Page 93 of Twisted Knight

“What if someone saw us tonight?”

“I kissed you in a locked bathroom. You kissed me in a public parking lot. That one’s on you.” He angles his head to the side and studies me. “What does it matter if someone saw us?”

He knows why, but he’s going to make me explain it, and I’m not sure if that makes me like him or hate him more for it.

“It’s hard enough for me as it is—”

“Thank you.” His grin returns right along with his ego as he cups a hand over his cock on the sheet.

“No … Jesus.” I roll my eyes. “Being a woman in Westmore—one who has aspirations beyond being married and meeting all the societal goals—isn’t easy. It’s taken me forever to earn the respect of the board, of my colleagues, of our suppliers. If someone saw us, if they knew I slept with you, you know any upward mobility on my part will be met with the assumption that I slept my way to the top. Men get praised for sleeping with bosses. Women get slammed for it.”

He gives a measured nod. “When I’m running the place, your position is earned by doing the work.”

“Or by sleeping with the boss.”

“No.” The word is curt and unforgiving as he rises from the bed, no shame as he stands there in all his naked glory. “Is all of this about how other people perceive you, or about how you perceive yourself? One I’ll accept. The other I don’t give a flying fuck about.”

“You … you just have to go.”

“So you’ve said, but you still haven’t answered my question and I think that’s what you’re struggling with. You slept with me. You wanted to. I wanted to. That doesn’t make you a bad person. Not in my book. It makes you you. Human. A woman. Someone with needs. What happens in this bedroom has no bearing on what happens outside of it.”

I slept with the man trying to ruin my dreams. That says a whole shit ton about me. A whole lot I’m not proud of.

I nod, my words caught in my throat, my voice barely a whisper. “We can’t do this again.”

He chuckles, clearly not believing me. “So you’re telling me the sex was so mediocre that resisting me—resisting there being a next time—will be easy.”

“I didn’t say anything about the sex.”

“So that part was good?”

Incredible. Phenomenal. Everything.

I shrug and nod.

“And the resisting me part?”

Our eyes meet, and I turn to find my discarded clothes. Anything to do with my hands so that I don’t have to face him. So that I don’t show him denying or resisting him will be anything but easy.

“You’re a fucking liar,” he says as his laugh rumbles around the room.

Yes. I am.

I jolt when Holden’s hand touches my neck and moves my hair to the side. I never even heard him cross the room. “Don’t worry, Sunshine.” He presses his lips there and murmurs as he slides his hand inside his shirt I have on. His touch against the bare skin of my abdomen detonates little earthquakes everywhere. “Your secret’s safe with me. The gray is a lot of fucking fun sometimes. It’s addicting. You’ll step into it again with me regardless of what you say.”

I close my eyes and try not to be affected by his words, by his touch, by the feel of his lips on my skin, but I am.

I know I am.

I don’t know what to say.

How to respond.

Because he’s right.

But I don’t need to say anything because suddenly Holden isn’t behind me. The heat of his body is gone. I turn to see him pulling his pants up over his hips, tucking his cock inside of them, grabbing his shoes in his hand, and then walking out of the house without another word.

I stare at the bedroom door, at the empty bed, and question my own damn sanity because hell if I don’t already want him again.