His Innocent Seduction

‘You’re going to break.’ He reaches behind me and in doing so traps me in a prison of his arms. My breath snags in my throat.

‘Break what?’ I don’t recognise my own voice.

He leans closer, dipping his head forward, buzzing his lips over my temple. I jerk with need. ‘The balls.’ He stands, his smile teasing.

Frustration unfurls inside me. ‘Look, Michael.’ I take his lead, standing up straighter, my stare unflinching. ‘I get that you have a whole thing going on here, but you know I just want to go straight to bed, right?’

His grin deepens; my stomach swoops. ‘You’re so impatient,’ he murmurs, appraising me.

‘So you’ve said,’ I murmur, then sigh. ‘It’s not like this is premature. I’m twenty-three. I’m curious.’

‘Naturally.’ He nods, but makes no effort to touch me. ‘I got this for you.’ He holds out a cue. It makes no sense.

‘Got what for me?’

‘A shorter cue. Mine are all for someone my height, which you’re not. This’ll be easier for you to play with.’

‘Oh.’ I frown, my forehead crinkling. ‘I don’t want to play pool.’

His laugh is throaty. ‘Sure you do. What’ll you drink?’

‘I—’

I’m on the brink of arguing, but he lifts a finger to my lips, staring at me as he holds it firmly in place.

‘Indulge me.’

My heart lurches. ‘Fine,’ I sigh, momentarily conceding to him—even when I know I won’t, for long. ‘How do I “break”?’

‘You’ve no idea?’ He sounds so Irish. I want to lick him all up. And later, I think I will.

‘No, I mean, I’ve seen it in movies, but I have literally never held a pool cue in my life.’

‘Show me what you’ve seen.’

I shoot him a look and then lean over the table, aiming the stick at the neat cluster of balls in the middle of the table. ‘And I’m aiming for the pockets?’

‘Sure.’ He nods, and then his body is close, his arm wrapped around me, his face right beside mine. ‘It’s hard to break and sink in one go. Really, you just want to scatter the balls as much as possible.’

‘Do I?’ I turn to face him and my lips are almost on his cheek. He doesn’t take his focus off the table.

‘So pull back the cue a little, like this, and stare straight down the length at the white ball.’

He smells so freaking good up close. Butterflies have taken over my body and batter my insides to mush.

‘It takes practice to know how hard you need to hit a ball to get it to sink. You’ll learn that.’

There is so much I want to learn.

‘Ready?’ And, out of nowhere, he looks at me. We’re so close. Our eyes lock and, at this distance, it’s with an intensity that seems to lurch me catastrophically sideways. Desire singes me.

‘Uh huh.’

His arm guides mine backwards, and it’s with his help that I drive the cue forward. It connects with the white ball, making a satisfying ‘clonk’ noise. The white ball rushes forward, careening into the triangle. Order becomes disarray as striped and solid coloured balls riot across the dark green surface.

Quite by accident, and to my utter surprise, a gleeful striped ball sprints towards a corner, dropping into a pocket with an unmistakable swoosh.

‘You’re going for stripes, then.’

He lifts away from me; I feel his absence like a rush of cold air, but I cover it, straightening, smiling. ‘Was that good?’

He nods slowly. ‘Very.’

‘Well—’ I lift a brow and curl my hand around the pool cue, as though I was born holding one ‘—I should warn you, I’m very competitive.’

‘I’m counting on it. Beer?’

‘Why not?’

I stare at him as he walks away, as I’ve been wanting to do since I arrived at his apartment. His body is the work of angels. Firm, toned, muscular yet somehow neat. If I didn’t know him to be a renowned lawyer, I’d think he had an outdoor job, something that required him to be on his feet a lot, using his body’s strength.

He returns with two beer bottles, holding them by the neck, and passes one to me when he’s close enough. ‘Your turn again.’

‘Sure.’ I sip the beer, its cool, familiar flavour welcome. I eye the table. ‘So I can only hit the white one?’

He nods. ‘Don’t worry too much about that in this round. While you’re learning, we can relax the rules.’

‘What if I like rules?’ I enquire archly, sipping the beer again, this time slowly, savouring the feeling of my lips on the bottle top, and his attention on my face.

‘You’ll learn not to.’

‘Now, now, Mr Brophy. You can’t tell me you’re not a rule follower from way back?’

‘What makes you say that?’

‘Your job, for one.’ I move around the table, eyeing the balls. I have no experience, but there doesn’t seem to be a single easy shot.

‘You don’t think being a defence barrister requires me to view rules with a level of flexibility?’

‘Sure.’ And flexibility is what I want. Flexibility with his rules, because I’m going to sleep with him tonight, to hell with whatever gradual seduction he’s got planned. I lean over the table, but knowing he’s watching me makes my fingers shake a little. I stand up straighter again. ‘Help me?’

His eyes hold mine as he rests his beer bottle on the lip of the pool table and moves back to me. He frames my body once more but I don’t line the cue up. I stay as I am, breathing him in, revelling in his proximity and perfection.

‘Don’t forget you can use the table’s edge to your advantage.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Bounce back. Look.’ Once more, he guides my hand and, with his help, I make the white ball connect with a striped ball. It flies across the table, hits the edge and comes close to rolling into the pocket. But not quite.