The hint of beer on his breath, the strong arm locked across her back, the heat rising between them. She’d planned for a lot, but she could’ve never planned for this. She blinked, grasping for control of her wayward emotions. “So you admit this plan is crazy.”

He grinned. “Don’t change the subject.” And then he lowered his cheek to hers, smoothing skin to skin until he was nibbling her ear, licking the lobe, drawing it into his mouth, leaving her breathless. “For the record, I am very attracted to you.”

“You are?”

“I am.” He backed her into the dresser, hooking a hand beneath her knee, and hiking her leg along rough denim.

Trish shivered. Something rough and unfiltered stirred in her chest, urging her to drive him back toward the bed and see this thing through.

“Despite what you may have heard, I’m a gentleman,” he continued, adding his trademark grin. “And you asked me to leave. So I’m asking you, is that really what you want, or should I stay and finish this?”

Beneath a hypnosis caused by Tony’s beautiful face—bold black brows, dark chocolate eyes—Trish wanted the baby, but suddenly somehow she wanted the man more. “Stay.” It was a hurried answer made by her overheated body instead of her overused mind.

A second later, his lips met hers, shocking her body with pleasure and giving her mind a much-needed break. It was impossible to think straight while being electrocuted, so she didn’t try. She surrendered to her tingling skin and racing heart, neither of which was necessary to get pregnant. But when his tongue invaded her mouth, making thought soupy and knees weak, she decided the chemistry was a welcomed bonus. At least she wouldn’t have to grin and bear it, not while his fingers crawled along her bare thigh and his mouth dropped to her neck. She squeezed her eyes shut and blocked her nervous chatter, threading fingers through his soft, thick hair, holding his head as he sucked the skin on her throat. Her sigh echoed in the silence. Burying her nose in the blanket of black, she breathed him in and let him consume her.

Just as she managed to fully relax in his arms, he spun her away from the dresser, releasing her onto the bed. Her shirt wound around her waist, and she scrambled to cover. Instinct.

“Too late.” Tony smiled. “I saw what I saw, and I liked it.” His jacket hit the floor. “Your turn.”

“For what?” She gulped to go along with the blush.

“I lost the jacket. You lose the shirt.”

She glanced at her jumbled shirt. “No way. I’m pantless. You’re not. We’re hardly even.”

“Fine.” He unbuttoned his shirt, widening the V at his neck, and then lifted the fabric over his head, pitching it to the floor. “There. You’re bottomless. I’m topless. Call me even.”

She’d call him mouthwatering. Hard and rough. Dark and light. A breathtaking balance of masculine beauty. And then there were the tattoos, strategically peppering his arms and abdomen so she noticed his best places, like his bicep, where the Italian words she’d noticed before looped his muscle, and his forearm, where a large star and rambling vines marred his flawless skin.

But there were unexpected works of art as well, ones he kept hidden beneath T-shirts and faded Oxfords. She eyed the fiery comet covering the uppermost part of his right pec. A tail of orange, red, and blue sprawled over his shoulder and disappeared around his back. She lingered there, noticing how the muscled chord of his neck created a gentle swell at the juncture with his shoulder. Her lips twitched, wanting to taste it. She swallowed too hard, knowing she stared too long.

“When you’re done admiring the goods, you can return the favor.”

She choked down the embarrassment. “Nope. We’re not even until you’re pantless, too.”

He chuckled. “Oh yeah? Well, ditto for your top.”

She would’ve rolled her eyes had they not been busy ogling his chest. And her brain, it cried for sanity. She was slipping further and further away from the simple purity of her plan. Have sex. Make baby. There wasn’t a single bullet note on watching each other undress. All they needed to do was the deed—missionary style—on the right days, and then wait for the positive test result.

But Tony changed the game, didn’t he?

He flicked the button on his jeans and tugged down the zipper, revealing gray boxer briefs. “Come on. Gimme something.”

“Fine.” Which was a complete understatement. She wasn’t fine. She was rolling onto her knees and reaching gingerly under her top to wiggle out of her bra in front of this gut-wrenchingly gorgeous man. Fine? She balked and pulled the bra out through her sleeve. “There.”

He waggled his brows. “Tricky, but I can see your nipples.”

She slapped her arms around her chest. “You shouldn’t be teasing me now.”

“No?” He walked to the bed until his legs touched the mattress. “Then tell me what I should be doing?”

She would if she could. The problem was, nothing she planned seemed to fit with this man and this moment, meaning she was improvising, something she avoided like horizontal stripes. Improvising led to foolish mistakes and a loss of control. Improvising led her here, to this bed, where a shirtless, grinning Tony Corcarelli loomed over her. For better or worse she’d seen the last of her simple, straightforward plan.

God help her with whatever happened now.

* * *

Tony figured Trish spent lots of time ironing out details, including how the deed would go down. He grinned, because knowing Trish, the all-business Boss Lady, “going down” wasn’t one of those details. But after the kick in the crotch he got from kissing her, he had his own ideas about her little plan. And after the way she responded to him, he didn’t think she’d mind the detour.

“Maybe you could just stop talking and get busy making a baby,” she said, sitting on her knees in the middle of the bed, crisscrossing arms over breasts. If it weren’t for the wide eyes and flushed face, he’d think she was disgusted by him. But he saw the way she gawked at his chest, and there was nothing disgusted about that.

“So that’s how it’s going to be,” he said, dropping his pants and boxers to the floor with one push.

She zeroed in on the goods for a second. Her eyes growing even wider, but then she looked away, reaching behind her for the edge of the comforter. “Seriously, Tony, it’d probably be best if we didn’t say anything else now. Let’s just…”

He dropped to the bed, grabbed her and pulled her to him, knees to knees, chest to chest. Gathering the hem of her shirt in his hands, he tugged the soft fabric over the curves of her bottom and back, stroking soft skin as he went. His breathing quickened, matching hers. When she was naked, pressed against him, he stole a glance between them.

“There,” he whispered. “Now we’re even.”

She didn’t seem bothered by his talking now. She matched his crooked grin, a look he hadn’t seen before, just the tilt of her lips, a sparkle in her eye, and he wanted her in the worst way.

He pressed against her until she toppled backward, sprawling on the mattress beneath him. And then he kissed her, hard and punishing, squeezing her face in his hands. She whimpered, grabbed hold of his wrists, digging nails into his flesh, and then she arched into him, trapping his erection between them, milking it with rolling hips.

Tony swallowed a growl. Making a baby would be damn near impossible if he gave in too soon. Raising onto his hands and knees, he straddled her, releasing some of the pressure to his groin. Another kiss. A brush of palm across her nipple. Her hands smoothing down his sides. The blood pounded through his veins, pooling in his penis.

Tony dipped his lips to her shoulder and then to her breast. As much as he wanted to linger, he needed to keep moving, to get away from her hands that were crawling across his lower stomach, inching toward the launch site. One touch, and he knew he’d be over.

He dropped his mouth to her stomach, licking her skin. His hands roamed, grazing her thighs inside and out until his fingers opened her. She was wet enough to finish this, no need to delay, but the faint floral fragrance of her skin on his lips urged him to taste the rest.

Shoving his hands beneath her, he lifted only to feel her muscles harden in his hands.

“Tony, don’t. You don’t have to. It’s not necessary.”

His gaze grazed the center of her body, past her taut belly button, between her swollen breasts, to find her staring down at him, brows furrowed even as her chest heaved. “But I want to,” he said. And when he did, she unclenched her butt cheeks, dropped her head to the pillow and moaned.

Apparently he’d found the ultimate way to relax Trish DeVign. He smiled as he kissed, licked, and teased.

She moaned again, squirmed, yanked his hair, and then she lifted her body to him, pressing against his mouth. More tortured noises. More hair pulling. He was hard as a rock, avoiding contact with everything and anything, praying for not so much as a brush of air. And then she broke. Shattered. Muscles shaking. Breathing in sobs. He crawled over her to find her eyes closed and her arm flung over her forehead.

“That was not part of my plan,” she whispered.

“I figured, but I like my plan better.” He kissed her, wanting for her to taste the proof of a good plan on his lips.

Several seconds passed before she returned the enthusiasm of his kiss, but when she did, there was no mistaking the boost of energy. She drilled his mouth with her tongue as she reached between his legs. This time, he didn’t panic. He held his breath and rocked against her hand, hardening every inch of his skin, feeding the ache to a fraction of the edge, and then he cranked her knees higher, lifting her hips. On a single, labored breath, he drove inside.