Page 48 of Takeover-
How were Sam’s needs any different? His lust would ruin everything.
Sam tapped the keycard folder against his palm. Michael would be waiting in his room. Naked? Dressed in that delicious suit? Sam exhaled a ragged breath as the elevator slowed and the doors opened onto the sixth floor.
If he did go, what would Michael do? Fuck him of course. But what else? Spank him? Use a belt again? Something else?
The doors closed, and it sounded like his heartbeat played from the speakers above his head rather than up-tempo jazz. The gleaming brass accents of the car interior swam before his eyes. He reached for the buttons and paused over the open door symbol.
He’d miss a good cup of coffee in the morning. Big deal. That was his life. No Michael.
Fire replaced his blood and burned his lungs. He couldn’t make his finger press the damn open button.
What would it be like to wake in Michael’s bed, in his arms? Sam stared at the panel. He could have that tonight. A good-bye in the morning. Something normal just this once, even if it were an ending.
Another voice from his past, this one akin to his own, whispered in his head. You going to let one bad night a decade ago dictate the rest of your life? You’re an idiot, Sam Anderson.
Sam punched the button for floor eight and backed up against the wall of the car as it rose, swallowing air in gulps. It took effort to force his arms to stop shaking.
How much of this bad idea was the whiskey, he didn’t know. Probably less than he’d like. Recklessness was becoming a habit—first sex in the shower and now this.
The elevator stopped and the doors opened to reveal the hallway of the eighth floor. He should press the six button and end this madness before it destroyed Michael. Instead, he stepped out of the car. The hallway blurred as Sam strode to the door of Room 823. He slid the key out of the folder.
Last chance to turn around, but then he never turned back. Sam took a breath and pushed the card into the slot. A whir, a green light, and then he was inside the room. The door closed behind him with an audible thump. After that, the only sound was the humming of the air conditioner and the rush of blood in Sam’s ears.
Michael sat on a couch, still dressed in his suit pants, shirt, and suspenders, but sans tie and jacket. No shoes, but dress socks. He set down the e-reader he’d been holding and stood.
Damn, the man was tall. Sam knew that, but the clothes Michael wore accentuated his height. No longer unassuming in Jimmy Buffet shirts and shorts, Michael was every stitch a man of power. That impression only grew as he closed the distance.
Sam couldn’t move. Hell, he couldn’t breathe.
“I wasn’t sure you’d come.” Michael stopped close enough that the buttons on his shirt shimmered as he spoke.
Sam followed the line of white circles up to Michael’s face. “Until I did, I wasn’t sure I would either.” He held out the keycard to Michael, who took it.
“Why?”
“Why did I come, or why wasn’t I sure?”
“I know why you’re here.” Michael brushed a finger along Sam’s jaw.
The feeling of his stubble moved by Michael’s touch sang down Sam’s every nerve. Heat and desire flooded his senses and he swayed forward. Michael caught him and tilted his chin up so that Sam had no choice but to look into Michael’s dark eyes.
“Tell me why you weren’t going to.” The faint scent of leather mixed with the earthy smell of Michael’s skin.
“We shouldn’t be doing this and I want—” He swallowed air. “I want more. More than I should have. More than is safe.”
“More?” Michael whispered in Sam’s ear before taking the lobe into his mouth.
Sam’s nerves exploded as heat traced down his spine. He wrapped his hands around Michael’s suspenders and closed his eyes against the onslaught of light that flashed before his vision. He clung to Michael because he wasn’t sure his legs would hold.
“More?” Michael spoke a second time, the heat of his breath warming Sam’s neck.
“More of you. More time. More of us.”
“A relationship?”
And there it was. Everything Sam had been dancing around since Curaçao. The one thing he could not have, not with his career, not with his nomadic life. “Yes.”
“And here I thought you only wanted me for my sense of style.” Amusement in Michael’s voice and a touch of something else, too. Approval?
