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  He glanced back over to Natalie just as her two other friends were leaving the table. It appeared they were saying their good-byes, and while Heather and Chloe made their way to the entrance, Natalie remained behind, texting with someone on her cell phone. The perfect opportunity to approach Natalie presented itself while she was alone, maybe even a little more accessible, and there wasn’t an audience around to witness their conversation. Which meant no gossip between the three girls when he walked away from the table if he said or did something stupid. Which was always a possibility.

  “I’ll be right back,” Wes said to Max, and after his friend lifted his beer in a silent toast of encouragement, Wes headed over to Natalie’s table. Just as he came up behind her, her phone rang and she picked it up with a cheerful, “Hi, Richard.”

  Shit. Wes came to an abrupt stop and thought about quickly pivoting around before Natalie saw him so he didn’t interrupt her conversation, but she turned her head at that same moment and their gazes met, her bright blue eyes widening in surprise when she saw it was him.

  “Sorry.” He mouthed the words to her, suddenly feeling awkward when moments ago he’d been so confident. “I’ll come back when you’re off the phone.”

  She shook her head as she listened to whoever Richard was—a boyfriend?—talking on the other end of the line, then she pointed at the seat opposite her. “Sit down. I’ll just be a sec,” she whispered to Wes.

  Not wanting to be rude—he was trying to be a nice guy, remember?—Wes slid onto the barstool across from her. As he waited for Natalie to finish her call, he couldn’t help but notice how animated she was with this Richard person, how excited her voice was as she spoke to him.

  “I know, right?” she exclaimed enthusiastically, and followed that up with a softer, more modest, “Thank you,” which turned into a “Yes, we’ll definitely have to celebrate,” and “That sounds amazing . . . ”

  After a minute or so, all Wes heard was blah, blah, blah as his gaze focused in on her lush mouth and the way her tongue occasionally slipped out to touch her full bottom lip—pink and soft and generous enough to cushion a man’s cock as she sucked him off. His groin tightened at the provocative image flitting through his mind, with sweet Natalie Prescott in the starring role of the gorgeous brunette on her knees in front of him, giving Wes the best fucking head he’d ever had.

  In reality, she could have been a complete failure at blow jobs—then again, was there really such a thing as a bad blow job?—but in his fantasies, she was a porn star pro who swallowed every inch of his cock and moaned for more.

  She laughed at something Richard said, and Wes issued the other guy a silent thank you, since that burst of amusement made Wes the lucky guy who got to watch the slight bounce of her full, perfect tits. She was wearing a white silk blouse, so business-like and demure, but the pearl buttons were unfastened just low enough to give him an occasional glimpse of virginal lace and a small, pretty pink bow pinned to the front of her bra where it dipped into her cleavage. That enticing peek of smooth, creamy breast was like a tease, and it took supreme effort for him to lift his gaze back up to her face.

  Her eyes were cast downward as she listened to the guy on the phone, a smile on her lips, and he was grateful that she hadn’t caught him blatantly staring at her chest. He didn’t need it getting back to Connor that he’d become a pervert where his sister was concerned.

  “Richard, I have a colleague waiting to talk to me,” Natalie said, clearly cutting the other man short. “How about I call you when I get home in a little while?”

  Richard must have agreed, because they said their good-byes and Natalie disconnected the call. She set her phone on the table and sent a brilliant smile Wes’s way. The flush of success suffused her cheeks in a warm, pink glow, and she looked as though she was riding a natural high of victory—which Wes fully recognized since it was usually him riding that adrenaline rush after a multimillion-dollar sale.

  “Hey, Mr. Big Shot,” she said, her light, feminine voice threaded with cheerful vindication. The kind that was self-satisfied without being overtly smug, but the intent was definitely there.

  Oh, yeah, she was reveling in today’s good fortune.

  “Hey, Brat-Gnat,” he replied, purposefully putting a little emphasis on the g part of the shortened name, which he’d given her years ago when they were kids and he’d wanted to swat her away like the annoying insect he’d nicknamed her after.

  “Pesky as a gnat, huh?” She grinned, clearly catching the context of the word he’d used, and wasn’t offended in the least. “It’s been a while since you’ve called me that.”

  “Yeah, well, you’ve been especially . . . bothersome lately.” More like a pain in his ass, but he was trying to be cordial.

  “Bothersome?” She arched a perfectly shaped brow, which highlighted the amusing gleam in her eyes. “Is that what you call someone who’s beating you at your own game?”

  “Bothersome, inconvenient, same thing,” he said with a casual shrug, not surprised that verbally sparring with Natalie, mixed in with that sexual awareness neither one of them ever spoke of, made his dick perk up. “Everyone gets a lucky break now and then.”

  “A lucky break?” she repeated incredulously.

  His backhanded praise sparked a flash of irritation in her bright blue eyes, but before she could dole out the comeback he saw forming on her lips, he oh-so-graciously issued the congratulations he’d come over to her table to deliver. “By the way, good job on the Davenport listing today.”

  “Thank you,” she said, more modestly than he’d anticipated. Then she tipped her head to the side, regarding him with concern. “Did that hurt?”

  Confused by her question—because to his knowledge he hadn’t suffered any kind of injury recently—he frowned. “Did what hurt?”

  She fluttered her lashes at him coquettishly. “You having to admit defeat to little Natalie Prescott.”

  The little minx. He swallowed the taste of crow rising in his throat and dazzled her with a charming smile instead. “Not at all,” he lied, and signaled for the nearby cocktail waitress. “In fact, I’d like to buy you a celebratory drink. What’ll you have?”

  Surprise lit her pretty blue eyes, and realizing he was being sincere—at least he looked the part—she ordered the house specialty, the Popped Cherry, with an extra cherry. He went with the house beer on tap. When their drinks were delivered, he lifted his toward her.

  “Congrats on today’s sale,” he said amicably, and waited until she tapped the rim of her glass to his before adding, “And here’s to the last sale that I’m going to let you steal from me.”

  Before she had the chance to take a sip of her cocktail, she burst out laughing. “Let me steal from you?” she asked with amused disbelief. “Are you serious right now, Sinclair?”

  He grinned. “Absolutely.” Okay, he knew it was impossible to make that kind of guarantee, that she’d never again outbid him on a listing, but it was worth seeing her get all riled up, which also helped to keep their attraction in perspective. “Like I said, everyone gets a lucky break now and then.”

  She didn’t respond immediately and instead took a drink of her creamy, chocolaty concoction, then slowly licked her bottom lip—distracting the hell out of him with that soft, wet tongue. And when he met her gaze and saw the bewitching heat glinting back at him, he realized that had been the minx’s intent.

  “Maybe you’re just getting a little too lax and careless and arrogant, which is fine with me since I’m the one benefitting,” she said with a casual shrug of a shoulder.

  That quickly, that easily, she’d turned the tables on him. She was provoking him while also making it clear that he’d made a big mistake by not allowing her to work for Premier Realty. He wanted to be irritated with her for calling him lax and careless—he’d cop to being labeled as arrogant because, well, he was cocky at times—when he was a businessman who gave every one of his listings one hundred and ten percent of his effort. But that f
licker of annoyance that should have burned bright and been aimed straight at Natalie was instead wrapped up in a fog of lust for a woman he couldn’t have.

  She took another drink of her cocktail, then pulled one of the cherries out of her glass and set it on her tongue. He watched as her lips closed around the fruit, and she plucked it off the stem and chewed as she pushed her glass toward him.

  “Would you like my cherry?” she asked, her tone oh-so-innocent while the seductive curve to her lips was anything but angelic. “It’s very sweet and juicy.”

  Somewhere along the way, they’d gone from talking about work to alluding to sex and her goddamn juicy cherry, and now he couldn’t get that dirty image out of his brain, or the thought of what said cherry would taste like on his tongue.

  It wasn’t the first time Natalie had playfully enticed him. Despite the current frenemy relationship they had going on, she’d flirted with him in varying degrees since she was fifteen. He’d been eighteen that first time, but knowing her since she was five years old, he’d watched her grow from a skinny, awkward tomboy to a beautiful, curvy girl who had starred in his teenage fantasies and was responsible for more than few of his wet dreams. At fifteen, she’d been cute and had worn her infatuation for him on her sleeve. But now, at age twenty-six, she seemed to take great pleasure in toying with him, as if she enjoyed tying him up in fucking knots. As if she was curious to see just how far she could push him before he’d break.

  There were times when he’d been so damn close to giving in, but thoughts of his friendship with her brother, and their business partnership, were always like a douse of cold water to bring him back to his senses. It didn’t matter that his pulsing dick was begging to taste her cherry, Wes wouldn’t touch her with a ten-foot pole, because he was pretty damn sure Connor would use that same pole to shove it up his ass for defiling his sister when Wes was a guy who had a little black book of fuck buddies, and a woman like Natalie did not fall into that category.

  Not now. Not ever.

  But it didn’t stop him from flirting back, because that, at least, was fairly harmless. “I’m sure your cherry is delicious, but I’m going to have to pass.” Unfortunately.

  “Your loss.” A smile kicked up the edges of her mouth as she went ahead and ate the second cherry herself, then chased it down with a sip of her cocktail. “You know, you’re making it way too easy to steal those sales from you. It’s like taking candy from a baby.”

  He nearly choked on a drink of his beer. “I’m making it easy?” Was she fucking serious?

  She rested her chin in her hand, the impish sparkle in her eyes taunting him. “You know, it’s like you’ve lost your Midas touch. Or maybe you just don’t want to admit that I’ve got more finesse in brokering a deal than you do. I know that’s got to hurt,” she said in a soothing tone that was totally fake.

  A muscle in his jaw twitched with the effort it took to hold back his own grin. “I’ll never admit it, because there’s no way you have more expertise in this luxury real estate market than I do,” he countered easily. “This has been my playground for over six years, whereas you’re just getting your feet wet. Today’s sale was nothing more than you having the right client at the right time with the right property. Pure and simple luck.”

  She gave her head a small shake. “Don’t be such a poor loser, Sinclair.” She reached across the table and patted the back of his hand in a placating manner. “Maybe next time you’ll manage to come through for your client . . . if I don’t sell the listing first.”

  Next time, there was no fucking way he was going to lose, and he was suddenly willing to gamble his reputation on it just to prove his point. She started to pull her hand back, but he grabbed her delicate wrist to stop her retreat, which caused her lips to part on a startled gasp and her widened gaze to shoot straight up to his. Ahhh, that definitely caught her attention, as well as threw her off guard. And finally gave him the upper hand. Perfect.

  “You willing to bet on that, Minx?” he asked, trading in her old nickname for a newer, more appropriate one, considering just how impudent she’d become. He skimmed his thumb across the pulse point on the inside of her wrist and could have sworn he saw her shiver at his sensual touch.

  He let go of her hand, and she quickly pulled it back to her side of the table. He saw a glimpse of that heated awareness that always seemed to simmer between them—hotter and brighter now that he’d stoked the fires a bit—but in the next moment, she tossed her hair back and was all sass again.

  “So, you want to bet that you’ll sell a listing before I do?” she asked, her voice surprisingly steady.

  “Yep,” he confirmed as he sat back in his chair and rubbed his fingers along the condensation on his bottle of beer. “Unless, of course, you think these recent sales were all just a fluke and you don’t want to take that risk.”

  “You’re kidding me, right? The month isn’t even over, and I’ve managed to ‘steal’ not one, not two, but three listings right out from under you,” she pointed out, sounding too gleeful with her success. “The way I see things, the odds are quickly stacking in my favor, not yours.”

  Jesus, she was so fucking hot when she was all fired up. And that made him think of all that blazing energy erupting between them in the bedroom. He was certain the push-pull friction they’d been engaging in for years now would coalesce into the wildest, steamiest, tear-each-other’s-clothes-off frenemy sex in the history of fucking. Or at least in his history of fucking.

  Too bad it would be nothing more than a fantasy for his spank bank.

  He leaned forward, folded his hands on the table, and did his best to ignore his unruly dick. “Since you’re so confident, how about a friendly wager?”

  “Friendly?” she reiterated, a doubtful note to her voice.

  He nodded. “I’m willing to put aside the fact that we’ve become adversaries for the sake of the bet, and to prove who deserves to be on top.” He let a slow, teasing smile ease up the corners of his mouth. “Which, I have to admit, is my favorite position.”

  She laughed at his double entendre, but he didn’t miss the slight flush rising on her cheeks. “Of course it is, and I’ll accept your friendly wager. What are we betting?”

  “Anything you want. Nothing is off-limits.” He was that confident he was going to win, so it didn’t matter to him what was at stake.

  She finished the very last of her drink as she considered her options, then pushed her empty glass aside, lifted her chin determinedly, and met his gaze. “If I win, I want to work at Premier Realty, and not as a menial agent but a broker just like you and Max.”

  Wes was impressed, and not at all surprised by her request. She was going for the brass ring, the one thing she’d been denied, and topping that off with an even bigger requirement that she be hired on at the same level as himself and Max. Clearly, she was testing him, and expected him to backpedal, but he wasn’t at all nervous. In fact, her demand gave him even more of an impetus to win.

  “Okay,” he agreed, and bit back a laugh at the noticeable shock that chased across her beautiful features.

  “You’re that sure of yourself, huh?”

  He nodded. “I’m one hundred percent sure that I’m going to win, so it doesn’t matter what you’re wagering.”

  She rolled her eyes at him. “Yeah, you keep telling yourself that. What do you want if you win? And you and I both know that’s a big if.”

  He steepled his hands in front of him as he thought about his request. There wasn’t really anything he wanted, at least not in the ambitious sense of what Natalie had just wagered. So, instead, he conjured up something that would be fun for him but not so much for her. Something that would put her at the mercy of his demands—not sexually, of course—but in a way that would humble her a bit, antagonize her a whole lot, and remind her who was in charge.

  After a few silent moments, she narrowed her gaze at him. “What’s with that devious look in your eyes, Wes?” she asked suspiciously. “It reminds
me of when we were kids and you were planning some kind of let’s-torture-Natalie scheme, which never turned out well for me.”

  He chuckled. “Because that’s exactly what I have in mind. When I win, I want you at my beck and call for two weeks. Whatever I want or need, no matter when I ask, you’ll do it without complaint.”

  Chapter Three

  Natalie sat back in her chair, unable to believe the words that had just come out of Wes’s mouth. Somehow, she managed to keep her face carefully composed, but her chest rose and fell a little faster as she tried to process what he’d just anted up for their bet.

  Whatever I want or need, no matter when I ask, you’ll do it without complaint.

  Wow. Her mind conjured up some pretty steamy scenarios, which wasn’t difficult to do considering she’d spent most of her youth, and even a few years into her twenties, imagining what it would be like to have all that sexual energy and confidence turned her way. Oh, who was she kidding? She still fantasized about how it would feel to have his hands sliding across her breasts and between her thighs, followed by his full, sensual lips traveling that same path. She’d dreamed about his soft tongue pleasuring her until she moaned and writhed in pleasure, and envisioned him pinning her to the bed while filling her full in one deliciously hard thrust.

  Jesus. Now was not the time or place to conjure up those arousing thoughts. Heat suffused her entire body, and she shifted in her chair, hoping that Wes mistook her squirming for unease because of his wager.

  Then again, it wasn’t as if he’d ever touch her the way she’d imagined too many times to count. For as much as they’d flirted and teased over the years—except for that year and a half she’d wasted on her ex, Mitch—Wes had long ago drawn an invisible line that he’d never crossed, then had gone on to build an impenetrable stone wall between them that fateful day when she’d stopped by the Premier Realty office to talk to her brother, and instead she’d overheard Wes’s unmistakable voice saying to Connor, Hell, no. We’re not hiring your Goddamn sister.