“You look effortless. As though bringing men to their knees is something you do every day of the week without breaking a sweat. You look like the kind of woman who can have anyone or anything she wants.”
“I … I … well, I don’t appreciate you dressing me,” she said. “It’s demeaning.”
“I don’t know if it was demeaning, but selfish, perhaps.”
“Selfish?”
“Because I’m enjoying looking at you so much.”
She bent down and picked up a black shawl from the couch, looping it over her arms before grabbing a black clutch purse from the little side table. “You shouldn’t say things like that.”
She breezed out the door ahead of him, clearly resigned to wearing the dress.
“Probably not,” he said, his tone light.
“But you did anyway,” she said, turning to face him.
“I did. There are a lot of things I shouldn’t have said or done over the past couple of weeks, and yet, it seems I’ve said and done them all.”
“I haven’t,” she said, turning away from him again and heading down the stairs, eager to avoid being in an elevator with him, he imagined.
“Oh, really?”
“Mmm. I have been virtuous. I’ve wanted to say and do many things in the past week that I haven’t.”
“Why do I feel disappointed by that news?”
“I don’t know. You shouldn’t be,” she said, her stilettos clicking and echoing in the stairwell. “You should be thankful.” She pushed open the exterior door and they both walked out into the cool evening air.
“I find I’m not.”
“I can’t help you there.”
Something hot and reckless sparked in him. She must have noticed because she backed away from him until she bumped against his car. That was a picture, Clara, in scarlet silk, leaning against his black sports car. The fantasies that were rolling through his mind should be illegal.
“I wish you could,” he said, taking a step toward her.
She shook her head. “There’s no help for either of us.”
“I’m starting to think that might be true.”
He wanted to kiss the red off her lips. He wanted to take her back upstairs and do something about the unbearable ache that had settled in his body more than a week ago and hadn’t released him since.
“Let’s go. We have a dinner date,” he said, his voice curt, harsher than he’d intended.
She nodded and went around to the passenger side and he let out a long, slow breath, trying to ease the tension in his body.
Being with her once hadn’t helped at all. One night hadn’t been enough.
But there wouldn’t be another night. There would be no point to it.
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