“Look,” he said, nodding his head toward the mirror they were standing in front of. The mirror she had very deliberately avoided looking at.

“I’d rather look at you,” she answered, turning toward him.

But he banded an arm around her hips and another over her breasts, forcing her to stay facing the mirror. Then he used his chin to nudge at her cheek until she reluctantly lifted her head and met his eyes in the mirror.

“Look at you,” he told her in a voice gone husky with desire. “Just look at you.”

She could deny him nothing when he asked like that, so she did. And saw the same Jamison she’d always seen staring back at her. Crazy red hair, too pale skin, a smattering of freckles on her arms and chest. And hips and thighs that needed about eight consecutive weeks on a Stairmaster before they could ever be considered toned.

“What do you see?” he asked.

She didn’t know how to answer him, what to say to make him understand. So in the end, she just told him the truth. “I see you.” She couldn’t keep the reverence out of her tone as her eyes traced his gorgeous muscles and even more gorgeous tattoos.

He sighed in frustration, shoved a hand through all that glorious, silky hair of his. And said, “Baby, I love the way you look.”

He moved a hand to her face, stroked his fingers down her cheeks. “Your eyes slay me. All violet and mysterious—I never quite know what you’re thinking. Even when that frustrates me, I get off on it.”

He moved lower, rubbed his thumb over her lips. “And your mouth. I love the color of your lips. Love this little dip right here.” He paused at the deep bow in the center of her top lip. “You’d be shocked if you knew how much time I’ve spent these last few weeks fantasizing about your mouth wrapped around my cock.”

She shuddered, her head falling back against his chest and her eyes drifting closed as she lost herself in the sensual promise of his words.

“Open your eyes,” he commanded, a dark note in his voice that had her instinctively following his directions.

“I love your skin. How soft and sweet it is. It’s why I kiss you so much, because I love to taste you—all peaches and cream and warm, rich honey.” He leaned forward, trailed his tongue over her shoulder. Played connect the dots with the scattering of freckles there.

It tickled and she giggled a little despite the spell Ryder was weaving all around her. “I also love your laugh,” he told her with a wicked grin. “Almost as much as I love these.”

He moved his right arm back down so that it once again banded her breasts. He cupped her left breast in his hand, stroked her nipple for long, breathless seconds.

“And this.” His left hand slipped down to cup her sex, his middle finger sliding through her folds while his bent index finger circled round her clit.

Heat licked through her, made her knees tremble and her skin ache with sensitivity. Again she started to turn in to him, and again he stopped her with his ragingly possessive hold.

“Look,” he urged, his voice somehow, impossibly, deeper than before.

And she did, for the first time seeing shades of what he was talking about. She didn’t look beautiful standing there, but she did look hot, sexy. Her hair was tousled, her eyes heavy-lidded with desire. Between his spread fingers, she could see her nipple, dark red and hard with need. Her legs were spread, her hips moving sensuously against his hand as he teased her toward yet another orgasm.

“Do you see?” His voice was pure gravel now.

She nodded against his chest. Her voice had deserted her.

“Say it. Tell me you understand.”

“I see.” Each word was a razor blade slicing the inside of her dry, tight throat. “I understand.”

“Thank God.” He turned her around, sank to his knees. “Keep watching,” he urged as he spread her legs and licked his way through her already drenched folds. He nodded to the second mirror, which was directly across from the one she was now leaning against.

“Ryder,” she gasped, her hands clutching at his shoulders in an attempt to keep her already unsteady legs from buckling completely.

He must have heard the desperation in her voice, because he braced his hands on her hips and lifted her onto the vanity. Then he brought her feet up to rest inches from her ass, urging her to let her knees fall open even as he did so. She was wide open to him now, completely vulnerable, and if she hadn’t trusted him so completely she never could have born it.

But she did trust him. How could she not when he had already brought her such incredible pleasure?

He chose that moment to pull her clit into his mouth and suck gently. Her head fell back on a moan, her eyes closing because she didn’t have the strength to keep them open for one more second.

But Ryder was having none of it. “Look,” he told her again, and she did, forcing her eyes open despite the near-blinding pleasure.

It was the most shockingly intimate thing she had ever done, but she didn’t stop him. And she didn’t look away. Instead, she watched him going down on her. Watched him taking her with his hands and lips and tongue. Her own hands clutched at his shoulders and hair, her hips arching into his mouth as her need for release grew more and more desperate.

“Ryder!” It was a high-pitched, keening cry as he licked her to the most intense, most overwhelming, orgasm of her life.

“I’ve got you, baby,” he whispered as he thrust two fingers inside of her at just the right angle to prolong her climax. “I’ve got you.”

And though she knew it was stupid—and very probably emotionally disastrous—she let herself believe him. And slid deeply, irrevocably into love.

Chapter Seventeen

Something had changed. Ryder didn’t know what it was, but somehow, in the middle of the most intense sex of his life, something had shifted deep inside of him. And frankly it scared the shit out of him.

He wanted Jamison. Wanted her for himself in a way he hadn’t wanted anything in a very long time. Or, more accurately, in a way he hadn’t let himself want anything. Not since Carrie.

If he was honest with himself, that was what terrified him. Not the fact that he felt something for the first time in a very long time. But the fact that Jamison did as well. Oh, she could talk a good game about no strings fun and taking care of herself, but he’d seen the way she looked at him earlier. Had recognized it, because he knew he had the same damn look on his own face.

He didn’t want to hurt her, didn’t want anything from the crazy, fucked up life he led to leak over onto her. He hadn’t been worried about that with Carrie and she had suffered for it, had paid the ultimate price. And Jamison had already been attacked once. He’d done the best he could to make her safe on this trip, as had Jared. But nothing was guaranteed and he’d be damned if he let her suffer the same way Carrie had, being attacked backstage by some loser whose band never had a chance of going huge—even before he’d been put on trial for rape. Not that the charges had stuck—Carrie had been so messed up on prescription drugs by the trial that her testimony had been “suspect,:” and he hadn’t been able to do a damn thing about it. Except shoulder the blame for her pain and her addiction and watch as she slipped further and further away from him. The thought of going through it again, of seeing Jamison suffer the way Carrie had, woke him up in the middle of the night, drenched in a cold sweat.Besides, if he was being honest, he’d admit that this thing between Jamison and him didn’t have a shot of working out. Sure, she could use her degree cooking for the band, could write her cookbookanywhere, but the fact of the matter was Jamison craved stability. She would never let herself live the way her mom had, and he couldn’t see himself living any other way. Not when staying in one place too long made him feel claustrophobic. Like he couldn’t breathe or think.

No, the best thing to do would be to end their relationship now. Before she got any more attached. Before he forgot all the reasons he couldn’t be the man she needed.

Part of him wanted to go talk to her right then, but it wasn’t practical. Night was falling over Houston, which meant the fans would be hitting the venue any minute now. Since the last thing he wanted to do was run the gauntlet tonight just to get to the stage, he needed to hit the dressing room pretty damn quickly. With a wave to Gerald, one of the band’s security guards, he ducked backstage. Headed for the dressing room the concert promoter had designated for Shaken Dirty. The concert didn’t start for a couple of hours, but he wanted some time to think. To just be.

He pulled up short when he saw Jared leaning against the wall outside the dressing room, cell phone in his hand.

“Hey, man. Everything okay with Victoria?” Ryder asked. He couldn’t think of another reason Jared would be standing in the hallway looking so grim-faced when his fiancée had to be around somewhere.

“Yeah, she’s fine, I guess. She went shopping a few hours ago and I haven’t heard from her.”

“Security’s with her, right?”

“Yeah.”

“So she’s fine.” Ryder smiled at him. “Probably just wanted to get something special for the show tonight.”

“Yeah. You’re probably right.” Still, he checked his cell for the third time in as many minutes.

“And then I figure we won’t be seeing you anywhere except on stage for the next few days.”

Jared’s teeth came together with a snap. It was Ryder’s first clue that there was more on his mind than Victoria—an idea that was reinforced when his best friend said, “Kind of like we haven’t been seeing much of you around lately?”