Page 33 of The Tycoon's Diamond Demand

Judging by the frustration pouring off him, he still hadn’t fully learned that skill. For Jens, it had been, and was still, excruciatingly hard. And that was why he was left with a cauldron of bubbling emotions and nowhere to put them.

And if she pushed him to talk, he’d close down and retreat behind his thick wall of icy control. She knew that he’d get annoyed and he’d respond with cool indifference, all his arrogance on display, and they’d retreat to their lonely corners snapping and snarling. She didn’t want to do that...

They could fight when they went back to Bergen. That wasn’t what either of them needed now...

And if talking was out, then there was only one way to reach him, to help him. So Maja reached for the knot on her gown and pulled it apart, allowing the gown to drop from her shoulders onto the slate floor behind her. She’d pulled on matching underwear earlier, midnight-black panties and a matching low-cut bra. She pulled the band from her hair and her hair tumbled down her back.

She watched Jens swallow, his eyes travelling up her naked body, painting streaks of heat over her skin.

‘Is sex your way of patting me on the head to make me feel better?’ he growled.

She held his eyes. ‘If you’re going to be a jerk, then I’m going to go inside and go to bed. Alone,’ she added, her voice pointed. He looked away and rubbed the back of his neck, a little flustered.

When he lifted his head, she saw lust in his eyes, but couldn’t help but notice the determined set to his jaw, the tension in his mouth. He hated being on the back foot, not being in complete control.

He stalked over to her and gripped her jaw, his expression tough but his fingers gentle. ‘This is just sex, Maja. Nothing more.’

He needed to think that. It made him feel as if he had a handle on the situation. Maja didn’t know what was happening to them, where they were going or how they were going to get there, but she knew, with absolute certainty, that this was more than sex, more than two bodies bumping.

He’d get there...hopefully.

‘When we get back to Bergen, things will be different,’ he insisted.

Was he telling her or himself? Maja wondered.

Those dark blue eyes narrowed, and he looked like the predator he was. The back of his hand skimmed over her breast and the corner of his mouth hitched when her nipple pebbled against the lace of her bra. Her skin flushed pink. He lightly pinched her nipple and lust skittered through her, a bolt of dark energy.

‘But I will take what you are offering, Maja.’

CHAPTER NINE

WITHTHOSELOW, heat-soaked words, Jens, carrying the wine bottle and two glasses, led Maja over to the far side of the wooden deck, where the magical half-light bounced off the bubbles of the hot tub sitting on the edge of the deck, suspended over the water-covered rocks below them.

Maja kept her eyes on his face as his hand drifted over her hip and around her back to find the clasp of her bra. It fell to the floor, draped over her bare feet. She tipped her head to the side as she watched him. His openly appreciative gaze heated, and she welcomed the familiar throb between her legs, the ache in her breasts. She wanted him to touch her but knew he’d ignore any demands to hurry things along. Jens wasn’t in the mood to take orders...

Then again, he never was. And never did.

Jens half filled their glasses and left them sitting on the edge of the hot tub. His finger skated over her shoulder, across her collarbone, down to the swell of her left breast. He touched her as if this were the first time, as if he were learning her shape and textures all over again.

Maja gasped as Jens’s finger brushed over her nipple. It tightened under his light touch. It was only one finger on one nipple and she was climbing, burning. And yearning for more. Would anyone ever make her feel like this again? Was it fair to expect anyone to? Would she ever be able to be with anyone but Jens again? She didn’t think so.

She had the horrible feeling that after their time together was done—however long that might be and despite his stupid blackmail attempt—Jens would always have her heart. She’d given it to him twelve years ago...

He was intense, sharp, abrasive, he could be brutal. But she craved him...

Jens’s breath skimmed over her cheek and his words landed lightly on her skin. ‘Stop thinking,’ he murmured. ‘You don’t need to do anything but feel what I do to you. Just be in the moment, open your senses. Feel my finger on your breast, taste my breath, and hear the sound of the water.’

Jens ran his finger down each bump of her spine, sliding it under the band of her panties, from her back to her front. He hadn’t even kissed her yet and she was already wet, throbbing, desperate for him to touch her intimately, to fill her. This was supposed to be about him, but she was the one in need of more.

‘Kiss me, Jens. Kiss me and then take me,’ Maja said against his cheekbone.

‘I’m too hard already and I’ll only last three seconds if I do that.’ To prove his point, Jens took her hand and placed it on his erection and Maja sucked in her breath. Her fingers drifted down the long, rock-hard length of him. He was so strong, so masculine.

Jens grabbed her wrist and gently, reluctantly, pulled her hand away and lifted his hand to tip her chin. She fell into the deep blue furnace in his eyes, her body on fire.

Maja moved closer to him, her breasts flirting with the cotton of his shirt. Jens encircled her hips with one arm and yanked her into him. Her stomach slammed into his hard erection and his tongue swept into her mouth. He tangled and teased her, his hand on the back of her head changing the angle of their kiss to discover another part of her mouth. His other hand slid beneath her black silk panties, and covered most of her butt. He went lower, then hoisted up the edges of her panties so he could stroke the tender skin of her inner thighs, allowing his fingertips to dance over her feminine folds.

He had too many clothes on, and she craved her hands on his bare skin. Maja shuddered as she found and undid his shirt buttons, breaking off the last one because she needed to have his broad chest and his hard, ribbed stomach under her fingers.

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