Page 33 of Angel's Temper

He just wanted her to need him the same way that he needed?—

Brass’s head slid from hers and dropped into the crook of her shoulder. His upper body curled into her with resigned despair. “I will not do this, Molly. As much as I fucking want to, am dying to, I won’t. It’s not worth the cost, and it’s a price I’d never ask you to pay.” Then he lifted his head slowly and—greedy, pathetic bastard that he was—claimed her mouth in one more drunken, dangerous kiss. A small one, just a token to take with him into whatever version of hell had called his number and would soon invite him in. The pillows of her lips softened beneath his and welcomed his pleas and passion with a hesitancy that made his fire cry out in fresh, new suffering.

It would have to be enough, he assured himself as his fingers curled and retreated inward against the rough waistband of her black work pants. It was a damn torture, one he deserved, to resist raking his knuckles across skin he knew would be just as sweet as it was smooth.

Her hands fell away from his chest, and he felt the loss instantly, mourned it, despite her taking her magic with them.

“Thank you,” he murmured against her mouth, and he steeled himself to go.

Molly’s sly fingers found his and began to unfurl each of his tense digits until they lay flat against her curved hips once more. “What I was trying to say, before you kept interrupting, was . . .”

Brass looked down at their joined hands, then back up at her in wild confusion. Those espresso pools glimmered with concrete certainty.

“I want you to stay.”

“No, you don’t,” he warned her, heat curling his words into a lethal promise.

“Don’t tell me what I want,” Molly insisted, firing back with a strength that surprised even her. At some point between the soul-searing kiss and the warm, slick muscles sandwiching her against the wall, her defenses hadn’t just begun to crumble but retreat.

Ever since Braden, she’d spent untold hours crying into her Cheerios over her poor decisions. She’d gone through the highlight reel of their relationship with a fine-toothed comb and dissected everything, from cheerful words exchanged to teasing body language to the literal counter-testing intimacies they’d shared. Only on the replays had she finally been able to see the penalties that had skirted by under the referee’s notice. The lack of eye contact during sex, the gifts given right before he’d ask her for something, even the uber interest in her recipes, which, at the time, she’d been so grateful for and humbled by that it had been easy to ignore the red flags.

Brass’s fingers tested their grip against the curve of her waist, seeking, exploring, perhaps begging for access elsewhere, but stayed put beneath her hold.

Waiting for instruction. Or permission. It was an anomaly that kicked her heart into high gear and made her wonder . . .

What else could she ask him to do? Would he listen? Did he still view her as his boss, though no paperwork had been signed, as it was an under-the-table arrangement? Either way, the kisses they’d shared were definitely ten kinds of wrong.

Right?

Then why the hell were her stomach muscles already quivering in anticipation of what his hands would feel like if she lifted them higher?

Brass pinned her with a take-no-shit glare. “Now is not the time to play the boss card.”

So, he was aware of that little dynamic between them, too?

Yup. And it’s obviously top of mind.

Great.

A thrilling idea came to her just then, and like the Boss Lady she was, she let her bottom lip suffer under her worrying teeth for only a second before she dropped a pebble in the pool to measure the ripples.

If she could be in charge . . .

“What if I want to be the boss?” She barely had time to register the golden sparks in his eyes before she gripped his hands and slid them beneath her shirt high enough for his knuckles to bump against the undersides of her breasts.

They hissed at the same time.

“Don’t do that.” He moaned between tight lips. “Molly, do not do that.”

“I already told you, don’t tell me what to do.”

There, she’d done it. She’d made the first calculated move toward her surging desire. Would he run from her, like he kept promising? She, of all people, couldn’t blame him if he did.

Please don’t run from this.

The thought threatened to rob every ounce of bravery she’d mustered up for a man who set her body to piping-hot levels of combustion with little more than a plate of pasta, some other well-timed acts of service, and, yeah, clothing-incinerating kisses.

But in her experience and with very few exceptions, men were unapologetically men. They had the power to take and trample for no one’s sake but their own. A glimmer of that old worry threatened to flare to life within her, tamping down the bravado she’d only just found in Brass’s reassuring arms. Would he?—

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