Page 46 of The Grump Who Stole Christmas
“Everyone underneath me who had aspirations of taking my job. I wasn’t a bitch to the people I worked with. I don’t want you to think I was that kind of manager. I was always professional and respectful to everyone. But when you’re in that life, people are gunning for you, so they have to label you as something.”
“Yeah, I know. They called me Junior.”
I huffed out a laugh and now I knew what to do with my hands. I wrapped an arm around his neck and snuggled closer to his chest.
“Calling you Junior sounds ridiculous,” I said softly. Geesh, he felt good. Warm and steady underneath me.
“It was. I wasn’t in the position I was in just because I was Paul McCleer Sr.’s son. I dedicated myself to the science of agriculture. I traveled the world looking for the best ideas on how to grow things. I understood the convergence of respecting the climate while still making a profit. I was fucking damn good at my job.”
“Which is why they called you Junior,” I reminded him. “It’s just a game. To get in your head. To feel less threatened by you.”
“Yeah. I know. It’s why I left. Nothing felt real anymore. All of it was a game. I wanted something more real.”
“Something not like me then.” I sighed.
This wasn’t a good idea. I knew it. He knew it. We both said it. I needed to get off his lap and go back to my own room.
“No, Kay-Kay,” he said, capturing my chin in between his thumb and forefinger. “Right now, you’re in my lap. Us whispering to each other like this in the dark. Feels as real as it gets.”
Then he kissed me and it felt like everything else about him. Warm and steady. There were no tricks, no angles, no attempts to impress me with any particular skills. Just like I wasn’t trying to impress him.
When was the last time I’d kissed someone without being stuck in my head? About what it meant, where it was going. Was this person a potential partner or a one-night stand? Would I seem easy, or prudish? What would they think of me afterward? Did I care?
But all of that went away sitting here in the dark on Paul’s lap. Kissing him, letting him kiss me. Our tongues touched. Our breaths melded. We broke apart only to go back for more. It felt like high school when the only goal was the kiss.
Without all the desperation and sweaty hands.
“Kay,” he said against my mouth, then pressed his forehead to mine. “We’ve got to stop.”
“Nooo,” I crooned, and dipped my head to suck gently on his earlobe.
“You taste too good,” he groaned. “I’m wanting things I don’t have any business wanting.”
But he smelled so good and his body heat wrapped me up like the best blanket. It wasn’t fair that I couldn’t have a little bit of this right now. I’d been through so much.
Reluctantly, I pulled away. Then he dipped his head to nip at my earlobe, and I could see how entirely unfair that was, because it only made me want more. Like his lips and teeth on my neck.Yes, just like that.
I’d always pulled away when any guy got too aggressive sucking on my neck. I never wanted some mark there that let the world know what I’d been doing the night before. So it was strange to want that mark now. To want to feel the pressure of Paul’s mouth on my neck and know that tomorrow, I would still feel him there. Still see him there.
I was also wanting things I didn’t have any business wanting.
He was right. We needed to stop. This all felt too good and that was trouble. After all, there was the future Mrs. McCleer I had to consider.
If we were going to be cool and have lunch and spa days together, I didn’t want to think about her husband sucking on my neck while we were doing it.
I must have tensed a little, because Paul immediately stopped and pulled his mouth away.
I was wet between my legs, my nipples were hard, my lips were puffy from kisses. I was going to feel my body all night long and part of me wanted to be frustrated about that, but the other part knew that stopping now, before it went too far, made more sense.
We were both sighing softly.
“You going to make yourself come when you get back to your bed?” he whispered in my ear.
It made sense. Finish myself off. Have a nice orgasm. Because that’s all I tended to have when I bothered to touch myself. Nice little orgasms.
I shook my head. “No, I think I want to feel the ache. Everyone is always racing to the end, but there’s something to be said about the ache.”
He laughed softly against my ear. “Okay, then. I won’t either. Won’t touch myself thinking about you touching yourself. Won’t come. We’ll just sleep in the ache.”
