A breath leaks out of her. “I should leave now.”
Her quiet murmur is far from convincing. I should step away from her, but I can’t convince myself to do that, either.
“Our session’s not over yet.”
“I can’t be here if you’re going to be like this. I won’t.” She gives a tight shake of her head. “I don’t care that I signed your damn contract. I don’t care about your money. I’ve been doing just fine without any help, and Daniel will have to clean up his own mess somehow. As for you, you’ll have to find another outlet for your anger and abuse, because it’s not going to be me.”
Her words are raw, her vulnerability as she hurls them at me strike me harder than a physical blow. Vibrating with the force of her emotions, she starts to turn away. My free hand moves before I’m even aware of it.
“Hey.” I halt her, wrapping my fingers around the delicate firmness of her arm. She freezes in my grasp, wary and untrusting, her gaze flying up to mine.
I scowl down at her, struggling with the self-directed fury that’s still running hot through my veins, and the remorse I feel for subjecting her to any part of it.
“I’m sorry,” I mutter, my voice like gravel.
Sorry for being an asshole. Sorry for frightening her. Sorry for wanting her more than I have any right to.
Part of me knows I should let her go. I never should have brought her into any of this in the first place.
But it’s too late for that.
Too late for either one of us. There’s no undoing the connection that’s been smoldering between us since our eyes locked for the first time. Now, those flames are on the verge of exploding into something neither of us can control.
If my desire for her was only about taking something of Hathaway’s, I’d already be inside her. But this need is something different. It’s something deeper. Something she’s not ready for.
Maybe neither of us are ready to give in to what we both want from each other.
Maybe neither of us are ready to let someone look inside all those dark corners. God knows I’ve kept my demons locked up tight for years. That’s where they need to stay.
That’s why the right thing to do would be to let her go—from the contract, and from my grasp. Instead, my fingers flex a little tighter. A possessive urge floods me, overriding logic and what thin sense of decency I may want to pretend I still have.
“Why didn’t you run when I gave you the chance, Melanie?”
She pulls in a breath through slightly parted lips, but it’s nothing close to a denial. The slender bicep caught in my loose hold offers no resistance at all. She won’t fight this any more than I can.
I’m still holding the whisky bottle in my left hand, but I move my right up the curve of her shoulder, then into the warm silk of her hair. Her breathing speeds in time with mine. Her eyes pull me in as I lower my head to hers. Our mouths meet and a rough groan rumbles out of me, half in curse for my own weakness, and half for hers.
Her lips are softer than I imagined, giving way beneath mine as I curve my palm around to the back of her head and pull her closer. I want to be careful with her. I’ve already scared her enough. I want to be gentle, even though this desire inside me burned right past that marker the instant she followed me out of the studio.
She moans against my lips, and her indrawn gasp is all the permission I need to sweep my tongue into the sweet inferno of her mouth. Her hands move up to my shoulders, and for the briefest second I wait to feel her push me away. She doesn’t kiss like a woman who belongs to another man. She kisses like a woman created specifically to drive me mad.
Still, I can’t ignore the fact that she’s isn’t mine. No matter how right she feels in my arms, against my questing mouth, she doesn’t belong there.
I wait to feel her retreat, but it doesn’t come.
Lifting up on her bare toes, she brings herself closer. Her palms create two points of heat that root me in place as I deepen our kiss. I try to rationalize it’s the whisky burning away my control with this woman, but that’s a lie.
It’s her. It’s the incandescent flame that is Melanie Laurent.
It’s us, on fire together.
And I fucking can’t get enough.
Arousal pounds in every pulse point in my body. I’ve been enduring the agony of that lust since the minute she arrived at my Lenox Hill address this morning in another prim summer dress, her naturally beautiful face pink and fresh, devoid of makeup or artifice, looking for all the world like a virgin on her way to be sacrificed.
And I am the Beast lurking in the dark, intent on devouring her.
A fitting growl unfurls in my throat at the very idea. The erection I’ve been trying to ignore all morning has surged to rampant life now. I can’t get enough of the taste of her kiss, my tongue thrusting and demanding, my hips crushing against hers.
