“Look at me.” I huffed in frustration. “I was there, Logan. I saw all the women who came and went from your flat. They were my opposite in every way.”

He shot to his feet, and I stumbled back at the sudden movement. “Aye, do you know why? I didn’t want serious, Grace, so I slept with women I knew I couldn’t see myself getting serious with. I didn’t want the complication.” He took a step toward me, and I forced myself to remain still. “You want the truth? There have been a few women over the last eighteen months who I sparked with… that spark of potential. I walked away. I didn’t take their number and I certainly didn’t sleep with them. Because I didn’t want serious. I didn’t want reality. I just wanted oblivion.”

Seeing the pain in his eyes made me move toward him. “Logan…”

“But you” – he shook his head – “I can’t walk away from you even if I wanted to. And I don’t want to. You are reality and sweet oblivion wrapped up in one annoyingly argumentative, always-bloody-right, classy, gorgeous-as-fuck package.”

I held my breath at his beautiful words.

“Does that answer your question, your doubts?”

I nodded slowly.

“So are we doing this?” He started to prowl toward me.

I panicked a little and backed up. “I’m going to try, but we’re taking it slow and we need to – ahh!” I cried out as I suddenly found myself hefted up over Logan’s shoulder. “What are you doing?” I yelled at his back as my hair swung against his delicious bottom.

“That was reality. It’s time for oblivion, babe.”

“No sex! We have to talk!”

He stroked his hand over my bottom. “I want inside you.”

Suddenly I found myself falling through air. I landed with a soft thump on Logan’s mattress and stared up at him in a panting, disheveled, and very aroused state.

“And you want me inside you.” He unbuckled his belt slowly, the blaze in his eyes turning me into a hot, flustered puddle on his bed.

“You are so very cocky,” I whispered.

“Take your top off,” he demanded, cockily.

I crossed my arms over my chest and glared up at him. “No.”

He grinned. “Take your top off, babe.”

“I don’t take orders.”

“In bed you will.”

My eyes widened, my heart thumping hard in my chest. “Are you into that kind of thing? Whips and dominance kind of thing?”

“Whips? No. Tying you to a bed and knowing you trust me enough to be tied up while I do whatever I want to your body? Yes. Canes? No. Spanking you? Yes. St. Andrew’s crosses? No, a little too dramatic for my taste. Playing out sexual fantasies? Yes. Fucking you in every sexual position known to man, yes, yes, and yes.”

I gaped up at him. “You may want to ease me into this very sexual frankness you have going on. I’m not used to it.”

“You like it, or you would have walked out of my flat ages ago.” He unbuttoned his shirt and threw it aside, revealing his sculpted chest and strong arms. “Now take off your top before I rip it off.”

I didn’t even dare to question that his threat was real. Logan MacLeod was Mr. Alpha in the bedroom, apparently. Although I’d enjoyed a good alpha in the fantasy of romantic books, I’d always thought I’d hate it in real life. But I was finding there was a balance. Logan wasn’t nearly so alpha outside his bedroom, but inside… Turned out that an alpha in the bedroom wasn’t nearly so scary as I’d thought. In fact, I found it really rather hot.

I grabbed the hem of my sweater and pulled it up over my head, throwing it behind me as I lay back down on the bed. In answer, Logan put his knees on the bed at either side of my hips, straddling me so he could skim his hands up my waist to cup my breasts over my bra.

I arched my back, pushing them into his hands. Logan kissed me, deep and hard, as he deftly unclipped my bra at the back. My hands traced every inch of his chest while we kissed, reluctantly letting go when he gently pushed me back on the bed and slipped my bra straps down my arms. His gaze drifted from my face to my naked breasts and the heat in them made my breasts swell, my nipples tightening. I wasn’t big chested like the women who had come before me, but under his heated gaze I no longer felt insecure about it.

I could see it written all over his face: Logan liked me just the way I was.

I felt that flutter in my lower belly and knew that if he slipped his hand between my legs he’d find me wet and ready for him.

He touched me, cupping my breasts again, squeezing them gently, thumbs rubbing over my nipples as he deliberately stirred my arousal instead of shaking it. He was intent on teasing me and I was intent on letting him. His breathing grew heavier and I could feel the hard press of him through his jeans. Amusement sparkled within me as I realized he might break before me.

Logan saw the look and his gaze darkened with tenderness and determination. I sighed at the gentle brush of his lips against first my right breast and then my left. He tormented me with whispered touches, trying to force me to beg, but despite my nails digging harder into the muscle in his shoulders, I held strong until my whimpers of need broke his will. He finally closed his mouth around my nipple, flicking his tongue over it, before sucking hard.

A larger ripple moved through my belly, and I cried out softly, throwing my head back against the bed.

Logan lavished attention on both nipples until they were swollen, until I was desperate for him. I cried out now, begging him, and he pulled back, easing off the bed to stand over me like some pagan sex god. The dark hunger in his eyes was my undoing.