Billionaire Romance Boxed Set (9 Book Bundle) (6 page)

“Isn’t it incredible?” he asked.

“That’s perfection. Where does it comes from?” she asked.

He glanced over at the menu and replied, “Malaysia and, apparently,
Tibet.”

“Oh, a Malaysian, Tibetan piece of perfection,” she said, then crinkled
her brow with a bemused look. “Fishing in Tibet?”

He shrugged. “The monks have to do something.” A diner at one table
over frowned at them and Dylan just let it roll off.

Laura speared something else on her plate and lifted the fork to him.
He took it, eagerly, greedily, eating something he didn’t even understand, but,
watching her, his eyes boring into hers, realizing that this meal was just the
appetizer and he was going to have the main course later on.

***

Oh, holy cow, she’d never been treated like this before in her entire
life. In fact, she was a bit concerned that she was leaving a wet spot on the
upholstered bench and that she had soaked completely through not only her
thong, but also her pencil skirt and pretty much through the outer layer of the
bench’s covering, the pad, and into whatever store was beneath this restaurant
because this guy was not just hot, he was flaming and how appropriate that he
was a
firefighter
.

She could see it in his eyes, too. Whatever was going on, there was a
kismet here that really shouldn’t be happening. After they exchanged their
bites, like a cross between “Lady and the Tramp” and a porno movie, she
realized that she was going to go home with this guy. Laura was going to sleep
with him and she was gonna like it.

From the look in his eyes he was in the same place mentally, too.
Hopefully physically. They both seemed to sort of hurry through their meal and
the conversation finally resumed after they had finished eating.

“Do you want another drink?” he asked, reaching for her hand again, now
that it was free from eating dinner.

She wiped her mouth with the napkin using her other hand, set it down,
and said “Um, I’m still too full. Maybe we could go for a walk?”

“Actually,” he said, looking away, “I had planned something else if you
don’t mind.”

“Oh, really? What’s that?”
Breakfast?
She stifled the thought,
terrified she had actually blurted that aloud.

“Turns out there’s a really a nice cruise here in town that I was
hoping we could go on.”

“Oh.” She looked at her watch, trying to hide her churning emotions.
Oh, man, it was already late. A cruise. She did some quick mental math. A
couple of hours on a cruise meant there was going to be no down time –
she had to work, had to get up at 6:00 in the morning, and that meant blowing
out the whole night. First date.
Calm down Laura, don’t be a slut, don’t be
a slut, don’t be a slut,
she told herself.

Don’t sleep with him on the first date, don’t sleep with him on the
first date if you want a second date.
Okay, okay
. Okay. Josie’s voice
entered in her mind. ’don’t sleep with him, Laura. Don’t do it, don’t do it,
don’t do it. Unless he’s incredibly hot.’

Oh, yeah he is.
Oh, yeah he is.

She had this entire conversation in the period of about three seconds
with herself, with Dylan looking at her with a very puzzled expression. Angel
Josie and Devil Laura argued inside her head until she realized she needed to
respond to Dylan’s comment.

“Okay, yeah, sure! A cruise sounds great. Did you already get tickets?”

He squinted and furrowed his brow, confused. And then his face went
neutral. “Oh, no, actually, not yet. I just figured we’d go there, and, you
know, climb on.”

You can climb on me
, she thought. Her eyes widened. Hopefully,
those words hadn’t actually come out of her mouth, because at this point, she
didn’t know what she was thinking as she squirmed and straightened her shirt
again. The black lace seemed to pop out like an erection. If she could see his
package from across the table, she suspected that he had his own little version
of the black lace pokin’ out going on somewhere in his pants.

The waitress brought the check and she had that internal dialogue that
all single women have when going out on new dates. ’do I offer to pick up the
check? Do I offer to go halfsies? Do I…’

He didn’t even give her a chance. He grabbed the check, handed a credit
card to the woman, and waved it off. Turned to her, he reached for her hand,
and said, “Thank you for a lovely date. Or, thank you for a lovely meal.”

“Oh, well, my goodness!” she said, a little taken aback that she didn’t
even have an opportunity to fight for the check. “Well, thank you so much! I
mean, I, really, I, can I, I’d like to offer to pay the…”

He nodded. “You can get the next date.”

“Oh!
Oh!”
She said, his words sinking in, finally. “Yeah, get
the next date.”

***

He couldn’t read her. It was driving him nuts. He just couldn’t read
her. What, had he gone too far with the next date thing? Was she offended that
he was implying that she should pay for the next date? Mike had suggested that
there was a great way to handle women who tended to have good solid careers,
but you didn’t know exactly how to handle the awkwardness of who paid for first
dates. He had his own thing about paying.

When he was taking women on dates, he had more than enough money these
days now that he had come into his trust fund, which he had always viewed as a
bit of a curse – but now he viewed as one hell of a blessing, because if
it meant that he could treat a woman like Laura right, then maybe he could have
the future that he had hoped for, then it wasn’t just a blessing.

It was everything.

Discomfort gnawed away at him. How he had come into his trust fund was
an issue he had not begun to explore, he and Mike the recipients of an annual
income equal to approximately 2.7 percent of the $2.2 billion in the massive
trust, split in half. The trust manager had laid it out in such clinical terms
that Dylan had nearly vomited on the spot, the words
twenty-nine million and
change per year for life
, minus management fees, pinging around his skull
like a racquetball that never stops.

And that was two months ago. He still drove the same car, still worked
his full shifts, but splurged in little ways, the enormity of his newfound
– literally! – fortune not quite sinking in.

Mike had bought a cabin on the slopes. Cabin wasn’t quite the right
word. Haven was more like it, a four bedroom ski palace that he knew would keep
Mike happy for the rest of his life. The ski resort, too – which had been
almost an after thought.
Oh, yeah, I can save the struggling ski mountain I
love, because I have more money than God now. Well, almost.

As Dylan caught Laura stealing shy looks at him, his money problems (
twenty
nine million of them per year
) faded and he started to wonder if she could
keep them happy for the rest of their –

“Dylan? Ready to go?” The waitress had taken the check, cleared the
table, and was practically pulling out the vacuum to clean their spot.

The meal paid for, they stood and he put his arm around her waist. She
leaned into him just enough to finally send him a signal that told him,
Oh,
yeah
, and off they went outside. He reached for her hand, intertwining his
fingers in hers. As they walked toward the boardwalk, he realized they weren’t
going on that cruise.

Her scent was intoxicating. He couldn’t believe that her unique mixture
of perfume, musk, and soap fused together to produce this. Even better –
he knew that there were other scents, other tastes that would be even more
divine if he could get there tonight.

Dylan stopped, finally, bursting at the seams with his own internal
dialogue, his own body’s cravings, and just looked at her and decided that he
needed to be as forthright with her as he had been with most people throughout
his life, because these games weren’t cutting it anymore.

Time to make his move.

He leaned down, caressed her jawline with his right hand, and brought
his lips to hers. She responded, pressing her body against his until
everything, from breast to hip, was his, pushed into him, and anything he felt
for her was extremely obvious right now.

They definitely were not going on that cruise.

***

Cruise, what cruise?
She had no intentions of going on a cruise.
As his kiss deepened, lips parted, as their tongues danced, she found herself
roiling in ecstasy inside, going so far as to be twisted into a cliché, one leg
lifting up as she stood on her tiptoes, even in high heels needing to stand on
tiptoes to match him in his kiss.

His hands roamed her back. She returned the motion, her fingers splayed
across the broad, muscular expanse of his shoulders, his hands cupping her jaw
now, pushing, needing, craving….

“Ah,” he said, his voice gravely and thick with desire, “Can we take a
pass on that cruise?”

She dipped her head down and laughed softly. “Yeah – good thing
you didn’t buy those tickets after all.”

Cocking his head, he looked at her with smoky eyes and asked, “Do you
have a car parked nearby?” She knew what he was asking, his words code for
Can
I take you home and fuck you without worrying about your car getting ticketed
or towed?

How sweet. Most guys didn’t care.

“No car. I took the train today.”

Nodding, his smile widened. “I drove, so let’s take my car to my place?
For drinks?”

Whoo – eee
. Laura swallowed hard, knowing that this was
really it. He wanted to sleep with her, was inviting her back to his place for
it, and she ran through her mental inventory. Clean lingerie? Yes. Shaved legs?
Yes – she’d been optimistic. No car? Yes.

Birth control?

Oh, shit.
She was on the pill, but had forgotten to take it a
few days ago. Missing one day shouldn’t hurt, right?

Hopefully he had a condom.

His puzzled look told her she was taking too long to think. “I would
love a drink.” And then he leaned in for another kiss, the move more certain
now, his hands on her more demanding and visceral, claiming her and marking her
arms, her neck, her lips and ass with his hands, his touch, his caress.

She was his tonight, and that had to be enough for her. He was hers for
whatever he gave, and as the kiss heated she felt her core warm, clit throbbing
and eager for what his tongue was promising right now, exploring her as his
hands roamed her back and neck.

People were staring now; as she opened her eyes the onlookers tittered.
She pulled back and wiped her mouth, embarrassed.

Dylan just grinned, leaned in and said, “Let’s stop giving the jealous
bastards a show.” Her laughter rang down the street to the parking lot where
his Audi sat.

When she climbed in it smelled like a campfire.

Blasting the local 80s station on the radio, they rode back to his
place in silence, his hand planted on her knee whenever he wasn’t shifting, the
fingers playing a melody of lust and creeping higher up her thigh until they
arrived at his apartment complex. It was a skyscraper made of glass and steel
and screamed
money
.

How in the hell did a firefighter afford this?
As if he heard
her thoughts, Dylan muttered, “I have a roommate.”

“Oh.” Disappointment flooded her. Maybe he really did just want to have
drinks? No guy ever,
ever
invited her to his place to share some vodka
and Coke, though. Not even the true assholes who beer goggled their way to
fucking a fat chick they despised in the morning.

Relief took over her disappointment when he smiled a wicked grin and
said, “But he’s gone for the night.”

Getting out of the car, walking up two flights of stairs and wandering
down Dylan’s hallway was a blur. Laura vaguely heard his keys rattling and then
a fierce, hot mouth was on hers, Dylan’s thick forearms scraping her shoulders
as his hands slid up her jawline, behind her ears, fingers nestling in her hair
and pulling her blond curls loose.

His tongue explored her mouth with such precision and his hips pressed
into hers with intent. Gasping, she inhaled sharply as he pushed her up against
his open door and took her mouth greedily.

Without a word he maneuvered their entangled bodies, closed the front
door, tossed his keys on the floor and had her in his bedroom in seconds.
No
complaints here
, Laura thought, and that was the last rational idea she had
as he went straight for her clit.

No pretense, no artsy coyness.

“What are you – ?” she gasped. And then,
oh wow
, he went
right for the center of her heat, the briefest of touches so profound she
nearly came all over his lips in an instant. Her thong slid down her legs as if
an unseen force stripped it off and then –

“
Ahhhhhh,”
she groaned, practiced arms reaching under her hips,
establishing his power. Using his forearms, he guided himself to her clit,
freeing one hand to touch her there, slipping a finger into her pussy and
caressing so that it set off unexpected waves of pleasure.

It was like a dream come true. She had resigned herself to guys who
went down on her like their Novocaine was wearing off. Lips flapping and trying
to do one thing but accomplishing nothing more than drooling. Who was this man?
This?
This was like being made love to by a silk mouth.

Her body flushed red and hot, the fire focused on her hot nub as he
teased it, slowly growing the release within, entering and pulling back with
two perfect fingers. Her thighs twitched and shook, and she knew she would come
like a freight train soon. She buried her hands in his hair, sinking her hands
into him, pushing his face in tandem with her need to strum her to the next
level –

“Oh, Dylan!” she murmured, fucking his tongue, which licked her, hard,
dead center on her nub. His tongue opened up, hot flesh on hers, as he gave her
focused and expansive flesh play. Two different sensations tipped her
completely over as every muscle tensed, her dripping hole clinging to his
finger, riding his face like a stallion, his tongue working hard to keep her
frenzy going.