“I’d like to go straight to bed,” she said, feigning a yawn that a few minutes ago would have been real. Reaching up to remove the pins from her hair, she watched the air of confidence seep from his expression, the cockiness disappear from the firm set of his stance. His reaction amused her, but she didn’t tease him for long.
Shaking her head and letting the long strands of her hair fall to the middle of her back, she added, “With the strawberries, champagne and a hot fudge sundae. With nuts on top, please.”
She turned on her heel and sashayed toward the bedroom, but not before she saw the wide, positively predatory grin that spread across his face. It wouldn’t have surprised her if he’d pushed away from the wall and sprung on her like some sleek jungle beast. A part of her even wished he’d do just that.
They would fall to the floor right where she was standing in a tangle of limbs, his heavy frame pinning her down. Clothes would be torn off, tossed away or left in tatters. Mouths and hands would be everywhere. They would come together fast, hot, frantically, the carpet leaving them scraped and raw.
And it would all be worth it.
She almost whimpered at the very idea, moist heat pooling between her legs, making her weak in the knees. She bit her lip, wondering what she might do to make it happen.
But in the end, she couldn’t think of anything that felt right. She wasn’t used to seducing handsome men, let alone devising a plan to get one to attack her.
So she settled for simply lifting her hands to the back of her neck and unhooking the single strap of her dress. The two pieces of material fell, an arm across her breasts the only thing keeping her from being completely bare.
“You will bring everything into the bedroom when it gets here, won’t you?” she asked as seductively as she could manage. Then, without waiting for an answer, she stepped into the other room and closed the door behind her.
Her heart was beating a mile a minute. She’d never done anything like that before—taunted a man, tried to work him into a lather and lure him into bed.
And now she would have to deliver. At the speed of light, she raced around the room, undressing. She kicked her shoes off so they each flew in different directions. Her dress fell to the floor and she opened the closet door to kick it inside. It was no way to treat an obscenely expensive designer gown, but at the moment she couldn’t care less.
Hopping from foot to foot, she made her way to the bathroom while working to undo her garter belt and roll off her black stockings. She left them in a ball on the floor, along with her matching black panties.
Naked, she stood at the sink, in front of the huge wall-to-wall mirror, and quickly brushed her teeth, washed her face, ran a comb through her hair. She reapplied a dab of perfume behind each ear and at the pulse points of her wrists, then hurried back to the bed.
Sweeping back the covers, she leaped onto the ivory satin sheets, plumped a couple pillows behind her back and tried to adopt a sexy, alluring pose. Marilyn Monroe, Jane Russell, Anna Nicole Smith … she thought of every pinup girl she could remember and tried to channel their spirits.
She pulled the sheet up to her waist, then over her breasts, then threw it off again. Bent her legs to the left, then the right. Threw an arm over her head, then scooted down and laid spread-eagle across the bed like the smorgasbord she hoped he would use her as.
When she heard the rattle of the doorknob, she startled, swallowed a panicked squeak and froze in the best position she could come up with at the last minute. She let the muscles in her face go lax and half-closed her eyes, hoping he wouldn’t notice she was a nervous wreck. She wanted him to think she’d just been lounging on the bed, waiting for him to serve her.
The bedroom door opened and he strolled in, dragging a room service cart behind him. This time it held a bowl of strawberries, a magnum of champagne on ice, two glasses and a very large, decadent, already melting ice cream sundae.
Normally, her stomach would have rumbled at such delicious-looking fare. But at the moment, it was her other four senses and her raging libido that were starving for attention.
Chase turned, his gaze soaking her in, slowly skimming from head to toe. From the hardening of his jaw and the steam rising behind his sea-blue eyes, she thought he must like what he saw.
A thrill rolled through her and she sat up straight, careful to act sleepy and nonchalant.
“Mmm,” she murmured. “It looks good.”
“Yes,” he said slowly, still staring intently at her. “It does.”
After a few tense seconds when she thought he might forget the food altogether and simply lunge at her, he picked up the bottle of Roederer Cristal, dried the bottom with a cloth napkin and popped the cork. He poured the champagne into both flutes, then handed one to her, followed by the bowl of strawberries.
She took a plump, bright red berry and bit into the tip before taking a sip of champagne.
“Good?” he asked, sampling a piece of fruit on his own.
“Delicious.”
Taking a long swallow of champagne, he set his glass and the bowl of strawberries aside and began shrugging out of his clothes. Suit jacket, tie, shoes … they all evaporated as though they were made of smoke.
As naked as she, he turned back to the wheeled cart, grabbed the dripping sundae and a spoon and climbed onto the wide mattress beside her.
“This is what I’m hungry for,” he said.
He lowered her gently until she fell back against the pillows. Before she’d even had a chance to get comfortable or wonder what he might do next, he dropped a dollop of whipped cream right in the center of her belly button.
She gave a little yelp and nearly came up off the bed, her first instinct to get the chilly substance off her bare skin. But the clicking of his tongue and the shimmering heat in his glance reminded her of the game they were playing.
Taking a deep breath, she relaxed her body and sank farther into the pillows and glossy sheets, ready to let him do what he wished with his sweet, sticky dessert and her naked, vulnerable body.
He grinned, flashing straight white teeth at her capitulation and digging once again into the sundae.
It took all of her control, all of her concentration not to squirm and shiver as he decorated her nipples, left dribbles of hot fudge sauce along her chest, midsection and inner thighs. Plucking the bright red maraschino cherry off the top by its stem, he placed it on top of the whipped cream on her navel.
“There,” he announced, setting the remainder of the sundae on the nightstand and sitting back to admire his handiwork. “Perfect.”
She chuckled, a brittle, throaty sound working its way up from her diaphragm. A trickle of vanilla ice cream was melting between her tightly closed legs, heading in a direction where she wanted only warmth—preferably created by Chase. “It’s cold.”
“Hmm,” he hummed, shifting closer. “Let me see what I can do to heat things up.”
His low tone and the determined look in his eyes sent a ripple of anticipation skating down her spine, taking precedence over the goose bumps breaking out along her skin.
He leaned in, covering a smear of chocolate with his tongue, then dragging upward to the underside of her breast. The action caused her nipples to bead beneath the fluffy white clouds he’d deposited there.
She writhed beneath him, her back arching, her arms lifting automatically to reach for him.
“Ah, ah, ah,” he warned without moving his lips from her skin. The words vibrated through her. “No touching from you. Not yet.”
His hands closed around her wrists, pushing her arms up over her head. “Lie back and enjoy.”
Easier said than done, she thought. At the moment, his idea of enjoyment bordered on torment—and he was just getting started.
He licked the whipped cream crowning one breast, tiny flickers like a cat lapping at a bowl of milk, until her nipple was bare.
Elena bit down hard on her bottom lip to keep from crying out as he switched to her other breast. This time he gave a low growl and engulfed the tip all at once. No small nibbles to draw out the agony, but that didn’t make the pleasure any less sharp.
Her hands clutched the pillow behind her head, her heels dug into the mattress. Already, her inner muscles were tightening, begging for release. “Chase, please.”
“Soon,” he whispered, kissing his way back down her stomach, picking up stray hot fudge as he went. “Very soon.”
He slurped the whipped topping from her belly button, working around the cherry, leaving it to fill the indent of her navel. Sliding down, hands skimming her hips, he parted her thighs and began to nuzzle ice cream from between them.
But he didn’t stop there. Even though she was sure the ice cream hadn’t dripped any deeper, he lifted her legs to his shoulders and began to explore. He nibbled, licked, stroked her moist folds until she couldn’t help but clutch at his hair—to pull him away or hold him close, she didn’t know.
When he concentrated his efforts on the hidden bud of her desire, her blood pressure skyrocketed and she climaxed against his mouth almost without warning. Tremors racked her body and she gasped for breath, arms falling to her sides as her bones and muscles turned the consistency of watery oatmeal.