Always Practice Safe Hex (Stay a Spell, #4)

by Juliette Cross

Standing, I slipped my wallet back into my pocket. “Perhaps, I have selfish reasons to keep him away from you.” She caught my roaming gaze. “You can’t be serious.” Even so, her heart pumped faster, pupils dilating as she let her own gaze wander down my frame. “We’re rivals,” she stated flatly, obviously trying to keep me at bay against her body’s own will. She might not realize it, but I could smell her arousal from here. I leaned closer, planting one hand on the booth above her head, the other on the table, caging her in. She didn’t move, even while her pulse quickened. I eased my lips close to her ear, inhaling her painfully hypnotic scent. “We may be rivals, Lavinia. But it doesn’t make me want to fuck your brains out any less.”

She could’ve easily given me her work email instead, but she lifted her hand. “Give me your phone.” Holding her gaze, I lifted it from the table and passed it to her. Mesmerized by her expression of both satisfied and devious female, I waited for her to punch in her contact info and pass it back. When I read Boss Ass Bitch above her number, I let out a bark of laughter. Willard jumped. Lavinia’s smile spread wide as she stared at me. “Don’t change the name,” she ordered when I looked back down at my phone screen. “Don’t plan to.”

“You’re a winner, Lavinia. You like to be on top.” I let that innuendo sink in, which it apparently did, judging by the flush of pink crawling up her neck. “I think it’s a fair assessment that you have a need to dominate in all facets of life.”

“Aren’t you going to order something to eat?” “I already know what I want.” He took a sip of beer, his eyes never leaving me.

“Also, loquacious?” I arched a brow. “Trying to impress me with your big vocabulary?” “Since you’re unwilling to check out my big cock, I thought it second best.”

“Oh, Lavinia,” he purred, smoothing the lapels of my collar after finishing the last button, dark eyes glinting. Then with a lascivious smile, he opened an intimate link and messaged me mind to mind. There will most definitely be a next time.

“Can I help you, Lavinia?” I asked, while copying Willard’s notes. “You know, it’s not a good idea that we get involved.” I couldn’t suppress the grin from my face as I twisted to face her. “I realize you believe this.” “But you don’t?” “That’s obvious.” I crossed my arms, leaning back against the copier. “You know I want you. It won’t affect the competition.”

I eased a step closer. “If you’d let me, I’d show you how non-average I am.”

I didn’t think to ask where we were going or consider if this was the right decision or not. I didn’t care anymore. I needed to quench the fire burning between my legs and sizzling along my skin. The one Gareth had started the first day I laid eyes on him.

And when he granted me smiles like this one that struck me near mute, I wanted to kneel in front of him and do anything he asked. Or commanded. Preferably commanded, actually.

“If this is what it takes to get you compliant in my bed, then I’ll shave you for free for the rest of your life.”

We lay there in silence, petting and holding each other. I was taking in my new reality. That I loved and was loved in return.

“You wanna know what I was just thinking?” “No, Sean,” snapped Violet, still pacing. “We don’t want to know what you were thinking.” “I was thinking about pussies.” “Sean,” warned Nico. “No, seriously. People use the word pussy to insult someone for being weak. But pussies are strong, man. They can take a pounding all night. They can squeeze out a baby the size of a watermelon. But you just graze a nut sac and a man is down. We should be saying, ‘Dude, you’re such a ball sac,’ when we want to call somebody out for being weak.”