"Jack . . ." I could hardly speak. "I wasn't making a pass at you."

"I know." One hand slid to the back of my head, fingers lacing through the silky-fine locks. Gripping gently, he guided me to look at him. "It's not at all your fault that I'm taking it that way."

"Jack, don't—"

"I like these," he murmured, touching the rectang-ular rim of my glasses, carefully grasping an earpiece. "A lot. But they're in the way."

"Of what?" I tensed as he pulled off my glasses and set them aside.

"Hold still, Ella." And his head lowered.

ELEVEN

If i'd been thinking rationally, i never would have allowed it. Jack's mouth brushed slowly over mine before settling with gentle pressure. I moved against his unyielding weight until I found some perfect, unexpected alignment that sent heat jolting through me. My knees gave out, but it didn't matter because he was holding me so securely. One of his hands came up to my jaw with extreme care.

Every time I tried to finish the kiss, he pressed harder, coaxing me to stay open, tasting slowly. This was so different from what I was accustomed to, it seemed like something other than kissing. I realized that my kisses with Dane had become a form of punctuation, the quotations or the hasty dash at the end of a conversation. This was softer, more urgent and relentless. Wild, fresh, tumbling kisses, eroding my balance. I groped Jack's shoulders, my fingers curving over the hard nape of his neck.

He took a quick breath and reached down, his hand sliding over my pajama bottoms as he coaxed my h*ps high and tight. The full-on pressure of him was stunning, galvanic. He was unbelievably hard. Everywhere. He was in control, infinitely stronger, and he wanted me to know it.

He kissed me until the sensations flowed in directions I couldn't go, spilling and sliding darkly. As I felt a desperate ache cambering low in my body, I finally understood that if I slept with this man, he would take everything. All the defenses I had built would be destroyed.

Shaking, I pushed at him and managed to turn my head long enough to gasp, "I can't. No. That's enough, Jack."

He stopped at once. But he kept me against him, his chest moving hard and fast.

I couldn't look at him. My voice was hoarse as I said, "That shouldn't have happened."

"I've wanted this since the first second I saw you." His arms tightened, and he bent over me until his mouth was close to my ear. Gently he whispered, "You did, too."

"I didn't. I don't."

"You need some fun, Ella."

I let out an incredulous laugh. "Believe me, I don't need fun, I need—" I broke off with a gasp as he pressed my h*ps closer to his. The feel of him was more than my dazzled senses could handle. To my mortification, I hitched up against him before I could stop myself, heat and instinct winning out over sanity.

Feeling the reflexive response, Jack smiled against my scarlet cheek. "You should take me on. I'd be good for you."

"You are so full of yourself . . . and you would not be good for me, with your steaks and power tools and your attention-deficit libido, and . . . I'll bet you're a card-carrying member of the NRA. Admit it, you are." I couldn't seem to shut up. I was talking too much, breathing too fast, jittering like a wind-up toy that had been wound to the limits of its mechanism.

Jack nuzzled into a sensitive place behind my ear. "Why does that matter?"

"Is that a yes? It must be. God. It matters because—stop that. It matters because I would only go to bed with a man who respected me and my views. My—" I broke off with an inarticulate sound as he nibbled lightly at my skin.

"I respect you," he murmured. "And your views. I think of you as an equal. I respect your brains, and all those big words you like to use. But I also want to rip your clothes off and have sex with you until you scream and cry and see God." His mouth dragged gently along my throat. I jerked helplessly, muscles jolting with pleasure, and his hands gripped my hips, keeping me in place. "I'm gonna show you a good time, Ella. Starting with some take-no-prisoners sex. The kind when you can't remember your own name after."

"I've been with Dane for four years," I managed to say. "He understands me in a way you don't."

"I can learn you."

It seemed as if something inside me had started to unravel, weakness spreading, all my body tightening against it. I closed my eyes and bit back a whimper. "When you offered me the apartment," I said weakly, "you implied you had no ulterior motives. I don't appreciate the position this puts me in, Jack."

His head lifted, and his lips brushed the tip of my nose. "What position would you prefer?"

My eyes flew open. Somehow I managed to twist away from him. Half-sitting, half-leaning on the arm of the sofa, I pointed to the door with a trembling finger. "Go, Jack."

Jack looked as sexy as hell, rumpled and aroused. "You're kicking me out?"

I could hardly believe it myself. "I'm kicking you out." I went to get my glasses, fumbling to put them back on.

His mouth had turned sullen. "There's more we need to talk about."

"I know. But if I let you stay, I don't think we'll do much talking."

"What if I promise I won't touch you?"

As our gazes caught, it seemed the entire room was filled with volatile heat. "You'd be lying," I said.