She uncrosses her arms and extends her fingers. “Would you let me finish? God.” She pulls her hair off her neck.
Her neck is fabulous—long and creamy and ready for my kisses. “Fine. Go ahead.”
“You kicked me out, Braden. It was…”
“It was what?”
“Humiliating, all right? It was fucking humiliating. I felt…disposable.”
Humiliating? I treat women well. I always have. I leave them satisfied. Every fucking time. Besides, I will never be held responsible for someone else’s feelings. I stopped that long ago.
“I don’t regulate how you feel, Skye. You do.”
She shakes her head and glares at me. Damn, she’s beautiful when she’s angry. All hot and bothered and ready for a good fuck.
But I glare right back at her. No way will I take the blame for how she’s feeling. “I don’t consider you disposable, so why do you?”
She curls her hands into fists. “I don’t consider myself disposable, which is why, Braden, if you want me in your bed so badly, you can’t treat me as if I am. You can’t just kick me out when you’re done.”
“We were both done.”
“Maybe you were,” she says. “Personally, I had several more orgasms left in me.”
Really? I resist the urge to chuckle. Does she truly think I’m that ignorant? That I can’t tell when a woman experiences something she’s never experienced before? She’s young. So young. Eleven years my junior. I need to remember that. She’s not nearly as experienced as I am, and she probably thinks I don’t have a clue that she never climaxed before me.
I run a hand through my hair. “I don’t normally let anyone spend the night at my place.”
True. I don’t. It’s nothing personal. I’m just not wired for a long-term relationship, and the sooner a woman understands that, the better. Allowing a woman to stay the night—to sleep in my bed—sends the wrong signals. It’s not that I don’t want a woman to spend the night. I believe I’d enjoy it—holding her, waking up next to her, fucking her in the morning. Of course I’d enjoy it. But so would she, and she’d continue to want more that I can’t give her.
“Then don’t,” Skye says, her brown eyes glowing. “I won’t go back to bed with you if you’re going to make me leave afterward. Simple as that.”
Fighting words. True fighting words. And if any other woman stood before me and said them, I’d nod, tell her goodbye, and walk away.
But I can’t walk away from Skye. My feet feel like they’re mired in cement, and the rest of my body seems caught in a force field.
This woman—this young and focused and, in some ways, immature woman—holds me in some kind of a thrall, which should bother me a lot more than it does.
I don’t beg women to go to bed with me. Ever.
But Skye somehow planted a feeling inside me, and it’s growing.
I want her back in my bed.
I will do whatever is necessary to get her back there.
I sigh, rubbing my forehead. “Fine. If that’s what it takes to get you back in my bed, you can stay until morning. Does that suffice?”
She shrugs. “I don’t have to stay. I just would like the option.”
I cock my head, resisting a smile. I understand this woman better than she realizes.
It’s control she wants.
She won’t get that with me, but for the moment, I’m willing to give her the illusion of control.
“I’m beginning to see what you really want,” I say. “It’s not so much that you want to stay. It’s that you want to be the one to decide, isn’t it?”
She stays silent for a few minutes as people bustle around us in the lobby. The MADD Gala must be breaking up.
Finally, when the chaos in the lobby settles a bit, “I can’t go back to your bed, Braden.”
I sear her with my gaze. “You can.”
“No, I can’t. It just doesn’t feel…”
I move into her space, feeling the heat that surrounds both of us. “You want to say it doesn’t feel right, Skye. But you’re not that good an actress. It’s a lie, and you know it.”
I close what little distance remains between us, bend down, breathe onto her ear.
“Come home with me,” I whisper, “and you can leave whenever you want.”
Chapter Nineteen
She goes limp in my arms for a timeless moment.
And I know I have her.
I pull back slightly.
“I…have to tell Tessa,” she says.
I take her hand and lead her back to the ballroom. Tessa is sitting at our table when we get there. Her purse is still there, too, and she doesn’t seem the least bit annoyed at Skye for abandoning it.
“What have you two been up to?” she asks.
“We just—” Skye begins.
“We’re leaving,” I say. “Can I give you a lift home?”
“I think I’ll stay, actually. Garrett and I are hitting it off. Peter’s a mess, though.”
“What’s wrong?” Skye asks.
“He’s terrified of you,” Tessa says to me, smiling. “Though you don’t seem all that scary to me.”
She’s flirting, and Skye doesn’t like it. I can tell by the way she goes slightly rigid.
I like that Skye doesn’t like it. I like it a lot.
As for Peter, good. I want him scared of me. I don’t want him near Skye. I don’t particularly want Garrett near Tessa, either, but that’s not my business.
“He just wants a contract with my company,” I say, “and he thinks I won’t give it to him because he was dancing with Skye.”
“Oh. Is that true?”
“No. I’m not giving it to him anyway. The decision has already been made.”
“Does he know?” Tessa asks.
“He will.” I turn to Skye. “Ready?”
“Yeah, sure. See you, Tess.”
“I’ll call you tomorrow,” Tessa says.
Within a few minutes, we’re sitting in the back of my car again with Christopher at the wheel. I inhale and get a whiff of everything Skye. Her raspberry-scented hair, her soft floral cologne, a hint of bourbon, and…her sweet musk.