Page 97 of Boss of the Year
His eyes met mine, and what I saw there was so dark, so full of want and self-recrimination, that it took my breath away.
The hands at my breasts squeezed lightly, then moved back down my body, pulling me flush against him before he kissed me again, this time slowly, achingly, and so long I was as limp as a silk ribbon in his arms, moaning into his mouth before it was done.
When he released me, he pressed his forehead to mine.
“When you ask me for that, Marie,” he said, “there won’t be any ‘maybe’ about it. You’ll be torn up with need, swamped in your own pleasure, whimpering for my dick after I’ve made you come so many times you’ll have forgotten your own fucking name.” He took my chin and forced me to look at him. “I’ll have you like that, sweetheart, or I don’t deserve to have you at all.”
We stood there, mouth to mouth, body to body, not moving while a breeze whistled around us and my heart thundered for more.
I opened my mouth to answer him.
To tell him there were no more maybes in my voice or my mind.
That if he wanted me to beg, I’d get down on my knees in the rice paddies, right here, right now.
But before I could say a word, a loud buzzing interrupted us.
My phone.
Lucas took one more deep breath, then released me against the wall and stepped away. “You’d better get that.”
Had I?I wanted to ask, but I retrieved my phone from my purse.
A text from Daniel was waiting.
Thinking about you, gorgeous.
That was all.
No questions. No calls. No wondering what I was doing or sharing any other parts of his day either, or even acknowledging the fact that I had called twice and left him a message hours earlier.
Just thinking of me.
It didn’t seem like nearly enough.
With Lucas’s kiss still burning on my lips, it didn’t seem like anything at all.
When I started working for the Lyonses, Daniel received a new car for his high school graduation, a beautiful Ferrari that gleamed like a fire engine in the summer sun.
For two weeks, he drove that car everywhere. Told every staff member and anyone who would listen about the custom paint job, the chrome wheels, the leather seats, and the one-of-a-kind engine.
Then Lucas showed up with a car of his own, a staid black Mercedes S-Class that barely made a sound when it moved, had tinted, bulletproof windows, and purred like a kitten with the power of a tank. Daniel took one look at the Mercedes and decided the Ferrari was trash.
As far as I knew, Lucas still had Lawrence drive him to work every day in that Mercedes. Sometimes the Rolls his father preferred. But Daniel’s Ferrari was gone, along with the many other cars that had followed in its wake.
For a split second, I wondered if Daniel knew I was here, pressed to a shed with the wet print of his brother’s mouth still cooling on my neck.
Did that make me the Ferrari or the Mercedes?
And did he really want either of them at all?
“Call him,” Lucas suggested as he turned back to the path. “Go ahead.”
I looked at my phone, then back up at him. “But don’t you think?—”
“It’s fine.” His voice returned to its usual controlled tone as he gave me space to fix my clothing. “It’s like you said—pleasure for pleasure’s sake. Nothing more.” When his eyes found mine again, they were kind, if somewhat more distant. “It’s okay, Marie. Really.”
It wasn’t fine. He knew it, and I knew it. But neither of us was going to say it out loud.
