I watched the city roll by as we drove, now and then stealing glances at the man sitting beside me, studying his handsome profile: the perfectly straight nose, full lips, and sculpted chin. The man was so damn beautiful it almost hurt. Black ink edged his angular jawline and past the nape of his neck, adding to his sex appeal.
Good girl.
Those two words had shaken me, stolen my breath, and turned me on in ways I’d never felt before. I talked myself down from straddling him in his kitchen.
“And yet you claim I have a big ego.”
“Oh, I know you do.”
“What choice do you leave me?”
I reluctantly ripped my eyes away from him, feeling the climate of our conversation shifting. “I don’t follow.”
“Well, I’m in a car with an extraordinarily gorgeous woman who can’t keep her eyes off me. Can you blame me for feeling like the luckiest son of a bitch alive?”
My cheeks flared with heat, and I bit my lip to keep myself from smiling like a fool.
“You’re a smooth talker, Derek Cain.”
“No, just telling it like it is. Come on; you know you’re stunning, Eva. And I don’t lie to women about their looks. I don’t have to.”
“I bet you don’t,” I said with an eye roll.
He chuckled lightly and relaxed in his seat, an elbow leaning against the door. “Do I look like a man who needs to sweet-talk women to sleep with them?”
A strange twinge of something clenched in my stomach at the thought of him sleeping with other women.
“Oh, of course not. They just fall at your feet, don’t they?”
“Or crawl to them.” His voice deepened, and he threw me a sly gaze.
The knot in my belly twisted, and I wanted to die when I felt a rush of wetness between my legs.
I squeezed my thighs together and shifted toward the door, as if he could sense the effect he had on my libido.
“I don’t need to know about the women you’re involved with, especially the ones on their knees for you.”
“I’m not involved with anyone.” We stopped at another red light, and his diamond eyes gleamed with menace. “I don’t even remember their names.”
“Well, that’s…something.” I wanted to feel disgusted by his admission, to use it as a reason to curb my attraction to him, but it only helped fuel it.
Had I no dignity?
“But you on your knees, Evangelina—now, that’s something I would never forget.”
The air rushed from my lungs, and I nearly broke a fingernail from the death grip I held on the edge of the seat. Naughty visuals took root in my brain and played like an X-rated reel in my head.
“Derek… we’re practically cousins.”
What the actual fuck did I just say?
Derek laughed outright and shook his head. “We’re not related. I don’t care how close you were to James.”
“No, I-I didn’t mean it that way.”
I briefly wondered how severe the road rash would be if I jumped out of the car at its current speed.
“Explain yourself then, because I know one thing with absolute goddamn certainty, and it has nothing to do with having an ego.”
