“You can’t hit me there,” she said, breathless, whacking his arm and sounding more aroused than indignant.
“You hit me in the face.” And so he hit her right between her thighs.
“Rhett! You can’t do that.”
He wasn’t sure how the rules went if she was allowed to do whatever she wanted and hit him anywhere, but he had restrictions.
When she raised her arms again for another assault, he pulled the pillow out of her hands and tossed it on the floor. “Now what?” he asked with a smile.
She went for a backup pillow behind her, but he tore that out of her hands, too. So laughing, breathless, she tried to strip him of the one he was holding.
“I don’t think so, little girl.” He kept a tight grip on it.
“Little girl?” she asked with a snort. “I’m eight years older than you.”
For which he was definitely grateful. She was hanging in way better with him than the younger women he’d dated.
“You’re right. You’re a woman. But you still can’t take this pillow away from me, no matter how hard you try.” He knew she would. He’d already pegged that aspect of her personality, and he found her tenacity admirable. And he had to admit, he enjoyed baiting her.
“Oh, yeah?” She lunged for him, and she was faster than he expected.
He almost lost the pillow to her nimble fingers, but he clamped down harder on it and raised it high above his head so that she had to stretch for it.
“Oh!” She glared at him in frustration, but there was a definite twinkle in her eye.
Then she did something he never in a million years would have predicted. Nor was he at all prepared for it.
She reached out with her left hand and stroked right across the front of his boxers, down the length of his cock. He was so shocked that he loosened his grip on the pillow. Which she snagged and then scooted backward on the bed, laughing, removing her hand from his erection.
Rhett was stunned. And turned on. And filled with a new respect for her quick thinking.
“Oh, so that’s how you want to play it, huh?” he asked, nudging his knee between her legs and pushing on the pillow so that she fell backward onto the bed on her back. He dropped his forearm onto the pillow, pinning her.
She squirmed, trying to push him off her, but he wasn’t budging. They were going to finish this to both their mutual satisfaction. Rhett leaned down and kissed her, but she turned her head to avoid it, so he ended up kissing her cheek. Frowning, he pulled back to gauge her mood. She was still giggling, a nervous reaction that she seemed unable to control.
“What? What’s so funny?”
“It just popped into my head that you’re about to go Dom on me, and it makes me laugh.”
“Why?” He didn’t bother to correct her that he wasn’t a Dom. Not technically.
“Because it’s funny. Sex is funny.” She looked up at him innocently, like she genuinely believed her words. “It’s so dorky when you think about it.”
“Not the way I do it,” he assured her most sincerely. He had never once thought of sex as dorky. Or funny. “Who the hell have you been having sex with that just the thought of me f**king you makes you giggle?”
Shawn’s eyes were a dark amber, but now they seemed lighter, almost glassy as she looked up at him, her chest heaving beneath the pillow. “I don’t know. I guess mostly I have buddy-buddy relationships with men. I don’t think I’m their sexual fantasy any more than they’re mine.”
He had to admit, that surprised him. No wonder she always looked at him a little nervously, yet determined. She must instinctively know that it would be different with him. Which it was going to be. He was going to show her exactly how she’d been let down by the men she had dated. Then again, maybe it wasn’t entirely their fault. Attraction was a mysterious thing.
“You’re my sexual fantasy. When I’m here, with you, in bed and naked, you can trust that you’re the only woman I’m thinking about, that you’re the only woman I’m interested in.” Something deep and intimate and territorial rose up in him.
She stared up at him, her smile smoothing out into something thoughtful, curious. “I want to believe you. But I also still want to giggle.”
It was a start. “Go ahead and giggle if you want, and get it out of your system. But trust me.”
That was, after all, the key to a healthy and satisfying relationship, particularly given his tendencies. She needed to trust him to pleasure her, to let him steer the ship. Rhett eased up on the pillow and watched Shawn, waiting for her answer. If she resisted, he would leave her bed tonight. He wanted her all in. He wanted her acquiescence, her eventual surrender.
He knew he would get it.
The question was just if it would be tonight or not.
CHAPTER EIGHT
SHAWN looked at Rhett, unnerved by his calm, by the way he was doing it again—staring steadily at her, making her the entire focus of his attention. She’d never really experienced that kind of intensity. She had been telling the truth in that most of the men she’d dated had likely been picturing supermodels when they’d been in bed with her. Obviously Sam had, given his wandering eye. She had never been in love with a man, had never emotionally connected on that level with someone. She’d had laughs and good times and respectable sex. But never all-consuming, earth-shattering pleasure.
Never had she looked up and felt like a man wanted to consume her, to eek every last drop of desire out of her body and swallow.
Until now.
Did she trust him?
She did, though there wasn’t necessarily any logic to it.
He was borderline rude, definitely bossy, and determined to get his own way.
But he was also honest, straightforward, fair. And most important, he never pushed her.
So yes, she did trust him. And even if it meant she was going to lose a little face by caving five days early, a mere forty-eight hours into their marriage, she knew beyond a doubt that his goal was to make it worth it for her.
“Okay,” she whispered, well aware that she was giving in to a course of action that would change the way they interacted over the next six months. But she wanted this. She wanted him. Inside her.
Then he smiled and it was so beautiful, she sucked in her breath, her heart beating almost as loudly as the vibrator that was still buzzing a few feet away from her right ear.
The least she could do was try not to laugh.
So when he bent over to kiss her again, his arm pressing into the pillows, she tried, she honestly tried not to think about the fact that her arms were contained beneath white linens, like a mummy. Or that if she wiggled her hands, they would pop out the bottom of the pillow like T-Rex arms. She twitched, a snort coming out as she tried to contain her nervous laughter.