WHEN SHE DELIVERED the final words of her presentation and the audience politely applauded, Gemma exhaled with relief. A few months ago, she’d been asked by the conference organizers to prepare a workshop to discuss the new distilling processes she’d developed. She didn’t like public speaking, and she wasn’t sure what she would do to entertain her audience for forty-five minutes. But that she’d gotten through most of it without fumbling her words or boring anyone to sleep was a bit of a miracle.
For three months, she’d worked on the presentation day and night, memorizing it, but when the door opened and a latecomer had entered into the room, she completely lost her train of thought and almost swallowed her tongue when she saw it was Tom. Panic had set in and she froze up for about ten seconds before she realized that she hadn’t needed to memorize anything. Of course, she could spend forty-five minutes talking about rum. Rum was her life, and she’d managed to revolutionize the distilling process. The impostor syndrome had drifted away, and every time she’d looked in Tom’s direction, she could see his eyes were locked on her. But she’d been pleasantly surprised when her allotted time had flown by like it was only a few minutes.
As she closed her laptop, fellow distillers and others involved in the production of rum all came up to congratulate her and discuss the finer points of the presentation. But the one person who didn’t come to her was the one she wanted to the most. Her attention was captivated by Tom hanging out in the back of the room, leaning against the wall with his hands in his pockets. He was so effortlessly sexy.
The crowd cleared after several minutes, and she was happy to see that that Tom had stuck around. She put her laptop in her shoulder bag and walked toward him.
“Great job,” he told her. “Your presentation was very informative.”
“Did you like it?”
“I did. You managed to present just enough information but not give away any of your secrets. Much to the chagrin of the people who came here to learn what you do.”
Gemma laughed. “Like you? Is that why you came to my presentation? To figure out how I did it?” She began walking and they left the room, heading for the lobby bar, where conference goers mingled between events.
“I was curious. I’m still kind of amazed you were able to pull it off.”
She stopped walking. “That was a crappy thing to say.”
“I didn’t mean it like that. What I meant is that for so long distilleries have been trying to find a way to quick-distill, and make it taste aged and hand-crafted. But you did it, and you did it well. If anyone could do it—and no one else could—it would be you. My guys wouldn’t have figured it out.”
“That’s because they’re talentless hacks who only know how to push a button. They don’t live and breathe rum the way I do,” she pointed out. “And that’s too bad for you. You aren’t getting anywhere near my secrets ever again.”
“I’ve gotten close to at least one of them,” he said, reminding her of what they’d done in the supply closet the night before. “How much would it take for you to come work for me?”
Gemma was stunned silent. Was that what he wanted? For her to work for Cain Rum? It was never going to happen. “It would take a lot more than whatever you’re willing to pay me.”
“Come on. You haven’t even heard my offer,” he teased.
She stopped walking again. This time she faced him. “Fine. Humor me.” There was nothing that would make her leave her brothers and their family distillery, but she looked him up and down. She might play along that she could be convinced. Maybe he’d throw a little something extra into the deal. Maybe if he’d pay her with orgasms, she reasoned, it might be worth it. Her eyes roamed over his body, and she wondered what he looked like underneath the suit.
“My eyes are up here, Rexford,” he said, drawing her attention to his face and into his deep, cool blue eyes. “Why don’t you let me buy you a drink? We’ll talk terms.”
“We don’t have anything to talk about,” she said. “I’m not going to work for you.”
“Gemma, you know we have lots to talk about.”
He was right, but at the moment, she wasn’t interested in talking. “I know.”
“Uh-oh, it looks like we’ve been spotted.”
Gemma looked over her shoulder and saw Reid and Quin at the other end of the hallway, watching her, both of them wearing matching frowns as they spied her with the enemy. She rolled her eyes and turned back to Tom. “I could really use that drink,” she told him. “Let’s go.”
In the hotel lobby bar, Tom handed Gemma the glass of rosé she’d ordered. “I’m surprised by this, I would have figured you to be strictly a rum drinker.”
She shrugged. “You how it is. I spend my whole day around rum. When I go home, I smell like rum. I’m sure it’s coming out of my pores. I like the stuff, and I appreciate it. But it’s not the thing I want to drink all the time. Some nights, after spending the entire day in the distillery, the last thing I want to do is sit down with a glass of rum when I get home.”
“I get that,” he told her. “When I spend all of my time freaking out over rum at the office, it’s not always the most relaxing way to unwind, now is it?” He was already finding things they had in common. “So, what sorts of things do you like to do when you aren’t making award-winning rum or revolutionizing the industry?”
“Why? Are you trying to get to know me or something?”
“I thought I might.”
“Why?”
He shrugged, but the intimate way he looked at her was anything but casual. “I already know what you look like when you come. I might as well find out your favorite movie.”
Gemma snorted over her glass. “You’re such a jerk.”
He laughed but then sobered. “For real, though, you really are impressive,” he told her. “I’m intrigued by you. I like you.”
“Do you really?”
“Yeah. You’re smart, talented, beautiful.”
“I’m also a Rexford.”
“You are. And I’m a Cain. I feel like you’ll make me regret ever talking to you in the first place.”
Her laugh was sultry, and the sound went right to his dick. “You might be right about that one.”
“I mean, if your brothers don’t make me regret it first.”
“Why are you so worried about my brothers?”
“Because they hate me, and I saw the way they stared daggers at me just for talking to you.”
She casually waved off his concern. “I’m not worried about them. I don’t really care what they think about who I talk to or what I do.”
“What is it that you want to do with me?” he asked, enjoying how easy she was to talk to.
“I don’t know yet. Maybe we’ll see where the day takes us.”
“What if the day took us up to my room?” he asked. “We can finish what we started last night in that storage closet.”
She sipped her drink but didn’t respond. He knew how to read women, and he knew from the way Gemma faced him openly, her eyelashes batting at him from over the rim of her glass, that she wanted him, too.
“You know, I was kind of disappointed that you didn’t come find me last night.”
She put down her glass and leaned an arm on the bar. “I considered it,” she told him. “Briefly.”
“So, why didn’t you?” He trailed one finger slowly down her bare arm. His touch raised small bumps on her smooth skin.
She shivered. “I realized what a terrible idea it would have been.”
“Why terrible? I know it would have been a great night, and so do you.” If touching her in a storage room had been any indication, getting her in bed would blow his mind.
“You don’t have to convince me,” she said. “It would have been amazing. I didn’t because I know how complicated it would have been. You’re one of our biggest rivals. And you know as well as I do that there’s some seriously bad blood between our families.”
He knew that would be her answer. And he couldn’t blame her. His father and Carolina had done some major unforgivable damage to the Rexfords, and he should consider himself lucky that she was even talking to him now. “Is that all you’re worried about? Carolina and my father?”
“Isn’t that enough?”
“What happened there was terrible, not to mention embarrassing.” He’d worked hard to keep the drama to a minimum, keep the rumors out of the rum community. “But I’m not my family. No more than you are yours.”
Gemma watched him for a bit. Her eyes were sharp, and he could tell she was trying to work something out in her head. “It can’t be that simple. We can’t just get a room and forget everything that happened, can we?”
“Why not? I want you.” He dropped his hand to her thigh and walked his fingers up slowly. “And you want me too, don’t you?”
She was quiet for a moment, as she watched his fingers. “Yes,” she said quietly. “I do.”
Gemma pushed up from the table and took a few steps away. She looked at Tom over her shoulder. He was still sitting, a curious, surprised look on his face. “Are you coming or not? Or were you just bluffing?”
In an instant, he stood. She noticed the way he covertly pulled the front of his sport coat over his groin, and she kept walking, preceding him to the elevator, knowing he wasn’t far behind.
She looked straight ahead, pushing the up button as he came to stand next to her. Conscious of anyone who might have seen them leave together, they both stared straight ahead, neither acknowledging the other’s presence. The doors parted, and they both quickly walked inside. He pushed the button for the fourteenth floor—the same one that her room was located on. When the doors closed, she was surprised that he didn’t make his move. They stood half a foot apart, and if he didn’t touch her soon, she might explode in a ball of need. The elevator stopped on the next floor, and people entered to fill the car, forcing Gemma and Tom to the back, pushing them together.
At the back of the full elevator car, Tom placed his hand very low on her back. But it didn’t stay there long. Her breath caught when his hand smoothed down over the curve of her ass. She stepped closer, and he gripped her, his fingers digging into her flesh, as the rest of the people in the elevator remained oblivious. It made her breath stop in her chest. She didn’t dare move, afraid that if she did, he might pull away.
The elevator stopped again, and everyone else disembarked. Thankfully Gemma and Tom were left alone again. His hand went lower, feeling her through the thin, flowy skirt of her dress. Through the material of her dress, he slid his finger along the crack of her ass and touched her pussy from behind. She gasped, the light, but potent, touch sending a shock wave through her body.
Finally, they came to their floor, and the doors opened in front of them. Tom removed his hand from her and stepped out of the elevator. But Gemma hesitated. What was she doing? This was Tom Cain—her rival. The Cains had almost ruined her family, and even though she was attracted to him and wanted nothing more than to go to his hotel room and do all sorts of terrible things with him, this all felt like a betrayal to her brothers.
He must have noticed that she wasn’t following, and he stopped, turned his head and cocked an eyebrow. “You coming or not?” He repeated her words from moments before in the bar, challenging her.
Gemma completely forgot her trepidation, and the betrayal, and followed him into the hallway. “Where’s your room?”
“Just down here,” he told her, taking her hand. They walked past the door of her own room, and that of her brothers’, and she knew that if either Reid or Quin opened their doors as they were walking past—hand in hand—there would be hell to pay. But the same thought that terrified her also emboldened her. It made what was about to happen sexier, more illicit, and she smiled to herself, looking at Reid’s closed door, daring him to come out at that moment.
Instead of walking further down the hallway, however, they stopped outside the room next to the one Reid and Lila were sharing, Tom’s room. Well, this is interesting. Tom unlocked the door and pulled her inside. When the door was shut, he pushed her against it. He took her hands in his and raised them above her head. She thought he might kiss her, but instead he just looked down at her while inhaling heavily through flared nostrils.
“You know, this is something I’ve been thinking about for a while.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, this has been a long time coming for me. Seeing you at other conferences, at industry events, was always a highlight. I’ve always wanted you.”
“Me too,” she revealed. He’d always been strictly off-limits. But those boundaries didn’t exist at the moment.
Especially when his mouth crashed down on hers. There was nothing preliminary or tentative about the touch of his lips. Their tongues stroked together, wrapping around one another, battering each other, plundering. The kiss was almost combative. Just like their relationship.
He still held her hands over her head, and she wanted them free, to feel him all over. But he held her in place. When he pulled away suddenly, she gulped for breath. “Worth the wait?” she asked.
“Definitely.” He released her hands and smoothed his own down her body. She tried not to giggle as his touch tickled her ribs, before he gripped her hips roughly with his large fingers. He pulled her closer against him, and she moaned when she felt the rigid, hard length of his cock through his pants.
Tom lifted her easily and walked them to the bed. He stood her at the foot and kissed her again. His hands went to her back, and he lowered the zipper of her dress. Gemma quickly shucked the material and let it fall to the floor in a pool around her feet. She stepped out of it, kicking off her shoes, and she crawled onto the bed and leaned against the plush pillows at the headboard. She was still in her bra and panties, and with her knees bent and parted slightly, she watched him as he unbuttoned his shirt.
This was it; she was about to actually see him naked. The night before, she’d felt all of the lean muscles underneath his clothing, but that wasn’t enough. She bit her lip, unable to take her eyes from him as he revealed his broad chest—well-formed muscles and neat, short hair that covered his chest and spread down his abdominal muscles and disappeared beneath the waistband of his pants. She moaned in satisfaction, and he paused unbuckling his belt.
“Like what you see?” he teased.
“I do. But there will be time to admire you later. Just hurry up and get over here.”
He snapped his belt from the loops on his pants and tossed it to the side, and he pushed down his pants and boxer briefs at the same time. He stood before her naked, and she was stunned into silence. He was all lean muscle and tanned skin. He strode purposefully to the head of the bed, but instead of joining her on the mattress, he grasped her thighs and pulled her to meet him.
He lifted her ankles and held them to his shoulders. His hungry gaze roamed over her body, and he made her feel more desired than she’d ever felt. He reached down and pulled her panties from her body and threw them over his shoulder. “Lose the bra,” he rumbled, dropping to his knees.
He spread her legs and leaned into the crevice formed by her spread legs. She pushed herself so that she was sitting. She removed her bra, just as he’d told her to do, and she watched as he extended his tongue and drew it up her seam. She gasped sharply at the contact and he looked up at her. He pulled her hips, and she fell back to the mattress as he tasted her again. His tongue teased her clit, drawing circles around the small bud, but then he used his fingers, dipping in and out of her. Gemma arched her back and pushed herself against him. His mouth was incredible, but she wanted more.
She grasped his hair in her fingers and pulled. “Ow,” he protested. “That hurt.”
“Well, get up here,” she told him. “I need you.”
“Glad to oblige,” he whispered. He left her only long enough to reach for his pants and pull out a condom from one of the pockets.
“Prepared.”
“I knew I’d have you today. I wanted to be ready in case you pulled me into another closet.”
“Thank god for that.”
She watched as he knelt over her and ripped open the packet and rolled the latex over himself. Using his forearms, Tom lifted her thighs, raising her hips to him, lining her up, and he slid easily into her.
Their combined moans filled the air. Using controlled movement, he pulled back and then pushed into her again. He did it again and again, each long, slow thrust filling her, scorching each of her nerve endings. He began to lose control, and his thrusts became more frantic as she started to feel the burgeoning orgasm low in her core. She cried out his name, and he responded by pressing his body down against hers, still holding her thighs, and spreading her legs at an angle she hadn’t known was possible. Her hips stung with the pressure, but with the change in angle, his cock hit her in a new, different place. It was enough to make her break apart and explode into a million different fragments. She cried out as she rode out the wave, feeling every last drop of the pleasure before he stiffened, gave a guttural sound and collapsed on top of her, releasing her thighs and supporting his weight on his arms.
With the exception of their heavy breaths, the room was now silent. She smoothed her hands up and down his back and heard conversation coming from the neighboring room—Reid’s room. Then she heard Reid laughing through the wall. Her brothers were both in the next room together, and gone was the daring feeling she’d had when she’d entered Tom’s room. It was replaced with the reminder that she was with Tom Cain, and what they’d just done—while incredible—was a complete betrayal of her brothers.
Gemma shifted underneath Tom. She didn’t want him to move—she could have stayed there all day. But she remembered that it was still the middle of the busy day she’d scheduled. Tom stood and tossed the condom in the trash can, while Gemma stood. Naked, and without his warmth, the room was cool, and she shivered.
As she slid back into her dress, Gemma watched Tom, who had his back to her, as he reached for his shirt. The way the muscles in his broad back flexed and rippled pleased her, and she smiled, savoring the ache in her thigh muscles that she’d strained with him.
He pulled the shirt over his shoulders and turned to face her as he buttoned it up. He looked up at her and shot a devilish grin. “That was fun.”
Understatement. Gemma laughed, forcing herself to look away from him, because she was afraid of the things that little smile would make her do. She turned to the mirror and tousled her hair to restore order to the thick tresses. When she caught her reflection in the mirror, however, she knew that there wasn’t much she could do about her appearance—no amount of finger-combing would make her look any less thoroughly sexed, nor would concealer hide her flush. “It was a lot of fun.” Her cell phone rang somewhere in the room, and she looked around trying to locate her purse.
“Over here,” he told her, reaching down to pick it up from the floor. When he handed it over, their fingers touched before he pulled his hand back, sliding his fingers against hers—rekindling the spark between them.
Gemma snapped her eyes to his. “Thanks,” she said as her phone continued to ring. But she could barely hear it.
“You going to answer that?” he asked, amusement in his voice.
“I guess so.” She took out her phone and saw her brother’s number on the caller ID. She sighed. “Do I have to?”
“Let me guess—your brother?”
She nodded. “Yeah, it’s Reid. Obviously. If I answer this, can I trust you not to make any noise that he’ll hear on his end?”
“Are you so embarrassed that you’re with me?”
She didn’t answer Tom and instead accepted the call. “Hey, Reid.”
“Gemma, where are you? We have an interview with Spirits Monthly in twenty minutes.”
Right. “I haven’t forgotten, Reid. I’ll be there,” she lied. The truth was, Gemma had totally forgotten about the interview, but no way was she telling her brother that.
“The last I saw, you were ducking out of the lobby with Tom Cain.”
She knew it had been a risk, going off with Tom when her brothers could have seen her. She’d been busted. “Nah, you must have confused me with someone else.”
Reid was silent for a moment, telling her that he wasn’t buying it. “Twenty minutes, okay, Gem? Don’t be late.”
“You got it.” She disconnected the call and put the phone back in her purse. She heard Reid cough in the next room. Her eyes widened. Would she be able to get out of Tom’s room and into Reid’s without being noticed? Her eyes slid to the rumpled sheets on the king-size bed.
“Are you wondering how loud we were?” Tom asked, wearing that same grin on his lips.
“No, I know we were pretty loud, and I know that the walls are plenty thin.” She blew out a breath. “I’ve got to get out of here.”
Tom moved in front of her and led her to the door. He opened it and ducked his head out, looking up and down the hallway. “All clear,” he told her.
“Thanks.” She brushed past him, trying to ignore the way her knees buckled at the scent of his cologne.
“Gemma, wait,” he said, stopping her in her tracks.
“Yeah?”
“I want to see you again.”
“I—”
“You’re not sure?”
She shook her head. “I’m not,” she whispered.
“Why don’t you let me change your mind?” he asked, grasping her by the waist and pulling her to him. His mouth crashed onto hers. All it took was one taste of Tom’s lips for her to melt against him. She snaked her arms around his neck and considered pushing him back into his room and shutting the door for another round.
“Have a good interview, guys.” Reid’s door opened, and before Gemma could dive back into Tom’s room, Lila stepped into the hallway. Gemma stepped back from Tom and looked at her brother’s girlfriend.
Lila pulled the door to her own room closed, thankfully barring Reid from seeing what had been unfolding in the hallway. “Hi,” she whispered. “You’re here for that interview already? The guys are both in there.”
“I, um—”
Lila looked from Gemma to Tom and back to Gemma. “Or you’re sneaking out of this guy’s room and heading back to your own to freshen up before you face your brothers?”
“Uh—”
She smiled conspiratorially. “Well, either way, I’m sure it’s none of my business. I’m going to get out of here. I’m meeting Celia at the spa for a massage,” she explained. Gemma still couldn’t find any words to respond. Lila leaned in and lowered her voice. “Let’s talk later, okay?”
Gemma watched Lila walk down the hall, and when she disappeared around the corner, they were left alone again. Gemma turned back to Tom. “I’ve got to go. I have to get back to my room and get ready for the interview.”
“You didn’t answer my question.”
“What question?”
“Can I see you again?”
“I don’t know.”
Tom’s smile was crooked and boyish. “That wasn’t a no.”
Gemma shook her head. She knew in her heart that she wasn’t done with Tom Cain. “No. It wasn’t.”
He leaned in for a kiss. “I’ll be seeing you, Rexford.”