And yet, standing in the middle of a Las Vegas nightclub with a woman whose name he'd only just learned--but whom he wanted more than any woman he'd ever met--Cole felt completely off his game.
The truth was, he was tired. It had been a long, frustrating day looking for a nice girl to take to his grandmother.
His dying grandmother.
"Cole? Are you okay?"
He blinked and looked into Anna's clearly concerned ocean eyes, felt something soft and warm on his forearm and realized she'd reached out to touch him.
Women looked at him in lots of ways--with dollar signs in their eyes, with lust, with anxiety when he was about to dump them--but never with concern.
Never like they actually cared about him.
"My grandmother is sick."
Shit, where had those words come from?
She moved even closer, put her other hand on him. "I'm so sorry."
He worked to swallow past the lump in his throat. "I am, too."
Together they stood like that for several moments, her comfort flushing through his veins, heading straight for his heart.
"Are you sure you'd still like to dance? Maybe we could find a quieter place and we could talk instead."
She was right. He didn't want to dance. But he didn't want to talk, either.
He wanted to kiss her.
He put his hands on her face, brushing his thumb against her lower lip. She went completely still, not blinking or even breathing as he lowered his face to hers. He didn't want to scare her and tried to go slow, even though all he wanted was to shove her against the nearest wall and wrap her legs around his waist as he sank into her wet heat.
Her breath was a sweet puff of heat against his mouth as he moved in to kiss her, her lips as red and tempting as plump berries in summertime. Cole liked kissing, always had, happy to spend plenty of time at first base even when most guys were already going for the home run. It was a bonus that kissing made chicks hotter, hornier.
But holy hell, no kiss had ever been like this. No kiss could have prepared him for Anna.
Her mouth was soft and so damn sweet, he lost track of his plans--forgot all about taking it slow and not scaring her. He had to taste her, had to run his tongue along the seam between her lips, from the center then out to first one corner and then the next. Hunger like he'd never known took him over, made him forget everything but the promise of pleasure.
A groan escaped as she opened up for him, her tongue tentatively finding his, a small stroke of sweetness that had him burning up head to toe. His hands slid up into her hair--so damn soft, he couldn't believe it--and his fingers tightened on her, pulling her closer.
She whimpered her pleasure into his mouth, the soft press of her curves against his hard muscles driving him crazy. His erection throbbed against her belly as he deepened their kiss, no longer able to be gentle, to worry about boundaries.
And then, suddenly, everything turned and she was the one kissing him.
Devouring him.
Her arms moved around his torso, her hands and fingertips all but scratching at him. Her tongue battled with his, her lips sucking at him, her teeth nipping and feasting on his mouth.
His kitten had turned into a lioness.
The club, the music, the overpowering scents of booze and sweat and perfume, all fell away as they made out in the middle of it all. She was heat and curves and pure sex in his arms and he knew if they'd been alone he'd be a heartbeat away from sinking into her, from taking everything she offered and giving her everything she demanded.
Something flashed in the back of his head, something he was supposed to remember, something he was supposed to do, but he couldn't follow it, not when he was utterly, hopelessly lost in Anna.
Sweet Anna.
Finally, she pulled away from him, gasping, her tongue coming out to lick at her swollen lips as if she were still trying to taste him.
"I've never done anything this crazy."
Her words trembled with confusion--and so much desire--that his mouth found hers again a moment later and she was so sweet he knew it would kill him when he finally had to stop tasting.
Instinctively, Cole knew it wasn't the champagne that made her taste like sugar. The sweetness was all her.
Grandma would love her.
The thought came at him blindside. He'd almost forgotten why he was here in the first place, why he'd picked her out of the crowd.
He didn't know anything about Anna other than how good her body felt against his, how right her kisses were, how much he liked her scent, how hard she made him--and how perfectly she embodied the "nice girl" he was sure his grandmother wanted to see with him.
He hadn't thought beyond finding someone to play the role he needed her to play, but now that he had, he was surprised to find guilt dogging his heels. He didn't know Anna well enough to not want to hurt her.
And yet...his gut twisted at the thought of what he needed to do.
And he did need to do it.
Because he owed his grandmother everything.
It was that vision--of his grandmother, pale and frail in her hospital bed--that had him leaning into Anna, brushing her earlobe with his lips.
"Let's do something really crazy, Anna."
She shivered as his lips made contact with her lobe. Even though he knew he needed to be holding focus, that his goal was the most important thing here, not how much he wanted pretty Anna, he had to pull her earlobe between his teeth and nip at it.
So perfectly, incredibly responsive to his every touch, Anna arched into him, her full, hard-tipped br**sts practically searing him through her dress and his shirt, another whimper of need, of desire sounding from her lips.
"So sweet," Cole murmured against her soft skin as he ran his mouth down her neck, his tongue dipping into the hollow of her shoulder bone. Her br**sts, full with arousal, pressed up and out toward his mouth from the neckline of her pink dress. He was half a breath away from unzipping her dress right then and there so that he could swirl her ni**les against his tongue, when the crash of a glass at the bar pulled him back into the here and now.
Her eyes were cloudy with desire, only partially focusing as she said, "What could be crazier than this?"
Jesus, he'd completely forgotten about his question, about where he was going with it.
Again.
How was one tiny woman--a woman who wasn't even his type, for f**k's sake--turning his brain, and body, completely inside out?
Needing space, needing air to get his brain to function again, he made himself move back an inch from her curves, from her warmth. But all that did was make it easier for him to look at her. She was so pretty--and so damn pure despite the way she'd been kissing him like a wildcat in heat--that his stomach twisted even as he said, "What's the craziest thing you can think of doing with me tonight?"