on her neck suggested otherwise. “I doubt he’ll last that long, but the upside is he’d be ready to go again pretty quick.”
“Lucky for you, then, that you’re not planning to sleep with any of them.”
Charlie’s hand tightened at her neck, and her curse was that she liked it.
“Are you planning to sleep with them, Maya? Or are you looking for a cheap, petty revenge fuck because you’re pissed at me?”
“I beg your pardon. That sounds like you’re talking about feelings, which I was under the distinct impression was forbidden.”
“Here’s the thing, babe.”
He spun her stool around, and it couldn’t have taken more than a second or two, but that was ample time for Maya to reflect on the fact that she didn’t find that word—babe—as offensive as she should have. As she would have if anyone else had called her something like that. Not the way he said it.
But then he was in front of her, and her heart kicked at her. He was dressed in a dark, impossibly well-fitting suit that did uncomfortable things to her body while it made a symphony out of his. It was obviously bespoke, tailored to his every muscle and sinew, making his rough power elegant. A different kind of raw.
His hard, gorgeous face was grave as he stared down at her. Those blue eyes of his, on the other hand, blazed.
And in case that possessive grip on the back of her neck had failed to announce to the entire bar that he was claiming her, he made it worse by stepping too close and wedging himself between her knees.
“Step back,” she hissed at him, aware that if she moved too much—or at all—her dress would roll too far up her thighs and expose her to the entire bar.
She could tell that he knew it, too.
“Here’s the thing,” he said again, that blaze in his eyes like a terrible fire deep inside her. “I don’t feel like sharing you.”
Her stomach flipped over, then dripped like fire deep into her pussy. But it was more than that. His words rolled through her, changing her and ruining her in one fell swoop.
Because the truth was, she didn’t want a random man in a bar. She wanted him. But surely there was something wrong with her for that. Surely she should want to prowl, totting up her numbers and having healthy, no-strings sex with as many men as possible, the way she kept reading women her age were meant to do.
She scowled at him. “You don’t get to decide. I’m not a possession.”
“Maybe not.” Charlie shrugged. “But I’m possessive.”
“Really.” She didn’t believe him. Or maybe she wanted to believe him a little too much. “Is that a thing you do? You have sex and then get all possessive? Does that happen a lot?”
He did something that made his eyes glitter even more and sent something like chills shuddering down her back. Except she wasn’t the least bit cold.
“I’m not generally a possessive guy when it comes to women,” he said after a moment, his voice gruff. And she had the distinct impression he was as overwhelmed and furious about it as she was. But no—that was a story she was telling herself. That was what she wanted to see, not what was real. “But for you, I’m willing to make an exception.”
“Lucky me.” She held his gaze and tried to look like the sexually liberated woman she should have been but never had been. “But I think I’ll pass.”
She wanted to sweep off somewhere—possibly to the washroom to have a cry—but she couldn’t move without exposing herself to the whole bar. And he settled into his stance, even widening it a little. Effectively trapping her.
He didn’t have to say a word. He just...kept her right there, her pulse a disaster and that blazing fire too hot and wild inside her.
“You can go straight to hell,” she threw at him.
“I can guarantee you I will,” Charlie said. There was a different note in his voice then, tangled through with what she might have called sorrow or self-disgust, if he’d been someone else. “But we’re not debating what’s going to happen to me when I’m gone. We’re debating what you’re going do with that tight little pussy while you’re here.”
Maya should have been appalled that he was speaking to her like that. That he was using such vulgar words. And she was horrified, certainly—but at herself.
She made herself look all the way up the acres of his chest, despite the fact he was dressed like a captain of industry instead of a handyman, which should have confused her more than it did. “I have no intention of entering into another relationship, though I’m sure you wouldn’t use that word. And if I did, it certainly wouldn’t be with you.”
“Sure.” His crooked grin was much too smug. “That’s why, every time you see me, you get so wet.”
“That was before you threw me up against a wall in the middle of the village.”
His grin got even cockier. “You were soaking wet then. I bet you are now, too. Should we check?”
Her breath shuddered through her. Out of her. He was electrifying—because he wasn’t anything like the men she knew, all of them as worried about public perception as she’d been. Charlie wasn’t like them. He wasn’t like her.
Maya had absolutely no doubt that if he wanted to, he would go right ahead and get his hands on her—right here in this high-class bar—in a way that would get them both arrested.
And the craziest part was she didn’t think she’d do a single thing to stop him.
“Charlie...” she managed, breathing out his name like it was a prayer.
His blue eyes were so bright they hurt. She held her breath.
“There you are,” came a plummy, rich voice that hailed from the British Isles. “I thought you’d run for the hills after that tedious exercise.”
Maya blinked, confused. An expression she couldn’t read crossed over Charlie’s face. He muttered something she couldn’t hear, so there was no reason it should pierce the wall of her chest and make her heart ache.
The same way she ached when he stepped back to a respectable distance.
“So sorry to butt in,” the man standing there beside Charlie said in the same merry way. “Your man raced off after yet another disgracefully boring business-owner’s dinner and I confess I followed, grateful to get away. I have no idea why they insist on boring us to death, as if the taxes aren’t sufficient to that purpose.”
Maya gaped up at the man, dressed in another gloriously bespoke suit that whispered of the kind of wealth and consequence that could afford that level of artisanal tailor. Exactly as Charlie’s did.
Something kicked in her at that. Something she didn’t want to face.
“I beg your pardon,” the round-faced British man continued, smiling down at Maya. “I’m Sebastian Fawkes-Morton, owner and proprietor of a far more modest establishment than the glorious
