Learning Curves - By Elyse Mady Page 0,61

with the almost impossibly gorgeous face and body. The one people wanted to watch perform. He drew everyone’s eyes to him like some magnetic force with an effortless ability that left her breathless and wanting.

Her? Not so much so.

“Why don’t you dance with me?” she hedged. After all, if he was dancing, he wouldn’t be able to look too closely at her body. And she could distract him with kissing and touching until he forgot the crazy suggestion entirely.

But he shook his head. “No, I want to be the spectator tonight. I want to watch you come apart. I want to learn what pleases you.” His face was resolved as he settled onto the sofa and leaned back, his arms stretching across the seat back.

His steady gaze unnerved her. She was the one who always knew the answer, the one who could be relied on to go above and beyond for the readings, the assignments, the essays. But when it came to the question of her own sexual satisfaction, she never put her hand up. She sat in the back of the class, so to speak, watching everyone else take the lessons to heart.

And she’d had enough.

She’d tried to tell herself what happened between them last Saturday night at the club had been an aberration. That despite her unprecedented behavior, she was still the same person, working inexorably toward her final destination.

But what if it wasn’t true?

What if…?

What if the old Leanne was the aberration? Maybe she’d repressed her true self because it didn’t fit in with the image she’d constructed for her future so many years ago. A future that, on first glance, looked concrete and sensible but which was as fictional as any novel she’d ever studied. Because in writing it, she left out the most important chapter, the one where she came to accept and relish her own desires.

What if she could write a new future? One that included her own sexuality, not at war with her life of the mind but as an integral component?

And Brandon.

Ruthlessly, she quashed the tiny voice that whispered pointlessly in her mind.

Because even as she saw the chance of rewriting her own self-image and reclaiming her own sense of sexual well-being, she knew it wouldn’t be with Brandon.

Because he wasn’t that man. He’d told her so himself.

She wished with all her heart it could be different but their lives weren’t meant to intersect forever.

But until then, he was here.

Only a few feet away, watching her, his warmth and vitality a drug, making sensible thoughts an impossibility. Here, where she could touch him and savor him and begin, if only for tonight, the process of reclaiming the pieces of herself. And that would be enough.

It has to be.

Her lips curved and she swayed toward him, running her hand up his strong, tanned arm before wrapping it seductively around his neck.

“So, you want me to dance for you?” she purred, swinging her sexy heels from her fingertips. She saw his eyes take in their rhythmic movement and felt the quick inhalation of his breath at the sight. He had a thing for her footwear and she was more than willing to exploit that fact if it heightened the already fevered pitch of their mutual arousal.

He nodded wordlessly. She bent, sliding the shoes back on her feet, making sure she faced away from him so he could get a good look at her ass. As she straightened, she saw him push up from the sofa and take a step toward her.

“Stop,” she commanded.

He froze.

“I’m sorry,” he apologized, confusion at her mixed signals clearly uppermost in his mind. “I just want to touch you so much right now. You turn me on until I can’t think straight. If you don’t want to dance, you don’t have to. We’ll go to the bedroom and…”

Leanne laughed. She felt powerful, sexy and definitely in charge of their swiftly escalating encounter. “I’ve changed my mind. Woman’s prerogative. But if you want me to strip for you, you need to remember two simple rules.” His eyes widened at her use of the word strip. He’d asked her to dance; she wanted to give him more. Realizing this was all part of their role-playing, his eyes flared at her tone but he obediently backed away—but not too far.

“First,” she said, guiding him back toward the sofa, “no touching the performer. You can look but touching isn’t allowed in this establishment. If you disobey, I’ll have to ask the bouncers to escort