Chased by the Billionaire 1 (8 page)

He wore no suit coat, or tie. He had on
a blue silk shirt—which brought out his aquamarine eyes—with the
top two buttons undone. He even had his sleeves rolled up to show
off his bulging forearms.

Diabolical…

If he couldn’t intimidate his opponent,
he’d flirt and charm his way through instead.

And Lance was a sucker for
skin.

“
You’ll have to show me how
you did that last night,” Jackson said. “I was completely at your
mercy, literally.”

And here came the flattery—top that off
with the imagery of getting to show Jackson his “moves”, and I was
surprised Lance hadn’t offered me up hogtied and gagged.

To his credit, Lance wasn’t falling for
it.

“
I am enjoying this…
immensely, but you know I’m wise to you, Mr. Burk.”

Jackson didn’t as much as flinch. If
anything his stare became deeper, more adoring—and then he reached
out and straightened Lance’s tie.

I could hear Lance’s intake of breath
from where I was standing, and every muscle in his body tightened
as Jackson played with his tie, his hands gently caressing Lance’s
neck and shoulders as he patted Lance’s shirt collar
down.

Lance sat there for a few beats,
staring wordlessly at Jackson. And then he stood up, turned on his
heel and headed back to my office.

He stopped for a heartbeat when he saw
me standing there, but then just kept on coming.

“
I can’t take anymore. You
two figure this thing out. He flirts like…” He shook his head and
then passed by me into my office, and not too gently pushed me out
the door. He shut and locked it behind me, locking himself in— and
Jackson and me out.

“
Betrayer!” I called through
the door and then turned to glare at Jackson. “That was so not
right.”

Jackson gave me one of those shrugs
that mean nothing and everything all at once. “I know I’m no match
for your ninja assistant, so I used some of my other talents.” His
smile was smug.

“
The Talented Mr. Burk? Who
will play you in the movie version?”

He looked a bit offended. “Brad Pitt,
of course.”

Of course
.

I was about to say something scathing
and hysterically mean… but then Jackson started walking toward
me.

The sight of all that muscle, of those
broad shoulders and how he bulged in all the best places—it caused
my nervous system to start to short circuit.

I’m not proud of what I did next, but I
knew I couldn’t let him get near me. With my mind hating him and my
body sending S.O.S signals every time I saw him, I couldn’t risk
letting him get too close.

So I side-stepped and went around the
other side of the reception area.

I tried to look nonchalant about it,
not walking too fast, but fast enough to get past him and make it
to the exit.

I didn’t look at him, but I could see
him stop in my peripheral vision, and then change course as he
realized what I was doing.

“
Liz,” Jackson called out,
but I was already heading out the gallery’s front door, the little
electronic bell that told us when a new customer had just come in
chiming.

Chapter
9

Wind blew around and through me,
coursing down the street, the breeze hot and wonderful. I took a
deep breath and tried to relax, walking down the street as fast as
my heels would allow. I heard the wind muffled sound of the bell
again, and knew Jackson was following me.

The bastard!

Did he have no shame?

After the way he treated me all those
years ago, on that oh so important night, how could he possibly
think I wanted anything to do with him now.

And I didn’t.

Well, my body did—I could feel the heat
building under my skin and it had nothing to do with the sun or
summer. It was all because somewhere inside me, I still wanted the
man who was chasing after me.

I slapped myself in the face, which
made the woman walking toward me gasp and give me a wide berth. She
probably thought I was a well dressed mental patient heading to my
twice weekly psychotherapy appointment.

I walked faster, passing shop after
shop, faking a smile and a wave to Vick at his newspaper stand,
crossing the street at the end of the block and almost getting run
over by a yellow cab.

Okay, that pissed me off. I stood there
for a few beats and stared the cab driver down, letting that anger
suffuse my being, burning every pathetic, needy thought from my
mind… but one.

I was not going to run from
this man. I’d had some of the most beautiful, wealthiest men in the
world as lovers. I was a self made woman, successful and
desired—even if I hadn’t had sex in three months, it was
because
I
couldn’t
get into it,
not
from lack of offers.

And even though it still hurt, what he
had done to me that long ago night, I hadn’t let that hold me down.
I shed the tears, I ate the requisite chocolate and ice cream, I
even cried on my best friend Susan’s shoulder about it—but I didn’t
die.

I moved on. I waited a month and a
half, and when I finally felt like it was time, I lost my virginity
to the sexiest professor on campus. It had been one of the most
liberating experiences in my life, taking control of the situation,
even though it had been my first time.

And I didn’t tell him. Not this time. I
kept my virgin status to myself.

I
had been in control.

I flicked off the cab driver and
stalked back across the street to where Jackson had stopped. He
stared at me with a mixture of fear and awe.

I was used to that, and seeing it in
his beautiful aquamarine eyes, and written all over his ruggedly
handsome face, made me feel more like me than I’d felt for some
time.

I circled around him, looking him up
and down, studying the lines of his body, the width of his back,
how his backside curved in, and then out to form his… well, he had
one hell of a nice ass. Round but tight.

I wondered if he had those little
dimples at the base of his spine that some men have. I wondered if
his butt cheeks had dimples as well.

“
What do you want from me?”
I said as I came around his other side.

He craned his neck around to look at
me. “I want to apologize to you.”

I kept circling him, stepping behind
him once more. “Whatever for?”

I watched his shoulders rise and his
ribs expand as he took a deep breath.

“
Liz…”

I stopped by his shoulder again, this
time standing so close I could feel the heat from his body and
smell the cool, clean smell of him. He had never been one for
cologne, just Dial soap.

I inhaled him, and as I used to back in
college, I set my chin on the bulging muscle of his shoulder,
gazing up at him.

I remember looking with such adoration
at his square jaw and golden California skin.

But he was not the young man that I’d
wanted to be my first. He was a cutthroat business man, and didn’t
seem to know the meaning of the word “no.”

He gulped as I stared at him, my
breasts pushing gently against his arm.

“
If you want to apologize
for not sleeping with me, don’t bother.”

He glanced at me, and looked away. “You
need to know—”

“
All I needed to know was
that you were not worthy of being my first.” I turned my head until
I captured his gaze with my own. “And you’re still not worthy. So
do yourself a favor.”

I stepped in front of him, staring into
his eyes as I reached out and ran my fingers down that rock hard
jaw line, ending with my fingers on his lips.

“
Go. Away.”

I stepped around him and started
walking back toward my gallery. The sun was hot on my skin and made
me squint, wishing for a pair of shades.

Jackson grabbed hold of my arm and spun
me around to face him. He was so tall, towering over me, breathing
hard and looking mightily pissed off.

Well… that made two of us.

He slid his arm around my back and
pulled me to him, crushing me against his hard chest. I felt my
nipples harden as our chests rubbed together, and my breathing
accelerated until our breaths were nearly in sync.

I glared into his eyes, hatred burning
through my mind.

“
You’re an
asshole!”

The look on his face faltered, from
heated to taken aback. But then he smiled, sexy little wrinkles
forming around his eyes.

“
Bitch...”

He leaned down and kissed me, hard and
hot and infuriating.

I pushed away from him, hauled off and
slapped him across the face.

He let me go and I staggered a couple
steps back from him.

He looked around us and then
grinned.

I looked around us too and found the
street perfectly deserted, not a soul in sight.

Everyone was back to work.

I looked back to Jackson. There was a
fine trail of blood on his cheek where I had scratched him, and the
red imprint of my hand.

I don’t know what it was, but I wanted
to hurt him again.

I wanted to…

I launched myself at Jackson, wrapping
my arms around his neck as I kissed him. His arms engulfed me and
he picked me up off my feet.

I knew we were moving, but I didn’t
know where—and I didn’t care. All I wanted was to taste him, to
feel him against me…

To have him inside me…

My back hit a wall and I cried out. I
felt his hands on my ass, sliding down to my skirt.

I took his lower lip in my teeth and
bit, hard enough to taste blood.

Jackson groaned and grasped hold of my
lace panties, his fingers strong and rough as he caught hold of the
fabric and tore them from around my hips.

The summer wind caressed my bare bottom
and licked my moist sex.

I needed this…

So damned badly…

I pulled away from his kiss and looked
around. Jackson had pulled us into some kind of hidden lee between
buildings—and from the abandoned paper cups and scattered cigarette
butts, this was someone’s break area.

I moved my hands down his chest and
pulled his shirt open, popping buttons to bare him to me. I leaned
in and pulled his right nipple into my mouth, sucking it and
tonguing it, and then biting down hard.

Jackson groaned and threw back his
head. I reached down and unbuckled his belt, and then pulled open
his pants.

I pushed my hand down into the
waistband of his underwear and wrapped my hand around his arousal.
He was already hard, but he throbbed and grew bigger at my touch. I
stroked him with one hand as I pushed down his pants.

I rose up on my tiptoes and kissed his
mouth ever so lightly, my stroking of his hardness just as gentle.
And then I let go of him, leaned back against the cool, filthy
bricks of the building and reached up behind my neck and unclasped
the top of my halter dress, letting it fall down to reveal my bare
breasts.

Jackson growled and crashed into me,
his mouth first invading my mouth, and then licking down my throat,
over my collarbone, and then lapping and sucking at my
tits.

My hands found his shoulders and I dug
my nails into the flesh that was exposed.

Jackson grabbed my ass with his hands
and lifted me up against the wall. I felt his cock nudge at my
pussy, sliding against my opening—my sex practically dripping from
how turned on I was.

When he pushed into me I called out,
wrapping my arms around his neck, feasting on his mouth as he
pushed further into me, stretching me in the most delightful
ways.

And that’s when the thought
of Susan in childbirth flared up in the back of my mind
again
, flashing like the
globes of a cop car.

I felt the chill on my skin and the
sudden cold creeping through my blood stream. I was moments away
from losing my want, my need, and my sex drive.

Jackson rocked his hips forward,
slamming his cock up into me as far as it would go. I groaned
because it actually hurt: not a good feeling when a minute ago I
was on the precipice of finally—FINALLY—having an
orgasm!

He used his hips and his cock to hold
me pinned up against the wall, his hands reaching up and grabbing
the sides of my face and snapping me out of the impending sexual
gloom I was heading toward.

He looked into my eyes—I swear to god,
I think he was really looking right into me, staring at my very
soul. I stared back, at a loss for words, seeing only the
shimmering green blue of his eyes, feeling him inside me, and his
strong, rough hands against the sides of my face.

He slowly leaned in, his breath hot on
the side of my neck, and tickling my ear.