Stripped (Stripped #1)(61)
Author: Jasinda Wilder

“Whatever I want?” There’s a dark edge to his voice.

I take the dare. “Whatever you want.”

He kisses the slope of my cle**age once more and then straightens, tugging his suit coat back into place and fixing his tie. I adjust my dress, shifting my br**sts and pushing at the loose strands of my hair. When we’re both presentable, he leads me out and back into the foyer area, which is bustling with reporters and men and women with cameras and microphones. We’re assaulted immediately by a flood of lightbulb flashes and questions. I hold on to Dawson and smile, let them see the ring, and try not to panic. These situations always make me a little crazy, and it’s usually all I can do to stay calm and let Dawson do the talking. If it was just me, I’d freak out and try to run, but Dawson is always calm and in control.

And then someone asks me a direct question. “Grey, over here, Grey. Were you surprised by Dawson’s proposal? Did you feel pressured to say yes because it was so public?”

Dawson starts to answer, but stops when he sees I’m answering. “Was I surprised? Yeah, clearly. I mean, you saw my reaction. Did I feel pressured? No, not at all. I knew he was going to ask me—I just wasn’t expecting it to be in the middle of the Academy Awards.” I laugh at that, and the crowd of reporters laughs with me. “I said yes because I love him and I want to marry him. There was no pressure at all. Except, I mean, having millions of people watch you in a situation like that is always scary.”

And then Dawson is shutting down the questions and pulling me into a walk to our waiting limousine. Greg is behind the wheel, and I don’t even know how Greg knew to pick us up, but he’s here, and I’m sliding in across the seat as gracefully as it’s possible to get into a low-slung limousine in an evening gown.

It’s a quiet ride through L.A. Dawson’s hand is on my leg, our fingers tangled together. I halfway expect him to make his move in the limo, but he doesn’t. I’m tense, wondering what he’s going to do to me, but it’s an excited tension. I want him. I wanted to let him take me backstage, but I’m not brave enough for that kind of public display. The proposal was public enough.

Dawson rummages in a console, finds a cord of some kind, and plugs it into his phone, then pushes a few buttons in the console. After a moment, music comes over the speakers. I laugh when I hear the song: “Marry Me” by Train.

“Really? Cute, Dawson.”

“Originally, I was just going to play this song while we were driving around, and I was going to pull over and propose in the car. But then I realized that just wasn’t anywhere near good enough. You deserve everything. The whole world. Certainly you deserve a show-stopping proposal.” He lifts my left hand and examines the ring. “It was a risk doing it that publicly. I wasn’t sure how you’d react. I mean, I was 99.9 percent sure you’d say yes, but—”

“You’re a public person,” I say. “So if I wasn’t willing to be seen by the whole world, I wouldn’t be with you. It was scary, but…I think a cliché proposal at a fancy restaurant just wouldn’t have been you.”

“You mean the whole ring at the bottom of a glass of champagne thing?” I laugh, and he shrugs, seeming almost embarrassed. “I almost did that, too, actually. I’ve spent so many months trying to figure out the best way to ask you that it turned into this whole snowball thing. I was freaking out. No lie. Then when I got the Best Actor nom, I knew that was it. I just wasn’t sure if you’d, like, pass out or something.”

I laugh, remembering all too vividly how close I came. “I nearly fell over!”

His gaze turns to mine. “I’ll never let you fall.”

“I know.”

He kisses me then, and, as always, I get lost in it, tumble willingly into the bliss of his mouth on mine.

And then we’re under the arch and Greg is opening the door for us. Dawson sweeps me off my feet, into his arms, and Greg trots ahead to unlock the door and let us in, but he doesn’t follow us. I hear the door close and the limo driving away. My heart is pounding again, because he’s staring at me with moss-and-bark eyes, hot, hungry eyes. He carries me through the house, to the door that leads to his—our—garage. I hold still and wonder, wait.

He licks his lips as we pass car after car. Old, new, shiny, battered, in various stages of completion. We come to the end, the Bugatti. The mirrored finish reflects the soft white glow of the overhead lights, and our shapes as we approach. He sets me down on my feet at the hood end of the car. I stare up at him, waiting and expectant.

I’ve learned him, over the past year. He’s never satisfied, never sated. He always wants me. He wants me seconds after he finishes inside me. He wants me in his sleep, in the shower, in his study, on the set.

And he’s had me in most of those places. Including the set of Tara, during filming of Gone With the Wind. He brought me there late one night, to the front porch of the full-size plantation house built in the countryside near Atlanta. He took me right there on the porch, lying on a blanket he’d brought with him, stars shining and frogs singing in the warm fall night.

I went on birth control while we were in Macon, and I’ve come to love the feeling of him bare inside me, nothing between us.

“Anything?” he asks again.

I don’t hesitate. “Anything.”

There’s only one thing we haven’t done. I’m still not comfortable with any of the normal terms for things, and Dawson thinks my clean and proper speech is cute. I’m willing to let him do that, but I’m not sure he’d bring me to the garage for it.

He smiles, a predatory, erotic gleam in his eyes. He brushes a strand of hair away from my eyes, and then his hands glide over my shoulders, around to my back. I’m wearing a Givenchy Couture gown that Dawson surprised me with for tonight’s appearance. It’s both modest and sultry, showing off my curves while not revealing too much skin. Since I stopped stripping, I’ve found my own style, a meeting of sexiness and taste. I’m gradually finding out who I am.

I’m Grey Amundsen, and I am desired.

His hands go to the zipper between my shoulder blades and pull it down so slowly, I shiver as his knuckles brush my skin between the widening gap. He slides the thin straps off my shoulders with a flick of his hands, and the dress billows with a soft whoosh to the floor, pooling at my feet in a slowly settling pile of lace and chiffon. My surprise for Dawson is revealed: I’m not wearing anything under the dress. His breath leaves him in a slow sigh, and he gnaws on his upper lip as he drinks in my body.