Page 7 of SCRUMptious

Chapter3

L A U R EN

“Something smells good,”Donal observed as he pushed his way through the kitchendoor.

“You're not supposed to be in here.” I'd said the exact same words several days in a row but Donal was intent on ignoring the rules.

“And yet here I am,” he said, strutting across the room. “What's on the menu today?”

“Sweet potato chili,” I answered, my knife making quick work of the onions and garlic spread out beforeme.

Donal peered over my shoulder, watching me work. “Ah, your specialty. What's init?”

I glanced out the corner of my right eye, surprised to see he'd managed to move within inches of me. I couldn't tell you the first thing about what he did on the field, but if it had anything to do with sneaking up on and surprising people, I thought he might have been the best in the business.

With his hip resting against the counter and his palm pressed flat on the cold metal work surface, he was close enough that I could smell his irresistibly provocative scent—the subtle mixture of amber, cloves, and something dark and woodsy that was both sweet and intensely masculine all at the sametime.

“Onions and garlic, carrots, black beans, sweet potatoes, and a few other secret ingredients I'm not going to tellyou.”

His hips slid further along the counter and I swallowed deep, his proximity making me think things I shouldn't. I'd tried to fight these urges, but the truth was, I was insanely attracted to Donal Casey. Despite our obvious age difference and the fact that we worked together, I hadn't been able to shake the way my body came alive each time he stepped into my kitchen, asking me to give him a taste of whatever I was cooking. More than once I'd wanted to offer myself up for devouring instead.

I could almost picture him pressing his solid, muscular body into mine before sweeping my ponytail aside to place a seductive, open-mouthed kiss at the juncture of my neck and shoulder. I closed my eyes as a shiver wracked mybody.

When I opened them, Donal was staring down at me with a glint of mischief in his eyes, his lips split in a knowing smirk. “You cold, chef?” Leaning close, the soft caress of his breath tickled against my ear when he whispered, “I could warm youup.”

I was pretty sure he could. In fact, my temperature had already spiked, my face growing hot as his words heated my blood.

Which is eighty different kinds of wrong, I reminded myself.

Pushing aside my lust for this boy in a man's body, I set my knife down and braced my shoulders in resolve. “This isn't appropriate.”

Donal's hand came to rest at the base of my spine, his fingers coaxing their way over a spot he couldn't have known drove me mad with desire. Even through two layers of clothing topped off by my chef's whites, his touch was a brand on my skin. “But what if I wanted to do very inappropriate things to you? Withyou?”

His hand snaked around my hip and he tugged me flush against his massive, toned body, making the evidence of his arousal very obvious at my back. When he rolled his hips, I couldn't stop the breathy moan that escaped mylips.

“I know you like me, Lauren,” Donal murmured against my ear, his tone full of cocky arrogance. “And in case it wasn't obvious, I like youtoo.”

My head fell forward and I let out a long sigh as I fisted my hands on the cold surface in front of me. “This is wrong, Donal. On so many levels.”

His hands stroked over me in greedy exploration, his palms coming to rest on my hips. “Why?”

The fact that he couldn't begin to guess why was a major red flag—it proved he hadn't stopped to think about what he was doing or the consequences of his actions. I didn't think Donal was immature exactly, but I also didn't think he possessed more than one serious bone in his body. That insanely beautiful body pressed up against myown.

“Because we work together,” I answered from between clenched teeth. If I were a stronger woman I would have added that he should take his hands off me now, but I wasn't … so I didn't.

I planned to put an end to … whatever this was … soon enough but it'd been so long since a man had touched me—shown me that I was desirable—that I wanted to enjoy the delicious torture for just a few seconds longer. Savor it. File it away in my spank bank for withdrawal during the long winter nights to come. The ones I'd be spending alone in my sad little bedroom in the sad little apartment.

“Only tangentially,” he answered, nuzzling his lips against that sensitive spot behind my ear that I loved to have touched. “And besides, we don't have a policy against dating between co-workers,” he continued. “Half the marketing team is dating or married to one of the players.”

“Damn,” I muttered, my main reason for staying away from him flying right out the window. I'd been counting on the whole “no fraternizing between colleagues” rule as a means of keeping him at arm's length. Sort of a “Sorry, them's the rules” approach to protecting myself. Because if Dublin Rugby wasn't going to frown upon us … fraternizing … then the only other excuse I had was our age difference. The problem was I didn't want to bring it up. How humiliating would it be to tell this virile young man that I was so much older than him? Donal's interest was a huge boost to my fragile ego, and I really wasn't looking forward to seeing the disgust on his face when he figured out how much older than him I reallywas.

Donal wrapped his muscular arms around my middle and pulled me into a full body embrace. “Why are you fightingthis?”

“I don't need the distraction of a relationship,” I managed to ekeout.

With his chin resting on my shoulder, he brushed his hand back and forth across my middle. “Who said anything about a relationship?”

And there it was: the ice-cold water I'd needed to douse the blazing inferno of mylust.

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