I Spy a Wicked Sin by Jo Davis Read Free Book Online Page A

have looked like a jerk, huh?”
    “Nah, you’re cute when you’re in a snit,” she said.
    “Good God, I haven’t been called cute since I was ten.”
    “Really? Because you’re pretty good at acting ten.”
    “Lily dear, the only thing about me that comes close to ten is in inches.”
    She choked on something, recovering quickly. “You wish !”
    “Dirty-minded woman, I was talking about my bicep.”
    “Uh-huh.”
    They ate in comfortable silence for a few minutes, until Jude realized something. “How did you do that?”
    “What?”
    “Manage to put me at ease, make me forget about how much I’d been dreading sharing a meal with someone other than Liam?”
    “No trick. There’s really only two ways to distract a man that a girl needs to know—tick him off or make him horny.”
    “Or feed him. That’s three.”
    “True. But under the circumstances, that one didn’t count.” Laughing softly, he resumed his meal. “Tell me about yourself,” he said between bites. “Are you close to your family?”
    “I have none,” she said shortly. And didn’t volunteer more.
    If anyone could understand the reticence to discuss the folks, he could. Since he’d opened the subject, he offered a bit of himself. “Me, either. At least none who care to claim me. I’m the son of a whore and her john, and the red-light district was my playground. The one bright spot was my pop, Mother’s dad. He lived with us because he had nowhere else to go and wouldn’t have left me anyway, and I was glad. As I grew older and Pop died, my mother’s hovel—no, the entire city—became a prison I couldn’t wait to escape.”
    Gentle fingers stroked his arm. “And you succeeded.”
    “One would think so.” A sudden surge of emotion almost blocked his windpipe. “But you know what I’ve learned? All prisons look the same in the dark.”
    “Jude,” she whispered. “I’m so sorry.”
    God, what had made him admit the one depressing truth he hadn’t even been able to share with Liam in his blackest moments?
    Her hand traveled down his arm to his denim- clad thigh and rested there. Her sweet scent, her nearness, drove the wayward spurt of self-pity back into its lonely corner. Her palm burned him right through his jeans as she slid it to the inside of his thigh, very near the telling bulge.
    Was she being bold? Or coy? Secretly smirking at his predicament? Lily was a blank page, and his hands itched to find out.
    “May I look at you?” Putting his fork aside, he skimmed the back of her hand resting on his leg, up her arm, gratified to feel her tremble slightly at his touch.
    “Yes, by all means.”
    Encouraged, he moved his chair to face her direction. Reaching for her legs, he was surprised to encounter dainty bare knees. “Spread your legs and scoot closer.” As she complied, the insides of her thighs resting on the outsides of his, he was tantalized with the unmistakable musk of her arousal. It chipped at his control as he began his exploration.
    He ran his palms up her thighs slowly, pleased by the feel of toned skin over solid muscle. This woman, however petite, was no weakling. She pushed her body and he found that sort of discipline damned attractive.
    Above midthigh, his fingers reached the edge of a skirt and he was tempted to stray underneath. But not yet. He continued his journey to her middle instead, finding a lightweight blouse untucked and riding high, and he couldn’t resist spanning her tiny waist with his hands. Moving upward to her ribs.
    “Your skin,” he prompted softly, so as not to dispel the sensuality developing between them. “Are you pale, or tan?”
    “A healthy golden tone. I tan easily, though I prefer not to. When I lay out, I wear sunscreen.”
    “I’m glad. You will be as well, years from now.”
    Her breathing quickened as he brushed his thumbs just underneath the curve of her breasts. He longed to touch them, but held back again. He wanted her straining for his hands, her body