“He has a good job, he’s divorced, and he has children. He’s not a dick.”
“That makes him sound like even more of a dick.” Logan turned fully around now to argue.
“He sounds like he’s responsible and willing to commit!” I felt my temper genuinely start to rise at his overprotectiveness.
“Really? Responsible? So who is looking after his bloody children while he’s out on a date with you?”
“I imagine his ex-wife is. He divorced her, Logan. He didn’t kill her.”
“No, of course not. Why kill her when he can keep her around as a glorified nanny while he fucks beautiful, impressionable women.” He gestured to me in irritation.
I was stunned silent for a moment.
There was an undercurrent of true anger under his ridiculousness, and I felt stifled by the way he saw me. I might as well have been Shannon for the proprietary way he was treating me and talking down to me.
“I am not impressionable!” I snapped, and hurried from the room. “You can see yourself out! I have a date to get ready for.”
If in the back of my mind I thought it strange that Colin had asked me out for drinks rather than dinner, I was determined to shove it aside and think he was just trying to make the whole first date thing more relaxing.
I should have listened to the back of my mind.
When I first saw him I thought him handsome, with his tall, dark, clean-cut good looks. Charming as well, as he stood up from the bar to shake my hand and press a kiss to my cheek. He smelled good too. He also couldn’t tear his eyes away from my cleavage.
And he did not look old enough to be a divorced father of two.
As I settled into a booth across from him with my glass of wine, I immediately said, “So Chloe tells me you have two children.”
He practically choked on a sip of his pint. “Excuse me?” He coughed into his hand, eyes bright with mirth.
Chloe was going to die as soon as I got my hands on her.
I gave Colin a strained smile. “Not divorced either, then?”
He shook his head, grinning. “What the hell kind of nonsense did Chloe tell you?”
“Please tell me your name is Colin.”
“My name is Colin and I work with Chloe, but I’ve never been married and I don’t have kids.”
What kind of game was my friend playing here?
“Your name is Grace, right?” he teased.
I stared into his warm brown eyes and found myself nodding. I didn’t know what Chloe was up to, but Colin seemed congenial enough. “I don’t know why she said those things.”
“Chloe has a weird sense of humor. She does tell me I’m the second work colleague of hers you’ve been on a date with though.”
I thought I detected something suggestive in his eyes and tone, but I shrugged it off, deciding I was paranoid. “It’s a large estate agency,” I joked.
He chuckled and nodded before leaning across the table. “This place is a bit pretentious. Why don’t we just cut to the chase and go back to my flat?”
I blinked at the suggestion. There was no denying the heat in his eyes. Apparently I wasn’t paranoid. “Pardon?”
“I mean I can buy you another drink if you want, but I just thought why waste some of the night, right?”
A few months ago I probably would have quelled my inner outrage, stuttered and blushed and somehow got myself out of the situation, apologizing like it was all my fault. Anything to avoid confronting the truth of it.
Therefore I could only blame Logan’s influence for forging past my fear of confrontation and asking straight out, “Are you telling me you’re only here on this date to get laid?”
Colin shrugged and nodded, like it was obvious. “Chloe knows I just like fun. Nothing serious. I’m sure she told you that… no?”
I grimaced. Yes, I was definitely going to kill her. “No. She did not.”
“So… this isn’t a hookup? You don’t want to go back to my place, then?”
Somehow I managed to refrain from throwing my drink in his face. He hadn’t even given me five minutes of conversation before deciding he wanted nothing more from me than a quick bang in the sack. As far as I was concerned, his way of doing things was just a glorified form of masturbation.
I gathered my purse and jacket and gave him a tight smile. “No. I’m afraid it would only be a disappointing experience for the two of us.” I stood up and stared down at him with a gleam in my eye. “I only enjoy the really dirty stuff, and I have to be able to know and trust a man before I’ll let him do absolutely anything he wants to me in bed.”
I sashayed out of the bar, leaving him staring after me with his mouth hanging open, and I laughed as I stepped out into the night air. I glanced back over my shoulder at the bar and shook my head, still grinning. I didn’t know what came over me in there, but I liked it.
Not enough to stop me from killing Chloe, however.
That momentary triumph of making Colin feel like he’d just missed out on something exciting dissipated as I walked home.
I was back at square one.
Chloe, in her infinite wisdom (not!) had put me there. Thinking about it, I realized exactly what she was up to. She had made it perfectly clear she thought Logan was the best candidate for me (as usual, not listening to a word I said) and had set about attempting to prove this by setting me up on another bad date.
All Chloe had done was proven that I could no longer trust her to help find me a decent date.
I’d barely put a step onto my landing when Logan’s door flew open. Staring at him wide-eyed, I waited for him to say something. Instead he just glowered at me. Still in a mood, I see.
“All right, then,” I said, and walked sedately over to my door. My heels made a helluva noise, echoing around the stairwell. It must have been what alerted Logan to my return.
“You’re early,” he grunted as I put my key in the lock.
“I am.”
“Why?”
I nearly jumped out of my skin at the sound of his voice at my ear. I glanced over my shoulder, and sure enough he was almost pressed against my back. “Just because. Dad.” Angry, I pushed open my door and stepped in, hoping he would take the hint and piss off.
I was to be disappointed.
Logan caught the door and ushered me inside. “Did he do something to you?”
“Where is Maia?” I said, as he shut my door behind him.
“She’s sleeping. I’ve locked her in.”
“Oh good,” I said, walking away from him. “If there’s a fire, at least her chances of escape are narrower.”
“She can unlock it from the inside,” he said through gritted teeth as he followed me into my kitchen.
“Logan, I am not in the mood for whatever this is.” I reached into my fridge for a bottle of wine.
The wine was promptly pulled out of my hands, and I grunted in annoyance as Logan set about opening the bottle and pouring me a glass. He slid the glass along the counter toward me with so much aggression I was lucky there was any wine left in it. “Speak,” he demanded.
I grabbed the glass and moved away from him so I could take a somewhat calming sip.
“Grace,” he warned.
My answer was a filthy look before I put the glass on the counter and started to unbutton my jacket. This was my house after all. I could make myself at home. “I don’t know if you realize this, Logan,” I snapped as I jerked open my buttons. “But I don’t actually have to tell you anything about my life.” I threw my coat at a stool that sat in the corner of the room and turned back for my glass.
The silence from Logan made me look at him.
His gaze was on my body, and I couldn’t quite work out what the sudden darkness in his eyes meant.
“Logan?”
“Is that what you wore?” he choked out. “For him.”
I glanced down at my dress. It symbolized all the hope I had been feeling about tonight and Colin, because it was the sexiest thing I had in my
wardrobe, and I didn’t wear it for just anyone. It was a black satin calf-length dress that fitted me like a second skin. It had thin straps and a sweetheart neckline that revealed more cleavage than any of my other dresses. I was wearing a sexy push-up bra that did wonderful things to my modest cleavage.
I’d pinned my hair up to show the dress off at its best.
Although it was far less revealing than the clothes I’d seen Logan’s women wearing, I suddenly felt quite exposed with him looking at me like that.
I blushed and took a swig of wine.
“Was he worth it?” He gestured to my dress with a look of angry distaste in his eyes.
My own temper rose in answer. “There’s nothing wrong with this dress.”
“Well, he could be in no doubt what you were offering when you turned up in it. So what the hell happened? Or was it the true definition of a quickie?”
I sucked in my breath, hurt. “Get out of my kitchen.”
He marched around the counter toward me. “Not before you tell me what that bastard did to you.”
“It’s none of your business. For the fifteen hundredth time.”
“I beg to fucking differ.” He stopped inches from me, towering over me, deliberately trying to intimidate me into answering.
I looked up at him, trying to shoot sparks at him with my eyes. “You’re being ridiculous. I am not your sister!”
Logan jerked back as if I’d hit him, surprise rounding his eyes. After a minute he said hoarsely, “Believe me, I know you are not my sister.”
What did that mean? I shivered under the heat of his regard and felt gooseflesh rise on the upper curves of my breasts. My nipples tightened against my bra. Trembling a little now, I skirted around him, putting some distance between us.
“I just want to know if he hurt you,” Logan said, no longer sounding angry.
“No, he didn’t.” I finished off my wine and turned, but I braced myself against the wall, unable to hold myself up against the confusion I felt.
The tension in the room was unbelievably thick, and I was starting to wonder if the sexual part of it on my side wasn’t just on my side. In fact, I was starting to wonder if the tension wasn’t entirely made up of sexual frustration, period.
I looked up at Logan from under my lashes. He’d turned to face me, but every muscle in his body seemed to be stretched taut. “No, he didn’t,” I repeated quietly. “But he was only after one thing.”
The muscle in his jaw ticked. “What did you do?”
“I told him I didn’t do one-night stands because when I went to bed with a man I wanted him to do whatever he wanted to me, and for that I needed to know and trust him.”
Logan’s face went blank. “You said what?” he asked flatly.
“I was being funny.” I shrugged, suddenly not feeling so funny anymore.
“Aye, well, I’d expect a phone call from him tomorrow. Saying shit like that to him, wearing that fucking dress…” He was angry again.
And like always, his anger ignited mine. “Why are you acting like a complete sod to me tonight?”
“Are you really that fucking clueless?” Logan shouted, wearing a look of disbelief.
“Apparently so!” I shouted back.
“Well, here’s a damn hint!”
I barely had time to blink at his yell before his body was pressing mine hard into the wall. He captured my wrists in his hands and pinned them, holding me completely captive. Breathing heavy, his face but an inch from mine, he stared down into my eyes and said hoarsely, “Tell me to get out, Grace.”
My skin was flushed. In fact, my whole body felt like flames were licking at every inch of it. I could feel my breasts swell up against the tight confines of my dress, and the tingling between my legs had increased to an insistent throb. I breathed Logan in, my breath hitching as I felt his erection. There was a pleasant flip in my lower belly, and I squeezed my legs tighter together at the rush of slickness between them.
“Grace.” His head dipped toward mine. “Tell me to leave.”
“No,” I whispered back, relaxing into the wall, and he melted into me with a groan. “I want you to stay.”
He looked into my eyes as if searching for the answer to something. “If I stay I’m going to fuck you.”
I trembled in reaction to his bluntness and licked my lips before I moved my feet, widening my legs so he could fit just right between them. His eyes flared at the movement, and I reached up so our lips brushed as I whispered, “I’m counting on it.”
CHAPTER 13
L
ogan MacLeod could kiss.
His lips were hot against my lips as his tongue slid against mine. Stubble from his beard scratched my skin as he deepened the kiss and ground his lower body against me. My nipples instantly hardened. I’d never been kissed like this before. With such voraciousness. Like he couldn’t get enough of me.
I let out a little gasp of excitement as he released my lips to trail his down my throat, traveling lower to the rise of my breasts. He squeezed my wrists as I arched against his mouth. In answer he released his hold on my hands and pulled back to stare into my flushed face. My skin felt inflamed and much too tight.
My lower belly flipped at the hunger in his heated gaze.
I’d never felt so wanted in my life.
And to be wanted by him…
“Logan,” I pleaded.
His eyes flared at my plea, and he slipped his fingers under the straps of my dress. With a deliberate slowness that had me panting, he lowered the straps of my dress, tugging on them until the front of it was bunched under my bra. He followed this by tugging my bra down to expose me. Cupping my breasts in his large hands, he stared into my eyes and gave me that sexy little smirk of his. His head descended, and I cried out as his mouth wrapped around my nipple. I reached for him, my arms curling around his neck, drawing him closer. I moaned, my head falling back against the kitchen wall as he licked and sucked and tormented before moving on to my other nipple. My senses were overwhelmed. His scent, his heat, his hardness, and strength. I was surrounded. I’d never felt this way before. Like I might burst out of my skin if he didn’t come inside of me.
I writhed against him, and Logan groaned against my breast, the sound reverberating through me deliciously. In answer he pressed his body deeper into mine and lifted his head to kiss me again. This kiss was harder, wetter, much more out of control. I instantly wrapped myself around him, and my fingers curled in the hair at the back of his neck as I licked and sucked and flicked my tongue against his, our kiss so deep I wasn’t aware of anything but him.
All I knew was that I wanted more and I wanted it now.
My hand slipped under his T-shirt, and I traced his hard stomach before sliding down inside his jeans.
He broke the kiss on a hiss, pressing into my hand as I tried to curl it around his erection against the constraining confinement of his jeans.
I pulled my hand out and began unzipping him. “I want you inside me,” I whispered hurriedly. “I need you.”
He gently brushed my hands away from his erection and slipped his own hand under my dress. As his fingertips trailed along my inner thigh, he asked against my mouth, “Are you ready for me, Grace?”
I nipped at his lower lip and sighed. “I’m so ready for you.”
“Fuck,” he groaned again, his fingers pushing under my knickers. “You are full of surprises.”
“Huh-uh?” I said on a whimper as he slid two fingers inside of me.
I pushed onto them.
He pulled back to stare into my eyes as he fucked me with his fingers. “I never thought you’d light up for the likes of me.”
I gasped, barely cognizant of what he was saying, as I clutched his arm, afraid he’d stop what he was doing to me.
“Jesus, you’re killing me.” His lips skimmed my jaw until his mouth stopped at my ear. “I’m going to fuck you until you see stars.”
I came around his fingers, my cries of release swallowed in hi
s kiss.
As I shuddered against him, I kissed him and sucked on his tongue. His answering growl spurred me on until it descended into the dirtiest kiss I’d ever experienced.
I felt his warm, rough hands on my outer thighs as they brushed my skin, pushing my dress up to my waist. Logan gripped the fabric of my knickers and tugged, and they slid down my legs. I kicked them away, not daring to break the kiss, and the sudden air between my legs increased the tingling need he was building in me again.
We both reached for his jeans, and we shoved them and his boxers down to his ankles, freeing him. Logan pulled back from the kiss, and I glanced down to check him out.
He was big.
Bigger than I’d had inside me before.
“Oh God,” I breathed.
Logan’s eyes darkened. “All for you, babe,” he said as he gripped my legs, spread them, and thrust up into me.
“Logan!” I cried out in pleasured pain, his throbbing heat overwhelming me. All of my focus was on the sensation of his thickness inside me, and I struggled for breath as my body tried to adjust and relax. Logan held still against me, breathing heavily, as though he was attempting to gain a little control.
I didn’t want control.
I wanted more. I pushed my hips against him and he eased me up against the wall so I could wrap my legs around him. It shifted him deeper inside me, and my fingers bit into his shoulders. “Logan!” I arched my head back, and Logan took it as an invitation.
His mouth tugged on my nipple, and my inner muscles clamped around his cock and snapped whatever control he was holding on to. He pounded us into the wall, thrusting into me hard, gliding in and out of me with increasing frenzy.
He lifted his head, and our eyes met as he kept his promise to fuck me hard. As he watched me, his eyes blackened. “Grace.” His voice was guttural. “I’m… close…” he panted.
At that I felt his thumb press down on my clit, and the combination of his cock inside of me and him rubbing my clit blew me apart. My release triggered his as my inner muscles rippled around his dick. Logan gritted his teeth, his eyes on me, his muscles strained, and he let out a deep belly grunt as his hips jerked against me in climax.