Agreeing to this outing must be my worst idea since the summer I turned seventeen, when I lost my virginity in a barn on a cousin’s Montana ranch. All that itchy hay on my skin. Not an experience I hope to ever replicate.
Forget breakfast. As soon as my brain decides to communicate with my mouth, I’ll come up with an excuse and flee.
Somehow, I summon the courage to meet his gaze. In my heels, the top of my head reaches his nose. Those espresso-tinted eyes lock onto mine, burning with intense emotion.
My pulse stutters. I involuntarily rear back.
Desire.
Raw. Unfiltered. Flaming.
I attempt to inflate my lungs, but the air goes nowhere. “Kellin, I don’t think I can?—”
He tugs me inside. The door snicks shut behind me, and a strong arm bands around my waist while his other hand cradles the back of my neck. For a heartbeat, he pauses. Allowing me time to protest. To leave.
But I don’t move or make a sound. Hardly dare to breathe.
In the next blink, his lips claim mine. When I gasp into his mouth, he pulls me closer to deepen the kiss.
He devours me like I’m the one on the breakfast menu. White-hot need coils through my body, lighting up every nerve ending and tightening my core. His clean, slightly musky scent invades my senses.
The memory of our first kiss has nothing on the searing heat of our bodies in real time or that magnetic tug in my belly. The taste of him on my tongue.
Through the thin material of my dress, my breasts brush his bare chest. My legs meet his rock-hard thighs. I slip my hands up his arms, over his back, and into his soft curls.
The short brown locks slide like silk between my fingers. I yank a strand, and he nips at my lip, a throaty half growl, half groan vibrating his chest. The grip around my waist loosens, and his hand travels to my hip. He traces slow, sensual circles with his thumb, matching the rhythm of his tongue in my mouth.
He breaks the kiss as quickly as he initiated it. The hand on my hip stills. The other one drifts down to settle on my lower back.
Kellin pulls away.
His eyes meet mine. Desire—heated but banked—still burns in their depths.
Controlled.
Seconds pass before I clear my head enough to speak. “I…came up here to cancel. That’s what I was trying tocommunicate on the phone. Maybe we can do breakfast, but I need to get back after that. Too much to do.”
His hand slips from my hip. “Is that what you’re telling yourself to avoid spending the day with me?”
Yes.
No.
Possibly.
A shiver runs through me. His faint smirk informs me that he caught my reaction. “No, of course not. I have a million things to do.” The truth, as well as a convenient excuse. “But I did create a list of other local hotels. I can text them to you.”
His wicked smile prompts me to clench my thighs. “You can spend the day touring hotels and showing me the city, or you can stay in this room with me for the next twelve hours. Your choice.” He strides toward the bathroom. “I’ll be ready in five minutes.”
The ultimatum dampens the lust pumping through my body and replaces it with annoyance.
That’s two demands in less than half an hour. Why do men always think they can order me around?
I’ve spent my entire life playing puppet to my father’s demands. I’m not about to cave to this investor, no matter how infuriatingly attractive he may be.
I march to the bathroom and stop beside the cracked door. “You can take that offer?—”
My phone chimes in my purse, killing the snarky reply. I fish out the device and spot a message from Dad.
