He wanted to worship her, so after she’d excused herself to stop in the restroom, he took her back to the hotel, his focus solely on the purity of the pleasure he wanted to give her.

He’d spread a small hand towel on the bed and left the lube and some massage oil on it. As the door to the room shut, he dimmed the lights, but didn’t turn them all the way off. He couldn’t bear not to look at her.

She turned to face him. He couldn’t read her expression.

“Are you okay? Are you nervous?”

She shook her head. “No. Not at all.”

“Good,” he said, grasping her hand and leading her to the bed. He backed her up against it, and when her knees hit the mattress she sank down, her hair spreading across the royal blue bedspread. She looked like a dream to him, her hair in waves, her breasts free under the soft cotton, and her eyes hooked on him the whole time. She propped herself on her elbows and watched as he unknotted the tie he’d worn to dinner and tossed it on a chair somewhere behind him.

It staggered him. Her desire. Her heart. How much she gave of herself. He moved up to her face, cupped her cheeks in his hands, and looked her in the eyes. He didn’t say it, wouldn’t say—couldn’t say it.

But he could say this. “About last night,” he began, trying again to fix his mistake.

She placed her finger on his lips. “Don’t say a word,” she whispered.

He shook his head and kept going. “When I said I can’t get enough of you, I meant it. I can’t,” he whispered, and it wasn’t a return of her sentiment, but it was as close as he could possibly come.

“I feel the same about you,” she said. Her expression softened more as she ran her fingertips over his jaw. Her touch nailed him in the heart. He grabbed her hand from his face, and clasped it.

His heart beat so hard he swore it was going to fight its way out of his chest, landing in her fucking hands where it belonged. He was aching to tell her how he felt for her. He fought that instinct hard, shoved it away, and returned to the role he could play well.

“Stay like that. I’m going to put on music,” he said, and grabbed his phone from the coffee table and called up Ravel’s ‘Bolero.’

The opening notes were faint, as the composer intended, and Michelle raised an eyebrow in question. “What are you playing?”

“Bolero.”

She grinned. “Like you told me you wanted to someday.”

“Someday is now,” he said, then he stalked over to her, dropped down to his knees and gently spread her legs apart. Her skirt rose up to her mid thighs, and he could only see a sliver of her panties, but the sight of her arousal took his breath away. She must have been wet all through dinner, because she was soaked now. And that delicious wetness was all for him. “I want you so much,” he said.