tempting…”
“Honesty…or—”
“The natural color and shape of your lips is so striking. Your bottom lip fair begs a man to…” He trailed off, his gaze fixed on her mouth, then lifted back to her eyes. There was so much electricity, it was as if a live wire had brushed against all her nerve endings at once. She felt…carnally singed. And it was only an intent look. Were he to put his hands on her just then, she wasn’t sure she wouldn’t combust into a ball of flames.
“Griffin—”
“Miss Duncastle…”
She couldn’t help it, she smiled.
He groaned, just a little, as her lips curved deeper. She should take some much-needed strength in the discovery that she held some sway over him, as he did with her. He with his accent and otherworldly eyes, and she, apparently, with her…lips.
Odd, but she’d always felt her strength was a keen mind. She should be insulted, perhaps, or at the very least feel condescended to, that his attraction was so seemingly superficial. Instead she felt rather primal and intensely female. And she wasn’t at all upset about it.
His knuckles, still resting beneath her chin, uncurled, and his hand opened to slide up and cup the side of her face. For a man who purported to have made his fortune using his own keen mind, she was surprised to feel the calluses on his palm.
Although they perfectly fit the cunning, Irish devil who was tilting her jaw and lowering his mouth to claim hers.
5
Aye, Griff. What in heaven’s name do ye think yer doin’, lad?
No stern admonition or sudden return of sanity was going to save him from what he’d begun. If he were honest with himself, the desire for the kiss, for her, had been far more the drive behind seeing her again than anything having to do with his coming inheritance, Lionel, or Hamilton.
“’Tis no’ meant to persuade you,” he murmured, a breath away from her lips. “I simply want to taste—” He paused for one brief moment, looked into her eyes, and liked to think it was his integrity finally showing up, needing to make certain she was a willing participant in the mutual exploration…but, in all honesty, unless she’d shoved him off, he’d have stolen a sip anyway. He’d just wanted to watch her while he did so.
In the end, he was rewarded in a way he couldn’t have foreseen, and never would have expected.
“It won’t,” she whispered, those plum perfect lips brushing the barest hint across his. “Since we’re being direct, I’ll admit I’d like to know what you taste like, too.”
The punch that breathy little admission delivered ignited the sparks already licking between them.
He took her mouth, and not in the gentle, seductive manner of a man who meant to stake his claim slowly, building trust and need at the same time. He took her mouth like a man half-starved for the taste of her, as if he’d been deprived of it for so long, he had no restraint, no civility left in him.
And, true to her claim, she responded with equal fervor.
Trays clanged, metal clashed, as he sank his hands into her hair and bent his head to hers, pushing her back against the worktable. He slid his tongue between those lips, then she did the same between his, both of them tasting, dueling, demanding. It was like plundering heaven. She tasted spicy, sweet, and dark, like something forbidden and exotic, known only to him, the lucky bastard who’d uncovered the buried treasure first.
Her fingertips flexed hard against his scalp as she held him where she wanted him, taking his tongue, taking him, then giving in return, taunting, teasing, until he wasn’t sure whose gasps were whose, and whether the vibrating growls were coming from deep inside his chest or from the one plastered so tightly against it.
Some shred of sanity prevailed long enough for him to pull her up and off the worktable before they destroyed another entire night’s work. He tugged her against him as he spun them around and pushed her up against a pair of oversized, stainless-steel doors.
The chill of the cooler doors made her gasp, but when he pulled her away, she grabbed the front of his shirt and yanked him right back close again. He was grinning when he took her face in his hands and claimed her mouth all over again.
She was tugging off his tie, and he was busily undoing the buttons on the front of her starched white baker’s coat, when a shrill, insistent beeping sound went off, startling them into leaping away from each other—as if they’d been doing something wrong.
Only it hadn’t felt at all wrong to him. Quite the opposite, in fact. Surprisingly so. “What is that?” he asked, a little dazed, breathing heavily.
“Cakes,” she panted, pushing back the hair that had spilled down out of her bun. Silky, dark brown curls clung to her flushed cheeks. “Ovens.”
“Don’t,” he said instinctively, when she started to gather the tumbled waves and knot them back up. He reached out, as if he had all the right in the world, and brushed aside a damp curl. The tips of his fingers caressed the smooth skin of her cheek. Her lips parted slightly, drawing him to trace his fingers across her bottom lip. He felt the slight tremble there, heard the catch in her throat. And his hunger for her surged right back, with a renewed vengeance.
He took a step toward her, crowding her back against the doors again. He watched her pupils expand, saw her throat work, knew that if he cupped her breasts, her nipples would be rock hard. The thought of peeling that starched linen from her body, and whatever else was beneath it, sent him from launch to orbit in a second.
“Th-the cakes,” she stammered as he slid one hand behind her neck and tilted her mouth up to his again. She sidestepped, half stumbling out of his reach. “They’ll burn.” She scraped her hair back and, with less than steady hands, managed to get it into some semblance of a knot.
“Right,” he said, letting his hand drop. He watched as she darted across the room, then leaned back against the closest worktable. He lowered his chin and closed his eyes with a deep sigh. “Well done, boy-o,” he muttered. “Well done.”
It was her sudden hiss that brought him fully alert again. “What?” He was half across the room before she answered.
“Nothing,” she said tightly, then quickly clattered the cake pans she was juggling onto the waiting cooling racks. She dropped the oven mitts and curled the fingers of one hand into a fist.
The cakes were a rich golden yellow, and their warm, sweet scent made his empty stomach growl. But he was more concerned with the color of her hand.
“Did you burn yourself?” He closed the distance between them. “Let me see, I can—”
She shooed him back as she shifted to the other oven in the smooth, almost graceful manner of someone who had danced between them many, many times. She handled the mitts better and was more purposeful, sliding out one tray at a time and placing them on a different cooling rack.
He didn’t push her about the burn, he just got out of her way. “Do you ever tire of the scent?” he asked. “It’s wonderful, and, along with your fresh roast, quite like paradise would smell, I imagine.”
She
