She turned around to face him. ‘Why are you so snarly?’
His expression was tight. Surly. Disgruntled. ‘It might’ve escaped your notice but I didn’t get any sleep last night.’
‘You looked soundly asleep when I woke up this morning.’
‘I have a crick in my neck, thanks to you.’
She pushed her lips out in a mock-sympathetic manner. ‘Poor baby. Do you want me to massage it for you?’
He glowered at her. ‘Have you been drinking?’
‘Why on earth would you think that?’ She glared at him in affront. ‘Just because I want some company—your company, which is not up to much, let me tell you, and I can totally see now why girls only stay half a night with you because you’re not very nice—doesn’t mean I’m off my face.’
He pointed to the connecting door with a rigidly outstretched arm. ‘Out.’
Lottie nudged up her chin. ‘You can’t order me about. I’m a princess.’
The tight silence ticked like the timing device on a bomb.
Tick.
Tick.
Tick.
He suddenly came at her, swooping her up like a whirlwind in his arms, throwing her over his shoulder and carrying her fireman-style back to her suite. ‘Hey! Put me down!’ She slapped at his back and his taut behind and kicked her legs up and down but to no avail. He dumped her in an ungainly heap on the middle of her bed.
But she didn’t let him have it all his own way.
Somehow she managed to grab a fistful of the front of his shirt, which made him come down with her. The weight of his body landing on top of hers knocked the breath out of her lungs, that and the feel of his pelvis coming into contact with hers.
It was as if the world had stopped.
Froze.
Took stock.
Waited.
Lottie saw the moment he gave in to the pull of desire. She felt it in his body first, the way he swelled and hardened. Then she saw it in his gaze, the way it went to her mouth and stayed there. ‘This isn’t supposed to happen.’ His voice was gravel-rough. ‘We’re not supposed to happen.’
Her body was tingling, feverish with excitement, her blood running hot and fast. A little demon was inside her urging her to do and say things she wouldn’t normally say or do. And she didn’t need the lubricant of a champagne cocktail or two or a lethal vodka chaser to make it easier. She linked her arms around his neck, keeping him close enough to feel his breath mingle with hers. ‘Everyone already thinks we’re happening so why not let us happen?’
His mouth came to the side of hers, as if he was only allowing himself a taste. He nudged against the fullness of her lips, his breath warm and redolent of mint and good quality coffee and something else that was entirely, irresistibly, unforgettably him.
Lottie shivered as he worked on the other side of her mouth, leaving the main surface area of her lips alone. He tantalised, teased and tortured her with those little tug-and-release nibbles that made her spine tingle like fine grains of sand funnelling through an hourglass.
‘I want to be inside you.’ His deep voice with its wickedly erotic, incendiary words made her body throb with need and her inner core melt.
‘So what’s stopping you?’
He nuzzled just below her earlobe, making the sensitive skin leap and dance in excitement. ‘You’re a good girl.’ The point of his raspy tongue sizzled inside the shell of her ear. A teasing flick. In. Out. ‘I don’t do good girls.’
‘I can be bad.’ She stroked her tongue over his chin, just below his lower lip, his stubble grazing her like sandpaper. ‘I bet I can be very bad if you show me how.’
She felt his lips move in a rueful smile against the skin of her neck. ‘You might hate me for this in the morning.’
‘Why would I do that?’ She stroked the side of his jaw. ‘This is just a one-night stand, isn’t it?’
His eyes meshed with hers in an unreadable lock. ‘And you’d be okay with that?’
‘Would you?’
He frowned again. ‘Sure. One night, it is.’
‘Half.’ She gave him a deliberately pointed look. ‘Come midnight you’re out of here and back in your own suite. Agreed?’
Something moved in his gaze, a whip-quick flicker. ‘Agreed.’ And then his mouth came down on hers.
There was something incredibly exciting about a kiss when you knew it was leading to sex, Lottie thought. The passion of it was that little bit more intense, that little bit more intoxicating. The strokes and thrusts of tongues touching, dancing and mating in that sensual prelude to the main event made her whole body quiver with longing. Desire throbbed through her with an escalating beat, the tempo increasing with every movement of his mouth on hers.
His hands were making short work of her clothes, peeling them from her with a deftness she presumed came from years of practice. But this was no time to be thinking of all the women he had entertained in his bed before.
This was her bed and she was entertaining him.
It made her feel less conflicted about sleeping with him. She was in control. She was setting down the rules because she couldn’t bear to be just another girl he’d slept with. Just another name he forgot before the bed was remade. She wanted him to remember her with clarity. She wanted every moment he spent in her arms to be imprinted on his brain. Every touch of her skin against his, every kiss and caress, every murmur and gasp, she wanted him to remember long after their night of passion was over.
‘You taste like chocolate milk,’ he said against her lips.
‘I raided the minibar.’ She kissed him back. Soft. Hard. Soft. ‘I always eat chocolate when I’m bored.’
‘Then we’d better keep you entertained, hadn’t we?’
Lottie shivered as his mouth came down over her breast, sucking on her tight nipple, pulling it into his mouth, taking it gently between his teeth before swirling his tongue over it. She writhed beneath him, frustrated that she was naked except for her knickers and he was still fully clothed. She started working on his shirt, tugging it out of his trousers and peeling it back from his shoulders as her mouth found his. She ran her hands down the strongly corded muscles of his back, dipping below his trousers to feel the taut shape of his buttocks. His erection was hot and probing against her belly, making her need of him all the more intense. An empty ache opened up like a cavern inside her, the pulse of her blood making her breathing laboured.
He left her mouth long enough to heel off his shoes and deal with his trousers. The black underwear went next, revealing him in full arousal. Lottie reached for him, guided by an instinct as old as time, shaping him,
