“Charlie,” he said, my name like a warning in that deep, dark voice of his.
We were close, but our bodies still weren’t touching. Just a whisper of space and we would be. While I hadn’t said I was ready to pay off my bet, yesterday had been him deliberately touching me, arousing me.
I thought payback was fair in a situation like this.
“What’s wrong, Colt?” If I’d been one of those women, I would have batted my eyelashes at him and pouted.
“You have plenty of room to get past me.”
“I really don’t. These hips don’t negotiate.”
His gaze dropped to my chest and back up again. “You could ask me to move.”
“Could I?”
“Sure.” The corner of his mouth curved. “I might even do it.”
I looked up at him. At the controlled patience on his face, the heat underneath it—and something else. Something quieter. Darker. He was the kind of man who waited because he knew he’d get what he wanted.
Was I really stupid enough to poke at that?
I guess I was.
I turned around to grab another bottle—who cared what—and pushed myself back against him. I had to bite my tongue when I felt the hard length of him pressing back.
The sound he made could only be considered a growl. I had yet to encounter a bear, but I knew that was exactly the sound they would make.
I squealed a little as a big arm wrapped around my waist and I was lifted off my feet. I didn’t have time to even consider what was happening before I found myself sitting on top of my bar, Colt between my spread legs.
Instinctively, I grasped his shoulders.
Then he kissed me. Again.
Not the bet kiss. Not the down payment kiss from yesterday. Not demonstrating or proving anything. This was just — him wanting me and not hiding it, his hands on either side of my face, his mouth moving over mine with a thoroughness that made thinking impossible. I grabbed his shoulders and held on like I always had to do.
When he finally lifted his head, there was no denying we were both affected.
“I’ve been wanting to do that all day,” he said against my mouth.
“So why didn’t you?”
“Because I wanted you thinking about kissing me again.” His hands slid from my face down my neck, my shoulders, lingeringon the sides of my breasts. Slow and deliberate, learning every inch on the way down. “Did you think about it?”
“Possibly.”
“All night?”
“Colt—”
“All night, Charlie?” His hands settled on my hips, and he pulled me to the edge of the bar until our bodies were touching at the most intimate of places and I felt exactly what yesterday’s down payment had been promising.
“Yes,” I said. “Fine. All night. Happy?”
“Getting there.” His mouth found my jaw, my throat, the spot below my ear that made my eyes close. His hands slid under the hem of my shirt, warm against my waist. “Tell me what you were thinking about.”
“I’m not — I can’t—” His thumbs were tracing slow circles against my skin and it was genuinely difficult to form sentences. “I’m not telling you that.”
“No?” He lifted his head and looked at me, and his hands moved — one staying at my waist, one sliding down over the front of my jeans, cupping me through the denim. I gasped. His expression didn’t change. “Was it something like this?”
