Page 27 of Little Did You Know

My fingertips tingled where they rested against the cool marble countertop, suddenly hypersensitive to every sensation—the distant hum of the refrigerator, the warmth radiating from where he stood too close, the way my blouse clung to my skin in the warm kitchen.

Heat crept up my neck, warming my cheeks. Had I been making noises? The thought alone made me want to crawl under the counter and disappear. I managed a weak smile and studied my plate with sudden fascination, pushing the remaining crumbs around with my fork.

Nick leaned in closer. Too close, but not close enough.

He moved with a slowness, telegraphing his intentions as he leaned toward me. I had plenty of time to pull away. I didn't.

"It sounded," he whispered, his breath warm against the shell of my ear, "like you were making love to that cake."

The contrast between his professional demeanor and these intimate words created a conflict that left me dizzy. Fire blazed in the pit of my stomach, spreading outward until even my fingertips felt feverish. Yet simultaneously, electric chills raced along my spine, raising goosebumps on flesh that felt too hot, too sensitive, too aware.

He pulled back just enough to study my reaction, his self-control maddening when my own felt so fragile. The corner of his mouth twitched upward, and when he spoke again, his voice was honey poured over gravel. "Is it better than sex?"

I choked on the last bite of cake in my mouth, the rich chocolate turning to sawdust as I struggled to swallow. The stool wobbled beneath me as I jerked backward, and for one terrifying moment, I was falling.

He caught me, placed me sturdily on the chair, and backed away.

Holy crap!What the hell was that?

He stood staring at me; surely, he didn't want an answer to the ridiculous question.

Looking up, I realized he did. The cake was delicious, but I couldn't compare it to sex, and that wasn't a conversation I wanted to have at that moment; I gave the best answer I could without lying!

The question hung between us—inappropriate, tempting, dangerous—yet delivered with such casual confidence that it seemed he already knew the answer and was merely waiting for me to catch up.

"Yes, it is." I gripped my fork tighter, studying the pattern on the marble countertop. After all, how could I compare it to something I'd never had?

Nick's carefully composed expression shifted, something darker and more intense replacing his usual professional demeanor. He leaned forward, closing the small distance between us. My pulse jumped as he leaned forward, his finger brushing against my lower lip. My breath caught.

"Missed." The word came out rough, barely above a whisper.

The pad of his thumb came away with a smear of chocolate. Something shifted in his expression—a decision made. Time seemed to stretch, elastic and dreamlike, as he brought his thumb to his mouth. The gesture should have been innocent. It wasn't.

His eyes held mine, dark and unflinching, pupils dilated enough that I could barely discern where iris ended and darkness began. He slowly—agonizingly slowly—licked the frosting away. The wet sound of his tongue against skin was barely audible, yet it thundered in my ears.

The kitchen felt too warm, too small, the air between us charged like the atmosphere before a lightning strike. I couldn't look away, couldn't remember how to breathe. My lips parted involuntarily, mirroring his movement.

The act was exquisitely, unbearably intimate—a promise of something I wasn't sure I was ready for. Just as I leaned forward, drawn by some magnetic pull I couldn't resist, the distant sound of Hannah's footsteps on the stairs broke the spell, leaving me suspended between relief and disappointment.

I had no idea what to do, if anything at all. He smiled, grabbed both plates, and turned his back to me, heading to the sink. I was getting whiplash! Again, it was as if nothing had happened, but it wasn't nothing to me.

He started rinsing the plates off when his phone sounded off, alerting everyone from Florida to Alaska that he had an incoming call.

Nick held up his soap-covered hands. "Check that, please. Might be Justin."

I stretched across the island, fingers closing around his phone. The screen lit up, and my throat went dry. A very blonde, very naked woman filled the display. My face burned hot enough to fry an egg.

"Who is it?" Water splashed as he rinsed his hands, his tone casual—too casual.

My eyes darted to the name above the photo, then quickly away from the explicit image lighting up the screen. I cleared my throat, suddenly finding it difficult to swallow. "Brittany." The word came out as a squeak, my knuckles whitening around the phone as if I could somehow contain what I'd just seen.

Nick's shoulders stiffened. I watched his reflection in the window above the sink—his expression morphing from confusion to realization to horror in the span of a heartbeat.

The plate clattered against metal as he abandoned all pretense of composure. He spun toward me, water droplets flying from his still-soapy hands. Three hurried steps, a skid on the wet floor, and suddenly Nick—always-in-control Nick—was sprawled on the ground, arm outstretched toward the phone I still held.

His fingers closed around it, jabbing desperately at the power button. The ringing stopped. Silence descended, broken only by his ragged breathing and my poorly suppressed snort of laughter.

He remained on the floor for a moment, dignity in tatters, eyes closed as if in pain. When he finally looked up at me, the plea for discretion in his gaze only made it harder not to laugh.

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