Elizabeth Bevarly - Indecent Suggestion

Oh, where had she put her cigarettes?

Recalling that she had smoked the last of them before going to bed, she gave herself a good mental shake and told herself to calm down. It wouldn’t be fair, anyway, to smoke in front of Turner when she’d bet him he couldn’t go all day without. She could go without, too. She’d just have to keep her thoughts focused, that was all.

Yeah, focus, she reiterated to herself. That’s the ticket.

Unfortunately, when Turner emerged a few minutes later from his bedroom, wearing snug, faded jeans and an even more faded denim work shirt that he hadn’t bothered yet to button up, Becca’s focus flew immediately to his person. To be more specific, her focus flew to that part of his person that was currently uncovered. And then her focus focused way too well. The rich scattering of dark hair that peeked out from his open shirt spanned his chest from shoulder to shoulder, she knew, because she’d seen him shirtless on more than one occasion.

But somehow, seeing him this way now felt different from the way it had on those other occasions. Before, when Turner had been shirtless around her, it had been in some public venue. Because they were swimming or he was working out in his parents’ yard or playing basketball or something else equally harmless. Now his state of dishabille seemed anything but harmless. Here, in the privacy of his apartment, when it was just the two of them, alone, it seemed more intimate somehow.

Lack of sleep, she reminded herself again. Yeah. That was for sure why she suddenly felt so restless around him.

“So what do you want to do today while you’re not trusting me to light up in secret?” he asked as he began to button his shirt. “Besides pretend we both don’t want a cigarette, I mean.”

Becca shrugged. “I don’t know. We could see a movie.”

He gazed at her through narrowed eyes. “Oh, I don’t think so.”

“Had enough, have you?”

“Let’s just say that when it’s my time to go to that big disease-of-the-week in the sky, I’ll know all the right things to say about moons and stars and no regrets.”

“Mmm.”

She watched as he finished buttoning himself up, and continued to watch as he rolled back his sleeves over strong forearms, and continued to watch as he dragged both hands through his still-damp hair, slicking it straight back from his face. And then she continued to watch some more as he gazed back at her.

“What?” he asked.

“What, what?” she replied.

“Why are you looking at me? Do I have toothpaste on my lip or something?”

Oh, she really didn’t want to talk about his lip right now. “It’s nothing,” she said quickly.

Probably a little too quickly, because he narrowed his eyes even more. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

“Why do you think something is wrong?”

“I don’t know. You’re looking at me kind of funny.”

“Well, I don’t know why. I don’t feel funny.”

“How do you feel?”

Oooh, not a question she wanted to answer right now. She needed a diversion. Quick. So she strode across the room to where she had slung her purse over the back of a chair, rummaged through it until she found what she was looking for, then shamelessly withdrew a limp, bent, God-only-knows-how-long-it’s-been-in-there cigarette, plus her lighter, and strode back over to Turner.

“Hey,” he objected. “You can’t smoke today.”

“Why not?”

“Because we have a bet, that’s why.”

“I didn’t make any bet,” she pointed out as she tucked the cigarette between her lips. “You did. I can smoke if I want to.”

He gaped at her. “But that’s not fair!”

She smiled. “Yeah, I know.”

“But…but…but…”

She withdrew the cigarette from her mouth and extended it toward him. “Would you rather have it yourself?” she asked sweetly.

For some reason, it suddenly seemed imperative that she get him to smoke. Not just because she needed him to lose the bet in order to accompany her to the hypnotherapist, but because the sooner he lit up, the sooner she could win the bet and vacate the premises. Then, in the privacy and safety of her own home, she could wonder just why the hell she suddenly felt so weird around Turner. So she moved the cigarette closer, rolling it between her fingers in an effort to free the sweet aroma of unsmoked tobacco, a fragrance she knew he wouldn’t be able to resist.

“C’mon,” she taunted him. “You know you want to. Can’t you smell it?” she cooed in the sexiest siren voice she could muster. She took another step closer, until her body was almost flush with his, then pushed the cigarette even closer to his face. “Smell how good it smells,” she entreated him seductively.

But Turner glanced away, silently declining her offer. She frowned at the rebuff, feeling strangely rejected. So she lifted her free hand to his face, cupping his jaw in her palm until she could turn his head toward the cigarette again.

“Look at it, Turner,” she said softly.

“I don’t want to look at it,” he replied, turning his head away again.

So Becca cupped his jaw more firmly and urged his face to where she’d held it before. “Look at it,” she instructed him more forcefully, her voice sounding throatier now, though she couldn’t recall making a conscious effort to have it do that. “Look how smooth and round it is.”

He did as she told him to, glancing down at the cigarette, then hastily back up at her face. “Yeah. So?”

“Don’t you want to touch it?” she whispered, arching one brow.

He shook his head slowly, but his gaze flittered back down to the cigarette she held out to him. “No,” he told her roughly. “I don’t want to touch it.”

“Of course you want to touch it,” she said sweetly. She threaded her fingers intimately into his hair. “You want to touch it sooooo bad.”

“No, I don’t,” he declared.

“Yes, you do,” she insisted. “You want to caress it, and stroke it and hold it in your hand. You want to run your fingers over it, up and down and around and around. Then you want to put it between your thumb and forefinger and roll it back and forth. It feels so good to do that, doesn’t it? I love how that feels.”

Becca lifted the cigarette to her mouth, and Turner’s gaze followed. Instead of tucking it between her lips, however, she raked the cigarette slowly across her mouth. “But as good as it feels to touch it, there’s nothing like putting it in your mouth, is there?”

“Becca…” he said, the warning in his voice unequivocal.

“You want to feel it against your lips,” she murmured. “Taste it on your tongue. You want it in your mouth, don’t you, Turner?”

“No. I don’t.” But his words were quiet, uncertain.

“Yes. You do,” she said. “You want your mouth on it, sucking hard. Don’t fight it, Turner. Take what you want. Take it now.”

For a moment, she thought he would succumb, because he actually lifted his hand toward her—or, rather, toward the cigarette. His fingers hovered there for a moment, lingering…lingering…. Then he drew his hand away again and crossed his arms over his broad chest.

“No,” he told her, his voice still a little shaky. “I’m just saying no. I will not submit to peer pressure.” And then, as if he wanted to physically illustrate that, he took a solid step backward, away from the cigarette, away from Becca.

Dammit. They had been so close. Though, somehow, what they had actually been close to doing wasn’t the thing she had wanted them to be doing. Or worse, maybe they had been close to doing that.

She made herself roll her eyes, as if she were as unconcerned as he. “Fine,” she conceded petulantly. Then, smiling playfully again, she placed the cigarette between her own lips and said, “Then you won’t mind if I smoke.”