Page 78

I give her every chance to change her mind.

But she doesn’t.

When nerves flash across her face, I stop.

She pulls me back. “I’m okay.”

“You sure?”

“Yes.”

I brush my thumb across her cheek. “We’ve got all night.”

“Okay.”

“And tomorrow.”

She nods.

“And however long after that you want.”

Something changes in her expression. “You mean that?”

Yeah. That’s the terrifying part.

“Yeah, baby. I mean it.”

She kisses me before I can say anything else.

So I stop thinking.

Stop fighting.

Stop trying to decide how this ends before it even starts.

For once, I let somebody choose me.

And I choose her back.

I kiss the crown of her head, my thumbs tracing the line of her jaw as my lips trail down her temple. The scent of her shampoo—something like vanilla and rain—hits me straight in the gut. “You do crazy things to my sanity, Clara.”

Her breath hitches. I watch the pulse jump in her throat. “What about the contract?”

“Fuck the contract.” My hands slide under the thin fabric of her dress, skating up the warm skin of her sides, tracing the delicate architecture of her ribs. My palm settles at the small of her back, pressing her closer. “I’m sick of this dress coming between us.”

She smiles, a slow, wicked thing, and hooks one finger under the strap of her dress, easing it off her shoulder. My blood goes thick.

I close my hand around her wrist and pull her flush against me.

Then it is a blur of heat and motion—her mouth on mine, our bodies pressed together tightly.

“Oh my God,” she gasps against my mouth, already climbing me like a tree, her legs locking around my hips, her fingers tangling in my hair.

“You’ve been teasing me in this dress all day,” I growl into her skin. “Every fucking thing about you draws me in. Sets me on fire.” My thumb brushes over her bottom lip, swollen from kissing. “The way you blush…the way your voice gets low and soft when you’re turned on… You intoxicate me.”

My hands slide up her thighs, taking the hem of that damn dress with them. My fingertips meet wet, bare heat and I groan, half out of my mind. “Where the fuck are your panties, Clara?”

She shudders in my arms. “I like the feeling of going bare.”