Chapter 5
KARA
My breathing ratcheted up when Shawn was, once again, right beside me. Why couldn’t I keep my stupid mouth shut?
“Let’s go,” he said to the driver.
“You weren’t supposed to get in the car,” I objected.
The tension built to an uncomfortable level as he activated the partition between us and the driver and shifted even closer. I couldn’t ignore the enticing scent of his cologne, or his presence that filled every inch of the back seat.
All I wanted to do was sleep off the anxiety from the disastrous day. I was tired, physically and mentally drained, and couldn’t last much longer.
“I’m going to kiss you,” he said.
“No, you’re not.”
He did it anyway, pressing his warm lips to mine. I ignored him and the delicious electricity he sent surging through me. Didn’t give him any response at all. He drew away a fraction of an inch, so his breath was hot on my face.
“Kiss me back. You’ll like it.”
“I won’t.” I disliked the quiver in my voice because it made my statement sound like a lie.
A smile ghosted across his lips. “Why not?”
“Because,” I said more firmly, “you’re an arrogant prick.”
His seductive eyes went wide then lit with warmth. Like he was thrilled. “Oh, Kara. That was the wrong answer.”
He assaulted my mouth like he couldn’t care less about what I thought of him. It demanded my participation, though. Hard lips moved on mine, aggressive and dominating.
Our first kiss had been just a quick meeting of our mouths before I’d put a stop to it, and I hadn’t a clue how risky it had been. I didn’t understand how much we’d both been holding back until his mouth crushed to mine.
Need erupted deep inside me. It was a tidal wave sweeping away the last of my resistance.
The next thing I knew, my hands were on the sides of his face like I was holding on for dear life, my kiss meeting his and pleading for more.
Holy shit, he knew what he was doing.
The power of his kiss was intense, consuming .
. . out of control. I sighed into it, and he issued a quiet sound of satisfaction.
I was the first one to use tongue to deepen our kiss.
My hands drifted down to clutch fistfuls of the soft wool of his jacket.
His fingers threaded through my hair, holding me at just the right angle to deepen his possession.
This was a delicious nightmare I was sure to regret later. But not right now. Not with what he was doing, with how my starved body responded to him. I didn’t care that I was over my head, drowning in him.
My moan when Shawn’s tongue caressed mine was loud, and the stroke of it created a sharp ache between my legs.
My breath was ragged when his lips drifted to my neck, trailing open-mouthed kisses on my sensitive skin.
I gasped when he nipped at my earlobe, giving me a shock of pleasure.
His concerned gaze found mine momentarily.
But I shut my eyes and let my head fall back on the seat, basically encouraging him to have me however he wanted.
He yanked at the tie at my waist to get inside my jacket, tugging it open.
It was unbelievably hot inside the car, under his hands that slid around my back.
Hotter still under his mouth which teased and tormented me.
He sucked on the sensitive spot where my pulse pounded in my neck, giving me a shudder of pleasure.
Outside, rain streaked across the windows, and inside, fog crept up the glass.
I wanted his mouth back on mine and yanked his head to where I needed it to be. I didn’t think about who he was, or what my sister would say if she knew I was kissing her brother-in-law. I couldn’t think about anything except the way he tasted or how hungry my body was for his touch.
He pulled away, breaking our kiss only for a moment, and hurried to kneel on the floorboard facing me.
As soon as he settled on his knees, he dragged me across the leather back seat so I was centered around him.
He set the flat of his palms on my thighs and pushed them upward, urging the fabric of my skirt toward my waist so my legs could open wide enough to accommodate him.
“Shawn,” I whispered, drunk with lust.
And then I felt something I hadn’t in years—a man hard between my legs.
My heart fluttered and blood roared through my head, muffling the sound of my ragged breathing. He gripped my hips and shifted me to the edge of the seat toward him, so I was slumped down and pressed firmly and intimately against him.
Where I could feel every impressive inch of how badly he wanted me. The pleasurable grind of his body against mine made sparks crack across every nerve ending, and the moan I let out was so loud and deep, a victorious smile blazed across his face.
We were only a heartbeat and a zipper away from sex, and there was a stranger less than five feet away, only black glass separating us.
“You’ve done a great job of proving I’m not irresistible,” he mocked, his lips by the shell of my ear. “You can continue proving it in your hotel room.”
“No,” I gasped, and reality splashed on me like cold water. My hands were on his chest, finding it hard beneath his suit. I’d put them there to push him away, but they remained, feeling the steady thump of his heartbeat. “You’ve made your point.”
“Which is?”
His kiss filled me with so much desire I shuddered. “That you can turn me on when I don’t want you to.”
“You keep lying to yourself—”
Finally, I found the frustration I wanted to feel, and it trickled into my voice. “You’ve convinced my body to want this, but not my mind.”
He leaned back, taking the heat away, and left me staring up at him, my skirt riding high and just barely covering my underwear. I felt exposed and vulnerable, but he didn’t seem to notice. His face had gone blank, as if my statement had taken his brain offline.
There was a small part of me that wanted to wrap his tie in my fist and pull him back to me. But he’d stopped so abruptly, it made me nervous.
“What?” I asked and dimly realized the car wasn’t moving anymore. How had we made the trip so fast, and in the rain? It wasn’t possible. Oh, God, I’d lost all track of time once he’d descended upon me.
“I can do that,” he said, his voice unsteady. As if unsure. “I can convince your mind, too.”
“Good luck with that,” I eked out.
I sat up and pushed my skirt down, then wrapped my jacket closed. The more layers between us right now, the better. And I meant it, too. He had a significant mountain to climb to change my view on him.
My breathing slowed to almost normal, making me believe I could do this. I could climb out of his car and get him to stay there. My words had stunned him, maybe even wounded his continent-sized ego—
One look said that was doubtful. He flashed a brilliant smile. “I don’t need luck.”
My hand shook as I grabbed my laptop bag off the floor and slung the strap over my shoulder. I reached for the door, but he placed his hands on my waist.
“Am I coming up?” He claimed my mouth once again, and this kiss tasted like sin with a side of persuasion. Even through my coat, I could feel the heat of his hands on my waist.
I tore my mouth away. “I don’t think so.”
Would he accept my answer, or make me stay right where I was? Surely, he knew he had that power. His kiss was intoxicating, and I suspected one more taste was all it’d take for me to give in.
“Very well.” He looked disappointed, but only for a split second. “Ich werde Sie bald sehen.”
Whatever that meant. I didn’t say goodbye. Instead, I fled from the car without looking back.
It wasn’t until I was in my hotel room and flung face down on the bed that I could breathe again.
I hadn’t gotten over the jet lag and needed sleep.
That and the incident with Scott was why I had waffled so badly.
If I weren’t so emotionally and physically exhausted, I’d be immune to him.
Maybe immune wasn’t the right word. Resistant, perhaps.
We hadn’t taken our clothes off. We’d done nothing more than kiss, and Shawn had barely touched me. And still, the encounter had left me desperate and shaky. Filled with need for him. Wanting him.
It had easily been the hottest twenty minutes of my life.
Good-looking, my sister had warned me about him. Not even close. Jason, Shawn’s brother, was good-looking in a rough-and-tough sort of way. My sister had always liked the bad boys. And while Jason, the head of Osterh?gen security, looked more conventionally dangerous, I knew better.
The taller brother in the suit was cunning and manipulative, making him far, far more dangerous than the one who carried a gun.
“Ma’am,” the ticketing agent said, waving me over. “I’m ready for you.”
I pulled my bag along as I walked up and dropped my passport on the counter. “Hi. I checked in for my flight yesterday, but my boarding pass disappeared from my phone, and now I can’t pull it up.”
“Let’s take a look,” the woman said, scooping up my passport and scanning it in.
It was insanely early, and I’d been bleary eyed in the back of my Lyft this morning, not understanding what I was seeing in the app. The only plus side to being at the airport so early was I was first in line, waiting for the counter to open at four a.m.
The agent leaned in to better study her screen. “This was for the trip to Amsterdam, correct?”
“Yes.”
She pressed her lips together. “The system shows this reservation was canceled.”
“Wait, what?” I stiffened. “No, that has to be a mistake. I checked in yesterday. I had a boarding pass.”
The woman nodded as she peered at her screen.
“I see that, but I also see a cancellation was logged last night. Looks like it was done over the phone.” She lifted her gaze to me.
“Your travel credit should show up in your account right away, but sometimes it can take the system a few hours to update.”
I stared at her with disbelief. “But I didn’t cancel it.”
The ticketing agent looked as lost as I felt, before turning her attention back to her computer.
“So, I can’t rebook you on the six twenty-five because there aren’t any seats available.
” She clicked her mouse a few times. “I could put you on standby for the seven fifty-five flight tonight. It gets into Amsterdam tomorrow morning at eight fifteen.” She glanced at me, paused, then looked back at her screen with confusion. “Kara Hayward?”
“Yes?” I said, desperate to keep my temper in check because, even though it wasn’t her fault, I knew my whole day was falling apart.
The agent pointed over my shoulder. I turned—
My mouth dropped open.
A man in a black suit stood to the side of the bank of counters, a sign bearing my name held in his hands. Rage flooded through my veins.
“That asshole,” I hissed under my breath, causing the ticketing agent to startle. I flashed her a polite smile and snatched up my passport. “Sorry about that. Thanks for your help.”
I jerked my roller bag along as I stalked toward the man with the sign. “I take it you work for Shawn Dunn?”
“Yes, ma’am. He’d like to offer you his plane so you can return home.”
I gripped the handle on my bag so aggressively my hand began to ache. How dare he cancel my flight, leaving me stranded with no other option? I glared out the windows beyond the man as I fought the knee-jerk reaction to instantly say no.
But I needed to get back to the office. I’d pushed back an important meeting, destroying the rest of my team’s schedule, so I could be in New York to terminate Scott’s employment in person. I couldn’t push tomorrow’s meeting a second time.
I spat it out. “Fine.”
The man took my bag and led me to a town car waiting outside, and a minute later it swept me away from the international terminal.
I scrolled to Shawn’s name in my contacts on my phone, preparing to call him and give him a piece of my mind.
It was ungodly early, so it was doubtful he’d be awake, and the idea of rousing him from the dead of sleep was satisfying.
But then I pictured him in bed, all shirtless and hair askew, with a days’ worth of stubble darkening his jawline, and there was an uncomfortable fluttering in my stomach.
What version of him would I get? Sometimes he’d send me things in German that I’d had to translate. They were always filthy, filling my body with steam, and it was the last thing I needed right now.
I put my phone away, took in a cleansing breath, and forced myself to cool down. My temper had caused me a mountain’s worth of problems in the past. I was determined not to let it happen again.
At the private airfield, a large, white jet gleamed in the runway lights. It was both impressive and intimidating. A perfect example of how different Shawn and I were in every way.
Despite my unease with wealth, excitement raced up my spine. I’d only flown business class a handful of times in my life, and every time that experience had felt novel and special. So, an entire private plane to myself? I could barely fathom what it’d be like.
I thanked the driver when he loaded my luggage into the open cargo hold and gestured to the compact set of stairs leading up to the open hatch of the plane. I eagerly climbed the steps but jolted to a stop the moment I was through the door.
Stupid. I should have known.
Any excitement I’d had died when I discovered the pair of warm, brown eyes waiting for me on board.