“Then do something about it,” he commanded.
Lucie grabbed the sides of his face and meshed her mouth on his. This time, saltiness left behind from her workout mixed with the strawberry taste of her lips. The combination was intoxicating, but it was nothing compared to the one-two punch he got when she swept her tongue over his upper lip.
Reid took that as an open invitation. Plunging his tongue inside her mouth was like tasting sweet ambrosia.
He hoped like hell his boxer briefs would do a better job of containing his growing erection than he did of containing the toe-curling groan that escaped his chest.
She pulled away, switching immediately into therapist mode. Although she wasn’t usually so breathless when assessing him. He liked her affected like this. A lot. “This isn’t a good idea, Reid. You need to stay focused with the stretches or you’ll cause yourself more pain.”
With his left hand on her chin, he dragged her attention away from his injury. “My shoulder isn’t in pain right now, Lu. However, I can’t say the same for another place of my anatomy.”
He waited patiently for her innocent mind to catch up with his fiendish one wallowing in the gutter. To no avail. “I don’t understand, where are you in pain?”
He hitched his left brow and quirked up a corner of his mouth in the universal smirk that said, “I’m thinkin’ dirty.” Now she’d get it in three…two…one…
A slight widening of those light gray eyes and a sudden interest in the ceiling above his head told him he was right on the money. He would’ve laughed at how charming he found the blush in her cheeks, but he wasn’t exactly in the laughing mood. Nope. His mind had already hopped onto the one track that was headed straight for trouble. The fun kind.
“I know I’m not your type, Reid. You don’t have to make things up to make me feel better about myself. I’m a big girl.”
Was she fucking serious? She didn’t think he was turned on by her? Now that was enough to piss him right the hell off. Abandoning the stupid stretch, he grabbed her ass in both hands and pulled her into his body.
Hard.
This time she gasped and planted her hands on his pecs in a feeble attempt to keep some semblance of space in the equation. Lucky for him, that wasn’t the half he was concerned with obliterating everything between them but their clothes. And even those weren’t a safe bet at this point. To prove it, he ground his pelvis forward, letting the hard length of his cock rub against the nerve-sensitive juncture between her legs.
“Feel that, Lucie? That’s not how I react to women I’m not into. Believe me, there are other ways of teaching you these things. Less intimate ways.” Ways that he should damn well be using. But instead he trailed one of his hands up her side and swept his thumb over her nipple, eliciting a wanton moan from her kiss-swollen lips. Even through the material of her sports bra and tank top he could see her nipple pucker and harden from his touch. He hissed in appreciation. “I just can’t seem to leave myself out of this.”
“Why not?” she said with just a hint of trembling.
Why not? That was the million-dollar question, wasn’t it? Why couldn’t he step back from her? Why was it that every time he pictured her doing anything with another guy, much less that asshole of a doctor she was so hung up on, his gut clenched like he’d just been sucker punched by a heavyweight?
“I don’t know,” he answered honestly. “All I know is I’m tired of fighting myself when I’m near you like this. So maybe I shouldn’t. Maybe starting right now we come up with a new plan.”
He wasn’t sure if she realized it or not, but Lucie’s hands left his chest and slid up behind his neck, allowing her breasts to mold themselves against him. Damn, he loved the way her softness gave way to his harder body.
“What are you suggesting?”
He dipped his head until they were so close they were sharing breaths, their noses lightly brushing as they danced around their overwhelming desire to fuse their mouths. “Maybe the best way to teach you how to seduce, is to let you feel what it’s like to be seduced. And then let you try it out on someone who’s not your eventual target. So you get any nerves out of the way.”
“Like a trial run.”
“Right. In the end I go back to reclaim my title like I want, and you bag what’s-his-nuts, just like you want. No strings, no hard feelings. But in the meantime, we blow off some steam and get whatever the hell this is out of our systems.”