“That’s right.” She crossed her arms under her tits, pushing them up, and Christ, I wanted to bury my face between them. Wanted to feel her nipples harden against my tongue. “And stop looking at me like that.”
“Like what?” I asked with a fake innocence.
“Like you’re imagining me naked.”
I grinned. Slow and dirty. “Darlin’, I’m way past imagining you naked. I’m thinking about what you taste like. How tight your pussy is. What sounds you’ll make when you come.”
Her breath caught. Her cheeks flushed darker. But she didn’t back down. “You’re crude.”
“I’m honest.” I held her gaze. Let her see the raw want in my eyes. “And you like it. You like that I don’t bullshit you. That I tell you exactly what I want.”
“What you want doesn’t matter.”
“Doesn’t it?” I leaned forward, elbows on the table. “Then why are your nipples puckered up? Why’s your pulse racing? Why do you keep coming over here when you could just ignore me?”
“You’re a paying customer,” she huffed.
“Bullshit.” I watched her throat work as she swallowed. “You want me just as much as I want you. You’re just too stubborn to admit it.”
“You’re delusional.”
“Am I?” I let my eyes drop to her tits again, then lower, to where she pressed her thighs together. “Bet if I slid my hand between your legs right now, you’d be wet. Bet your panties are already soaked just from standing here talking to me.”
“You’re—” She stopped. Took a breath. “You’re impossible.”
“I’m right.” I leaned back again, adjusted myself openly. Let her see what effect she had on me. “And you know it.”
She stared at me for a long moment. I could see the war happening behind those sharp eyes. Wanting to give in. But too stubborn to give me the satisfaction of showing she cared.
I liked that about her. Liked it way too fucking much.
“It’s just old history,” I said, keeping my voice light. Casual. Tapping my fingertips on the leather cover, drawing her attention back to the journal. Even though my cock was hard as steel and my hands itched to touch her. “Things that happened a long time ago. Nothing worth losing sleep over.”
“You’re lying.”
“Am I?”
“Yes.” She didn’t blink. Didn’t back down. “You’ve been coming here for six months. Think I can’t tell when something’s weighing on your mind?”
I laughed. Couldn’t help it. “You got me all figured out, do you?”
“I know enough.” She picked up the coffeepot again, holding it like a weapon. Or a shield. “I know if it weren’t for Grace, you wouldn’t be here. You’d still be in that big city out east.”
“That bother you?”
“Why would it bother me?”
“You tell me.” I eyed her, waiting for the crack in her wall. The air between us crackled. Charged. Like touching a live wire.
Trudy’s jaw tightened. “Not everything is about you. You walk in here like you’re doing me a favor, like your money and your attention are supposed to make me fall all over myself. Well, they don’t. And the fact that you think they should? That’s exactly the kind of arrogance I can’t stand.”
“That all?”
“That’s all you’re getting.”
There it was. That wall. That refusal to give an inch. She threw my words back at me and my dick twitched in my jeans. Christina would’ve melted by now. Would’ve sat down, touchedmy hand, asked me what was wrong and wouldn’t push if I refused to tell her. Would’ve made it easy.
Trudy made nothing easy.
