The Billion Dollar Bad Boy (6 page)

“But I don’t—”

He moved one hand, placing it directly over the damp heat between her thighs. Looked into her flushed face. “Close. Your. Eyes.”

He wasn’t expecting her to and yet she surprised him again, dark lashes at last falling shut. Closing him out. Good. It was hard to drop the mask when you knew people were watching.

Donovan leaned forward, pressed his mouth to the soft skin of her stomach, just above the waistband of her panties, feeling it dip and hollow at his touch. A sharp, indrawn breath from above.

He shifted his hand again, hooking the lace to the side, and slid his fingers through the damp red curls between her thighs. She gasped aloud, the sound shocked, a tremble shaking her. The muscles of her thighs tensed.

He had assumed she wasn’t experienced and this confirmed it.

Donovan paused. “Shall I stop?”

“No.” The word was sharp, bitten off.

The mask again. But then, she wouldn’t be this wet if it was all just a mask. If it was all a point she was making.

He looked up at her. She had her eyes screwed up tight, her beautiful mouth slightly open, the lines of her face as taut as the muscles in her thighs.

Jesus. He wanted to make her come, make her mouth open, her eyes open, everything about her loosen and sprawl outward, relax and soften, the mask dropping …

He stroked his finger though the soft, wet folds of her pussy, finding her clit, circling, teasing.

She trembled again, another sound escaping her. “No …”

“No?” He slicked the pad of his thumb over her clit. “Are you sure?”

“I mean … God … I mean …”

“Say yes, Victoria.”

Her hips moved under his hand, rocking as he caressed her. “I can’t …”

“Yes.” He spread her wide. “That’s the word you want. That’s the answer. Yes.”

Then he bent his head and put his mouth between her thighs.

She cried out as he pushed his tongue inside her, as he licked her deep and slow, another tremble shaking her.

“Oh … God … ,” she gasped in a hoarse voice. “Yes.”

And he felt her muscles begin to loosen, the tightness relaxing. But he didn’t want to stop and look at her face, didn’t want to stop period, because, holy fuck, she tasted as good as he’d thought she would. Hot and spicy and sweet at the same time.

He curled his arms around her thighs, licking deeper, harder. Using his fingers as well.

She began to shake. “Yes … please … Oh, God … please …”

Her fingers were in his hair, holding on tight, and he didn’t stop, his thumb on her clit, his tongue inside her, pushing her over the edge.

Victoria went rigid in his arms. Then she gave a long, wordless cry, almost of surprise, her body convulsing as the climax took her.

Donovan didn’t move, holding her as she trembled through the aftershocks. Then, once she’d calmed, he looked up at her face. Her eyes remained closed but those taut, tight lines were gone, her mouth full and soft, her expression relaxed.

No mask now. She looked younger, vulnerable. Heartbreakingly beautiful.

When was the last time he’d watched a lover climax? He couldn’t remember. He’d always been too into finding his own pleasure to watch someone find theirs.

There was a constriction in his chest. One that hadn’t been there before.

With an effort, he forced the feeling away because hell, he wasn’t done yet.

He shifted, reaching over to one of the limo’s many storage cupboards set into the door, finding the stash of condoms he always kept in there. Bringing one out he debated getting her to do the honors, then discarded the idea. Her mouth had just about blown his head off and he was too close to the edge.

Ripping the packet open, he tossed the foil, then protected himself.

Then he reached for her, gathering all her relaxed warmth into his arms before sitting back, bringing her into his lap.

She’d opened her eyes by this time, blinking at him, registering slowly where she was and what was happening.

The weight of her on him was perfect, the wet heat of her pussy pressing against his cock, pushing him even closer to the edge.

Her face was flushed a deep rose, her breathing fast and shallow. Her lipstick smudged, her mascara running. She didn’t look like the Victoria de Winter who’d walked into his meeting room an hour or so earlier. Cool and calm and tough as nails. No, this Victoria was soft and hot and panting. No mask. No ice. And this time, no control.

He met her gaze. “Yes?”

She didn’t reply. Instead she lifted her hips and slid down onto him as easily and gracefully as if they’d been doing this for years.

As if she’d been made especially for him.

The heat of her closed around him and for a second he couldn’t think. Couldn’t even move. Could only watch as her mouth opened in a soundless gasp, her eyes widening, pleasure unfurling over her face. “Oh … Donovan …”

His name had never sounded so erotic. Hearing it shredded what was left of his control.

He gripped her hips, beginning to move. Setting a hard, driving rhythm. Watching her as he did so, her pupils dilating into blackness. She looked dazed, like this was new to her, and shit, he knew how she felt. This intensity, this feeling, was new to him, too.

Not a good thing …

But no, he didn’t want to think about that, so he didn’t. Only moved harder, faster. Her hands on his shoulders, her fingers digging in, holding onto to him like she was drowning. Then her lashes fell shut, her eyes closing tight, her mouth opening, a cry of what sounded like anguish tearing from her throat as her body arched, her hands, her knees, her pussy clamping down on him like a vise as she came.

It was only then that he let his own mask slip, her orgasm detonating his own. And he had to close his eyes in the end because it was too much, too intense, pleasure exploding around him, annihilating every single thought in his head.

It took a long time to come back to himself afterward, as if somehow his soul had slipped its moorings and got free. Gone somewhere else. Somewhere he didn’t remember.

When he opened his eyes again, he found her staring at him as if she’d never seen him before in all her life.

“What have you done to me?” she whispered.

As soon as the words came out of her mouth, Victoria knew she shouldn’t have said them. They sounded too needy. Revealed far too much. Also, it really wasn’t him she should be asking it of.

The question she should have been asking was what had she done to herself.

Because it had gotten out of hand, this little power game. And instead of winning, conquering like she expected, it felt horribly like it was Donovan who’d ended up with the upper hand.

The pleasure had been … devastating. She’d never experienced anything like that before. Didn’t know it would make her forget herself. Turn her helpless. Expose a secret, feminine, emotional part of her she hadn’t known she possessed.

And that meant it could never, ever happen again.

Despite all her good intentions of being calm and cool, a wave of hot embarrassment had her pulling out of his arms, scrambling inelegantly out of his lap. What she really wanted to do was escape the hell out of his car entirely but of course she couldn’t do that. That would have been tantamount to running away, and she’d never been a coward.

“Well,” she said instead, grasping for as much cool as she could muster, desperate to get some of the control back, “I guess the tabloids were right about what goes on in your limo. How interesting.”

She didn’t look at him as she sat herself back down in the seat opposite, smoothing down her skirt, then bending to gather all the hairpins he’d scattered all over the floor of the limo.

Until long fingers closed around her wrist. “Let me do that,” Donovan said.

“I can do—”

“I said, let me, Victoria.”

At the sound of her name another bolt of electricity went through her and she had to take a breath, her heart racing. This was ridiculous. She needed to calm the hell down. And if he wanted to pick up her hairpins, why not let him?

“In that case,” she said smoothly, “feel free.”

He released her and she straightened, steeling herself to meet his gaze.

He’d put himself to rights, his pants done up at least, but he’d left his bow tie undone and his shirt open at the neck. She couldn’t seem to stop looking at that patch of brown skin. Watching his pulse beat in the hollow of his throat

She could still taste him in her mouth. Still feel him inside her.

Yes. That’s the word you want. That’s the answer. Yes.

Victoria wrenched her gaze away, completely unable to think of what to do.

Which was bad. Very, very bad.

“Come sit back over here.” He patted the seat next to him.

Since there wasn’t any reason not to and arguing would reveal far more than she wanted to, she did as he asked, settling onto the seat beside him, smoothing her already smooth skirt. “Now what?” she said.

“Turn your back to me.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Just do it, Victoria.”

Well, at least that would mean she wouldn’t be looking at him. She shifted in her seat, presenting him with her back. And then stiffened as she felt his fingers in her hair.

“Stay still,” he murmured.

“I’m getting a little tired of following your orders, Mr. Morrow.”

“Hush.”

Hush,
he’d whispered, his hands gentle on her thighs, the word falling over her like rain.
Close your eyes.

“And I think after that we can dispense with the Mr. Morrows. It’s Van, okay?”

Victoria tried to force the memory away, but she could still feel those gentle hands on her thighs, still see those intense, blue-green eyes looking into hers as if he didn’t see Victoria de Winter the ball-busting ice princess at all, but someone else. Another woman. The woman behind that. Which was crazy because there wasn’t another woman behind that, was there?

“Oh, I don’t think so,” she said coolly. “We’re business colleagues, remember?” Reminding both of them that reality waited outside the confines of the car. A reality that was going to give her back some of the control.

There was silence behind her.

Then he said, “Ah, yes. Business. In that case, Ms. de Winter, if you wouldn’t mind keeping still, I’ll fix your hair for you.”

She opened her mouth to protest that she could do it herself. Yet she didn’t move as his hands gathered her hair and twisted it up into her customary bun, carefully beginning to put it back into place with the pins he picked up from the floor.

Well, if he wanted to pin her hair back in place, who was she to argue? She didn’t care one way or the other.

“So,” he said quietly. “Are you going to tell me what you meant?”

“Meant about what?”

“You wanted to know what I’d done to you.”

Tension coiled inside her. She looked down at her hands. “Did I? I don’t remember.”

“I think you do.”

She stared out the window of the limo at the traffic outside. Horns sounded, a siren echoing off the buildings.

Soon they would be at the party …

Oh, hell. The party. Where she’d planned to force him to negotiate this deal.

Her stomach dropped. She’d forgotten all about it. How on earth had that happened? She’d gotten so caught up in the game they’d been playing that it had slipped her mind. Completely. Which was unheard of. She never forgot a business deal. Never.

Clasping her hands in her lap, Victoria took a deep, silent breath.

She was a businesswoman. She was a de Winter.

“It was nothing,” she said dismissively. “A commentary on your prowess which, I have to admit, is impressive. I can see why you’re so in demand.”

“‘What have you done to me.’” A pin slid into her hair. “Those were your exact words.”

Victoria swallowed past the lump in her throat, ignored the flame of embarrassment that seared her yet again. “If I’d known I was going to get an interrogation as well as sex, I would have come prepared. Do you do this with all your lovers?”

“No.” Another pin slid into her hair. “But then my lovers usually say things like ‘that was amazing’ or ‘your cock feels so good’ or ‘let’s do that again.’ No one has ever said ‘what have you done to me.’” He slid yet another pin. “Like I hurt them.”

Her throat tightened. “You didn’t hurt me, don’t be ridiculous.”

He did. Don’t deny it.

Because she could tell herself all she liked that what they’d shared had been about control and power games. But really, it hadn’t been. It had been about desire. About wanting someone and being wanted in return. About reaching for what had been missing in her life—excitement, passion, pleasure … Things she couldn’t have because they were weaknesses she couldn’t afford. Not if she wanted to be a true de Winter.

She remembered eavesdropping on a heated conversation her father had with her brother Marc, not long after her mother had died. Her brother had gone off the rails and she knew that made her father sad. She’d been only ten and yet she’d been getting into trouble at school herself—her mother was gone and her father seemed to treat her like a stranger. The unwanted gift he couldn’t return.

Then, as she heard her father angrily end the conversation, it had come to her that if her brother wasn’t going to be the son her father wanted him to be, then she would. And maybe, finally, he’d accept her as part of the family, not the girl he’d adopted to make his wife happy.

So she’d worked her ass off to be that son. Sharp and tough and hard. The kind of businesswoman her father respected and approved of. Was proud of. Who would eventually be ushered into the sacred de Winter boardroom to take her place at his side.

But that wouldn’t happen if she didn’t land this deal. If she kept getting distracted by Donovan Morrow and meaningless sexual desire. This was important. Cameron de Winter wanted that real estate back in de Winter hands and that’s what she was going to do.

“If I didn’t hurt you,” Donovan said quietly from behind her, “then what was it I did do to you?”

“You gave me a couple orgasms and they were very nice. But that’s over now so I think we can call it done, don’t you?”