Malcolm instantly caresses that spot, his hand spreading all over my bare back. “I’m going to tan with your big hand on me!” I laugh.

He chuckles and moves it to curl around my neck, then up to my scalp. His phone rings again, and he stands and paces while he talks. I watch a smile flash across his face.

He runs his fingers through the sexy disorder of his hair. “Yeah? Good.”

I grin like a dope, addicted to watching him work, wondering what he’s doing. When I’m with this man, I can never think of anything but all that makes him who he is.

He glances at me with his cell phone to his ear, crooking a finger to call me over. God, he’s so bossy. I frown, but I sit up and try to tie my bikini top, curious as to what’s going on.

I pad over and he hangs up. He whispers, “Got to show you something. Come here.” He hooks a finger into the side string of my bikini bottom and uses it to have me follow. We go to the sitting area on deck where suntan lotion and fruit are set out, along with his laptop and tech gadgets. He pulls open his laptop and types in some passwords.

I sit on his thigh sideways to allow him to type. He logs on to some administrative page, then clicks a button and a window pops open with an image of a street.

“What is that?” I frown and stare closer at the screen.

“Something,” he says in his low voice, “I believe the lady will like. Look at the screen.”

The screen displays several images—a grocery store entrance, a street corner. “End the Violence has been pushing for citizen surveillance,” he explains.

Shock flits through me.

“I know.”

“I funded their movement. The government’s got several satellites up already, with a few more to follow.”

I’m so stunned, one of my hands is covering my open mouth, my obvious disbelief making Malcolm’s eyes fill with amusement.

“Nothing to say?” he prods.

Forcing my mouth shut, I stare at him wide-eyed: him, an ever-changing mystery. Always surprising me. Teasing me. Annoying me. Seducing me. Enchanting me.

“This just brings me one step closer to that coveted moon you say I want,” he teases me softly when I can’t speak, when I’m still blown away.

He’s peering at me, a smile twisting his lips as he runs his knuckles down my jawline. “You bring out a side in me I thought I didn’t have.” His voice is low and reverent somehow, as are his eyes, knowing and grateful. “I’ve been told that I’m reckless, that I could not be relied upon, that I couldn’t make a difference for others—just for myself. My father looked at me as if I was to blame for everything, and Mother as if I would get myself killed. People look at me like I can get them the moon, but you look at me like I already did. Like all I need to do is exist, and you would be happy,” he murmurs, tracing his thumb down my earlobe as he smiles at me, his eyes happily twinkling. “I like it, Rachel.”

“I’m so alive with you,” I whisper, without being able to even think of my words before I whisper them. “I’m so alive with you, you make everything pop for me, everything stand out.”

“Ahh.” He throws his head back and laughs deliciously then scrapes his hand over the stubble of his jaw, his smile both sexy and humorous. “See, that makes me feel good in a whole other way.”

“Because you’re arrogant and nothing’s enough for you, no amount of admiration or respect. I love . . . this. I love this so much, Malcolm.”

I duck my head, blushing because I thought the word you before the one I actually said, which was this. It popped into my head, so real and unfiltered, I’m blushing as I try to push it down. “I do love this,” I add, focusing on the screen again.

He turns my head around and looks at my lips, rubbing them a little. “Good. My girlfriend wants to change the world, and I want to own it.”

“Why do you insist on me being your girlfriend?” I complain, but when his eyes slide up from my mouth to lock on mine, that typical shyness he brings out in me comes out with a vengeance.

“Why do we want anything?” he asks me, one eyebrow up.

“Because it gives us pleasure, satisfaction, it makes us happy.”

“So when can I call you my girlfriend?” he insists.

He’s so stubborn! I giggle because his question is “when.”

In Saint’s mind, it’s not impossible. He knows it’s happening, he’s actively carving his way to making it happen, and he’s just curious to see how long he has to wait.

I feel a yearning to say, Now! But I can’t. “Let’s talk about it again later,” I propose instead.

He takes my face in one open hand. “Next week.”

Knots, knots, knots in my tummy, my chest, my throat.

“I might need more than a week to come out of the box,” I begin when the flexing in his jaw and the tumult in his eyes tug at my heartstrings. Coupled with my own aching heart, resisting him is killing me. “But . . . will you be waiting?”

“I’m waiting, Rachel,” he assures me, his tone steady, as if there’s no doubt that he will wait as long as he needs to. He leans forward and gives me the sweetest, hottest kiss on the corner of my mouth.

I sigh inwardly, a sigh he doesn’t hear, doesn’t even notice.

His attention goes back to the computer as he starts to check out the software, and he works the keyboard with those long, blunt fingers that type, I realize, as fast as mine do—and I type like the wind. I’m sitting in his arms, watching him show me, so safe right now. His scent steals into my nose and I drag it inside, getting wet between my legs, happy in my heart. “I want you again,” I whisper, in his ear.

He lifts a hand to cup my pussy and shift me, starting to caress me. “That was the aim of all this,” he whispers, nuzzling my ear.

I turn around and his nose presses to mine, my breath on his lips as I speak. “I’m really wet,” I admit. “Let me get pretty. I want to look so pretty I give ‘your type of girl’ a whole new meaning.”

When I stand, he tugs me back down as if I’m being silly, chuckling, “Come here.”

“No, seriously!” I laugh, then I say, “I’ll be right back,” and head quickly to the bathroom to get a little pretty. I see my phone messages.

Wynn: Hey we’re worried, call!

Gina: Rachel where are you? You ok? We’re worried

I answer them both.

I am physically okay but so absolutely in trouble