Page 147 of Under an Endless Moon

“You about finished?”I stood just inside the main door of Moonflower, a sentry standing guard, watching Raven as she flitted around her shop, finishing her daily tasks. All her orders had been picked up or delivered, and she was tidying and wiping down her workstation.

Wearing another one of those dresses that drove me out of my damned mind, though this one was short as fuck, pure black and frilly, a pair of five-inch heels to match.

Of course, now that I knew the real reason she wore them, it only made it five-thousand-times worse. The greed that rolled in my stomach as I watched her move through her space.

Fluid and lush.

The girl in her element. So fucking free and beautiful as she managed this shop that I knew brought her a ton of pride and joy.

“Ten minutes max.” She peeked back at me, playing innocent, like maybe she was attempting to do what I’d asked of her earlier and forget every delicious thing that had gone down between us.

Acting typical.

The way we always interacted.

Would have bought it, too, if it weren’t for the waythose inky eyes dragged over my body in a slow slide of appreciation, flaring as she succumbed to what clearly played out in her mind.

With that single look, I was hooked, my dick kicking in my jeans and the greed I’d barely kept tamped all day threatening to bust out of its confines.

Doing my best to ignore it, I busied myself by glancing at the giant farmhouse clock on the wall.

Five o’clock.

Thank fuck.

Closing time.

I reached over and flicked the lock on the door, then I turned back to her, rumbling, “What can I do to help?”

Needed a distraction. Something to get the temptation that was this woman out of my head. Quite the quandary considering it was my duty to keep her within fifty feet of me.

“Um…you could finish wiping down these counters while I close out the totals for the day?”

“Sure.” I pushed off the doorjamb and ambled through rows of flowers that took up the center of the store and around the long counter. Each step I took, it brought her closer to me. Her aura becoming more potent.

The sweet honeysuckle moonflower scent hitting me like a landslide.

Her kindness.

Her belief.

The vixen underneath.

Was never going to get over the way she’d shouted my name when she came. Would never get over the way she’d gazed up at me with those eyes as she had my cock shoved down her throat.

I scrubbed a palm over my face to try to break up the onslaught of visions, and I edged her aside and took the rag from her. I started wiping down the counters while she turned to the computer she had set up facing out toward the main part of the shop.

She started humming as she worked, her throaty voice floating through the air, winding around me and twisting me in greed.

“How’d it go today?” I asked, trying to divert the out-of-control train of my thoughts.

“It was good, busy until late this afternoon. Not that you couldn’t tell from across the street.” There was a bit of a taunt to it, a pressing that told me she’d known I was watching too close.

I grunted as I swept the little pieces of leaves and petals into my palm so I could toss them into the trash.

“Couldn’t hear what you were saying, though. Couldn’t tell how you were feelin’,” I admitted.

I felt her still a fraction, her movements slowing as she murmured, “I felt safe, if that’s what you’re wondering.”

---