She narrowed her eyes at me, studying me for long moments, before she nodded once. “Okay.”
My brows flew up my forehead. I hadn’t expected her to agree so quickly. “Okay?”
“I’ll behave under a couple conditions.” That was more in line with what I’d been waiting for.
“Who said you get to make any demands? Or did you forget you’re the one in lockup?”
“You haven’t arrested me. No Miranda rights.” She waved a hand through the air. “We’re negotiating, so that’s how this works. If you want me to behave, I want permission to lead yoga classes on the resort’s property. I’m tired of being arrested every time I find my Zen. I’d much rather be arrested for actual important causes.”
I narrowed my eyes, wondering if it could really be that easy. Especially since Addison had just been muttering about something similar this morning. “That…sounds reasonable.”
“I’m not done.”
I exhaled a long-suffering sigh. “Of course you’re not.”
“You also have to agree to attend two of those classes—as a willing participant—and receive one massage. My treat. You’re looking a little stiff, Sheriff. Holding in all that stress isn’t good for your body or your soul. As you’ve so generously proven.”
I swept my gaze over her, from her mass of chestnut waves swept over her shoulder in a messy braid, to her blue eyes lit with a ring of fire around her pupil, to her full, lush lips lifted at the corners, to the delicate lines of her throat that I so desperately wanted to wrap my hand around while I—
I shook my head to clear those thoughts and tried to get a read on her. There had to be a trick in there somewhere, but I couldn’t see it. Though, truth be told, being in her presence for the scant three hours she was demanding was going to be punishment enough. But if it’d help my family and the resort, as well as the town, I’d do it without question.
“Those are your terms? Fine.”
“That’s not all.”
I leveled her with a stare that had made fully grown men wither in their seats. She just regarded me with amusement dancing in her eyes.
“I think that’s plenty,” I bit out.
She shook her head and crossed her arms over her chest. “One last thing or there’s no deal.”
“What is it?”
“A kiss.”
I froze for half a second, sure I’d heard her wrong. “A…what?”
“A kiss,” she repeated, not even a hint of a waver in her voice.
“From Beck?” The words tasted like acid on my tongue, though I had no idea why. It wasn’t my business who she went around kissing, even if the other party was one of my brothers.
She snorted and shook her head. “From you. For educational purposes, of course. I want to see if you kiss like you do everything else.”
“And how’s that?”
“Utterly controlled and like you have a stick lodged so far up your ass, your tongue gets splinters.”
I clenched my jaw, the urge to storm out of here pitted against the need to bend her over the table and smack her ass until my hand was imprinted on it. And then find other ways to occupy her mouth so she couldn’t run it just to piss me off.
Not thinking about it a second longer, I stood and stalked over to her, pulled her straight out of her chair, sank my fingers into that lush mass of hair, and slammed my lips down onto hers.
With the amount of aggression that had built up between us in the time she’d been in town, it was no surprise that sparks erupted as soon as our mouths met. But that had nothing on the jolt of electricity that zipped through me and pooled in my cock when she parted her lips and our tongues slid against each other. I gripped her hair tighter as she moaned into my mouth. With her hands resting on my chest, she melted against me, her fists bunching the fabric of my uniform shirt. And I didn’t even care that she was wrinkling it.
Couldn’t be bothered by it.
Not when I already had to use every ounce of my restraint so I wouldn’t reach down and grip her ass, slam her into a wall, and show her just how much she affected me. I was hard as fucking stone, and it was all because of her. Allforher.
Christ, this woman. She was infuriating and intoxicating at once, and I had no business being sucked into her orbit.
