Donovan knew tonight wasn’t going to go as well as today had. Then again, he’d spent several hours at a baby shower, so he wasn’t sure he could call it a good day.
Except for the part when he’d been buried balls deep inside of Kora. That had been fucking spectacular.
Remembering where he was and who was standing in front of him, Donovan took a quick look around. Kora’s house was nice. Clean. But something just didn’t fit. There were no pictures on the wall, no knickknacks on the shelves, nothing to show that she actually occupied the space. “How long have you lived here?”
“Six weeks.”
Then he remembered, Kora had lived with Sam before they’d broken up, and from what Sam had said, she’d moved in with her parents for a short time just to get away from him.
“You okay?” he asked, following Kora when she swept past him into a sparsely furnished living room.
“Perfect.” Kora’s clipped tone told him that she was anything but. “Want a drink?”
“Yes,” he said, keeping his voice even, firm.
Kora spun around so fast her hair flew around and brushed over her face.
“That was blunt,” she stated, her forehead creased.
“You asked. I answered. That’s the way it works, right?”
“What happened to polite?” she snapped.
“I tend to tell it like it is, Kora. I’m not the man who talks just to hear himself talk.”
Donovan could feel her tension and he knew it didn’t have anything to do with him. But he knew he needed to defuse it if at all possible. Closing the gap between them in a matter of seconds, he came to stand directly in front of her, his hands going to her hips as he pulled her up against his body.
She was warm and she smelled good. Something light and floral. Since her hair was wet, he assumed it was her shampoo.
“I know you’re not pissed at me,” Donovan told her. “If you were, you wouldn’t have given me your address. So what’s the problem?”
“You. You’re my problem.” she retorted. “You just bulldoze your way in here like I’m supposed to welcome you with open arms.”
“I’m not the problem, Kora.”
Her mouth pursed and her eyes lit with her anger. “And how can you be so sure of that?”
“Because…” Donovan leaned down, his mouth dangerously close to hers. “You wouldn’t let me do this if I were.”
He swallowed her sharp exhale when he slanted his mouth over hers, his tongue slowly sliding past her lips. He kept it gentle, simple. Nothing like the inferno that had consumed them in that storage closet, but this was nice, too.
Kora’s hands were on his chest, but she wasn’t pushing him away, and Donovan took that as a good sign. He pulled back, then curled his hand around the nape of her neck as he locked his eyes with hers. “Today must’ve been hard.”
Another spark of anger ignited in her gaze and he knew he’d hit a nerve. Only he didn’t feel bad about it because he’d done it on purpose. The last thing he wanted was Kora feeling sorry for herself. He doubted she wanted that, either.
Sure, she’d been burned by Sam, but that didn’t mean she had to wallow in it. As far as Donovan was concerned, she was better off without a guy who would cheat on her. She deserved a hell of a lot better than that.
“You don’t know the first thing about me,” Kora hissed, jerking away from him.
He smiled when she gave him her back. “You’d be surprised what I know.”
“Whatever.”
Donovan followed her into the kitchen and watched as she pulled out a bottle of vodka and two shot glasses.
He had no intention of indulging in liquor. That wasn’t the reason he was there.
Placing his hands on her shoulders, he gently kneaded the muscles, feeling the knots against his fingers.
God, she was tense.
No wonder she was in a foul mood.
“No vodka, Kora.”
She tried to shrug him off, but he didn’t budge, keeping her trapped between his body and the counter, her back to his chest. She could’ve easily slipped away if she truly wanted to, but she stopped moving, which Donovan took to mean she didn’t have a whole lot of fight left in her.
“I need something to take the edge off,” she said, but there was no conviction in her tone.
“No alcohol,” he said, his mouth close to her ear.
“Why not?”
“Because tonight, when I take you to your bed, I want you completely coherent.”
“What makes you think that’s gonna happen?” she countered.