Lover at Last (Black Dagger Brotherhood #11)(108)
Author: J.R. Ward

As that scent of hers flared once again, he put his mouth back where it had been…close, oh, so close. "I think I know what you did. But I want you to tell me."

"Screw you – "

"Did you think of what you saw?" As a gust of wind blew some of her hair into her eyes, he tucked the strands back. "Did you imagine it was you I was f**king?"

Her breath began to pump in her chest, and – dearest Virgin in the Fade – that made him want to take her. "How long did you stay?" he breathed. "Until the female finished…or until I did?"

Her hands punched him away. "Fuck off."

In a quick shift, she shot around his body, jumped back into her car, and slammed the door.

He moved just as fast.

Surging in through the open window, he turned her head and kissed her hard, his mouth taking over, the drive to wipe clean any trace of that human male making his sex pound.

She kissed him back.

With equal strength.

As his shoulders were too big to fit through the window, he wanted to claw through the steel. He had to stay where he was, however, and that made him even more aggressive, his blood roaring in his veins, his body straining as his tongue entered her, his hand snaking behind her neck, burying into her hair.

She was slick and sweet and hot as hell.

To the point that he had to break off for a deep breath or run the risk of passing out.

As he separated them, he met her eyes. They were both heaving, and as her arousal thickened the air, he wanted to be inside of her.

To mark her…

The sound of his phone going off was exactly the wrong thing at the wrong time: The ringing from his coat seemed to snap her back to reality, her eyes flaring as they slid away, her hands locking on the steering wheel as if she were trying to ground herself.

She didn’t look at him as she put the window up, engaged the engine, and drove off.

Leaving Assail panting in the cold.

Chapter Fifty-four

All in all, the date wasn’t half-bad.

As Sola got up from her chair and started to put her coat on, Mark came in behind her and helped settle the wool on her shoulders.

The way his hands lingered suggested he was more than open to this being the end of dinner, but the beginning of the rest of the night. He wasn’t pushy, though. He stepped back and smiled, indicating the way to the exit with a gallant hand.

Moving in front of him, it seemed like some kind of mental-health felony that he didn’t make her blood boil…and yet that highly aggressive, dominating man from the night before did.

She was going to have to give her libido a pep talk. Or maybe a spanking…

Perhaps from that other guy, part of her suggested.

"No," she muttered.

"Sorry, what?"

Sola shook her head. "Just talking to myself."

After wending their way through the crowd, they got to the restaurant’s door, and wow, what a sinus-clearer when they stepped out into the night.

"So…" Mark said, shoving his hands into the pockets of his jeans, his well-developed torso bunching up – and yet still not managing to get close to the size of –

Stop it.

"Thanks for dinner, you didn’t have to pay."

"Well, this was a date. You said so." He smiled again. "And I’m a traditional kind of guy."

Do it, she said to herself. Ask him if you can go back to his house.

After all, there could be no hanky-panky going on at hers. Ever. Not with her grandmother upstairs – the woman’s deafness was highly selective.

Just do it.

This is why you asked him….

"I’ve got an early-morning meeting," she blurted. "So I have to head off. But thank you very much – and I’d like to do this again."

To give Mark credit, he covered any disappointment he might have felt with another of those winning grins.

"Sounds good. This was cool."

"I’m just parked back here." She thumbed over her shoulder. "So…"

"I’ll walk you to your car."

"Thanks."

They were silent as their boots crackled through the salt that had been put down over the ice.

"Nice night."

"Yes," she said. "It is."

For some reason, her senses began to fire in warning, her eyes searching the darkness outside of the lit parking lot.

Maybe it was Benloise coming after her, she thought. He undoubtedly knew by now that someone had broken into his home and his safe, and had also probably noticed the shift in that statue’s position. Hard to know whether he would retaliate, though. In spite of the business he was in, he had a certain code of conduct that he adhered to – and on some level, he must be aware that what he’d done in canceling that job and cutting her pay had been wrong.

He would most certainly understand the message.

Besides, she could have taken everything he’d locked up.

Approaching her Audi, she disengaged the alarm. Then she turned around and looked up.

"I’ll call you?"

"Yes, please," Mark said.

There was a long pause. And then she reached a hand up, slid it behind his neck, and drew his mouth down to her own. Mark immediately went with the invitation, but not in a pushy, domineering way: As she tilted her head, he did the same, and their lips met, brushing lightly, then with a little more pressure. He didn’t crush her to him, or trap her against the car…there was no sense of out-of-control.

No feeling of great passion, either.

She broke the contact. "I’ll see you soon."

Mark exhaled hard, like he’d gotten turned on. "Ah, yeah. I hope so. And not only in the gym."

He lifted his hand, smiled one last time, and walked to his truck.

With a quiet curse, Sola got behind her wheel, shut the door, and let her head fall back against the rest. In the rearview mirror, she watched his taillights come on, and saw him make a fat turn and head out of the parking lot.

Closing her lids, she didn’t see Mark’s gleaming smile, or imagine his lips against hers, or feel his hands roaming her body.

She was back to being outside of that cottage looking in, playing witness to a pair of hot, slightly evil eyes looking up at her over the exposed breast of another woman.

"Oh, for the love of God…"

Shaking herself out of the memory, she feared that in this case, her craving for, oh, say, chocolate, was not going to be eased by a diet soda. Or a Snackwell’s cookie. Or even one single Hershey’s Kiss.

At this rate, she was going to have to melt down a case of Lindt truffles and run them through an IV directly into her vein.

Putting her foot on the brake, she hit the button on the dash and heard the engine flare to life. As the headlights lights came on –