She opened with, “We need to get a couple of things straight.”
“This have anything to do with upstairs?”
“I’ve known you too long for…” she flicked her wrist and eyed him from head to toe, “…whatever game you have going on.”
“Trust me.I don’t have a game.”
“You know what I mean.”
“I don’t.”
“Whatever it is you’re doing.Trying to distract me.Or draw my attention from my ex—”
“Your ex-husband was the last thing on my mind.”
She appeared to be in total disbelief.“Then why did you just do that?”
“Because I wanted to.”
“That’s a selfish reason.”Her lips pursed, and she shook her head.“I willneverlet a man manipulate me again.”
“Whoa.Hang on—”
“I won’t be more pliable or listen better or follow your rules and directions just because you kissed me.”
He strode forward.
She took a step back.“And I’m sure as hell not going to—” Her breath quickened.She pressed against the wall.“—not going to—”
Callum closed the distance.“Not going to what?”
Grace rolled her bottom lip into her mouth.“Pretend you were ever interested in me.”
Her breathy whisper went straight to his dick.“I wasn’t pretending.”
“You were.Because I wasalwaysinterested, and you never noticed.”
He kissed her again.To shut her up.To prove her wrong.To take advantage of the moment when he could pin her to the wall and feel her go completely liquid in his arms.
Kissing Grace restored the sanity he didn’t know he’d lost.There wasn’t a moment of hesitation as her mouth opened to his.Her arms locked around his neck, and she tasted like everything he’d always needed.
But he needed to slow down.Callum pulled back.If she wanted to talk, then they should talk.Even if his mouth on hers was better than any words he could string together.
They breathed hard.Her eyes were just as wild and alive as he felt.“Why do you keep doing that?”
Too many reasons.Most of them were dangerous and the wrong answer.“Because it’s fun.”
Grace smacked her palms into his chest and pushed him away.“I don’t want to play games with you.”
“You don’t think that was fun?”The only game he had in mind involved pinning her wrists over her head and starting this song-and-dance over again.But warning bells rang out in the back of his lust-fogged brain.Her ex-husband had put his hands on her in a way Callum didn’t understand yet.He wouldn’t do anything in the same universe as Marino.He let her smack his chest again and easily stepped back when she pushed.
“I think—” She threw her hands out.“I have complicated feelings about this.”
“You think I don’t?Grace,I thought you died.”
Her chin dropped.
“Okay,” he said.“I shouldn’t have said that.”
