Page 78 of A Ticking Time Boss

SIXTEEN

His tawny eyes are deeply golden, his hair falling over his forehead from where I’ve run my hands through it. Half lying above me, he seems enormous. All wide shoulders and muscled torso.

“Yes,” he murmurs. “Anything.”

My sudden nerve in asking falls flat. It’s a crazy suggestion. Only, something in me is frightened of going first. Of having it be all about me, of taking off my panties, of lying here naked when he’s not.

“Audrey?” he prompts. He so rarely says my name, and there’s soft seriousness in the tone. It reminds me that it’s him, the same man who’d made it a sport to make me laugh, who texted me about how he drank his coffee, who’d picked me up from my dentist’s appointment.

I push myself into sitting. He follows suit, not trying to hide the erection that’s clear through his pants.

“I want to see what you did when we spoke on the phone.”

Carter’s mouth falls open. Then he grins, and it’s filled with so much heat that it sends an aching pang through my stomach. “Not what I expected you to say.”

“Only if you want to, of course.”

“If I want to?” He palms himself through his pants. “Yes. I do.”

I reach for the belt buckle and he lets me, strong hands resting beside mine on his lap. I undo the button of his pants and slide the zipper down. There’s something reassuring about focusing on him and the inescapable evidence of his arousal.

Carter tugs his pants down and pulls himself out. He’s long and hard and thick and dear God I can’t look away. Especially not when his hand closes around the shaft and starts to stroke in slow movements.

I’m mesmerized.

“This is what I was doing,” he says. “When we spoke on the phone.” His voice is hoarse, head leaning back against the couch. His eyes move across my collarbones, my face, my bare breasts. Down to my panties. “Imagining you just like this. How beautiful you’d look beneath your clothes.”

“You’ve thought about that?”

He raises an eyebrow. “About thirty seconds after we met.”

“No. In the bar?”

“Yes,” he says hotly.

My words form and die on my tongue, over and over again, and I can’t look away from his hand gripping himself. The long fingers wrapped around rock-hard flesh.

“Well,” I finally murmur. “I’d better not disappoint.”

Carter’s hand strokes lazily. “That would be impossible.”

But the real impossibility is for me to remain a spectator. I reach out, and his own hand falls to the side, letting me take over. His skin is hot against my hand and moves like silk over the hardness. I echo his previous movements, stroking slowly from base to tip.

Carter rests his head against the couch and swallows thickly. The muscles of his throat work with the movement. “Christ,” he mutters.

“You feel good,” I say.

“Oh yes, I do,” he says with a flash of his grin. It disappears when I trail my fingers around the sensitive head. A groan escapes him.

I don’t know how long I touch him. Teasing, exploring, getting to know the man who is so comfortable sitting naked on his couch and letting me do what I want. It’s tantalizing. He looks big, and thick, and I ache inside with the knowledge that I’ll soon feel every inch.

“Spitfire,” he finally says, voice hoarse. “As much as I’m enjoying this, I wasn’t the only one touching myself during our phone call.”

I meet his eyes, heavy-lidded and heated, and the last shred of my inhibition slips away. “You’re right,” I say. I give his erection a last, lingering stroke before I reach for my underwear.

It’s now or never.

I lift my hips and slide them down.

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