Can't Buy Me Love

by Rin Daniels

  Oh, man.

  A smudge of soot shadowed her jaw as she tucked that fringe of hair back behind her ear. The feeling that gripped him at that small, vulnerable gesture wasn’t anything as nice as relief.

  He cleared his throat. “Let’s get you cleaned up. Want a shower?” He shed his jacket, adding, “Come on in.”

  She hesitated. “My shoes.”

  “Leave them there,” he said, waving that way. “I’ll show you where you can relax.”

  He led her over the hardware floors, through the open-floor concept that he preferred. Modern structures were so much better than the closed-in mausoleums of the houses the old money of Sulla Valley preferred.

  She lagged too far behind him. Behave, he told himself sternly. He backtracked, took her hand in his, and tried not to push her against a wall and have his wicked way with her when she inhaled a quick, not at all silent breath.

  At least he managed to keep walking.

  “Do me a favor,” he said without looking at her. His fingers tightened over hers as he took the stairs. “Don’t do anything to make me any crazier.”

  She bit off a laugh. “Adam, I—”

  “I know,” he said over her, frustration thick in his throat. “I know, you’ve just had a really, really shitty night. That’s why I’m trying to be very good.”

  “What’s very good?” she asked him, and damn, if her voice didn’t drop an octave. “I’m not sure I want very good.”

  “Sort of good?”

  “Maybe that’s not good.”

  The stairs passed the second floor, and topped out directly in the master suite. He winced reflexively, but the housekeeper had come and gone—his usual clutter was nowhere to be seen.

  Bless efficient staff.

  Ignoring her sultry invite—and he’d have to be made out of stone not to hear it—he drew her up onto the landing, turned her around, and pointed to the bathroom door. “There,” he said gruffly. “That’s your end goal.”

  “Are you sure?” She looked back over her shoulder. Head tilted to meet his eyes.

  Her lips a breath away.

  He couldn’t help himself. He caught her jaw in one hand, held her still as he kissed the mouth she gave him—shuddered in barely restrained need as she opened her lips and invited him in.

  This was somewhat out of his league. He could admit that. The women he’d casually dated were the self-sufficient kind. The worst things they ever had to deal with was a broken shoe. Which Kat had already suffered, and then some.

  He hadn’t asked her about her salon. Not even when he’d screwed her senseless against the side of it.

  Regret touched his usually unassailable libido.

  Adam let her go, easing his mouth away with a sigh. “You smell like smoke,” he said softly.

  The skin around her eyes flinched.

  Smooth. He nudged her to the bathroom. “Let’s take care of that.”

  CHAPTER NINE

  SIX HOURS AGO, if Adam had called her up and said, “I have an idea, let’s turn my gorgeously appointed bathroom into a mini-spa for your exclusive use, and I’ll even wash your hair,” Kat would have laughed herself into fits.

  Now, as she sank deeper into the rich, foamy lather of bubbles and let Adam’s strong fingers drag over her scalp, smooth away knots built on knots, she could only sigh in sheer bliss.

  He sat on the porcelain edge, his slacks rolled up to his knees like some kind of business-class cabana boy, and bracketed her shoulders with his calves. The hair on his legs rasped pleasantly against her wet skin.

  The firm way he rubbed her scalp sent tingles from crown to toes, and then shot them right back up to hover pleasantly between her thighs.

  This. Felt. Marvelous.

  The candles he’d lit, the lights he’d turned dim, even the murmuring sounds of encouragement he made as he coaxed her head to one side was enough to make her forget, or at least bury, her problems for a while.

  Well, she didn’t cry, anyway.

  Without opening her eyes, she reached out a bubble-covered hand.

  The cool edges of a glass slipped into her grasp. “Madam,” he intoned, the very epitome of a movie star butler.

  She giggled against the rim before she remembered that high-class women probably didn’t blow bubbles into their expensive wines.

  She took a swallow. Rich, fruity. That was about all she knew about wine. Oh, and red.

  He took the glass back, set it down on the ledge beside him, and murmured, “Head back.”

  Kat obeyed, leaning back on her elbows. Adam’s breath caught. Then, with a muttered word, he eased his hand beneath her head and cradled it while he rinsed the suds from her hair.

  She cracked open an eye to find the bubbles had parted in front of her, baring a gleaming vee of pale skin. Her self tanner had faded, but Adam didn’t seem to mind, if the way his eyes fixed on her bare skin was any indication.

  Her mouth tilted up.

  Before he could issue his next command, she turned over in the tub, sloshing water up the sides—splattering his slacks. “Hey,” he began, then strangled on it as she pushed herself up onto her knees.

  Frothy white bubbles skimmed down her body. Iridescent soap shone in the candlelight.

  She felt sexy. Unstoppable.

  A shade desperate, but her distractions were few and far between, and she wanted as much of this one as she could get.

  Adam went still on the ledge, his feet braced on the tub floor like he’d push up and run away any second.

  Or maybe shove her over the edge of it, pin her there and rock her world—and maybe the claw-foot tub, too.

  The thought turned the tingling heat she’d reveled in to sparklers of anticipation.

  She licked her lips. “Hi.”

  “Hi,” he replied hoarsely. “You’re beautiful, Kat.”

  She grinned. “Would it be really weird of me to say that you are, too?”

  One dark eyebrow climbed. “I’ll have you know that I’m masculine,” he said, but his airy bravado rasped. “I’m the epitome of handsome, distinguished. Possibly,” he added, mouth twitching, “gorgeous. I am not beautiful.”

  “Details.” She caught the edge of the tub in both hands, just on the inside of his thighs. His still clothed thighs.

  Mildly damp thighs.

  Her lips pursed. “I know for a fact there’s a part of you that’s beautiful.”

  He laughed hoarsely. “I guess that’s a word for it.”

  “Mm.” Slowly, shedding bubbles, she flattened a hand on one thigh. Then the other.

  The material soaked up the water clinging to her skin.

  Adam’s shoulders tightened. “Is this a thing where you’re looking for a distraction?”

  She edged closer. Soap slipped off her breasts, eased down her arms. The muscles under her hands clenched. “What if it is?”

  “No problems here.” His simmering stare tracked a large blob of white foam as it slid down her chest. Caught on her nipple and clung. “I’m feeling kind of jealous of soap right now.”

  “Oh, poor baby,” she crooned, earning a sudden twitch of his eyebrow. His mouth, caught between a cringe and a smile, twisted. Then sealed when she closed the final space between them.

  Her breasts, wet and slick, leaned into his shirt, soaked it. The heat of his skin seared through the material. One hand spanned the small of her back.

  The other caught the back of her wet hair and held her still for his kiss—and it wasn’t much of a nice boy kiss. Exactly the way she liked it. He fused his mouth with hers, a low sound in his chest ratcheting her playful teasing into something sharper, harder.

  The water sloshed around her waist as she leaned into him, licked her way along his bottom lip and slipped into his mouth. His tongue touched hers, flicked and came back for more. She shivered.

  Adam drew back. “Stay,” he said firmly.

  She muffled a surprised laugh. “I’m not a dog.”

  “I feel like one,” he shot
back, leaning away from her. He stepped out of the tub, stripped out of his shirt. His skin was suntanned, probably more naturally than her methods. A sprinkling of light brown hair spread over his pectorals, arrowed down to a fine line that she couldn’t help but trace with her eyes.

  Her imagination.

  If she licked that path all the way down, she knew what she’d find—knew intimately what he tasted like.

  She hummed a low note of approval. Folding her arms on the ledge, she rested her chin on her forearms to watch him strip.

  His fingers hesitated over the waistband. “Can I help you?”

  Kat couldn’t help herself. But oh, God, could he help her. Her stomach fluttered, hope and longing and visceral pleasure, and her lips stretched into a hungry smile. “Yup.”

  His gaze seared into hers.

  She loved his eye color. In daylight, it made her think of warm things—chocolate and the color of a dappled horse and other happy-inducing things. In here, in the humidity of the bath and the glow of the candled, his eyes looked like pure gold. Like sex and heat and promise.

  When she didn’t look away, his hands moved. Slowly, deliberately, they pulled his belt-buckle loose, tugged his belt free. He dropped it beside the soaking wet shirt he’d discarded like it wasn’t expensive.

  Her gaze followed the coil of black leather. Also expensive.

  Everything in this bathroom spoke of money. Tasteful, elegant, and understated. She didn’t belong here. Adam Laramie wasn’t her world.

  But here she was, about to have him in her arms. About to let him into her body.

  A shiver raced down her spine.

  When the faint pop of a button echoed in the huge bathroom, her eyes snapped back to him. To his waist, the muscles there delineated by every breath. No matter what he said, his body was beautiful. Trim at the waist, sculpted to perfection.

  His slacks parted. Eased down his hips. He’d hooked black cotton with them, peeling it all off in one go.

  Yeah. That trail of hair went all the way down, to the gorgeous shape of his erection. She just couldn’t get enough.

  He kicked his clothing aside and prowled to the edge of the tub. His finger jutted out into a hard point. “Sit,” he said tightly.

  She wriggled. “Or?”

  “Or I bend you over this porcelain and make you scream,” he said softly.

  Not much of a stick. Hell of a carrot. She smiled slow and wicked.

  “Sit,” he said again, his voice lowering to a dangerous growl.

  Curiosity drove her to obey. Well, that and the simmering arousal every command plucked in her belly, between her legs. Like he had a dial right in to her nervous system and knew how to make it thrum.

  She stood. Water and soap slid down her skin.

  So did his gaze.

  “God,” he rasped, and his eyes narrowed. “Kat.”

  She sat. The porcelain was cold under her butt, hard against her thighs.

  He stepped into the water. Sank down to his knees. She stifled a moan of protest as the froth slipped over him, hiding his thighs, his erection, from her view. As she had to him, he edged between her knees.

  But he didn’t stop at flirting.

  Adam’s hands spanned her thighs, one in each palm. Cradling her gently, he loomed over her, caught her lips in a kiss that didn’t linger. “Thank you,” he breathed against her mouth.

  She tried for a casual ‘don’t mention it’, but couldn’t get past the first syllable.

  Not when his mouth touched her jaw. Slid over her neck. Nipped once, then licked a path to her clavicle. He ran his tongue over the fragile bones there, dipped into the hollow of her throat and tasted her suddenly pounding pulse.

  She gasped.

  His fingers splayed over her the outside of her thighs. Held her in place as he kissed the slope of her breast.

  Her head fell back.

  Adam flicked her nipple with his tongue. Caught it gently between his teeth and rolled his tongue over the sensitive flesh. She jumped, breath catching, a broken moan cracking as she laced her fingers in his hair.

  “Oh, God,” she managed. Barely. The feel of his lips around her nipple, the rasp of his five o’clock shadow sent pinpricks of light through her nerves. Slipped like a drug into her bloodstream and curled languid feelers through her body.

  His hands refused to move. They held her legs, cradled her gently, but she shifted, and they tightened, held her still.

  She arched her back.

  Adam obeyed her silent demand, opened his mouth and took as much of her breast into it as he could. Her body pulsed like a live wire.

  As he turned his attentions to the other, her hips shifted. Tilted subtly, silently pleading. One arm cradled his head, held him to her flesh, and Kat’s breath shortened to panting gasps as his abdomen rubbed against her sex.

  She closed her eyes.

  “Good girl,” he murmured against her skin. She shuddered. “Stay there.” He licked her navel. Paused over her shuddering belly and kissed her damp skin.

  She held her breath.

  The water sloshed in the tub, slapped against the porcelain as he shifted lower. As his mouth touched the skin she’d shaved bare again that morning. He breathed out.

  Kat grabbed the edge of the tub, her eyes flying open.

  His hands finally moved, slid up her thighs to cradle her hips. Holding her still, he met her gaze, gave her a smile made of sin, and dragged his tongue through the wet heat of her body.

  Her elbows wobbled.

  The water splashed, bubbles erupting into the air as Adam wrapped both arms around her legs, trapped her in place, and delved deeper into her body. Nuzzled the overly sensitized bead of her clit, and licked her like she was his dessert and screw dinner.

  Or maybe she was dinner, too.

  Kat’s laugh broke on a sob as he tightened one arm around her, freed the other to slide two fingers into her body. His tongue flicked her clit, his breath fanned over her wet, swollen flesh, and her hips tilted in response. Writhed.

  She rode his fingers like she wanted to ride his cock and he ignored her breathy cries, her wordless pleading, ignored the hand she wrapped in his hair and tugged with. Her body tightened around his fingers, opened for his mouth, until her thighs were wide and straining and she slammed both hands back on the porcelain before she fell off it.

  Her body stretched, tightened, thrummed like a, God, like a song, like a spring, like everything that promised untold violence at the end of an aching spiral. “Please!” she gasped.

  Adam’s mouth left her. His fingers crooked, dragged over her wet flesh, and she let out a long, shuddering breath that did nothing for her tension.

  He rose above her, stumbled out of the bathtub. “Shit,” he growled, knelt to fumble with his discarded pants.

  Condom. She laughed as he found it, tore it so far in half the rubber spilled into his hand.

  He didn’t even bother with gracious. Who needed it? He rolled the condom over his straining erection, snatched her off the edge of the tub and pulled her over his lap. Suddenly, she was straddling his naked lap, inches away from slamming his cock into her body.

  And then she wasn’t even that.

  He filled her in one thrust, hands hard at her waist, shoulders straining under her arms. The sound he made was something between a groan and a guttural growl of approval, and she wasn’t any better, crying out with so much relief and pleasure and want that he lifted her by the waist and pulled her down hard again.

  The way his erection naturally curved rasped the head of him across a spot that left her keening in seconds, panting for breath, sweaty and needy. “More,” she breathed. “More, Adam, more!”

  He didn’t seem to care that she couldn’t say anything else. She wanted to, wanted to tell him how much she loved his cock, how much he made her feel, how fucking amazing he was, but all she could pant was, “More.”

  He gave her more. Jaw tense, mouth shaped to a hard line, he guided her hips against his, too
k her weight and helped her ride him until cords popped in his neck from the strain and his eyes blazed with intensity she couldn’t hide from.

  Kat framed his face, sliding herself along him, reveling in the sound of flesh slapping against flesh as it echoed in the bathroom. She caught his mouth in a kiss that mingled their breath, their sweat; he swallowed her rising wail as her orgasm crested sharp and sweet and sudden. His arms banded around her, locked her hard against his shaft.

  Everything she’d wanted to hide—all the feelings she’d buried for five years, masked behind ice cream and teasing and her so sassy façade—welled up inside her. He threw his head back on a strangled grunt.

  Her body, her whole being, unraveled around him.

  “Adam.” She buried her face in the sweat-damp skin of his neck and couldn’t stop the words from tumbling out. “I love you.”

  * * *

  Adam cradled the back of her neck in one large hand, swallowing hard as her words reverberated in the bathroom—in his head. I love you.

  He shuddered against her, eyes closing as he fought to regain his breath.

  It wasn’t the first time he’d heard the words, not even the first time they’d come at him on the heels of sweat-slicked satisfaction. He’d heard them purred, gasped, said seriously over morning coffee—that one had been the worst.

  Words were cheap.

  Adam splayed a hand across her slick back, his thumb tucked against the edge of one shoulder blade, and couldn’t get a grip on himself.

  Three little words.

  They lodged somewhere in his chest, sharp and hot and tight.

  What the hell just happened?

  His heart thudded as Kat sank against his chest. Her head tucked under his chin, and she inhaled deeply. “Wow,” she exhaled, slow and sultry. “Just wow.”

  “Yeah.” Adam rested his cheek against her hair. It was starting to dry. Strands clung to his lips and jaw.

  One hand flattened against his abs. His muscles clenched. “Hey, Kat?”

  “Mm?” Her lips brushed against his skin.

  He eased out a slow, torturous breath. “One thing.”

  “What’s that?”