by Anna Durand
Catriona MacTaggart turns my brain to jelly.
I try to grab the keys, but she snatches them away.
"You sneaked into my room," I say, "and nicked my keys. That's not a very Catriona-like thing to do."
"When will you get it through your head that I'm not an innocent grad student anymore?"
Before I can respond, she whirls around and breezes out of the house.
Since I seem to have no choice, I follow her.
Cat is already behind the wheel when I get into the car.
I fasten my seatbelt and glance at her sideways. "You've become a cat burglar. It seems appropriate, doesn't it?"
She laughs, starts up the engine, and roars down the driveway.
Chapter Eighteen
Catriona
Alex got flustered. Who knew that could happen? I'd never seen him that way before, and I have to admit I like it. Anything that knocks him off his axis has to be a good thing. I get bloody sick of his "maybe" this and "what if" that. I want him to tell me one true thing, without equivocation, before this day ends.
He wants to have breakfast at a fast-food restaurant via the drive-through. I nix that idea the instant he suggests it. Of course, he tries to change my mind. First, he uses his considerable charm in an attempt to sweet-talk me into agreeing to his idea. I pat his cheek and call him "an adorable lad," which makes him grimace. He switches to explaining that we can both get to work faster if we use the drive-through and eat in the car. I tell him that won't work for me, since I plan to order something decadent that drips with syrup and butter, and those sorts of foods require both hands and silverware.
Alex clenches his teeth.
His last-ditch attempt proves to be the hardest to resist. He slides a hand along my inner thigh, brushing the heel against my groin, and speaks in the deepest, sexiest voice imaginable. The devil himself couldn't sound hotter than Alex Thorne does when he tells me, "If we avail ourselves of the drive-through, I'll feed you every luscious bite of whatever you order. By the time I'm done, you'll beg me to fuck you in this car. While you're driving."
"Ye cannae fuck me while I'm driving. It's physically impossible."
I sound breathless and lustful, which doesn't help me resist him. Oh, he knows every little way to tease me and tempt me and make me give in to his demands. This time, I won't do it. I'm on a mission, and giving him what he wants does not suit my plans.
"Come on," he purrs in that silky, sexy, panty-melting voice, which only sounds better and more enticing because he's British. "You want it as much as I do."
Bod an Donais. I've never thought the British accent was arousing—never except with Alex. American women apparently love any Brit's voice, but I love only his.
He knows that. And he's using it against me, the bastard.
I have only one option to stop myself from giving in. I veer into the parking lot of an IHOP and shut off the engine. "We're eating here, Alex. At a restaurant. With other people all around us."
"But that's not what you really want."
"You expect me to deny that." I shove the door open and swing my feet down onto the asphalt. "Of course I want you. But that doesn't mean I'll give in every time you speak to me in your silky sex voice."
"My what?" He chuckles. "I have a sex voice, do I? You never mentioned that before. And it's a silky one too." He smirks. "Have you just shown me your Achilles heel? You know I'll have to exploit it at every opportunity." He leans toward me. "And I'll do it with my silky sex voice."
He speaks those words in that very voice.
I want to smack him, but I know that will only make him smugger, so I stick my tongue out at him instead.
And he chuckles.
"Breakfast, Alex. We will eat breakfast and go to work." I jump up, almost hitting my head on the car's roof, and duck down to aim a hard stare at him. "No matter how sexy your voice and your body are, I am not having a poke with you until I decide it's time."
I slam the door.
We have our breakfast, and he watches me with an amused expression while I consume the French toast, crepes, waffles, and pancakes I ordered. Not to mention the bacon and sausage. And the large glass of milk. Two large glasses, since I need a refill to finish off my breakfast. I don't actually eat all the food, so I get the rest of it to go.
Alex has no right to feel so smugly entertained by my eating habits. He ordered an enormous omelet with pancakes on the side, and after he finished that, he ordered buttermilk biscuits and gravy. I think he wound up eating more than I did, since he didn't have any leftovers to take home.
I let him drive the rest of the way to the campus, despite the way he'd chuckled when I dribbled syrup on my blouse. He'd laughed even more when I'd daubed water onto the fabric and sucked on it to get the syrup out.
As soon as he pulls into his assigned parking spot in the faculty lot, I jump out of the car and hurry away.
I swear I hear Alex chuckling again.
Oh aye, he knows every way to drive me insane—with lust, with annoyance, with complete frustration. I need a little time away from him to gather my wits and come up with a plan to drive him insane, so he'll finally confess his secrets to me.
After two hours of devising lesson plans, I've had enough. I walk to Alex's office, but his TA tells me Alex is at the museum. Aye, the man is hiding behind locked doors in a secure area he knows I don't have access to, that's how afraid he is of me. I take that as a good sign and do my job for the rest of the day.
I do occasionally call his office to check if he's there. He isn't. The man is still hiding. He even told his TA to handle the one class he has scheduled this afternoon, claiming he has urgent business to handle at the museum. Your bum's oot the windae again, Alex.
He also sends a car for me, to take me home. Alex Thorne, the best liar in the world who never flinches from a confrontation, is so frightened of me that he hired a car and a driver to take me back to Moirai House.
When I get there, his car is already parked in the driveway. I give my driver a tip and then hurry into the house to search for Alex. I don't see him, but I know where he's hiding this time. The door to his study is closed, and light creeps out underneath it.
I skulk up to the door, gently resting my ear on it. I hear nothing except the ticking of the clock that hangs on the wall in there.
"Alex," I say, knocking on the door, "I'm home. I'll make dinner, and I expect you to join me. Avoiding your roommate is rude, and it won't stop me. I'll hound you until your dying day, so you might as well come out and eat something."
The only response I receive is the ticking of the clock.
I get down on my hands and knees to peer under the door.
Ah-ha. I can see his feet under the desk.
Now that I have proof he's in there, I clamber to my feet and knock again. "Ye cannae hide forever, Alex. If you don't open this door in the next thirty seconds, I will come in there anyway."
A noise that might be a grunt is all the response I get.
"You are acting like a bairn, Alex."
The distinctive sound of papers rustling tells me he's doing something. Will he open the door? Or is he trying to distract himself by pretending to read papers on his desk? I count the seconds in my head.
When I've reached thirty, Alex still hasn't emerged.
"Have it your way," I say. "Donnae say I didn't warn you."
I rush upstairs to get my tools and change clothes.
Chapter Nineteen
Alex
Cat's footsteps recede, suggesting she's given up on convincing me to come out of my study. Do I believe she's given up? Not entirely. The woman is relentless in her determination to make me expose all my secrets to her, but that will never happen. I can stay in here as long as it takes for her to get tired of waiting for me to open the door.
I turn my chair sideways to the desk, facing the tall windows. The sunlight wanes as I stare at the green vines and the pale-pink flowers on the bus
hes. I relax into my chair, closing my eyes. Maybe this is a sort of meditation, but no one taught it to me, and I've never thought of it that way. I'm collecting my thoughts, sorting through them, and finding peace in the process. This has been my way for a long time, not just since Catriona decided to torment me.
She failed. I'm in here, and she's out there. Somewhere.
Doing what?
No more thinking about her. I take in a long breath, letting it out little by little, feeling the tension melt away.
Strange noises originate from the door. Ticking. Scratching. A click.
I will not open my eyes. It's probably a mouse. So I resume my relaxation routine, letting my mind drift into a state free of thoughts and worries and—
The door opens. I hear the click as the knob turns and feel the rush of cooler air from the hallway.
"Your stronghold has been breached," Cat says cheerfully.
What the bloody hell is she doing? How can she be cheerful about invading my private sanctum?
I sit there trying to ignore her, my eyes still closed, but one thought flares in my mind. How did she get in here? Since I know she wants me to look at her, I refuse to do it. With my eyes closed, I say in a disinterested tone, "How did you get through the door? I locked it."
Maybe that doesn't sound as disinterested as I'd hoped. Bollocks.
"Open your eyes and I'll tell you," she says, humor in her voice, like she can't wait to show me and have a jolly good laugh about how stupid I am.
"I can live without knowing the answer." I tip my chair back a touch, locking my hands over my belly. "Good night, Catriona."
Despite the fact I can't hear her moving, I sense she's coming closer. But that's ludicrous. I can't sense her. Logan's sisters might claim to have psychic powers, but I do not believe in that nonsense. I can smell Cat, though. The scent of cocoa butter wafts over me. Christ, she still uses the same body lotion after all these years? I remember the scent, and it makes every hair on my body stiffen and my cock start to harden too. She always used to slather that lotion all over herself when we got into bed, and I loved watching her smooth it over her legs.
On more than one occasion, I'd massaged that lotion into her flesh as foreplay. She loved that, and I loved taking her body afterward.
"If you don't look at me, Alex, you'll never know how I got inside your study."
"Doesn't matter." I want to know, want to look at her, and need it so badly that I'm squeezing my eyes shut to keep from opening them. I won't tell her that. So instead I say, "Go eat something or…whatever."
"No."
Christ, she won't go away until I look at her and listen to her explanation of how she so cleverly breached my study. I will pretend to be impressed, solely to get rid of her.
I open my eyes.
And almost choke on my own saliva.
She stands an arm's length away dressed in a black lace teddy. It's almost transparent, giving me a glimpse of her taut nipples and the hairs between her thighs. The teddy's slender straps leave her shoulders and most of her chest exposed.
She's virtually naked.
I rest my hands on the chair's arms, rocking gently like I don't give a toss about how sexy she looks or how good she smells. "Go on, tell me. How did you get inside this room?"
Cat grins. "I picked the lock."
For a moment, all I can do is stare at her. Catriona MacTaggart, the straitlaced lass who never exceeded the speed limit, knows how to pick a lock? She must be lying. She got into the room some other way.
"You're having me on," I say. "You don't know how to pick locks."
"My brother Aidan taught me how to do it. He used to lock himself out of his car so often that he asked Uncle Angus to teach him lock picking."
"Angus?"
"My cousin Iain's father. Angus used to be a petty criminal, though he only broke into the homes of rich scunners and only stole what he needed to keep his family fed."
"Well, if he did it for noble reasons…" I tip my head to the side, studying her with a new appreciation. "You actually picked the lock?"
"Aye."
"I thought the MacTaggarts were a bunch of puritanical prigs. Now it turns out you're a larcenous lot."
"Angus stopped being a thief years ago. He's reformed."
"Hmm." I rock the chair more vigorously, fascinated by this turn of events. Cat broke into my study. She knows how to pick locks. It makes me want her even more. "What's your plan now that you've done your cat burgling for the evening?"
"I haven't stolen anything." She smiles. "Yet."
"You stole my keys this morning. What will you take from me this evening?" The woman has already robbed me of my sanity. I probably shouldn't have asked the question.
"Nothing." She opens her hand to reveal a small, soft case that I'm sure holds her lock-picking tools. Setting that on the desk, she kneels in front of me. "I'm not taking anything. I'm giving you a chance to be honest with me, and I'll do whatever it takes to convince you to do that."
"Afraid I don't have time to play with you, Cat. I have work to do."
"You were asleep when I came in."
"No, I was thinking."
She pushes between my legs, forcing me to spread them, and lays her hands on my wrists where they rest on the chair's arms. "In a few minutes, ye willnae be thinking at all."
With her body so close to my cock, I can't disagree with her statement.
Keeping one hand on my left wrist, she reaches behind her and brings out a pair of—
"Handcuffs?" I say. "That's not the Cat I know."
"Maybe you don't know me as well as you thought." She slips the cuffs, which have fluffy pink padding, around my right wrist and closes them snugly without making them too tight. Then she secures the other cuff to the chair's arm. "Cannae have ye running away again."
I seem to have lost all control over my body, because I sit there like a statue while I watch in mute fascination as she pulls out another pair of pink handcuffs and secures my left wrist to the chair.
"Where did you get handcuffs?" I ask.
"There's an adult novelty store one block from the campus." She wriggles even closer, pushing my thighs further apart. "We drove by it this morning, but I guess you were too busy complaining about my driving and my choice of restaurant to notice."
I've lived in this area for several years, but I never noticed an adult store. How had I missed that?
"To be fair, though," she says, "the store doesn't look like much from the outside. It's called The Cave, which doesn't sound erotic."
Well, at least I'm not a blind moron. I do vaguely recall a place called The Cave, but I never went inside the store.
She snakes an arm behind her back again and brings out a clear plastic packet of what looks like some sort of multi-colored granules. I can't read the label on the packet.
"Have you got an arsenal in your knickers?" I ask.
"This is the last thing I hid back there. It was tucked inside my waistband, just like the handcuffs were."
I lean forward to peer down at the packet. "What is that? If you're going to drug me so I'll talk—"
"No, I wouldn't do that. Your confession needs to be your choice." She sets the packet on the desktop. "My method will be erotic, not coercive."
Her method. That sounds…like exactly the sort of thing I'd love under normal circumstances. But I can't have her breaking my will. My gut-spilling was an aberration, one that I will never repeat.
She plants a hand on the chair between my legs and pushes down so it's not tilting backward anymore. Then she sneaks a hand under the seat to lock it in place.
"I can roll my chair backward to get away from you," I say. "And what if you're not the only one who knows how to pick locks?"
Cat is the only one of us who can, but she doesn't know that.
She slides her hands up and down my thighs. "Try picking the locks with both your hands bound to the chair.
You won't escape from these cuffs." She scoots backward a little and turns my chair so it's facing away from the desk, then pushes it backward until it meets the obstacle. "I've got you right where I want you."
"This is lunacy, Cat. You resorting to sexual torture? Not convincing at all. What's your real plan?"
"Maybe I will torture you. Sexually."
She picks up the packet and tears it open with her teeth.
Now I can see the front of it and read the words emblazoned on the packaging: oral sex candy. What the…
Holding the packet between her teeth, she unhooks my belt and the button on my trousers. The intensity with which she focuses on the task turns me on even more. But when she drags my zipper down millimeter by millimeter, I get so hard I wonder if my cock could explode from the pressure.
"Stop this nonsense," I command her, though she pays no attention to what I've said. "You won't torture me with sex."
Her long, delicate fingers close around my cock and liberate it from my trousers.
"This is absurd, Cat."
With her head still bowed, she looks up at me through her lashes.
My cock throbs. Moisture beads on the crown, and I know I will explode any second if she doesn't stop what she's doing. But I can't speak to tell her to stop. I'm breathing so hard and so fast my head feels light. I have never gotten so sexually excited that I can't speak or breathe or think. It's nonsense.
But it feels incredible. The mystery of what she might do to me excites me more than anything or anyone ever has.
She keeps one hand on my cock while she plucks the packet from her teeth and pours some of the crystals into her tongue. Keeping her mouth open, she smiles.
A breath erupts out of me with such force it flutters her hair.
I try to roll my chair sideways, but her body blocks me from doing that. I am her prisoner.
She firms up her hold on the base of my cock and slides her mouth over the tip.
Tiny shocks explode on my flesh.
What is oral sex candy? It feels like a filthy version of those candies children like to eat, the ones that burst on their tongues.
She takes more of me into her mouth, setting off more tiny fireworks.
