“Hey,” he said pulling back to look at her. “Are you all right?”
“I’m just not used to being awakened in the middle of the night by a cyberattack. I didn’t know what it meant.”
He smiled and brushed the hair back from her face. “Welcome to the cyberwars, sweetness. Sometimes things get a little bumpy.”
She could sense his exhilaration, almost feel the adrenaline coursing through him. When the alarm sounded and he’d leaped from bed, he’d been wearing only his underwear, but his back felt warm under her fingertips, as if what he’d been doing had invigorated him and kept him warm.
He loves this. He’s a junkie and hacking is his drug, she thought.
He slipped his hands into her robe and kissed her.
“Tired?” Kate asked, kissing him back.
“Wired,” he murmured against her lips. “Do you know what a cyberbattle does to me?”
“I can probably guess.”
“What about you, Katie? Are you tired?”
“I’m not that tired,” she said.
He took off her robe, and now they were both wearing only their underwear. He lay back on the couch and pulled her over on top of him.
“Don’t worry about what happened tonight, okay?” he said, twisting a lock of her hair in his fingers.
“I just didn’t want you to have to go.”
“It would take a lot more than something like this to make me leave you.”
“So it wasn’t a big deal?”
“Pretty mild in the grand scheme of things. Remind me to tell you about the time I got into it with a hacker from the Russian mafia. Boy, did I piss him off. I did leave town after that. It seemed like the smart thing to do.”
“Ian,” she said, hoping he could hear the frustration in her voice. “That’s not helping to ease my mind.”
He grinned. “But it’s such a good story.”
She wedged her hand between their bodies and pinched the front of his thigh, hard.
“Ow,” he said.
“You exasperate me.”
“I don’t mean to.”
“Try to remember that your world is very strange and I’m not completely used to it.”
“I’m sorry. I’ll do better. Now let’s kiss and make up.”
“I’ve already kissed you.”
He reached for her hand and held it, their fingers intertwined. “I think we should kiss some more.” He kissed her hard. Then soft. Then hard again. “Still exasperated?”
She trailed a finger along his bottom lip. “Maybe a little less so.”
“Ah, it’s working.” He kissed her again, and Kate’s body relaxed.
Now that the threat of him leaving had been eliminated, she convinced herself there was nothing to worry about, and she lost herself in his kisses and his touch. He led her back to bed, but it was another hour before they slept. And when Kate’s alarm clock went off at eight and she awakened with his arms around her, she was no longer quite so exasperated with him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Ian was sitting on the couch looking incredibly handsome in his dark jeans and sport coat when Kate walked into the living room on New Year’s Eve. She was wearing the black cashmere sweater dress he’d bought her, and she’d paired it with her black over-the-knee high-heeled boots, the ones she’d been wearing the day they drank champagne in the park. The dress hugged her curves, and the short length made her legs appear as if they went on for miles. She’d styled her hair in the messy French twist again, which had required a multitude of hairpins and quite a bit of patience. She stood in front of him, and his eyes roamed up and down as he studied her.
“I see what you mean now,” he said. “Not an outfit for Dad.”
“Nooooo,” she said.
Leaning forward, he lifted the hem of her dress, pulling it up until the lace of the thigh-high stockings became visible. He lowered it without saying anything. He already knew she was wearing the bustier because he’d laced her into it, but she hadn’t put on the stockings until the last minute.
“You weren’t supposed to see those yet,” Kate said.
“Sometimes I have poor impulse control.”