He opened his arms wide. “Whatever you want.”
David must have had little confidence she’d succeed if he was giving her free rein. She took a deep breath and looked deep into his eyes, trying to find the tone of voice he described. “Stand up.”
He lifted an eyebrow. “Nope. Not at all. Try harder.”
She leaned forward, narrowing the distance between them. “David,” she said, voice low and sugary. “Stand up.”
He smiled. “That’s a little better.”
She sweetened the sugar. “Stand up.”
He twitched, his hands moving to the armrests as if he meant to stand, but he didn’t. Anna sighed, a flicker of annoyance licking at her chest. She wondered if this was how it felt to try to seduce someone.
Someone not interested.
“Try softening your tone,” he said. “You have to want me to do it.”
She softened her tone to a whisper that, in her humble opinion, sounded fairly seductive for a woman who’d never had the slightest interest in sex. The command washed over him with no more magic than a blown kiss.
He chuckled, and with crossed arms, she slumped back in her chair. “The magic isn’t just your voice,” he said. “It’s in everything you do.”
His gaze slid from her eyes to her throat and downward, and she sensed a distinct shift in him—from practice dummy to teacher. The smile that suddenly graced his face could have convinced her to stripnaked and give him whatever he wanted. He set an elbow on the armrest and propped his temple on one finger. Alluring and dangerous, like poisoned wine.
“Your body language matters,” he said. “Every nuance of your mannerisms bolsters your hold on someone’s whims. You have to be confident. Desirable. Forbidden. Untouchable. Everyone always craves what they can’t have. You have to seem unobtainable, and only fulfilling your wishes will give someone the chance to have you.”
Anna sighed. What he described truly was seduction in its most basic form, and she’d never possessed the inkling to so much as kiss a person, much less seduce them. She didn’t know how to tempt, how to entice, how to tantalize. She couldn’t imagine herself using her body to wheedle someone’s free will from their grasp.
Which meant…
Coercion wasn’t something at which she’d ever excel.
“I can’t do that,” she said.
“You can,” he replied, tone beyond certain. “You have a face worth trusting and blue eyes that are hard to look away from. You just have to want it. You have to makemewant it.”
Anna reached forth and slipped her fingers around his wrist. She tilted her head to look up at him through her lashes, reaching a tone that was almost embarrassing to hear spill from her mouth. “Stand up for me, David.”
Even in the low light, she saw the moment the magic hit him. His eyes went dark, and he rose from his chair, still linked to her at the wrist.
“Now sit.”
He sat at the edge of his chair so their knees touched. Was he really feeling the magic, or was he indulging her? What if she asked him to do something he didn’t want to?
“It’s weak, but it’s there,” he said. “Find a way to strengthen it.”
Her grip tightened compulsively on his wrist. “How?”
“Think. What do you want most from me right now?”
“Your secrets,” she said at once.
His brows rose a fraction, and inside him, the icy emotions warmed with surprise. “They’re not good ones.”
Perhaps it was the darkness that gave her the courage to tell the truth, but she found herself saying, “I don’t care. I want them anyway.”
The edge of his mouth quirked. “Then take them.”
She lifted her hand to his face and looked deep into those soft green eyes. Her fingers wandered to the gold strands at his temple, soft like she’d imagined. Her thumb brushed his scar. “Tell me how you got this, David.”
