7. Stone
STONE
I have a Grammy. It’s awesome. I pet it and stroke it. And it is definitely one of my proudest accomplishments. Well, all five of them are.
It’s hard to top a Grammy. It’s harder still to top a quintet of those statues. But I intend to, starting today.
I’m going to impress the daylights out of myself with this incredible feat—I’m not going to flirt with my bodyguard.
Hell, I’m not going to flirt with anyone.
I can behave.
That afternoon when Jackson takes over the guard detail outside the hotel, holding open the door for my limo, I practice. I give the big man a clap on the shoulder, slide into the back seat, and say, “And how the hell are you this morning?”
There. That’s friendly.
As he joins me in my ride, he tips his forehead to the sun, high in the sky. “You mean this afternoon.”
Damn, he is good. He slides right back into giving me a hard time, and I love it. “I say morning. You say afternoon. Tomato, tomahto.”
“Let’s call the whole thing off,” he says dryly as the limo pulls out of the portico.
“Are you trying to impress me with your musical knowledge?” I ask, giving myself a virtual pat on the back. I’m sixty seconds in, and I’m earning my no-flirt trophy with panache.
“Is that all it takes? Just rattling off a commonly known set of lyrics? I had no idea you were that easy.”
I suck in a breath, doing my best to resist, but that’s some low-hanging fruit. And I need to pluck it. “I think you absolutely know how easy I am.”
Jackson rolls his eyes, mutters something under his breath, and stares out the window.
And . . . maybe I shouldn’t have said that.
Did I need to remind the guy that I’m a hound dog? Might as well have howled at the moon. Humped a stuffed alligator like my brother’s horny little Chihuahua does.
Easy.
That’s not really a compliment to the person you were easy with.
Only one way to course correct. Make a joke. “Just kidding, J-man. Nothing easy about me. I’m hard as a rock,” I say, wiggling my eyebrows, and that’s so much better.
Not.
But I can right this ship.
I stretch out my legs in front of me. “Anyway, I slept like the dead last night. Didn’t drag my ass out of bed till eleven, and it was beautiful. How about you?”
“I was up early.” His tone is crisp, businesslike. But that’s par for the course with Captain Stoic.
Or should I call him Captain Mostly Stoic? Given that he caved last night with that bone-melting kiss.
“I bet you were. I bet you already did twenty workouts and mastered some new phrases in Spanish. Probably learned to make one of those fold-up boats that slides inside a bottle,” I say, rattling off the man’s hobbies as the car cruises along the Strip.
Jackson says something to me in Spanish. I have no clue what he said, but that’s cool. I still dig his language skills. “See? You act like I don’t pay attention. But I do. I knew you were studying Spanish.”
“We were in Madrid together for one of your shows,” he says, a slight laugh in his voice. “I ordered for you at a café when you needed a morning pick-me-up.”
“And I ordered for us in Paris,” I point out, since I can hold my own with the French language, merci beaucoup . “And the salade Nicoise was epic, along with the wine.”
“I wouldn’t know. I don’t drink on the job.”
“I’m well aware. Since I pay attention. And I paid attention, too, when you mentioned you were studying Spanish, wanting to know more of the language.”
He scrubs a hand across the back of his neck, pressing into his skin, something he does when he’s stressed. “It’s good for the job. To know more languages. And yes, we’ve talked about it.”
“And I remembered. See? That’s impressive.”
He lifts his face, but his hand is still working his neck. “Glad you’re impressed by yourself.”
“And I’m impressed by you knowing song lyrics,” I say, slapping Jackson’s thigh. Oops. Guess I’m not earning all the awards today. But that thigh. It’s like a mass of muscle, and I want to glide my hand up and down it.
In fact, I’d like to kneel between those strong legs, undo his zipper, take him in my mouth, and feel those muscles under my palms as I suck him off.
Maybe that’d make him feel better.
But resistance is the name of my game.
Trouble is, the name of his game seems to be tension. He lets go of his neck, then stretches it back and forth.
It cracks. That sound worries me.
I can relieve that tension. I want to relieve it.
I reach across the back of the limo. My fingers have a mind of their own, and they travel up the back of his neck.
He’s still for a second, then his eyes float closed and his lips part. A sexy breath escapes them.
Even sexier is the faintest groan that comes when I run my fingers into his hair, short and neat and so damn soft.
This is exactly what I promised myself I wouldn’t do.
And there are reasons I need to stop.
But Jackson looks like he’s about to melt. He looks like he needs my hand, my fingers, my touch.
So I let him, let us , exist in this space where touch isn’t a violation of duty, where it doesn’t mess with your head. Where it only makes you feel good. My fingers travel up the back of his neck, coasting through his hair. He leans back against my hand, like he’s savoring the touch.
I slide my thumb down his neck, pushing, kneading. He breathes out hard, evenly. His muscles visibly relax as I rub.
He murmurs, something that maybe sounds like “ So good. ”
I want to pump a fist, to kiss the sky. I did that. I made him feel better. Made him feel good again.
I dig my thumb and fingers in, rubbing and working out the knots, and he seems to savor every second of the attention. I can’t help it—my eyes drift down to his pants.
To the thick ridge, so visible.
Seems his dick savors the attention too.
I stifle a groan as I stare at the outline of his cock.
I want it, and him.
Want to ride it, want to have it.
I’m tempted, so damn tempted, to crawl across his lap, straddle him, and grind against his hard-on.
And while I’m doing that, I’d love to rope my hands through his hair again and kiss away whatever tension resides in him—the tension that seems to disappear when I touch him like this.
But Jackson’s words from last night echo.
My promise to myself does too.
I let my hand fall, resting briefly against his shoulder before I let go.
His eyes open slowly. He swallows, and I stare at his throat, at his Adam’s apple bobbing, like he’s trying to solve a problem.
The problem of me.
But I can fix it for both of us.
I have to.
“Did you sleep well?” I ask, doing my best to return to the colleague-banter volley.
“Yes.” He shifts instantly, away from the physical, like the last few minutes didn’t even happen.
“Me too. I did some yoga, some Pilates in the morning. I feel like a brand-new man today. Ready to tackle any challenge that the world is going to throw at me.”
“What sort of challenges do you think the world is going to throw at you?”
“Anything. Everything. The world is tossing them in my direction, and I’m going to handle all of them, J. And mostly, I want you to know the biggest challenge I’m going to handle,” I say, since this is serious.
No messing around here.
No matter how much I want this man, I need to honor his lines.
I want him to know I respect his boundaries.
“What’s that?”
“The biggest challenge is that I need to resist you. And I plan on it. I’m going to resist the hell out of you. I am going to earn myself all the awards ever in the history of resisting the sexiest bodyguard in the world.”
He laughs, loud and deep, and that shifts the mood once more. Turns it light again, the sensuality washed away with a chuckle. “That’s good to know.”
“Isn’t it?”
He meets my gaze, his eyes showing a hint of regret. Like maybe he doesn’t want me to resist him. Maybe not after the way I just touched him, like he needed some softness, some tenderness.
But in a split second, that regret is erased from his irises.
He is all certain, and—as an adult who is trying desperately to adult—I’m glad I’m resisting him.
“Yes, Stone, it’s very good to know,” he adds.
“And you know why I’m going to do it?” I ask, because I need the reminder too.
His brow knits. “Because I work for you?”
“Because you work for me. Because I respect you. And because I want to show you my skills,” I say, laying out my reasons.
“You want to show off by resisting me?”
I answer from the heart. “That’s what you were getting at last night when you talked about the private party. You think I’m easy. You think I touch anyone. And you don’t like that. You were jealous at the thought of me touching someone else.”
Jackson shakes his head, his jaw tightening, his lips forming a straight line. He glances toward the front of the car, even though there’s a soundproof screen between us and the driver.
“We don’t need to talk about this.”
“But we do. Because I think that’s part of the issue for you. You don’t like the fact that I’m a free spirit.”
His answer is hard, bitten with tension as he gestures from him to me. “That has nothing to do with this.”
“You say that. But it kind of does. And I want to prove something to you. I want to prove to you that I don’t just throw myself at anybody.”
Jackson lets out a beleaguered sigh. “Why do you want to prove that to me?”
I look hard at him, at this stunning man by my side. I could give him a million lines. I could tell him he’s sexier than anyone I’ve ever known.
But that doesn’t matter to him. He won’t care about that.
The things that matter to Jackson go deeper than sex, deeper than looks.
That’s why I want to impress him with the man I can be.
I don’t know what the future holds with Jackson and me.
Don’t know if there’s a chance for anything more with him.
But for now, I need to show him and myself that there’s more to me.
“You’re important to me. So I made a bet with myself. To resist you and everyone else.”
He laughs. “You’re crazy.”
“Maybe I am.”
But maybe this is something I need to prove to myself.
Not only that I can resist him, but that I can resist sex.
So that’s what I do for the entire next month.