Page 11 of Tempting the King

“So, red dress is the cuddler,” he mutters on a disbelieving head shake and a sniff. “Damn, karma’s on my side for once.”

He reaches for my face, as my brain comes back online. I step back, an involuntary sound slipping from my lips, as I re-group and get whatever chemical imbalance he’s causing inside me under control.

“Yes, I am, but… But…”

Girl, your brain is not a potato, stick to the program.

With a hard swallow, I fall back on the introductory speech I’ve delivered to at least a hundred clients before today. “Let’s go through some things first.”

The floor suddenly feels like it’s made of marshmallows as I retreat another two steps, a swirl of some sexy male pheromone making the room wavy around the edges.

“What do we need to go through?” His voice reaches out and licks at my skin, his face a battleground of scars and broken bones, which only amplifies his sex appeal. A chip on his front tooth sets off a battalion of butterflies in my belly.

“First,” I cough, the edge of my desk biting into my ass and stalling my retreat, but I manage to right myself before I turn into a whimpering puddle, “it would be prudent for us to clear things up about what happened last night, so we can start fresh.”

“Yes.” He continues forward, pushing inside my personal space, waves of heat flicking at my breasts. “We do need to do that. Are you okay? I’ve been worried.”

“You’ve been… What? Am I okay?” I repeat, blinking once, twice, three times.

“Yeah. Are. You. Okay? Are you in any pain in here?” He brushes the backs of his fingers over my sternum, picking up the gold yin and yang pendant around my neck as my skin comes alive under his touch. He drops the gold emblem, raising his fingers to tap on my forehead. “Or in here?”

I forget how to speak as he brushes my hair behind my ear in a motion so sweet and intimate, my toes curl in my sneakers as I stare up at his perfectly imperfect face, a tsunami of arousal coating the inside of my panties.

“I’m—I’m, yes, I’m fine.”

“I mean, finding out your boyfriend is married. That’s…” He shakes his head, nostrils flared, with a menacing darkness in his eyes that should scare me. Instead, it only makes me want to reach up and trace my fingers down the long, ragged scar on his left cheek. “A gut punch.”

“He wasn’t my boyfriend,” I correct in an urgent burst.

Rule number one of the Cuddlist Code... Don’t share personal information.

“Good thing. Then, you weren’t…with him?” The question implies more than if we were sharing physical space. I shake my head, ignoring rule number one.

“No. It was that dating app, Hollar. Third date. I didn’t even really like him.”

Good job, Emee not sharing anything personal.

“That dress you were wearing said otherwise.”

“What do you think it was saying?”

“Well, maybe it wasn’t saying it to him, but it was saying it to me, ‘Take me. Own me. Save me. Keep me.’ And I intend to do all of those.”

CHAPTER 5

King

This girl was on a dating app?

She should have men lined up around the circumference of the Earth just to breathe near her.

Not that I’d let them.

I make a note to figure out how to delete her profile from any site that would make some other swinging dick think she’s out there looking.

Because her search for Mr. Right is over.

Her body language is closed off and a little panicky, and I get it. I’m a handful when I’m not so fucking keyed up, but her eyes are telling me there’s something inside her that’s with me already.

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