. ‘Well now, sugar. That’s just a natural male reaction to waking up beside a beautiful...’ The suggestive comment drifted to a halt as he squinted into the sunlight, then jerked into a sitting position and thrust a hand through his hair. ‘Damn it, what time is it?’
‘About ten, at a conservative estimate.’
He swore, whipped back the sheet and jumped out of bed, protective hands cupping his morning erection as he raced to the dresser.
‘What’s the matter?’ She sat up, hugging the sheet to her bosom, and smiled, his panicked antics dissolving the tightness in her throat.
Honestly, what on earth was she worrying about? She’d be leaving soon and, while it might be a bit more of a wrench than she’d anticipated, nothing would make her change that. Of course she felt drawn to him, in a way she hadn’t with other men, because they had a past. But that didn’t mean they had a future.
‘It’s the weekend today,’ she supplied.
‘It’s Sunday,’ he declared, as if that explained everything. He dug out a pair of boxers and hopped across the room while shoving a foot into them—nearly falling over en route to the wardrobe. The resultant muttered curse elicited a chuckle from her ringside seat on the bed.
‘As much as I’m enjoying the show,’ she said, the now familiar giggles floating out as he yanked a perfectly pressed white linen shirt out of the wardrobe, ‘isn’t it bad karma to be swearing like that on a Sund
ay?’
He swung round, buttoning the shirt. ‘Very funny.’ Strolling back to the bed, he tugged the sheet out of her hands, his eyes glittering with retribution.
‘Hey,’ she protested, only to have the sheet flipped off entirely.
‘No need to look so smug, Miss Gina. Because you’re coming with me.’