Unlike she was going to be the second they walked through his condo door.
Chapter Twelve
Houston didn’t know what in the hell was the matter with him. He had never spanked a woman during sex, had never really entertained the idea. He had always been efficient in the bedroom, choose top or bottom, in and out, let’s go. Because if you delved too much into fantasies, you made connections, and he didn’t want that.
Never that.
But Josie had him contemplating all kinds of twists on the old tried-and-true. Watching her stare at him like she’d suddenly found herself on a date with a self-proclaimed serial killer, he managed a small smile.
“Not hard, of course.” He should back off, apologize, tell her he’d lost his mind momentarily, but he had an aversion to admitting he was wrong. It made him feel weak. And besides, he really did want to grab onto her ass and give her a little spank for putting him through so much sexual torture.
Memories of his father suddenly leapt into his head. Images of that bastard’s hand knocking his mother down onto the kitchen floor, along with Houston’s hatred for the manwhose DNA he shared, rose swift and sure. Along with hatred for himself that he could ever be anything like that sorry excuse for a human being.
Josie made him lose control. Control he’d worked all his life for. And what if, when he lost that control, he learned parts of him were closer to his father than he ever cared to acknowledge?
Standing there in the fading sunlight, Houston stared at Josie and wondered if he had to pull the plug right then and there. She was too damn dangerous.
But then she smiled, perfectly straight teeth flashing at him, her dimples deep and adorable.
“Spanking me when I’m not fully prepared is probably not a good idea,” she said, tugging the bottom of her shirt down. “I’d probably end up pitching forward, landing on the ground, and knocking my teeth out.”
The solemn seriousness with which she spoke amused him, breaking his sour mood. He might be afraid of Josie, but hell if he could resist her. “Well, we don’t want that. It’d be a shame to mess up such a model smile.” He touched the tip of her nose. “Anything else I should know about you before we go in? Any medical conditions or physical limitations?”
Her lips pressed together and she tilted her head. “I can’t touch my toes.”
Houston laughed at the unexpected answer. “I’ll keep that in mind.” And he reached for her hand, pulling her next to him so they could walk.
He tucked that little soft pale hand in his and tried not to notice that he never did this with a woman, that he was already crossing into an intimacy with Josie he had never shared with anyone else.
Shit, he hadn’t held a female hand since he was seventeen and at the prom. And then it had only been because he’d had to for the pictures. He touched women, of course, but only as a prelude to or as part of a sexual encounter. He didn’t hold hands, rub shoulders or backs, kiss hello and good-bye, aside from his mother and Kori.
No one touched him back, either. Women sensed he didn’t want that, or if they didn’t they learned soon enough. He didn’t snuggle and he didn’t spend the night, and when he showered or took a nap, he was always alone.
Which suddenly felt very cold and isolating.
He wanted to touch Josie and have her touch him back. He wanted to feel all of her, in his arms and flush against him. He wanted her to let him bury himself inside her soft luscious body until he felt the way he should, content with his life.
Hewouldbe inside her. But he told himself the rest was a bunch of bullshit, his extended state of arousal making him needy and weird. Hewascontent with his life.
There was no room for anything else in his guarded heart.
Yet he found himself caressing that feminine hand in his, giving a light squeeze, enjoying the way she bumped his arm as she walked, her eyes tilted up to his with anticipation.
With a pure unrestrained pleasure that wiggled under his defenses and made him want to smile.
Chapter Thirteen
Something was happening and it wasn’t good. Houston’s hand in hers was causing rapid heart rate and compromised breathing and she wasn’t prepared for this side of him. This sort of nice, almost tender, contented silence that made her want to scream in agony.
God, this was a mistake. She couldn’t do it, couldn’t remain aloof and worldly and nonchalant in a “let’s just be lovers” way. That was for tall women with long French-tipped fingernails, who had an actual aesthetic and accessories.
Not Josie. When a man touched her clit, even through fabric, she couldn’t ever go back to thinking of him as a disinterested co-worker.
So she babbled. Long, and eloquently, about nothing.
“It’s a little warm tonight, at least ninety still and here it is mid-September.” She stopped herself just short of adding a golly-gee. “That’s why I keep my hair short, you know.” Of course he didn’t know. She was making absolutely no sense. “It’s usually so hot here.”
Silence. She waited five seconds, then opened her mouth again.