begging to go there, begging me to open the button on his bulging trousers and take him inside me with long, hot, hard strokes. But I hadn’t forgotten he had completely abandoned me today, hadn’t texted or called, and hadn’t even answered his phone when I called him. And now that he was back, it was all about sex again.
His hands moved from my ass and rested on my thighs, and I covered them with my hands to keep him from moving inward. His gaze met mine, and I saw the question in his eyes.
My heart was beating so hard I could barely speak, but I managed to say, “I didn’t think you’d be gone so long today.”
He didn’t attempt to free his hands, but he did rub his fingers in small circles on the bare skin of my thighs, which seem to shoot little sparks of electricity straight to my clit. I tried not to squirm. “Neither did I. The meetings went longer than expected.”
“What sort of meetings were they?” I asked, still breathless. “Work or Wyatt or something else?”
He looked away. I wasn’t surprised. He was back in vintage William Lambourne mode—his version of don’t ask, don’t tell. “A little of this and a little of that,” he finally said.
His hands were distracting me, but I wasn’t going to let this go. I wanted to say I came all the way from Chicago to be with you, and on the first day, you take off for fourteen hours. I think I deserve more than a cursory answer. But instead I just looked at him and didn’t say a thing. I let my silence do the talking.
We sat there for a minute or two, not saying anything. Then his eyes, an icy blue, met mine. “It’s nothing that concerns you. If it did, I would share it. Please know that.”
I blinked, stunned. I started to wriggle to move off of his lap but he clamped his hands down hard on my legs and held me in place.
“Catherine, you have to trust me. There are some things I can’t discuss. You’re safe here. The security team is here. Everything is fine, and there’s nothing for you to worry about.”
“You were with her, weren’t you?” I asked. I had no idea where that accusation came from. I didn’t even know I was going to say it, but the image of the dark-haired woman at the airport, who I hadn’t thought about at all today, just popped into my head. I remembered the two of them together on the tarmac, the way she’d placed her hand possessively on his arm. The way she’d ‘accidentally’ brushed her breast against him when they stood beside one another.
William’s eyebrows came together. “With who?”
I don’t know what was wrong with me. It was like my mouth was on autopilot and I couldn’t not keep going since I saw her so vividly in my head. “That woman you met at the airport. The one who couldn’t keep her hands off you.” Maybe it was my imagination, but I thought I saw a flicker of guilt in his eyes.
He took a moment to reply and when he did, his response was careful and measured, which of course I noticed. “She was with me today, but not in the way you seem to think.”
“So she can know what’s going on, but not me?”
“Catherine.” His voice turned soothing, velvet and warm, and he was back to breathing normally. I was impressed that he could compose himself so quickly given that I was naked and straddling him right out in the open on his pool deck. Anyone could have walked out and seen us. “There is nothing going on between Anya and me. She’s an old friend and occasional business associate. That’s all.”
“And her name is Anya?”
“Anya Pierce. She’s not your rival. You have no rivals.” His hand traveled up my thigh to cup my hip. The soft stroke of his fingers forced me to take a shaky breath. I wasn’t quite sure Anya Pierce was nothing to William, but it was also true he was here with me now.
“I’m yours, Catherine,” he said quietly. “I don’t want anyone else.”
Suddenly I felt possessive of him. Very possessive. His gorgeous eyes, now liquid and all but
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