In Name Only. Kat Cantrell

keep my hands off you?”

      Actually, he needed to practice self-control, not the other way around. Restraint was the name of the game. Perfect. He could focus on that instead of the fact that the lingerie had been a gift, not a carefully crafted plan to drive him over the brink.

      It was a testament to how messed up he was that he couldn’t squelch his disappointment.

      She nodded. “My sister just got married not too long ago and she’s pretty open with me about how hot the sex is. I think she envisions all newlyweds being like that.”

      “That doesn’t mean she expects us to strip down in your parents’ foyer,” he countered a little too forcefully. Mostly because he was envisioning how hot this newlywed couple could be. They could give Grace and her husband a run for her money, all right.

      No. No, they could not.

      Viv was not wearing the yellow lacy gateway to heaven for him tonight or any night. She wasn’t challenging him to out-sex her sister’s marriage. There was no sex at all in their future because Viv had a career she cared about and really didn’t have time for a man’s inconvenient attraction. Even if the man was her husband. Especially if the man was her husband who had promised to keep things platonic.

      Of course he’d done that largely for himself. He’d never experienced such a strong physical pull before and he wasn’t giving in to it no matter how badly he wanted to. There was a slippery edge between keeping himself out of trouble so he could honor his promise to his late friend and maintaining his integrity with Viv and his family about the nature of his marriage.

      On that note, he needed to change the subject really fast. And get his rampant need under control before he lost everything.

      * * *

      Viv couldn’t quite catch her breath. Her lungs ached to expand but the towel was in a precarious spot. If she breathed any deeper, it would slip completely from her nerveless fingers.

      Though based on how long it was taking Jonas to clue in that this was a seduction scene, maybe throwing her boobs in his face would get the point across.

      God, she sucked at this. Obviously. The girls on TV made it look so simple. She’d bet a million dollars that if this scene had happened on Scandal, the seductress would already be in the middle of her third orgasm.

      Maybe she should have opened the wedding gift with Jonas instead of laying it out so he could find it. For some reason, she’d thought it would give him ideas. That he’d maybe take the lead and they could get something going while they had the perfect setup to indulge in the sparks that only burned hotter the longer they didn’t consummate their marriage.

      How was she supposed to prove she could be the opposite of clingy with a man she wanted more than oxygen if he wouldn’t take her up on the invitation she’d been dangling in his face?

      “Instead of practicing anything physical,” Jonas said, “we should get our stories straight. We’re not going to be hanging out with your family anytime soon but mine is just on the other side of the door. I don’t want any missteps like the one at dinner where we didn’t plan our responses ahead of time and somehow ended up promising to go to Korea.”

      “I don’t mind going to Korea, Jonas. I would love to see it.”

      He shook his head with bemusement. “It’s a sixteen-hour trip and that’s only if there’s a not a horribly long line in customs, which even a Kim cannot cut through. Trust me, I’m doing you a favor by not taking you.”

      How had they shifted from talking about hot sex to visiting his grandfather? That was not how this was supposed to go.

      “Well, we have plenty of time to talk about our stories, too,” she said brightly. “And the good news is that my hair is almost dry so the bathroom is yours. I like to read before going to sleep so I’ll just be here whenever you’re ready.”

      “Oh. Um...” Jonas glanced at the bed and back at her. “Okay. I was thinking about sleeping on the couch and setting an alarm—”

      “You can’t do that,” she cut him off in a rush. That would ruin everything. “What if someone gets up for a midnight snack? Also, the couch would be so uncomfortable. Sleep here. I insist.”

      She shooed him toward the bathroom and the moment he shut the door, she dragged air into her lungs in deep gulps as she dropped the towel and twisted her hair into a modified updo at her crown, spilling tendrils down her cheeks. Then she slithered into the shameless yellow teddy and panties set that she’d picked out with Grace yesterday. Strictly so she could rub it in that she had a hot husband to wear it for, of course. And then she’d had Grace gift wrap it. The sly wink had been all her sister’s idea, so she really hadn’t fibbed much when she’d related the story to Jonas.

      The lace chafed at her bare nipples, sending ripples of heat through her core. The panties rode high and tight, the strings threading between her cheeks. Not a place she was used to having pressure and friction, but it was oddly exciting.

      No wonder women wore this stuff. She felt sexy and more than a little turned on just by virtue of getting dressed. Who knew?

      The sound of running water drifted through the walls as Jonas went through his nightly routine. She dove into bed and pulled up the covers until they were tight around her shoulders. Wait. That wasn’t going to work. Experimentally, she draped the sheet across her chest like a toga, and threw her shoulders back. Huh. The one breast looked spectacular in the low-cut lace teddy, but the other one was covered up, which didn’t seem like the point. Inching the sheet down, she settled into place against the pillow until she was happy with how she looked.

      That was a lot of skin on display. Much more than she was used to. The lace left little to the imagination.

      Surely this would be enough to entice Jonas into making the most of this opportunity to share a bedroom.

      Light. She leaped up and slammed down the switch, leaving only the bedside lamp illuminated and leaped back under the covers. The doorknob to the bathroom rattled and she lost her nerve, yanking the sheet back up to cover the yellow lace until X-ray vision would be the only way Jonas could tell what she was wearing. He strode into the room.

      Oh, God. Was a more delicious man ever created in the history of time? He’d untucked his button-down and the tail hung casually below his waist. Plenty of access for a woman to slide her hands underneath. There was a gaping hole where his tie had been. A V framed a slice of his chest and he’d rolled his sleeves up to midforearm. It was the most undressed she’d ever seen him and her pulse quickened the closer he came.

      This gorgeous creature was about to strip all that off and get into bed. With her. This was such a bad idea. Alluring and aloof was not in her wheelhouse and at that moment, she wanted Jonas with a full body ache that felt completely foreign and completely right at the same time.

      “I thought you were going to be reading,” he said, and stopped in the middle of the room as if he’d hit an invisible wall.

      So close. And yet so far.

      She shook her head, scrambling for a plausible excuse when she’d just said that was what she planned to do. Couldn’t hold an e-reader and pretend you weren’t wearing sexy lingerie that screamed put your hands on me at the same time.

      In retrospect, that might have been a nice scene. She could have been reading with the tablet propped up on her stomach, which would have left her torso completely bare without making it look like she’d set up the scene that way. Dang it. Too late now.

      “I couldn’t find anything that held my attention.”

      “Oh. Okay.”

      And then the entire world fell away along with most of her senses as Jonas started unbuttoning his shirt. It was a slow, torturous event as he slipped the buttons free and each one revealed more of his beautiful body.

      Thank God she hadn’t stuck a book in front of her face. Otherwise she’d have missed the Jonas Striptease.