control chemistry. Just let me know when you’re ready to explore all our options.”
“Don’t count on that happening,” she said to Dallas as he strode away, leaving her alone to wonder why she couldn’t resist him. Why she had let him go so far. Why he could so completely splinter her coveted control, and she welcomed it.
He might have caught her in a moment of weakness, but from that point forward, she vowed to reclaim her power. Call all the shots in this sexual game he seemed determined to play. Turn the tables on him. The time had come to shed her insecurities and prove to him—and to herself—that she could be a strong woman capable of going after what she wanted, wisdom be damned. Business be damned. Fact was, she wanted him.
Perhaps she hadn’t been born a natural seductress, or acquired any real skills in thirty-two years, but it was never too late to learn. When it came right down to it, celibacy wasn’t the least bit fun.
Celibacy sucked swamp water.
Dallas had discovered that recently but learned long ago the lack of merit in a cold shower. He’d taken one anyway at dawn, following one helluva restless night. Afterward, he’d headed to the kitchen, made a strong pot of coffee, a couple of scrambled eggs and ate them at the kitchen island like he did every morning at the cabin. But his normal news catch-up routine had been disrupted by visions of the woman sleeping down the hall. Just the thought of touching Paris again, going further, going all the way, kept him from focusing on the state of the global markets. But he had to remember the annulment terms—no sex in the real sense.
If he had any hope of maintaining his sanity for the next twelve months, he had two options—take care of the problem himself, or convince Paris they should take care of each other, even if it meant not fully consummating the marriage. He liked the second plan best. Taking it slow seemed to be the only way to accomplish that goal, even though it would damn sure prove to be real hard. Literally. Now if he’d been a dishonorable jerk, he would’ve crawled into bed with her last night to solve the problem, knowing he’d had her exactly where he’d wanted her before he left her on the dock.
The problem only grew more obvious when Paris padded into the room on bare feet, wearing some short flimsy peach-colored robe, her hair piled on top of her head in a messy ponytail. On one hand, she was about as cute as a newborn foal. On the other, she looked sexy as hell, even with her face free of makeup.
She sauntered over to the counter, poured herself a cup of coffee, then turned a sleepy smile on him. “Happy birthday and good morning, handsome husband.”
She looked like a birthday gift he wanted to thoroughly investigate. “Mornin’, pretty wife.” He’d never dreamed those words would ever leave his mouth. But then he’d never imagined meeting anyone like her, either. He liked the way she moved. The way she talked. Her intelligence. Her body. And he knew he would seriously like the way she loved if she gave him the chance to partake of all the benefits that most married couples enjoyed.
Wait a minute. For all intents and purposes, they’d entered into a fabricated union. They weren’t playing house, they were doing business. If it was up to her, that’s all they’d ever be doing.
Maybe not, he decided, when she sauntered over to the island, sat on the barstool across from him and didn’t bother to close the opening of the robe, allowing him a nice view of the curve of her breasts. “Sleep well?”
Not hardly. “Fairly well. And you?”
“You mean after you left me alone topless on the dock? I’ve had better nights.”
“Sorry,” he muttered, although he really wasn’t all that sorry, except maybe about the leaving part.
She then leaned completely across the granite surface to study the newspaper in front him, causing the robe to gape more and giving him full view of her bare breasts, nipples and all. “Wall Street Journal, huh? I expected you to be reading some ranching magazine.”
He expected to elevate the island at any moment. “I’ve been interested in financial news since I acquired my MBA.”
Her green eyes went wide as she sat back down, taking his fun away but giving him some moderate relief. “I had no idea you have a graduate degree. Where did you go to school?”
He couldn’t resist rattling her chain a little. “Got it online from the University of Dumb Cowpokes.”
She laughed softly as she rimmed a fingertip around the coffee cup, drawing Dallas’s undivided attention. “Be serious for a change.”
He had a serious need to see what else she might be wearing underneath that robe. Or what she wasn’t wearing. “I got the undergraduate degree at a small college in Stephenville, Texas, while on a rodeo scholarship. A few years later, when I decided to open the saddle shops, I decided to go for the masters at a bigger university in Fort Worth.”
“Impressive. Why saddle shops?”
Recounting his history could calm his rowdy libido. “When I was growing up, a ranch hand named Gordy taught me how to tool roping saddles. I used his design, started my own line of saddles and began to market it.”
“Gordy doesn’t have a problem with that?”
“Nope. He’s happily retired living off the royalties.”
“You are a man of many talents, I must say. Do you have any sugar?”
Ignoring the urge to tell her he could give her something really sweet, Dallas nodded toward the cabinet behind her. “Right next to the coffee maker.”
She glanced over one shoulder before sending him another smile. “Oh. I didn’t see it,” she said as she slid out of her chair.
She sure had great legs, he realized, when she walked to the counter to sweeten her coffee. The robe was so short that if she lifted her arms, he felt sure he could see her bottom. He should’ve told her the canister was in an upper cabinet. He’d give a month’s worth of pay to find some excuse for her to bend over. He didn’t have to let go of a dime when she dropped the spoon on the floor and reached down to pick it up.
Damn if she didn’t have on a thing. Damn if she didn’t have one fantastic butt. And damn if he didn’t have the mother of all erections.
She turned around and leaned back against the counter. “What are your plans for the day?”
He could offer up a few that involved staying horizontal for the next twenty-four hours, but remembered his aim to take it easy. “I thought we’d go fishing.”
She sipped her coffee then set the cup aside. “Sounds like fun. When do you want to do it?”
Right now on the kitchen island. “We need to get going before it gets much later, while the fish are still biting.”
“Then I should hurry. What should I wear?”
Not a damn thing. “T-shirt and jeans, I guess. Or shorts. It’s going to be close to eighty degrees today.”
While Dallas sat there suffering from lack of sex, Paris rinsed her cup out in the sink and put it in the dishwasher,
