Page 23 of A Love So Sweet
Her fingers curled into his shirt and her lips curved up as she glanced toward her car. “I do have dessert.”
“I want you for dessert, but I’ll settle for more time with you.”
Her eyes widened, and she trapped her lower lip between her teeth.
“We’ll go slow, Max. I’m not going to hurt you, and I sure as heck don’t want to scare you.”
“You don’t scare me, and I believe with my whole heart that you won’t hurt me.”
After several more steamy kisses, Treat followed Max to her apartment. He parked beside her car and came around to help her out.
“I can’t believe I’m taking you into a one-bedroom apartment.”
“What do you mean? What’s wrong with that?” He grabbed the cake box and put his arm around Max as they crossed the parking lot.
“You own gorgeous resorts. I wish I could magically create a glamorous house for me to call my own, but…”
He stopped at the entrance to the building and swept her into his arm, balancing the cake box against his side. “You need to get over whatever is going on in that pretty head of yours.”
“My apartment is small,” she said apologetically.
He kissed the corner of her mouth. “I love small.”
“It’s not glamorous. It’s…utilitarian.”
He held her tighter. “I’m all about efficiency.”
“There’s nothing special about it.”
She swallowed hard as he set the box down and gathered her in his arms. Her breath was sweet and warm as he tilted her chin up so she had no choice but to look at him and said, “It’s yours. That makes it special.”
He covered her lips with his, and her keys dropped to the concrete. They both smiled into the kiss.
“I think we’d better get inside before you try to take advantage of me,” Treat teased.
They went up to her apartment, and he was aware of her watching him as he took in the secrets of her private world. Max’s home was exactly as he’d envisioned, meticulously tidy and beautifully put together, yet understated. The beige couch and overstuffed chair spoke of comfort and stability, just like Max. His gaze skimmed over the bar separating the cozy kitchen from the rest of the living space.
“It’s small, I know,” she said, “but—”
“It’s perfect,” he assured her, and it was. Just like her. “As much as I appreciate the finer things in life, I don’t get off on them the way other wealthy people do. My bungalow in Wellfleet is a testament to that. It isn’t much bigger than this. So, let’s both relax, Max. I’m with you, and if you lived in a tent it wouldn’t change the way I feel about you. I’m just a regular guy,” he said as they went into the kitchen and he set the cake on the counter.
Max took two plates from a cabinet. “If you call guys who look like Greek gods, smell like hot summer nights, and whose eyes scream of sinful promisesregular, then yeah, you’re just a regular guy.” She leaned against the counter looking painfully alluring, and slightly amused. “I’ve had exactly two males in my apartment before, and I’m pretty sure the Cub Scout selling popcorn with his mother didn’t count.”
“Please don’t tell me about the other guy,” he said under his breath. He opened the box and found a plastic fork standing upright in a half-eaten layer of cake. “My, my, my. What have we got here? You might think you don’t know what to do with a man like me in your apartment—and I assure you, I’m much more of a man than whoever the other guy was—but you sure know what to do with a chocolate cake.”
“Hey, don’t judge.” She laughed and carried the cake to the table. “A girl has to have her priorities straight. And the other guy was just a date. I knew exactly what to do with him, and I did it. I said goodbye at the door. But then you came into my life. You were just this deep voice over the phone, the owner of the resort where I was planning my boss’s wedding. You were a mystery, and after we spoke a few more times, you became a fantasy.” Her expression turned serious, and she said, “And then you walked into the room and my heart nearly stopped. For the first time in my life—in mylife, Treat—I couldn’t think straight.”
“I remember every second of the day we met,” he said as he closed the distance between them. “My first thought was,Where have you been hiding?”
She blushed, and he ran his fingers down her cheek.
“It’s the truth, Max. You were looking at me in the same way you have been since we came together again, like you wanted me but you were unsure. And from that very first second, when your cheeks flushed and you opened your mouth to speak but no words came, I was hooked. Danica had to introduce you, and I thought you were the sweetest, sexiest woman I’d ever met.” He took her hand in his and brushed his thumb over the back of it. “I remember how soft your skin was when I kissed your hand and how you looked shocked, as if no one had ever done that before.”
“No one had,” she confessed.
“That’s a shame, because a woman like you deserves to be treated like a lady.” He placed his hands on her hips and said, “A ladyanda lover.”
She inhaled a shaky breath.
