you.” It was a bit startling, given that they’d only met ten days ago.
Marie tilted her head and regarded Leo with a puzzled expression. “You do, don’t you?”
“Yeah, I know all your tells. You lift your chin like this”—he demonstrated—“when you’re feeling cornered.”
“I do?”
“Yeah. And you have a fake smile and a real smile, and I fucking hate the fake one.”
A startled laugh bubbled out of her, and he pointed at her in triumph. “See, that there’s the real smile. That’s better. So, yeah, you can’t fool me. What happened with your father? Spill it.”
“There’s really nothing to tell.” She hesitated in a way that he was pretty sure indicated she was holding something back. “We don’t see eye to eye on many things.”
“The watches?”
She huffed a bitter laugh. “We haven’t even talked about that since we officially broke for the holiday.”
“The UN thing?”
“Yes, but I’ve decided I’m doing that anyway. They asked me, not him. He makes the decisions about the Morneau brand because he runs the company. And I don’t have an official seat on his advisory cabinet even though I do most of his work since my mother died. But I don’t need his permission for this.”
“Good for you.” Ambition looked good on her.
But then why was she so dejected?
And another why: Why did he care so much? She clearly didn’t want to talk about it. He redirected. “You wanna go back to your room and watch some Buffy?” Maybe it would relax her, and he could find out what she was so upset about.
“No. What I want is . . .” Marie sat up straight, the way she sometimes did when she wanted to exert authority, but that didn’t seem like what was happening here. It was more like—
Oh.
She was taking off her sweater. She pulled it over her head, threw it on the floor, and reached around to unclasp her bra.
“You want to look at my chimney some more?” he said, hoping to make her smile by invoking the silly innuendo they’d used earlier in the day.
She produced a “prophylactic,” out of her pocket, and his body reacted in predictable ways. She also ignored his question. “What I want is for you to say filthy things to me, and then I want us to do those things.”
Oh, eff him. He had created a monster. Not that he could take credit. She had created herself. He’d just done a little encouraging.
All right, then. Following her lead, Leo took off his T-shirt. She raised her eyebrows as if she were not impressed. He chuckled, unzipped his jeans, and took his already-at-attention dick out. Raised his eyebrows right back at her and let himself drink her in. The only sources of light in the room were the bedside lamp he’d been reading by and the fire, so she was painted in a soft warm glow. Her breasts were as gorgeous as always—white and pink and . . . perfect.
She cleared her throat.
Right. She’d wanted him to talk, and here he was getting all moony over her breasts. “Take off your pants.” She did. And as she began to shimmy out of them, he added, “Underwear, too.” She started to move toward him once she was naked, but he held up a hand to stop her. “Sit back down.” She pouted a little. He stroked his dick and said, “I thought you wanted to talk.”
She sat.
“So what do you wanna do, Princess?” he said while he took his pants the rest of the way off. “You want to open your legs and I’ll come over there and eat your pretty pussy? I can guarantee you that’s the only way you’ll ever get me to kneel in front of you.”
Her breathing had grown audible. She was so delightfully easy to wind up. Or unwind, to use the word she had the other day. “Nobody talks to you like this, do they?”
“Just you,” she whispered.
Damn right.
Her pupils were blown, and she was staring at his mouth. He no longer regretted the lack of a couch in this room. There was something intensely erotic about sitting in armchairs facing each other, her naked and him nearly so. He let his teeth scrape across the lip she was fixated on and was rewarded with a little whimper that went straight to his dick.
“Or maybe,” he said, “you want to come over here and ride my dick and bite my lip some more.”
She inhaled sharply, bent her arms, and used her elbows to squeeze