Afraid he might kiss her.
Afraid he wouldn’t.
“I’ll take that tape now,” she said, her voice thick and raspy.
He didn’t give it to her, didn’t move. “Tell me what you see in Elliott Bentley-Squire.”
Jordana stared up into Nathan’s dark eyes. She shook her head.
“Tell me,” he insisted.
Although talking about Elliott was the last thing she wanted to do in that moment, Jordana drew a breath and tried to conjure words. “He’s kind and affectionate,” she murmured lamely. “He’s loyal and steady and attentive …”
Nathan’s lips twisted with dark amusement. “That’s how I’d expect you to describe a pet, not the man who’s fucking you.”
The frankness shocked her, embarrassed her. But she was also unwillingly aroused by Nathan’s lack of delicacy. There was a rawness about him that was unlike anything she was accustomed to.
She was playing with fire where this dangerous male was concerned, and it only made her want to dance closer to the flame.
“Elliott and I are not lovers,” she said, pushing the words out of her mouth before she was too afraid to bite them back. “I’ve never been with him in that way.”
Something flickered in the depths of his dark eyes. “And you don’t want him like that either.”
Jordana frowned, hating that Nathan could know that about her so easily. “I’ve never wanted anyone like that. There’s been … no one.”
“No one?” Nathan seemed to go even more still where he stood. The only movement she could detect in him was the ticking of a tendon along the line of his jaw. “He wants you, this Elliott Bentley-Squire. He’s waited a year to bond you to him by blood. How long do you think you can keep him from claiming you, Jordana?”
“Elliott is a patient man. He’ll wait until I decide it’s time.”
Nathan gave a harsh grunt. “Then he’s not the kind of mate you need. Not the kind of male a woman like you deserves.”
She collected her courage enough to meet his challenge with one of her own. “What could you possibly know about what I need or deserve?”
He stepped in tighter to her, crowding her backward with the massive breadth of his body. “Have you ever kissed Elliott Bentley-Squire the way you kissed me?”
She didn’t answer, couldn’t form words with him this close to her.
“Has he ever made your cheeks flame just by looking at you, or made your pulse beat like a hammer in your veins because of the things you wish he’d do to you?”
Jordana swallowed. She exhaled a shaky breath edged with a humiliating whimper. Somehow she managed to find her voice amid the tumult of confusion and dark, unwanted desire that was swirling like a tempest inside her. “I suppose you’re arrogant enough to believe that I should want someone like you instead?”
He chuckled then, low and humorless. “No, Jordana. I’m the last kind of man you should want in your life … or in your bed.”
And yet he didn’t move away from her. He just kept her caged with his body for a seemingly endless moment of time.
His irises crackled with tiny sparks of amber as he stared at her. Only the barest tips of his fangs were noticeable behind the lush line of his upper lip.
Jordana felt him reach between the scant distance of their bodies to take her hand. His fingers were warm and strong, so large and commanding as he held her in his firm, guiding grasp.
He uncurled her loose fist, only to place something hard and round, cold and sleek, in her palm. Of course. The roll of packing tape.
“Go back to where you belong now, Jordana.” He drew away from her at last, leaving her standing in a chilled, confused state of arousal and rejection. “Get out,” he said, a warning in the curt command.
Jordana held the tape to her chest and could hardly scramble for the door fast enough.
As she started to rush for the corridor, he added, “That kiss was a mistake, Jordana—for both of us. But don’t expect me to believe you’re any more sorry than I am that it happened.”
6