Page 131 of Untouchable

She saw the words process in his eyes, and his expression twisted very briefly with emotion. “Okay.” He pulled her into a tight hug and murmured against her ear, “Although I think you might be alittlebetter than me.”

She shook with bone-dry amusement and a different kind of feeling and let herself enjoy his embrace.

He held her against him for a long time until he adjusted their bodies enough for him to press his lips against hers. “Thank you for telling me. About your uncle.”

She nodded, knowing he’d realized how hard it was for her to say. “I’ve never told anyone.”

“You can tell me anything.”

“Yeah.” After a moment she added, “What about you?”

“What about me?”

“Do you have anything you want to tell me?” She looked up at him and was surprised to see an expression of uncertainty on his face.

Like he was torn, like there might be something he wanted to unburden on her too.

She wanted it. Wanted to know more about him, wanted to know the contours of his soul. Wanted so much to know if she was allowed to feel for him this way.

She waited, but then she saw his face relax and knew he’d made his decision.

He wasn’t going to open up all the way with her yet.

“I love you,” he said, turning on his side and smiling at her. “Is that what you wanted me to say?”

She accepted the new mood his word and smile had shaped since it was safer, easier. She smiled back. “You said that this morning.”

“I haven’t changed my mind yet.”

“Good. Me either. I love you too.”

His smile widened and he leaned forward, kissing her gently at first until he wrapped one arm around her and the kiss deepened dramatically. “Do you know what?” he murmured against her mouth, his voice throaty and erotic when they finally broke the kiss.

“What?”

“This is the first time in my life when I’ve ever wanted a woman for more than her body. Is that strange?”

He was definitely getting into sex mode, but she could tell that his last question had been a serious one. He wanted an answer.

“I don’t know. Maybe a little. Forty years is a long time to want nothing but sex from women.”

Her mind felt rather blurred and overly warm as he kissed her again, deeply and leisurely. She pressed her body against him, wound her arms around his neck, opened her mouth to his tongue, felt all of him giving to her, taking from her, both at the same time.

When he finally pulled back from the kiss, he was smiling. “Well, truth be known, I didn’t start pursuing women when I was two, so it’s been a little less than forty years.”

It took a minute to register the words through the cloud of lust and feeling in her mind, but when she did, she couldn’t help but giggle. “Twenty-five years then. It’s still a long time. You’ve really only thought about women’s bodies in all that time?”

“In work contexts, it’s different. I can respect them as much as men. But beyond that…” He shook his head. “You’re the first woman I’ve ever wanted beyond just the physical.”

She couldn’t help but like that idea, no matter what it said about Caleb’s sexual history. She liked that he’d never felt for any woman anything close to what he felt for her.

She knew those kinds of feelings were dangerous, knew the more she entertained them, the harder it would be to ever do what she was here to do. She knew the smartest thing for her to do right now would be to change the mood between them to something simpler—something hot and sexy and not filled with this kind of soft emotion.

But instead of saying something dirty, she asked, “So what exactly about me do you want?”

His expression was unusually soft, tender, with something almost happy warming his eyes. “Are you fishing for compliments?”

“Not compliments.” She was smiling the same way he was. “Just an explanation of what you meant. How hard can that be?”