She blinked. Then she swallowed.
“I just have a headache,” she replied.
One look at his face told her that was the wrong answer. His brows shot together and his hand at her hip gripped her harder.
“Do you get those often?” he enquired.
“What?”
“Headaches?” he asked, his voice not soft, not tender, not teasing but sounding impatient.
“Um…” she was uncertain of the state of affairs or, more to the point, uncertain how his mood had flipped so quickly. For goodness sakes, it was just a headache. “Not really. I mean, occasionally. When I’m under stress.”
“Did you take something for it?” he queried, she nodded and his hand relaxed as did his body. “Is that what I heard you taking this morning?”
She nodded again, saying cautiously, “That and my vitamins.”
“It sounded like you were opening a pharmacy in there. How many vitamins do you take?”
She did a quick mental calculation and told him, “Six.”
He stared at her.
“In the morning,” she went on when he didn’t speak. “I take a couple more at lunch.”
He burst out laughing.
She blinked again at his second change of mood in the last thirty seconds then she decided to look on the bright side. At least he didn’t look angry anymore.
His hand traveled up her back to cup her neck and maneuver her head toward his.
Mouth again at her ear, he stated quietly, “We’ll work out that stress later, baby doll.”
And, fighting the shiver his words caused, she could do nothing but nod yet again.
His other hand slid up the outside of her thigh, over her hip and under her silk knit, wide ribbed, black turtleneck, then down, digging into the waistband of her winter white wool slacks.
This time, she hadn’t forgotten their audience and she stiffened in his arms.
“Callum, what are you –?” she stopped when his long finger hooked on something under the material of her slacks and he pulled out her claiming chain. Freeing it completely, he settled it around her h*ps outside her slacks as she finished breathily, “Doing.”
Her mind took that moment to remind her how the chain felt dangling from her body while he drove into her last night, the delicate links a tantalizing torment against her sensitive skin. And more, after they had cl**axed, when she had lowered her arms and Callum was still behind her, gently thrusting inside her, the chain had slid up her waist, her ribcage, to rest on the underside of her overly aroused br**sts. The charm tweaking so close to her nipple, at the time, every inch of her body so responsive, she’d had to bite her lip not to cry out in pleasure.
That reminder, so sharp it was almost as if took her back to the actual moment, made the urge start to surface, wanton impulses flooded her brain. Things she wanted to do to Callum. Things she wanted him to do to her.
“I like to see it,” Callum muttered, his voice bringing her hooded eyes to his. His gaze lifted from the chain to her face and his body grew tight under hers then he whispered, “Fucking hell, baby doll.”
She took in a fluttering breath and tried to calm her thoughts, focusing on his hand still moving at her chain. He was fiddling with it and her head tipped down to look.
Then her mind erased as she saw for the first time (as she hadn’t had a lot of time yesterday and she hadn’t been paying much attention to anything but to her fevered thoughts this morning), the charm.
In heavy gold, beautifully rendered, it was the head of a snarling wolf with two eyes made of yellow diamonds.
“It’s a wolf,” she breathed and she was so taken by the charm, entranced by it, she missed the air in the room getting tense.
She forgot the bricks on the bad side of the scale. She forgot everything. Except the fact that Callum had put that charm on her claiming chain.
Her head snapped up and he’d moved so close, he had to rear his own back to miss being clipped on the chin.