The Closer Read online

  Jess agreed, then nodded a goodbye at the man when they exited the elevator, her hand still in Griff’s.

  “He was certainly a character,” she remarked.

  Griff merely smiled. “That’s one way of putting it.”

  “Oh? What would be your way?”

  His eyes dropped to her mouth, flared with hunger. “I’m pretty sure you were looking at your stylist, the infamous Andre.”

  “Really. Wow.” She nodded, not exactly sure what to make of that information. “All righty then.”

  “You know what else he was?” Griff asked her.

  “No, what?”

  “An unwanted interruption,” he said. “You weren’t finished kissing me yet.”

  Jess bit her lip as a thrill whipped through her. She’d been mildly worried that the dog lover in the elevator might have been a welcome distraction for Griff, one to give him the necessary wherewithal to resist her again.

  She did not want him to resist. She wanted him to make her a part of his plans, to map out a schedule of seduction so depraved and thorough and wicked that they made every use of every amenity in their suite.

  Starting with, but not limited to, the bed.

  Careful to scan their surroundings, Griff approached the door and released her hand long enough to withdraw the key card and insert it into the lock. He bolted the door, throwing the additional lock he’d personally installed earlier, then made his usual sweep of the suite, checking for any hint of disturbance or anomaly.

  He glanced at the coffee table and frowned. “Did you eat a second strawberry?” he asked.

  Jess hesitated. “I’m not sure. Why?”

  “There’s one missing.”

  Wow. She knew that he was keeping a vigilant eye on everything, but to notice an extra strawberry was missing from the plate? She considered the question once more, then winced. “I think I did, actually,” she said. “Right before we went downstairs.”

  He nodded, seemingly satisfied, then untucked his shirt and lifted it, revealing those glorious abs again, the taut line of coppery masculine hair below his navel, and pulled a strip of surgical tape from his side. He held it up for her perusal, indicating the pair of small keys stuck to the back.

  “A pocket is too risky,” he explained.

  She smiled, impressed by his ingenuity. “That’s clever.”

  To her surprise, he pulled a gun from the back of his waistband—she’d assumed he had one, but seeing it was another matter altogether—and then removed the cuff from his wrist and stored the case in the in-room safe in the bedroom. He hadn’t done that before, so she could only assume that he was confident that the box was secure enough to take the risk. She watched him hide the keys beneath a block of smoked cheddar cheese in the refrigerator—inspired, she had to admit—and then he turned and, smiling lazily, sauntered toward her. It was a purposeful but unhurried gait that she found instantly arousing—a damn-near swagger, for lack of a better term—and his grin was endearingly boyish, but hot and promised sin.

  A shaky breath leaked out of her lungs as he paused before her, his heavy-lidded gaze searching hers. He reached up and framed her face with the rim of his palms, the pad of his fingers warm against her skin. He slid his thumb along her jaw, eliciting a shiver. “The case was in the way,” he murmured. “I’m going to need both hands for this.”

  Ah, Jess thought as giddy expectation bolted through her. So he did have a plan.

  * * *

  GRIFF DIDN’T SO much have a plan as a purpose and that purpose involved getting her naked as soon as possible and losing himself in the soft valley between her breasts and the even silkier heat between her thighs.

  He’d fought the good fight. He’d lost.

  But if this was losing, he thought as he tilted her face up to meet his and slanted his mouth over her sighing lips, then clearly being a winner was overrated.

  Honestly, when she’d asked if she could kiss him, he’d been so shocked at the request, he’d had to lock his knees to keep from staggering. No one had ever asked for permission to kiss him—as if she was concerned about taking advantage of him, of all things—and that simple request from that sinfully beautiful mouth had shattered what had been left of his control.

  Hell, it had been in shreds, anyway.

  He’d never been more drawn to a woman, never been more fascinated or charmed, never wanted one with this sort of utterly relentless intensity, the kind that dogged his every footstep, haunted every thought, seeped into his very bones.

  She had that effect on him. God help him, only her.

  She was the infection and the cure, the disease and the antidote, the sickness and the remedy. His Achilles’ heel. His Kryptonite.

  His undoing.

  Though he doubted Ranger Security would see it that way, he was—for the very first time in his life—going to ignore the consequences of his actions in favor of his own selfishness. If they had anything to say about it, he’d reference their own wives and tell them all to go to hell. He and Jess were consenting adults and what they got up to in the privacy of the hotel room the company was paying for was nobody’s damn business.

  * * *

  THERE WAS A SIGNIFICANT flaw in that thinking, but he determinedly ignored it and drew her closer, deepening the kiss and stroking the sweet curve of her cheeks. She made a little sound, one that rang with desperation and pleasure, of need in its basest form, and his balls tightened in response, his cock thickening. A twitchy heat rushed through his veins as her hands pushed into his hair, massaging his scalp, and he gathered her against him, felt the weight of her lush, wonderful breasts against his chest.

  “Bed,” she murmured between kisses. “Now.”

  Griff smiled against her mouth, then without warning, he lifted her up, eliciting a little squeak of surprise from her throat. She accommodatingly wrapped her legs around his waist and, as he filled both hands with her wonderful heart-shaped rump, he felt another strike of heat land in his loins. The massive four-poster loomed large in the bedroom, a veritable oasis, and he followed her down onto the decadent softness, ate another sigh of pleasure from her ripe lips.

  Seemingly desperate for the feel of him beneath her hands, she tugged at his shirt, pulling it fully from the waistband of his pants, then slid a greedy palm along his side, over his ribs. A low groan issued from her throat, one that, impossibly, made him even hotter.

  Determined to feel her as well, Griff left her mouth and pressed a line of kisses along her jaw, down her throat while simultaneously slipping the front buttons of her shirt from their closures. Creamy skin, the swell of breasts above the lace edge of her bra, a nipple pushing through the silky fabric, pouting for him, ready for him.

  He slid his nose down the middle of her chest, breathing her in, then traced the plump curve of her breast with his tongue before latching on to the crest and pulling it into his mouth through the fabric.

  She inhaled sharply, mewled low, then squirmed against him even as her dextrous hand found the snap of his pants. He popped the front clasp of her bra to the tune of his own zipper whining, then bared her breasts with his teeth as her hand wrapped around him.

  He closed his eyes tightly and shuddered from the intimate contact. Though a part of him longed to take things slow, to gradually discover her, to push her to the absolute brink before following her over, desire obliterated the sentiment, delivering a knockout punch to every inclination to dally.

  There’d be time enough for that later.

  Right now he just needed her. Needed to feel the rasp of his tongue against her nipples, her firm legs around his waist, her hot, wet heat surrounding him as he plunged dick deep into the welcoming cradle of her thighs. He wanted her hands on his ass, her mouth against his throat and his name screaming from her lips as he pounded into her, slaking the full measure of
his lust in her glorious, womanly body.

  Blessedly, she seemed to arrive at the same conclusion just as he did and she tore at his clothes, shoving his pants down his legs, then dragging his shirt over his head. Because being naked alone was as out of the question as unfair, Griff reciprocated in kind. Her slacks and panties got kicked to the foot of the bed and her jacket and shirt slung onto the floor, along with her bra.

  He drew back to look at her, slipping his hands down over her sweet belly, the generous curve of her hip, and took in the thatch of silky mink curls at the top of her sex. Her breasts were mouthwateringly magnificent, full and crowned with dusky-pink nipples, puckered and waiting for his attention.

  He released a shuddering breath as need and something else, not as easily defined and pretty damn terrifying, reached critical mass.

  She reminded him of a Renaissance painting he’d once seen in Florence by the Italian master Titian—Venus of Urbino. She was sprawled across the down comforter, unapologetically feminine, blatantly sensual and unwittingly erotic. Her dark hair spilled out over the bed, her lovely mouth swollen from his kisses and her sleepy-looking dark gray gaze raked boldly over his body, lingering on his chest, his abdomen, his cock.

  It, naturally, hardened further, practically preening beneath that sultry stare.

  After what seemed like an eternity, her gaze bumped back into his and the slightest upturn of her lips beckoned with an unspoken invitation. Griff leaned forward and snagged a condom from the bedside drawer—this suite really was well equipped, he thought as he tore into the small foil package, withdrew the protection and quickly rolled it into place.

  She glanced at his erection and snickered, which was, for obvious reasons, not the reaction a man wanted when a woman inspected his junk. “Leopard print? Really?”

  Having been so distracted by the naked woman lying ready on the bed, Griff had not paused to inspect the protection he’d donned. He did now and felt his lips twitch. He glanced back at her and growled low, his own poor impersonation of the large cat, then determinedly crouched low and carefully sprang onto her, playfully biting her neck as he nudged her entrance.

  “That was impressive,” she said, laughing softly. She wrapped her arms around him, slid her nails down his back—not hard enough to break skin, but enough to get his attention. His skin prickled with gooseflesh. “Can you do other animals, as well?”

  He drew back, laved her breast with his tongue, then pulled the tight bud into his mouth as he pushed into her. Her breath left her in a soundless whoosh, her muscles tightened around him and he squeezed his eyes shut as sensation blasted through him. His chest tightened, a fluttery heat winged through his belly and his cock felt as if it had died and gone to heaven. She was hot and tight and fit him like a glove, as though she’d been made expressly for him. And though they were only joined in the usual place, he felt the connection from one end of his body to the other—on a cellular level—and it was as exquisite as it was terrifying.

  Because being afraid of anything, least of all sex, was unacceptable, Griff batted the notion away and coupled his “mountain lion” impression with another ball-deep thrust. He desperately needed some humor to lighten the moment, to try to convince himself that these feelings weren’t quite as significant as he suspected.

  “Cougar,” he panted, doing it again and again, thrusting harder and deeper, then deeper still. “Leopard, cheetah, lynx, jaguar.”

  She smiled and clung to him, drew her legs back, opening farther for him, then grabbed his ass and squeezed with desperate tension, clawing need in her frantic touch. She bent forward and licked his neck, a sleek path along the underside of his jaw, a sensitive area he hadn’t known existed until she’d found it with her tongue.

  Impossibly, he hardened more, could feel the tightening coil of climax circling in the back of his loins, and another low growl issued from his throat.

  “What was that?” she asked.

  He laughed, lifted her hips off the bed and plunged deeper. “Me,” he said. “Just me.”

  “It was my favorite,” she breathed brokenly, then tightened around him, fisted repeatedly, seemingly determined to make him lose it before she did.

  Hell would freeze over first.

  He reached between their joined bodies and massaged her clit, circling the engorged little kernel with the pad of his thumb. She sucked in a sharp breath, then swore hotly. “Dammit to hell— That’s not— But you can’t—”

  Griff smiled down at her and increased the tempo. “I can’t what?”

  She glared at him, the muscles straining in her neck as she wrestled with the sensation. Her breath came in jagged little puffs, her glorious rosy-tipped breasts shook on her chest, absorbing each one of his frantic thrusts, and she clamped her feminine muscles around him once more, fisting tighter in an attempt to hold him, keep him there with her.

  Harder, faster, deeper, he pistoned in and out of her, chasing after her release, determined to see her satisfied first, to see the exact moment when she lost it for him, when she came for him.

  And it was worth it, Griff thought as every muscle in her body seized violently, bowing her back up off the bed, the hot greedy walls of her sweet sex bearing down on his aching cock. A silent scream ripped from her opened mouth and her cheeks blazed with color as she clung to him, held him, her shaking fingers biting into his flesh. Still convulsing around him, she leaned forward and licked his nipple, drew the small nub into her mouth and captured it lightly between her teeth.

  The little shock of pleasurelike pain tore the breath out of his lungs and ripped release from the back of his balls. He shuddered violently as the orgasm tore through him, set his toes deep into the mattress and locked himself into her silky heat. His release triggered another aftershock of pleasure from her and she quaked anew, her breathing ragged and satisfied.

  His limbs limp as noodles, Griff lifted himself off her, neatly disposed of the condom into the bedside trash, then hauled her firmly up against him. She made a low, contented sound and settled more comfortably into the wall of his chest.

  “What was that?” he teased, referencing her own little noise.

  She chuckled softly. “That was the sound of a satisfied woman,” she said. “It’s a little disturbing that you don’t recognize it.”

  Pleasantly exhausted, Griff laughed and slung an arm over his forehead. “Maybe I just need to hear it a few more times. You know, so I can commit it to memory.”

  She turned and pressed a lingering kiss against his jaw, her twinkling, sated gaze tangling with his. “That sounds like a plan.”

  He grinned. “That’s me, baby. The man with the plan.”

  And right now his only plan revolved around her, the bottle of massage oil he’d noticed in the drawer and a tiger-striped condom. Beyond that, who knew?

  But he suspected Jessalyn Rossi was going to be a significant part of his future.

  10

  HOURS LATER, AFTER she’d attended several press events, met the much nicer Clarice and underwent a necessary but mortifying “fitting” for the bra, during which Griff naturally had to stand guard, Jess was mentally and physically exhausted. It wasn’t that she minded him seeing her breasts—she rather liked the way he looked at them, actually, the way that hot hungry stare made her feel—but having him watch as Clarice and a seamstress literally adjusted her nipples for her and tsked over the removal of the push-up padding was more than a little awkward.

  “I’m thrilled that you’re doing this,” the seamstress, Marjory, had told her. “It’s a giant step forward if you ask me, having a normal-size model on the cover of the magazine. You’ll be an inspiration to women everywhere.”

  Jess had merely smiled. She didn’t know about that, but she appreciated the sentiment all the same. It had certainly beaten the hell out of Ms. Blaylock’s opinion, that was for damn
sure.

  She mentally gave the hateful woman a single-finger salute, and happily took another bite of her cheeseburger. Griff sat next to her on the small sofa, his gaze roaming over more intel Ranger Security had provided. The soft glow of the fire cast a halo of coppery light around his head, illuminating his curls. He’d stripped off his shirt and pants, revealing gleaming skin over mouthwatering muscle, and lounged comfortably in his boxers, his long masculine feet kicked out in front of him. Aside from when they’d dozed this afternoon, it was the most relaxed she’d seen him. She loved the sleek turn of his bare shoulder, the exact spot where it met his neck. It made her hot. Hell, who was she kidding?

  He made her hot.

  He sent her a slant-eyed look, humor lighting his gaze. “You’re staring.”

  She lifted one shoulder in a shrug and dragged a fry through a puddle of ketchup. “What do you expect? You’re practically naked.”

  “You could be, too, if you wanted. You’d get no objection from me.”

  She’d just bet she wouldn’t. She’d never felt more beautiful than she had this afternoon, when he’d been hovering above her, his big powerful body thrusting into hers while he raked her bare skin with his blistering gaze. Her lady bits quivered, remembering, and a hot rush of sensation tingled in her sex.

  It had been unbelievably exquisite, the exact moment when he’d pushed inside her. She’d been breathless, shattered, rebuilt and reborn all in an instant. It was as though every minute leading up to that one had been for nothing—utterly pointless—and every moment going forward would be forever tied to it, as well.

  It had been a significant turning point, she thought, but whether that would be for better or for worse remained to be seen. Though she’d love to explore this...thing between them—to see if the fiery connection could burn indefinitely or if, like a dying star, it would simply blaze magnificently for a little while and then fade away into insignificance—she wasn’t sure it was such a good idea.