Page 70 of Hot for Hostage

“Do I want to know what that was about?” He rubbed my hips. “Or why my chef is calling you pet names?”

“Just kitchen talk.” I smiled, refocusing on my piping. I had a feeling Davian wouldn’t appreciate it if I told him Antonio had warned me to run far, far away from here. “Speaking of kitchens, did you know you have the most gorgeous one I’ve ever laid eyes on?”

He rested his chin on the top of my head, watching me decorate. “It’s just a kitchen, Sadie.”

“No way. It’s so much more than that!” Pausing in the middle of piping a pink daisy, I tilted my head back against his chest to peer up at him. His square jaw looked even more appealing from this angle, and I had the strangest urge to bite it. “Your stand mixers alone cost over three months’ worth of my school stipends.Each.”

“Sounds like I need to lower Tony’s appliance budget,” he said dryly.

“What? No! Don’t do that,” I backtracked, wishing I hadn’t said anything. I didn’t want to cause any trouble for Antonio. “It’s a good thing. I got to use both mixers at the same time. Do you have any idea how big of a turn-on that is?”

Davian’s hands stilled on my hips. “You’re telling me you were in here getting turned on with my chef?”

…Oops.

Setting the piping bag down, I turned in his arms to face him. I had to stretch up on my tiptoes to wrap my arms around his neck, and he let me tug his head down.

“Maybe we should focus on the part about me being turned on now?” I asked, drawing him closer to my lips.

“Because of some mixers,” he said flatly, though his fingers dug into the skin of my hips as our lips brushed.

I hummed. “Yes, because of your beautiful, magnificent twelve-speed andself-cleaningmixers.”

Just thinking about them again made my voice all husky, and Davian’s eyes darkened.

But, like a tease, he only pressed a fleeting kiss to the corner of my mouth before peppering a trail along my jaw to my ear. I hung on tight as my back arched to get closer to him.

“Oh,” I whispered when he took my earlobe into his mouth. Suddenly, I couldn’t think—let alone talk—anymore. I needed to change the subject before things got carried away in the middle of Antonio’s sacred space.

I cleared my throat and used all my willpowernotto jump up and wrap my legs around his waist. “Is everything, um, okay with your rat infestation? Antonio said they haven’t gotten into the kitchen, so that’s a good sign.”

Davian stilled with my earlobe between his teeth, and he nibbled once more before pulling back. A dark brow rose. “You want to talk about that right now?”

No, but… “Infestations are no joke.”

“It’s being handled.” As he spoke, his fingers slid under the hem of my top, and the graze of his calluses against my skin made my heart skip a beat. Any worries of rats or infestations flew out the window. “But another matter still needs to be resolved.”

My gaze dropped to his mouth. “Oh?”

His lips curved into a rakish grin. “I believe I owe you after we were interrupted on the patio earlier.”

Flashes of me straddling him in nothing more than a slip of underwear bombarded me, and I ducked my head against Davian’s chest to hide the blush spreading like wildfire.

“Oh, now you’re shy?” he asked with a chuckle, his own voice growing husky. “You shouldn’t be. I’ve thought about little else since then.”

If human beings were liquefiable, I’d be a puddle on the floor.

“You know what? I can finish icing these later,” I said. The way his thumbs skimmed the skin above my waistline made thinking impossible, let alone focusing enough to decorate cupcakes. Was everything about this man designed to scramble my insides? I still had the mouthwatering image of his sculpted butt seared into my brain. “You mentioned bed?”

His grip on my waist tightened, and he lifted me into the air for the second time today. But this was a much shorter flight before Davian deposited me onto the counter.

“Change of plans.” He squeezed my waist. “Stay right here.”

I blinked as he stepped back, but he didn’t go far. Davian took the two large trays of dog treats on the counter behind me and stacked them onto other cookie trays.

Without another word, he walked to the nearest door to the hallway and…

Flipped the lock?

---