His breath had quickened as much as hers.
Was he going to kiss her? Or were they going to stand locked together like this for eternity? She wasn’t sure which she desired more. The anticipation was exquisite.
He lifted a hand to her cheek and dragged the pad of his thumb over her trembling lower lip.
“Where are you right now?” he asked softly. “Are you here in the moment with me or is that brain of yours off analyzing from afar?”
She was very much here with him. Every inch of her was more aware of his body and his presence than anything she’d ever experienced. His mouth was so close. She had not been calculating or analyzing their situation until he mentioned it, but now that he did…
Blast her luck.
Bryony swallowed. As much as she wanted him to kiss her, she could not let him do so. He would have no interest in trading kisses with the investor who refused to sell him his property. The moment would be ruined.
Worse, she liked him too much to allow her first kiss to be under false pretenses. She didn’t want him to be smitten by some mystery persona that didn’t truly exist. She wanted him to see her asBryony.
Her skin pricked with nervousness. She had kept her secrets for long enough. Come what may, she would not go another moment before telling the truth. She respected Max too much to keep him in the dark.
When he kissed her, if he ever did kiss her, she wanted it to be because he was truly choosingher.
Chapter 9
Max was frozen in time and place.
He hadn’t meant to touch her. Had been trying as hard as humanly possible to keep his eyes on his sums and not on the rosy plumpness of her lips, just begging to be kissed.
Struggling to keep his hands busied safely atop his desk and not buried deep in her hair. Or curved about her cheek so he could stroke her lower lip as he was doing now.
This was a mistake. An aberration. He devised plans and he stuck to the plan, and in no version of any of his plans was he pulling a strange woman into his arms in the back of his office before he’d secured the Cloven Hoof as fully his own.
But Bryony didn’t seem like a stranger. Or rather, he liked all the ways that she was strange.
She was smart, quick. She could sum columns in her head, backward and upside-down, but it was more than that. Her strong opinions were not meant to show off, but to improve the Cloven Hoof’s profitability and efficiency.
Some men might not find a shared affinity for one’s gambling den as romantic as Max, but of course those men’s entire future was not wrapped up in the success or failure of a single venture. A month ago, Bryony hadn’t known him, and yet her gut reaction was to help whenever possible. Because she cared.
Her ideas were sound and selfless. Her pockets did not depend on the price of his imported wines. How refreshing was that?
He still didn’t know what twist of fate had caused her to sneak into his establishment that first night, but he had looked forward to each visit ever since.
Here was an intelligent woman who chose to seek out his company time and again. Her genteel accent indicated her birth was higher than his, but Max wasn’t proposing marriage.
Indeed, he had vowed not to start a romance of any kind until he finally owned the deed and was able to turn the Cloven Hoof into twice the success that it already was, ensuring a stable future for his sister, himself, and his eventual wife.
That much hadn’t changed. But there was a vast difference between a romantic entanglement and a simple kiss, was there not?
What harm could come of lowering his mouth to Bryony’s just this once? She was so open, so honest. And he yearned to taste her lips.
One kiss. Nothing more. One kiss, and that would be the end. They would put out this impossible spark between them. One kiss, nothing more.
He stroked her cheek, hoping she could not see the battle within. He needed to concentrate on his business. Not on women. Not even on her. He could not risk allowing himself to be vulnerable.
And yet the harder he tried to push her from his mind, the more she filled his every waking thought. Now here she was, in his arms. Gazing up at him. Waiting for him to kiss her.
There was no sense fighting Fate.
He lowered his head until their breath mingled, giving her every opportunity to push away… Or pull him close.
“I’m the investor,” she blurted out just before his lips grazed hers.
