TEMPTATION - A Bad Boy Romance (118 page)

He wasn’t sure that he’d heard her right, but when she answered him he knew that he had. “By the middle of the month. We need to get stage one completed as soon as possible so that we can move on to stage two. Time is money, or have you forgotten that?” She had her haughty voice back, and Shawn could have screamed.

“Of course I haven’t forgotten it, but there’s no way in hell that the guys are going to be able to get it done that quickly. Not unless you want them to compromise on the quality of the job.”  Kassie was looking up at him with a pretty scowl on her face, her green eyes flashing fire as she anticipated yet another argument springing up between them. “If we rush it, mistakes will be made. That’s going to have a knock-on effect and end up costing more time and money to put right. I know there has to be a deadline, but make it a realistic one, for God’s sake.”

Kassie could have quite happily screamed in frustration. What made it worse was the fact that he was right, and she knew it. “Well, don’t take too much time, Shawn. Please be mindful of the end goal here. We have six months in total to get this place ready for business, and if I have to start adding on time to the contract then I’m going to start penalizing you and your crew financially. Am I making myself clear?”

“Yes, boss. Crystal clear, boss.” He didn’t even try to hide the sarcasm in his tone, and Kassie felt her hackles rise again. “Let me make something clear, Kassie. I take pride in my work, and I take pride in the work my crew does.” His voice had hardened, and Kassie, typically someone who never got nervous when dealing with members of the opposite sex, felt herself take an unwilling step backwards. “If you have a problem with any of them or with the work they do, you come to me first and I’ll deal with them. You have my business card, so you can get hold of me day or night. If I find that you’ve gone around me and dealt with whoever it is before talking to me first, it will be
you
who is penalized, and I don’t mean financially. Am
I
making
myself
clear?”

For the first time in her adult life, Kassie had no come-back or biting response. His words had been biting enough, but it was something in the way he said them that had her insides quivering; and it wasn’t only with nerves either. She straightened her shoulders and raised her chin up a notch to give her time to steady her voice before answering. “Perfectly clear, thank you.” She gave him a curt nod as she spoke and then turned and walked away on legs that weren’t quite as steady as they should have been.

Sat in her apartment later on that evening she poured herself yet another glass of wine, and then shook the bottle in disgust when she realized it was now empty.
The nerve of the man, talking to me as though I was nothing more than an incompetent schoolgirl.
She took a large gulp from her glass and then continued having a conversation with herself.
It’s not like it’s my first rodeo. I mean, I do know what I’m doing. Most of the time anyway.
She took another mouthful of wine and got unsteadily to her feet, walking across to the kitchen with the intention of liberating another bottle from the fridge.

She wasn’t usually prone to drinking all that much, and she hardly ever drank when she was alone. But, the meeting with Shawn had left her shaken and unnerved and a few glasses of wine after she’d got home had seemed like a good idea at the time. Rather than calm her down though, it had made her belligerent and more pissed off than she was earlier.

She reached for the bottle of wine in the fridge and then paused.
I should call him and give him a piece of my mind, she thought. In fact, that’s exactly what I’m going to do.
She closed the fridge door again, the wine all but forgotten in her determination to let the sexy foreman know exactly what she thought about him. Reaching for her bag she pulled out her notepad and went to her contacts list to pull up his telephone number. She dialed the first few digits and then hesitated, her eyes still on his contact information in front of her.

Fuck calling him. I should pay him a visit and tell him face to face what an arrogant bastard he is.
His contact information didn’t just show her his phone number, it had his business address as well as his home address listed as well. Kassie put the phone down without completing the call and reached for her boots. Realizing that she’d had too much to drink for her to drive, she reached for the phone again and called the taxi service she usually used, then she went outside and sat on the front step while she waited.

A short time later, her nerves still steely with wine, she got out of the back of the taxi outside Shawn’s house. The car had pulled away before she thought that she should have asked him to wait to make sure that Shawn was even home, and she heaved a sigh of relief when she saw that there were lights on in the house. She walked to the door with determination in her step and kept her finger on the doorbell until she heard footsteps inside.

Her foot tapped impatiently on the concrete step as she waited for the door to be opened. “I’ve got a few things I need to say to you.” Her voice was louder than was necessary, but she was too tipsy to notice or care.

“What the hell? You do know that it’s almost midnight, right? This couldn’t have waited until tomorrow?” Shawn sounded pissed off and for a fleeting moment Kassie had the grace wonder if he was married, or if he had a girlfriend warmly ensconced inside his home. She pushed the thought aside though and stood outside of the door with her arms on her hips.

“No, it couldn’t have waited. Because if I’d waited then I wouldn’t be able to say what I wanted to say. I mean, I wouldn’t have been able to say what needed to be said to you.” She had been rehearsing what she was going to say to him while in the taxi, but now she was here and he was in front of her she couldn’t seem to get her words out properly. “What I mean is…”

Shawn was trying hard not to laugh at how flustered she was getting. “Have you been drinking?”

“I might’ve had a couple of glasses of wine, but that’s got nothing to do with this.” She sounded like a petulant child, and she knew it, but there didn’t seem to be anything she could do to stop it. “Anyway, we need to talk.”

“I guess you’d better come in then, hadn’t you.” It was a rhetorical question and he stood to one side and held the door open for her to walk past him. “Keep walking straight and go into the room in front of you. I’m going to go make a pot of coffee to sober you up.”

Kassie started to walk in the direction he’d indicated and then paused and turned back to him. “Can’t I come to the kitchen with you? What I need to say shouldn’t take long and then I’ll leave you alone. After I’ve called a taxi. Would it be okay if I called a taxi from here? I think I left my cell phone at home.” She was still rambling drunkenly although thankfully she was unaware of it. Shawn had a feeling that she was going to feel mortified in the morning when she realized exactly what she’d done in her drunken state.

“Of course you can come into the kitchen. Are you sure you can walk that far without falling over?” He couldn’t resist teasing her, and as a blush spread over her high cheekbones he mentally cursed his cock as it twitched in awareness. The last thing he needed right now was an affair with his boss, although what he had in mind could hardly be classed as an affair. The woman needed taking down a peg or two, and if she wasn’t careful he was just the man to do it.

The two of them made their way to the kitchen with Shawn leading the way, and he pulled out a chair at the kitchen table for her to sit down while he made the coffee. “So what is it you need to say to me?” He put the coffee pot on and then turned to face her, leaning back against the counter and crossing his arms over his muscular chest. “It must be important for you to come out of this time of night.”

“You’re a jackass, and I don’t like the way you talk to me on site.” Okay, that had
so
not been what she had been wanting to say to him and it definitely wasn’t what she’d rehearsed in the taxi, but the words fell from her mouth before she could stop them.

“Sweetheart, if you don’t like the way I talk to you on site, you’re going to hate the way I talk to you off it.” His voice had deepened to a husky drawl that sent shivers running through Kassie’s veins. “We’re not on site now and you’re in my home and on my time not company time, so be very careful what you say because I can’t guarantee that you’ll like the response you get.”

Kassie’s eyes were huge in her face as she listened to him. She could honestly say that no man had ever made her feel such a mix of emotions before. He was infuriating and opinionating, but he was incredibly sexy and, dare she say it, masterful. She wasn’t sure how to feel about him, or even if she was capable of forming any kind of rational impression of him in her current state.

“I didn’t come here to be insulted.” She got unsteadily to her feet, ignoring the pull of sexual awareness that her treacherous body was willing her to act on. Her breasts ached and her clit throbbed, and all he’d done was stand up to her. She needed to get out of here fast, before she made an even bigger fool of herself. “I came here to discuss work matters, but I was obviously mistaken.” She wasn’t sure what she was rambling on about or what exactly she felt mistaken about, but she had to do something to try and save face.

“You were mistaken about what, Kassie?” He pushed away from the work counter and walked towards her. “Mistaken about coming to talk to me, or mistaken about the real reason that you felt you had to come and see me at this time of night?”

She had to swallow before she could talk. “I don’t know what you mean.” She almost didn’t recognize her own voice.

He walked closer until Kassie could feel the heat emanating from him, and she took an involuntary step backwards until her ass came into contact with the table. “Tell me that I haven’t been on your mind since our meeting earlier.” He took another step. “And don’t tell me that when you’ve thought of me it’s all been about work, because I’ll call you a liar.” He reached out a hand and his fingers tucked a stray lock of her hair behind her ear.

She tried not to show any reaction. She really did. But she felt her head tilting into his hand as his palm cupped her cheek and his thumb gently brushed against her skin. She felt hot and bothered, and she had no idea what to say or do. All she could think about was how good his hand felt against her skin.

Shawn stepped closer still, until his body was a whisper away from touching hers, and Kassie forgot to breathe as she waited with baited breath for whatever he was going to do next. She watched his face get closer to hers until she could feel his day-old stubble tickle her cheek as he whispered in her ear. “What do you really want, Kassie?”

She tried her hardest to not react to his closeness. She really did. But as she felt his lips gently come into contact with the side of her neck she knew she was lost. “Is this what you want?” His breath was warm against her ear and she shivered in response. “Or is it this?” His strong arms came up and wrapped around her, crushing her to him in an embrace that took what little breath she had left away.

His lips came down and met hers in a kiss that was as erotic as it was tender; firm but gentle, and totally in charge as he slid his tongue over her startled mouth. He probed until her lips parted and granted him access, and then his tongue mingled with hers in a dance as old as time. Kassie sighed as her arms crept up around his neck and she gave herself up to his kiss. Her hand tangled in his thick hair as she strained against him, trying to deepen the kiss even more as she moaned against his mouth.

Shawn’s hands moved down her back until he reached her hips, and then he pulled her lower body into his and she was left in no doubt as to just how aroused he was as well. As her body came into contact with the very large and very hard bulge he was sporting in his jeans they both gasped in reaction.

Kassie thought about pulling away. She thought about it really hard for a split second. And then she pushed the thought away as he pulled her into him even harder. She might be a little tipsy, and that might make her judgment a little off, but she would be insane to turn down what he was so blatantly offering.
Or maybe I was the one doing the offering
when I came here, she thought briefly before pushing the thought away and concentrating on the kiss that Shawn seemed in no hurry to end.

No words were needed between them; their bodies said everything, and more. Kassie pulled her hands between their bodies and started to pull at the hem of the T-shirt he was wearing, raising it up enough so that her hands could explore the flat, muscular plain of his stomach. Shawn responded in kind by reaching for the buttons of her blouse and undoing them as quickly as he could. She moaned as the cold air of the kitchen hit her bare midriff, and her nipples puckered and hardened in the lace confines of her bra.

She wanted to feel his hands on her. She wanted to feel him cup and squeeze her breasts while she held his head to them and made him suckle on her aching nipples. Her hands came up to take hold of his and she started to direct his touch to where she wanted, but Shawn stopped kissing her and pulled his head back to look into her face.

“It’s not going to happen, Kassie.” For one awful moment she thought that he meant that their love-making wasn’t going to happen, and she felt her heart sink to her toes. “You might be able to take charge on site, and you’re perfectly justified to there. But, if you think you can take charge of me here, like this, you’ve got another thing coming.” He placed his hands firmly back onto her hips again, making it clear that he would touch her where and how he wanted to.

Kassie took a step back, breaking the contact between them as she scowled up at him. “So what you’re saying is that I can’t tell you what I want or how I like things?” She didn’t like the sound of that. Not at all.

“That’s not what I’m saying at all. I like a woman who’s not afraid to take charge when it comes to sex, and I love to give up control to her if the mood takes me. But I don’t think you like giving up control to anybody at any time, do you, Kassie?” He smiled at her knowingly, and she had the feeling that he understood her better than she understood herself, although there was no way on God’s earth she was going to admit that to him.