Eternally Yours - Brenda Jackson [52]
Clayton didn’t think she was quite ready to hear how much he loved her. So instead he answered, “I’m getting older, wiser and more cautious. There’s no longer such things as ‘safety in numbers’ and ‘no risk, no pleasure.’ Now the present climate is more like ‘unsafety in numbers,’ and ‘no risk, live longer.’ And although I’m a careful man, I don’t like the chances I take sleeping around. It’s time for me to make some lifestyle changes. Therefore, you and I getting together is the perfect solution. Like I said, we’re perfectly suited for each other. Besides, you’re all the woman I need.”
He lowered his head and touched his lips to hers. He deepened the kiss when he felt her immediate response. He heard himself release a groan of pleasure when her mouth began opening beneath his.
Syneda’s hands slowly slid up his chest, wrapping themselves around his neck. He reveled in her fire, her heat, her scent and her trembling warmth in his arms.
Clayton slowly broke off the kiss and looked deeply into her eyes. The passion he saw glittering in them was a mirror of his own. He then rested his forehead against hers, his breathing unsteady.
“You don’t have to give me your answer tonight, or even this weekend if you need time to think about it,” he said huskily, stroking her shoulder. He lifted his head to again look in her eyes. “I don’t want to rush you into anything. Just promise me that you’ll at least consider the idea.”
Syneda nodded, unable to say anything. It wasn’t too often she was at a loss for words. If anything, she usually had too many of them. But as usual, Clayton’s kiss had zapped her of all logical thought.
Clayton heaved a deep sigh as he stood. “I think I’ll go out for a while.”
“Go out? Where?”
“No place in particular. I’ll just take a walk.”
“Take a walk? In New York? This late?”
Clayton grinned. “Yeah, I’ll be all right. I might stop by that video store and pick up a movie or something.” He reached up a hand and rubbed the back of his neck. “I just need to get out of here or I won’t be responsible for my actions. I told you I would visit as a friend this weekend, and until you say otherwise that’s all I’ll be.”
Syneda drew in a shuddering breath. He had left the decision in her hands. What did or did not happen between them this weekend and any weekend that followed would be her choice.
“I’ll be back later.”
She watched as he turned and walked out the door.
Alone, Syneda walked across the room, her arms cradling her middle. It was an instinctive protective action, and she needed all the protection she could get from Clayton Jerome Madaris.
How dare he suggest they become lovers! She didn’t want to be that involved with any man. Men had a tendency to get too possessive, too domineering, too crazy. Her life was just fine without a man in it. She liked being in control of her life and not having to answer to anyone. And most of all she hated feeling vulnerable.
And with Clayton she felt vulnerable.
Even with the confrontational tension that usually surrounded them, lately there had been an increase in physical tension between them.
Syneda sighed, acknowledging the effect Clayton had on her. She was intelligent enough to know it wasn’t based on love but on something for which she really didn’t have a clue. Neither Thomas, Marcus, nor any of the other men she’d dated had made her feel the way Clayton did. None of them had even come close.
Her palms felt strangely damp. The neat, tidy case Clayton had presented to her was in no way a weak one. Like the brilliant attorney that he was, he had presented all the advantages of their becoming lovers. He had stated them so eloquently that there was no way she could even poke holes in his opening argument.
A cross-examination of the facts he’d presented would have been useless. He had, beyond a reasonable doubt, cited all the reasons she had avoided an intimate involvement. He had then used those very reasons not in favor of the defense, but to further