When she opened those green, green eyes again, she reached out, cupped his cheek, skimmed her thumb over his lips. A charge of power struck deep in his chest on its way down to his cock. How was it possible that he wanted to hold her close and pound into her all at once?

  “The truth is,” she went on, “I got way more out of this arrangement than you. I got my brother and my life back. You just got laid.”

  He gritted his teeth and gripped her shoulders. “You listen to me. I didn’t just get laid. I met a great woman who made me think a lot about my life and what’s important. I won’t forget that.”

  “But the sex was good?” She bit her lip, as if uncertain.

  He snorted at her understatement. “The sex was so great it nearly sent me into meltdown.”

  A bittersweet smile lifted the corners of her mouth as her cheeks flushed pink again.

  Rafe couldn’t resist the urge to take her hand and thread her fingers through his.

  Kerry glanced out the window, and Rafe’s gaze followed hers as the limo merged onto the freeway. Then she turned back to him, a hint of mischief dancing in her eyes.

  “That good, huh?”

  “Damn straight.”

  She drew in a deep breath and looked him in the eyes. “I’m not wearing any panties. On purpose.”

  Using their threaded fingers, she drew his palm over her breasts. No bra, either. He groaned.

  Shit. “Kerry, I’m leaving.”

  At those words, she sobered. “I know.”

  “I don’t want to take advantage—”

  “You’re not.”

  He swallowed, resisting the urge to just pounce on her and forgo the questions. “Why?”

  “I want you. Just one more time.”

  She squeezed her hand over his as his fingers curled around her breast. Rafe felt the rising nipple scorching his palm. He started to sweat, despite the chilled air emerging from the vents above. How the hell was he supposed to resist something he wanted so badly, his brain was nearly fried in his head? Already, his cock was hard and eager and more than ready. The thought of holding her again, having her again, sent him to the edge.

  But it would be unfair to make her hope they could work things out, to take more from her when he had nothing else to give.

  “We used my last condom yesterday.”

  Kerry reached into the little purse at her side and dug out a foil packet. With a flick of her wrist, she tossed it into his lap. One pristine condom, waiting just for him. Holy shit.

  “I’m prepared. Don’t say no. Besides”—she grinned—“I owe you a little something for the action you missed out on the last time we were in the back of a limo together.”

  God, he wanted her so much. His brain whirled with images of impaling her on his cock, of breathing in her sugar sunshine scent again as she came, of memorizing the feel of her against him. It probably made him a bastard of mythic proportions, but he couldn’t refuse her.

  In fact, he couldn’t get to her fast enough.

  He grabbed both arms and hauled her onto his lap, locking his mouth over hers. He took possession of her lips as he positioned her on top of him. His tongue dove deep, wanting more of her, wanting all she offered. Sweetness. Warmth. Sunshine. Pure decadence.

  Kerry opened to him, yielding. She met his kiss perfectly, parry to his thrust, driving him out of his mind.

  As he settled her on his lap, his hips parted her thighs around him. Her skirt slid up, up, up. She hadn’t been lying. Not a bikini, thong, or boy short separated his gaze from the damp, gold curls shielding the soft lips of her pussy. A quick drag of his finger up her swollen cleft proved she was every bit as wet as she looked.

  The reality sent him into a blind frenzy.

  Latching on to her mouth again, he plunged past her lips to get more of her taste on his tongue while he pulled her brief tank top up her waist, over her ribs, sliding it above her breasts. He broke the kiss in order to shove the top over her head, onto the floorboard, and get a good look at paradise. Thank God for tinted windows.

  Hard rosy nipples jutted inches from his face. He swallowed as another bolt of lust jolted his cock like a live wire.

  Taking one point between his thumb and forefinger, he laved the other with his tongue. With her groan crashing into his ears, he sucked her nipple into his mouth, gently nibbling with teeth. A soothing swipe of his tongue followed. He repeated the process with her other nipple.

  Getting enough of this lush, vibrant woman was impossible. What the hell was he going to do back in New York with all the models and socialites whose bodies could double for coatracks? Whose personalities most resembled dead houseplants?

  When Kerry started unbuttoning his dress shirt with fevered hands and rocking her hips so that her cleft nudged the ridge of his cock, he was gratified that her impatience matched his.

  Together, they peeled off his shirt. Kerry took it from him and hung it from some hook to her left. As she did, Rafe discovered he had just enough room between their bodies to shove his pants down to his thighs.

  Then he grabbed her hips and pulled her flush against him. Her soft, wet folds bracketed an ever-hardening clit. He guided her to slick them against his naked cock, focusing on the sensitive ridge below the head.

  “Give me your lips,” he demanded, feeling his blood churn with fire.

  Kerry leaned in, crushing hard-tipped breasts against him, and consumed his mouth with a kiss that both yielded and demanded. Her tongue stroked inside his mouth, danced, flirted, and teased before retreating. Blood roared in his ears. She nudged against his dick again, now soaked and hot and wild. Rafe threw back his head and hissed at the pleasure sizzling up his spine, down his legs.

  On either side of his hips, Kerry’s thighs began to tremble. He could feel her juices flowing, coating his cock as she swelled with pleasure while she rocked against him. Damn, the woman made him feel hotter than a fire with a never-ending supply of gasoline.

  She picked up the pace, urging her hips against his more rapidly. Her breath began to catch at the back of her throat. A flush splotched the skin from her breasts to her neck. She threw her head back in abandon.

  Rafe nibbled at her neck, breathing on a sensitive spot just behind her ear. “You’re going to come, aren’t you, babe?”

  “Yeah.”

  Her weak, trembling voice made him smile even as it tightened the coil of his need to be inside her. Deciding that if she could fan his flames, he could return the favor, he pulled at one of her nipples with his thumb and forefinger, rolling, pinching, listening to her gasp. The other hand he feathered down the cleft of her ass, just enough to wake up all the nerves and leave her tingling.

  He swallowed her first moan, then her next.

  “Come for me, babe. I love the way your skin turns pink and you cry out my name.”

  “Rafe!”

  On the underside of his cock, he felt gentle flutters of sensation, followed by a drenching rush of her juices. Holy mother of . . . He blew out a deep breath, did his best to keep his composure, despite the warning tingles brewing at the base of his spine.

  Sated for the moment, she sank against him. He stroked a hand down the damp skin of her back, fighting the urge to hammer into her.

  He lost the battle.

  Rafe grabbed the condom from the seat beside her, tore it open, and rolled it on. “Got to be inside you. Need you now.”

  Green eyes, wide and beseeching, latched on to his face as she raised herself up. “Yes, now.”

  Clutching her hips, he guided her down until he impaled her. He felt her stretching to accommodate him. She writhed, trying to fit him all inside. She rose up once, twice, removing all but the most sensitive part of his head, then she slammed back down. Finally, she sheathed him fully, and Rafe felt her everywhere. Wet beyond his dreams and fist tight, she surrounded every inch of him. He ground into her, stimulating her clit with his pelvis, the head of his cock touching the mouth of her womb.

  Then he swallowed her gasp with a deep kiss.

  Rafe let her establish the rhythm, for now anyway. But her choice pleased the hell out of him. Slow, dragging, friction-filled, each stroke caused maximum impact. Desire tore through his blood, coursing like a raging river. And at the bottom of each stroke, he rose, making sure his body had contact with that distended clit.

  But the effort was costing him in control.

  “Babe,” he rasped. “You’re killing me here. Can’t hold out much longer.”

  “Harder. Need . . . Just a little . . .”

  Happy to oblige, Rafe grasped her hips tighter and crushed her down onto him. He took a nipple in his mouth, rolled it around on his tongue—and felt her contract around him.

  She cried out, pulsing around him, milking him of every last drop of energy, semen, and, he feared, the ability to want anyone but her.

  They’d barely righted their clothes when the limo pulled up curbside. Her days, her nights, her time with Rafe in general, all at an end now.

  “Have a good flight,” Kerry murmured, holding back tears boiling behind her eyes.

  That beat the heck out of saying, Have a nice life. That just seemed too flippant . . . too final.

  She looked at him, his cheeks still sporting the remnants of a flush of desire, his mouth as tempting as ever. Biting her lip, she drank in the sight of him for the last time. She’d miss his quiet strength, his brash ways, his willingness to listen, the way he always helped, even when he didn’t think he did.

  He pressed a card into her hand. “This has my office and home numbers, along with my cell number and address. If you need anything, if something goes wrong with Moza or the proceedings . . . or whatever, call me.”

  The edges of the card sliced against Kerry’s finger as she grasped it.

  “Ah, babe. Don’t look at me like that. I’m trying to do the right thing.” He clutched her shoulders. “I wish I could be a better man for you. I want you happy. In the long run, I just can’t give you what you want. Don’t hate me.” He gave a self-deprecating grunt. “I’m already pretty pissed at myself.”

  She filtered her fingers through the soft, inky blackness of his hair. “I think you’re wonderful the way you are. I’ve never been happier than when I’m with you, Rafe.”

  He frowned. “This is an anomaly. This isn’t me. Away from here, from you, I’m a snarling, sarcastic workaholic. No one likes being with me. Trust me, you’re better off.”

  “Maybe you’re different with me,” hope made her blurt.

  At the resignation that crossed Rafe’s features, Kerry wished she’d bitten her tongue instead.

  “I can’t afford to gamble your heart on that, babe. You shouldn’t want to, either.”

  And he’d go on believing he was incapable of a relationship, even if she told him a hundred times that she loved him just the way he was. He didn’t see himself as successful soul mate material. All the pleading in the world wasn’t going to change his mind—not unless he decided to change it. She knew just how stubborn Rafe could be.

  Defeat drooped her shoulders.

  “I love you,” she whispered finally. And she couldn’t hold the tears back. “Don’t forget that.”

  Eyes squeezed shut with pain and regret, he looked away. “I know. And I don’t know how to love you back the way you deserve to be. I’m sorry.”

  And he was too afraid to try, she realized.

  Rafe caressed her cheek, brushing away fresh tears, and shot her a lingering glance that clearly showed all his grief and confusion. Then he turned away and exited the limo—and her life.

  Tears fell in earnest then, her stomach twisting with anguish. She’d saved her brother . . . but in the end, she’d lost her heart.

  Chapter 18

  May eighteenth dawned. His thirtieth birthday. Whoop-de-frickin’-doo.

  As Rafe ducked out of his posh apartment building on the east side of Central Park in the upper eighties, he swore and dragged on his overcoat. It wasn’t supposed to be fifty degrees this time of year. Had someone forgotten to tell Mother Nature that spring had sprung?

  Both elevators in the modern high-rise he called home had been unavailable this morning. The first because it had been broken. The second because one of his stupid neighbors two floors down had passed out in there after an all-night party, leaving behind the pungent odor of vomit.

  You’d think that if someone was paying four thousand a month for an apartment, he would be more responsible than a teenager at his first keg party.

  Shaking his head, Rafe walked down twenty-four flights of stairs, which made him realize he’d better get his ass back to the gym. He just hadn’t had the energy since leaving . . . Florida last week.

  A guy in a charcoal suit juggled his briefcase and glasses—and promptly spilled hot coffee on Rafe’s left shoe—before walking on. The shoe, now ruined, squeaked when he walked. A biting wind whipping off the East River seeped under his skin. He shivered.

  What a hellacious morning.

  It was supposed to be eighty-six degrees in Tampa today. He’d looked at three this morning when he’d been unable to sleep. Again.

  Rafe sighed as he stepped into the subway. Damn, he’d seen cleaner public restrooms at gas stations. And why did everyone have to talk on the cell phone, rather than pay attention to where they were going?

  Once sandwiched on the subway between a model-shaped brunette giving him the eye and some Rasta dude who needed a shower, Rafe settled in for his ride to Midtown.

  At least he had the FBI off his back. Alex Moza had notified him that all of the charges against Mark Sullivan had been dropped the previous week. Standard National Bank had paid him promptly. For finding the real culprit, they’d sent him a bonus.

  Had he kept it and smiled? Rafe snorted. Nope. He’d gone fucking soft in his old age. He’d sent the excess back with a note indicating that he’d rather see Mark Sullivan reinstated in his job and the enclosed amount applied to his back pay. The bank had readily agreed.

  So everyone should be happy now. The Sullivan siblings were together again, Mark had his job and his freedom, even if he was minus a wife, while Rafe had his five million dollars and his bachelorhood intact.

  Whoop-de-frickin’-doo.

  Why was he so damn miserable?

  Maybe he needed to get laid. He hadn’t since . . . Florida.

  “Good morning,” said the cool brunette on his left. Her smile held interest.

  Rafe glanced. Nice smile, great tits under a tight blue sweater. Legs up to her armpits. A vision many guys could relate to having a wet dream about.

  His libido didn’t even make a halfhearted jump.

  What the hell was the matter with him? He’d imagined the decade of his thirties would change him, yeah. But not on his first day. He hadn’t expected it to kill his sex drive, either.

  Nodding the brunette’s way, Rafe extracted his cell phone and pretended to look at his calendar. He hopped off at Fiftieth and walked the rest of the way.

  Along the way, he took a call from Regina and ran a few errands. Still, all too soon Rafe found himself entering a familiar Gramercy Park apartment building. Dragging up two flights of stairs, he arrived in front of the square black door he hadn’t knocked on in several years.

  After a perfunctory rap, the jingle of chains and the turn of a deadbolt made Rafe’s stomach knot. If he’d bothered with breakfast, or even a single good meal in the last few days, he might have tossed it all up.

  He swallowed the nausea down. Damn it, he was here for a purpose. He’d waited six years for this day. Worked long, tough hours tending bar and doing freelance work after a full day of college classes. Starved until he’d built up his business. Lived in an apartment building that housed more rats than people. Nothing was going to fuck this up, especially not some melancholy he hadn’t been able to shake since . . . Florida.

  The door was flung wide, and Rafe found himself staring at his father.

  Wearing a blue silk robe belted around his slightly paunching middle, Benton Dawson III stared at Rafe. He knew this expression—the one that told him he was as welcome as a swarm of mosquitoes. Well, today he planned to be just as pesky.

  “You.”

  Rafe plastered on an acidic smile. “I’m here for a long-overdue father-son visit. I know you’ve missed them.”

  Shooting him a resentful glare, his father reluctantly shuffled back, smoothing a hand down his thick graying blond hair. Rafe stepped inside. Yep, it still smelled like a distillery. The hardwood floors were sticky under his loafers. Clothes were strewn across the couch, over the breakfast bar. A nearly empty bottle of gin sat on the coffee table in front of the TV.

  He walked to the rectangular bottle and lifted it. “Last night’s party, or just starting early this morning?”

  “I don’t have any coffee made yet. Say what you came to say and go.”

  “Gosh, I’m feeling the love today, Dad. I’ve missed you, too.”

  Benton Dawson III drew himself up and gritted his teeth. “Must you continue in this juvenile method of torture? You really are more like your mother than you know.”

  “Well, since she was capable of human feeling and decency, I’ll take that as a compliment.”

  His father snorted. “She also came from a worthless peasant family.”

  A white-hot tread of anger sizzled through him. “Apparently, she was good enough for you to seduce.”

  Red flags of anger appeared on his father’s pale, unshaven cheeks. Blue eyes boiled. If looks could kill . . .

  “Well, Alondra certainly wasn’t good enough to birth any offspring I’d want to claim.”

  Rafe held in a wince. That one shouldn’t hurt him, but it did. He shoved the feelings aside. “Oh, you are feisty this morning. I haven’t heard that particular nasty insult since I was about sixteen.”

  “Maybe I should remind you more often.”

  Damn, why was it always the same with his father? Ugly, unkind, sarcastic. And he’d even started it today. Behavior like that would garner him a soft lecture that would make him feel about three inches tall if he were still with . . . well, in Florida.