Page 30 of The Reluctant Billionaire

Being here with him like this, my body cradling his and his cradling mine, feels right in a way that’s quiet and tentative and yet revelatory.

It’s also hot as hell. Aide is coursing through my bloodstream like a drug, this proximity to him messing with my brain. He looks up at me, his face pained but open.

Questioning.

And I know what my answer is.

13

LOTTA

Irelease him and take a step back, crossing my arms in front of me so I can tug my oversized Venus t-shirt over my head and chuck it in the far corner of the room.

‘What are you doing?’ he mutters, his gaze roving over my chest, with which he’s now perfectly at eye-level. He presses his hands to his thighs, palms down, fingers splayed in a way that feels intentional. Like a predator trying to talk himself out of attacking.

‘Giving that brain of yours something else to obsess about,’ I tell him. ‘Watch.’

I cross my arms again and pull my white t-shirt up, shaking out my hair as I pull my top all the way off. Aide’s sharp intake of breath when he finds himself at eye-level with and inches away from my boobs encased in their pale pink, lacy bra isthebest sound I have ever heard.

‘Jesus fuck,’ he groans. ‘Oh my God.’ I doubt he’s aware of it, but his hands go straight to grip my hips, holding me in place through my cut-offs.

His breath is warm on my breasts. His face is anguished. His fingers dig into my hips. And I want this man’s mouth on my nipples like I’ve never wanted anything in my entire, charmed life.

‘Take off my bra,’ I tell him.

His laugh is choked. ‘No, Carlotta, I—’

Fine. If he’s going to go all shy on me, I’ll take matters into my own hands. I reach behind and unhook my bra, letting its straps slide down my arms before it lands on his thigh. He doesn’t bat an eyelid, because his stare is fixated on my now-bare breasts.

‘Oh my God,’ he says again. He pants out a breath. ‘Fucking hell, you’re so beautiful. Jesus Christ.’ His words are slurred already, and all he’s done is look.

I know objectively I have great boobs. They’re decent-sized and pert and shapely and fabulous. But I have never in my life wanted a man to appreciate them like I do now. I want him to adore them. Worship them. I want them to give him everything he needs in this moment. And I’m not sure my nipples have ever been pinched so tight. So aching.

I want him togo to fucking town on them, like he threatened to the other day.

I put my hands on his shoulders. He’s wearing one of his sexy builder-vests, and under my palms his shoulders are huge and taut, the skin smooth. ‘I want you to touch me, Aide,’ I tell him. ‘I really, really need you to touch them.’

‘Oh fuck,’ he rasps, and it has my lady parts clenching madly under my shorts. He looks up at me, his eyes dark and hooded, his lips parted. If this is the way he looksbeforehe touches a woman, I can’t begin to imagine how he looks when he’s inside her.

Just imagining that feels unwise.

Dangerous.

Because a mere look like this, from a man like this, isn’t something you recover from easily.

‘You sure?’ he mouths, his fingers flexing around my hips, and I give them a little thrust in his direction.

‘Please,’ I beg. I’m standing here with my boobs out for him, my skin bare, and his breath warm on them, and his mouth so close it’s torture.

He slides his hands up my sides. They’re warm, and his fingers are calloused, and they send a scatter of goosebumps over my skin and a flurry of butterflies through my stomach.

His eyes flick back up to my face one more time. I suspect what he sees there is the equivalent of a big fatyes pleasetattooed across my forehead, because he allows his hands to skate higher until they’re framing my boobs and his thumbs are stroking along the creases of their undersides.

I groan, because his touch, and the anticipation of more of it, is already igniting me. My noise seems to catalyse him. He dips that dark head and runs his nose and lips over my skin, back and forth over my décolletage and the tops of my boobs before he kisses right between them.

I grip his shoulders harder in encouragement, and he acts.

His mouth moves to my right nipple. He teases it with the tip of his tongue before taking the entire thing in his mouth and sucking hard.

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