Page 84 of The Price of Scandal

Thanks to the mounting tension of disappointed expectations and the second bottle of tequila, the dinner had taken a turn for the worse. Bethenny and Ed thoughtfully ushered off the dean of medicine and her wife to safer territory while the Stantons circled each other like sharks.

Well, three of the four of them did. Emily, the underwear-less genius, sat sphinx-like in the midst, soaking up her family’s bad behavior. When voices raised over Byron’s tryst with a professional tennis champion, Emily folded her napkin neatly over her untouched veal and turned to me.

“Derek, would you like to dance?”

I’d itched to touch her all night. So much temptation tonight. A man could only hold out for so long.

I wasn’t one to turn my back on opportunities. Opportunities opened doors. Opportunities changed lives.

“I’d be delighted.” That was a lie. There was nothing delightful, or even reasonably socially acceptable, regarding my feelings toward her. I wanted to tear her dress from her. To shove my hands into her hair, raining down pins. I wanted to destroy every wall she’d ever built until there was nothing between us. I wanted to watch her come. Watch her let go. Be human. I wanted her to let me possess her.

She didn’t have a clue about the dirty, annihilating thoughts I was having as she slipped her hand trustingly into mine. She led the way to the dance floor, and I was content to follow.

There were other couples swaying to the orchestra. Moving in time. Appropriate and sedate. And I had a raging beast under my skin.

I stopped her in the middle of the floor and pulled her into me with a restrained violence. Need had stripped me of my manners. My propriety.

Her breath caught in her throat, and I savored that small noise.

I needed to remember my place. I wasn’t here to ravage my client, lovely and irresistible as she was.

“What’s going through that mind of yours?” Emily asked, placing a hand on my chest. Oh, so proper. I could feel the years of etiquette and dance lessons in that delicate, restraining motion.

“Darling, I don’t think you really want to know.”

Her nostrils flared delicately like a doe scenting danger. “I think I really do,” she said quietly.

She wasn’t soft or pliable. Emily Stanton was a challenge. A razor-edged, high-walled challenge. And there wasn’t anything in this life that I enjoyed more.

“I’m thinking about tearing these to shreds,” I said, running a hand up her back, across her flesh, to finger the off-the-shoulder strap draped over her arm. “Then chasing you into some dark corner and watching your dress fall off those perfect breasts.”

Her eyes narrowed, the glassy blue-gray of them sparkling at me from under her thick lashes. Her lips parted a fraction of an inch, and I could envision them, pearly pink and plump, wrapped around the head of my cock.

I hardened at the speed of light. And I knew if she didn’t let me into her bed tonight, I’d end up breaking my rule and spend an hour in the shower jerking off to every fantasy I’d crafted around Ms. Emily Stanton.

We were closer than appropriate. People were looking at us. And for once, I didn’t care.

“Are you just trying to sell the story, Price?” she asked, her voice husky.

“I’m trying to get into your bed,” I confessed, brushing my lips against her earlobe. Was she this smooth, this soft everywhere? I needed to find out.

“That’s against the rules,” she reminded me. “You’ve never taken a client to bed before. Unless, of course, that was a line.”

I shook my head, letting my hand on her back skim down to rest on the subtle upper curve of her ass. “No line, love. I haven’t before. But I’ll live to regret it if you don’t let me touch you.”

Our grip on each other’s hands tightened.

I wanted to pull her against me, to press my hard-on into the flesh of her belly. To show her exactly what it was that she did to me.

The swell of her breasts moved with her breath. “I can’t believe dinner with my dysfunctional family didn’t turn you off,” she said lightly. She was turning it all around in that big brain of hers. Weighing decisions. Measuring data.

I was so hard I was afraid to breathe too deeply. My long-denied orgasm was on a hair trigger. And I realized I wanted to give her a sliver of the love and respect that her family should have been providing for years. The people who were supposed to love her and protect her were the ones inflicting the most damage. I wanted to fix it. To be what she needed.

“You’re even more miraculous than I thought,” I confessed. “To come from that?” I nodded in the direction of where Byron and Trey were glaring at each other over the second empty bottle.

“I didn’t come out unscathed,” she assured me with a laugh. “I’m mean. Aggressive. Cold.”

“You’re fucking terrifying,” I agreed.