Page 62 of Recipe for Temptation

“Of course not,” she muttered, throwing him a sardonic look. “You’ve been a willing accomplice.”

He cocked a brow. “Accomplice? Have we committed a crime here?”

“I almost wish we had,” she groaned, covering her face with her hands.

Michael pretended to take umbrage. “I think you’re the first woman who’s ever told me that committing a crime would be preferable to making love with me. There goes my ego.”

A muffled laugh escaped her. “Oh, hush. You know what I meant.”

He smiled lazily.

Uncovering her face, she shot him a shy glance under her lashes. “Don’t get me wrong, Michael. Last night was amazing?—”

“That doesn’t even begin to describe it.”

She blushed deeply, averting her gaze. “You’re right. Amazing doesn’t do justice to what we shared last night. It was…unforgettable. But that doesn’t change the fact that it was a mistake.”

His breath hissed through his teeth. “Here we go again. The damn boyfriend.”

“Yes!” she burst out, her dark eyes snapping angrily. “I have a boyfriend, a fact that you seem unwilling or incapable of respecting.”

Michael flinched. Her words had struck a raw nerve, forcing him to acknowledge how easily he’d abandoned his long-held convictions. Maybe he and Grant Rutherford were more alike than he’d thought. Like his stepfather, Michael had pursued and seduced Reese, flagrantly disregarding the other man in her life. Although the obvious difference here was that Reese wasn’t married with children, his behavior was still deplorable by his own standards.

Agitated, he scrubbed his hands over his face and muttered a vicious oath under his breath.

Reese moved to slide out of the bed. “I really should?—”

Michael’s arm shot out, forestalling her retreat with a hand on her thigh. Beneath the covers, she quivered at his touch.

“Wait,” he growled, sitting up quickly. “You don’t have to leave. Let’s talk about this, damn it. How serious is this thing between you and that dude?”

Jerking her leg out of his grasp, she snapped, “I’m not going to discuss my relationship with you.”

That was probably for the best, Michael mused grimly. The thought of her being with another man—giving herself to him with the same passion and abandon with which she’d surrendered to Michael—filled him with a possessive fury that was unlike anything he’d ever felt before.

Yeah, he definitely didn’t need to know the specific details of her relationship with what’s-his-face. Still, he couldn’t resist demanding, “Are you guys fighting or what? I mean, he sent you two dozen roses and asked you to come back to him.”

“So you did read the card,” Reese pounced accusingly. “I knew it. You had no right!”

Michael scowled. “It fell on the floor. It’s not as if I went digging through the box to find it.”

“You could have handed it to me without reading it!”

“I could have, but I didn’t. Anyway, that’s not the point. I asked you a question. Are you and Victor having problems? Are you breaking up with him?”

“I don’t know!” she burst out in helpless frustration.

Disappointment knifed through Michael. He held her flashing gaze a moment longer, then eased back against his pillows and folded his arms behind his head, a deceptively relaxed pose.

Silence lapsed between them. This time he wouldn’t be the one to break it.

And he wasn’t.

“I’m not a cheater.”

Michael turned his head on the pillow to look at Reese. She’d spoken so softly he wasn’t sure he’d heard her right. “What did you say?”

“I’m not a cheater.” A wry, humorless smile turned up one side of her mouth. “I know that sounds hard to believe under the present circumstances, but I generally pride myself on being faithful.”

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