Page 40 of The Scandal You Started
She shook her head as she tried to crumple in on herself, her belly aching under the strain of her laughter. But Dominic’s weight on the duvet left her with little wiggle room.
“You set me up,” he grumbled.
She hiccupped when she finally caught her breath, tears of delight slipping through her bottom lashes. “Oh, Dominic,” she cooed, swiping at the liquid slipping across her cheek.
He turned onto his side and rested his jaw against the flat of a propped fist so that he hovered over her with a playful scowl. “I shall never trust you again, you wicked woman.”
“Like it was my fault,” she sassed back through a snicker. “But don’t be embarrassed. It happens to everyone.”
He huffed a sceptical sound but wore a faint smile. He brushed his thumb gently through the dampness under one set of her lashes. Her amusement stuttered in place like a system of rusted cogs as the sunny warmth in his eyes poured over her chest as thick as syrup.
The beat of her heart sounded in her ears as she held still and unbreathing.
Don’t look at me like that. Stop looking at me like that.
“You humiliate me,” he rasped, “and yet I cannot find it within me to be angry when the sound of your laughter is the most precious melody.”
That was the moment she should have laughed at his stupid, cheesy flirtation and rolled her eyes. But the gooey trap of his gaze refused to let her play it off as a joke.
It felt near impossible to break out of the warm, sticky pools he was dragging her into, deeper and deeper and under.
At least until he traced the same thumb along the line of her jaw, skimming dangerously close to her lips. Then her heart kicked for another reason entirely, warning her that this was moving dangerously close to forbidden territory.
She swallowed and clenched her teeth, pulling his hand away from her face by his wrist. “Don’t cross the line, Dominic.”
The glaze coating his stare cleared away, and he curled his hand away from her. “What line have I unknowingly attempted to cross, sweet Rayna?”
“You can’t touch me like that.”
“Then how may I touch you?”
“You’re not supposed to touch me.”
“At all?”
“Intimately,” she said with a bite of irritation. “You can’t touch me intimately.”
Something wispy darted through his eyes, dulling the bright hue of his irises, but Rayna couldn’t figure out what it was. It was probably better that way too.
“I think you should go back to your room,” she said.
He held still for a second, then twisted over and flopped on the bed again. He rubbed his head into the pillow as he crossed his arms over his chest. “In a minute.”
“Dominic.”
“Five more minutes. Please,sweetheart. I shall not touch you.”
Say no. Say no, Rayna. Now.
But fuck him, because something about the softness of his tone smashed whatever stubborn front she’d been hoping to maintain to smithereens.
“Five minutes,” she echoed, then rolled over, giving him her back.
Chapter 12
Dominic
The day after River dropped Dominic’s smart mobile phone off at the farmhouse, Rayna did as she’d promised Dominic and showed him around the acreage of land and all it had to offer.
