The Wife He Needs - Brenda Jackson Page 0,41

time. You always looked sexy in your business suits, but my imagination gets a little more risqué than that.”

He shook his head. “I never knew.”

“What? That I wanted you as much as you wanted me? I told you that in the kitchen earlier.”

“I assumed that desire began since you’ve been here with me.”

Boy, was he wrong. “No, it goes back further than that.”

It was important that he knew everything. Not only that the desire was mutual but also that it hadn’t just begun. If he understood that then it would be easier for her to build the kind of relationship they needed, regardless of whether he thought they needed it or not.

“I never knew,” he said, looking a little confused. “You never said anything.”

“I wasn’t supposed to. You are my boss and I am a professional.”

He nodded because she knew he couldn’t refute that. “How long have you felt that way?”

There was no way she would tell him that she’d had a crush on him since she was sixteen, or that he was the reason she had returned to Fairbanks after her first year in college. She had heard he was back home from the military with a broken heart, and she’d been determined to fix it. Things didn’t work out quite that way. He was deep in mourning for the woman he’d lost and had built a solid wall around himself, one that even his family hadn’t been able to penetrate for a long while.

“The length of time doesn’t matter, Garth. All you need to know is that the desire between us is mutual. Now are you going to finish undressing or what?”

He gave her that Garth Outlaw smile, and her gaze shifted lower, from his face to where his hand rested at his zipper. He was fully aroused. That much was obvious. Seeing him had the tips of her breasts responding.

Her heart raced in her chest and she couldn’t recall another time when seeing a half-naked man had done that to her. But she knew it was more than seeing Garth without his shirt, because he’d been bare-chested around her before. It was Garth, period.

The man she had truly loved forever.

Her gaze was fixated on his zipper and it was quite obvious that he was aware it wasn’t his zipper per se that held her interest. “Are you ready for me, Regan?”

She was ready for him, and ready to see him. “I am ready for you, Garth.”

“Do you want to touch me now?” he invited, tapping his crotch.

She swallowed. That invitation was bold, and it made the tips of her fingers itch. She glanced up and met his gaze. “Copping a feel won’t satisfy me. I’d rather touch you there when you’re not wearing any clothes.”

She saw the flare of heat in his eyes and smiled. Little did he know she intended to touch him—and taste him—all over. By the time they left for Fairbanks, she hoped he would have become so addicted to her touch that he would seek her out to continue what they’d started here.

“I’m not one to keep a lady waiting.”

Her eyes were glued to his crotch when he began lowering his zipper. When he slid the jeans down muscled thighs and legs, her breath caught. The only thing left was his briefs and they were barely keeping him contained. She watched as he lowered them down his legs.

“Wow,” she said, with both awe and feminine appreciation in her voice.

He smiled over at her. “Now are you ready to touch me?”

Garth knew that for as long as he lived, he would never forget the look on Regan’s face the moment she saw him totally naked. She had no idea how much her expression boosted his ego. And he wasn’t a man whose ego needed stroking. However, he was discovering that when it came to Regan, she got to him in a way that wasn’t normal.

He’d been attracted to beautiful women before, but for some reason his attraction to her was different. For months, he’d tried to downplay it. Then he’d gone through a period of denial because there was no reason for him to all of a sudden become fixated on her. When ignoring it didn’t work, he’d accepted his attraction to her was only physical. After sex, he thought, he would get back to normal. Once he’d gotten his fill of her—worked her out of his system while they spent time together here in Santa Cruz—then things between them would get back to