Page 28 of Tempting the King

“What do you know about me?” he asks in a low, rumbling tone.

“Just the information I received from Dr. Hoffman. You are a hockey player with the Blades, you’ve had some issues with your temper, and the team needs you back on the ice.” I shrug, unsure where this is going.

“You didn’t look me up or do any research on your own?”

“No. I want to know each client for who they are with me. I don’t need third party information or speculation. It messes with the energy flow.”

“I’m just a client?”

“Well.” I tip my head as his hand on my shoulder radiates heat onto my chilled skin. “No one is just a client, and from what’s happened this morning both in my office and with the fire, I’d say you are a teensy bit more than a just a client at this point. Sort of trauma bonding.”

I tug back my smile as he nods, sucking air through his teeth.

“I agree with the bonding part. But, I don’t think what we did up there traumatized you. Or maybe I do.” He flashes a playful smile with a wink. “You ever been to a hockey game?”

I shake my head. “I don’t think I’ve even watched one on purpose before. I just know there’s lots of fights, ice and a puck that goes in a net.”

He considers that for a second, before his hand lowers to cover where my heart is racing. I realize he’s mimicking the way I touched him and asked him questions upstairs.

“Have you always been in control?”

I draw my knees together to stem the growing tension as his lips curl into that cocky smile.

“I guess.” I do a quick assessment of my youth. “Yes, I had to be.”

“How so?”

His questions are hitting the same sort of buttons I aim for with my clients, but I don’t feel manipulated. I feel seen and heard. Like I haven’t in a long time.

“Oh, you know. Parents that didn’t do a lot of parenting. I was in charge of my brother, pretty much from the time I could make a bowl of cereal and help him with his homework.”

And he made sure when my father needed to take his anger out on one of us, it was always him, so I for sure got the better end of the deal.

“You have one sibling? Younger, I assume.”

I shake my head as heat blooms in my chest under his hand, while the other rests on the steering wheel. His long, dangling fingers, crisscrossed with veins, are as sexy as that chipped tooth.

“Yes, just one. Benjamin. Older. Two years, actually.”

“Interesting.” He shifts in his seat and I can’t help myself. I let my eyes drift to his lap and see that outline again, an erection that has to be Guinness World Records worthy. “You like to please, too.”

It’s a statement this time, not a question, but I nod anyway.

Because I want to please him.

“You’re going to please me often.” His voice turns into a thick drawl. “You’ll like that, won’t you? Pleasing me.”

I curl my toes in my squishy tennis shoes as his blue eyes center on mine. It feels like he is getting bigger, or the space inside the truck is getting smaller.

I swallow hard, silently chastising my body for its reaction to him. My cheeks are hot. My panties wet, and not from the sprinklers. My nipples are hard, and my brain is short-circuiting.

“You can answer that without saying anything, firecracker.” His hand wanders down my chest, turning the backs of his fingers toward me, brushing them over my tingling nipple. I clench from teeth to toes as they dance over my stomach without hesitation, then finally come to rest under the hem of my t-shirt, on the waistband of my drenched sweats. “Lean back.”

His other hand darts out, grabbing my leg behind the knee and tugging me forward.

I shoot a look out the windows at the firemen and a few lingering onlookers. “Wait, there’s people—”

“Tinted windows, baby. I’ll never let anyone see what’s mine. I’m greedy that way.”

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