Authors: Mary Hughes
With a moan, Straw Piggy curled over and slid to the floor.
“What the fuck?” Chicken Little got in my face, his spaghetti claw of bangs shuddering with emotion. “What did you do to him?”
“Nothing.” I clutched my gift and purse and, heart hammering, edged toward the still-closed doors.
C’mon open, open
. “He grabbed me and I reacted, that’s all. It’s fine. He’ll be fine.”
Chicken Little stalked me nose to nose. “He is
not
fine.”
My vision zoomed. My internal doctor kicked in.
Bad breath. Small, purplish acne. Thinning hair under the hair gel but a whole swarm of chest hair escaping the neck of his shirt
. “You should stop those steroids, Mr. Little. They don’t make you look any healthier and they can lead to high blood pressure and testicular atrophy—”
“You witch,” he snarled. “Don’t try to weasel out of this. Haywood‘s hurt and it’s
your
fault.”
My warning congealed into a lump in my throat.
“Why are you really here, Sin-no-vah?” He poked a threatening finger in my face. “Who invited you to Ric Holiday’s
private party
?”
I leaped back to escape the finger, expecting door but hitting air. My heart skydived into my stomach. I stumbled, sunk my spiked heel into the gap—my cousin was so getting a “Kick Me” slapped on her back when I saw her next—but I managed, barely, to turn it into a floundering spin.
I blundered into a plush lobby of red textured walls and well-oiled lustrous wood. A single alcove, lit by mellow lamps, housed the only door.
The penthouse. My salvation. I sprinted for it.
“Oh no, you don’t.” Chicken Little seized my arm.
I executed a simple twist, popped loose and skied on the balls of my feet across the thick red carpet. I didn’t stop so much as splat palm-first against the door. Panting, I cranked the knob.
The door was locked.
My heart kicked into race. A thrown glance showed Chicken Little rolling toward me, arms waving like a Dalek, expression set to exterminate.
I hammered the door with the heel of my hand, getting in a couple good
bams
before he grabbed my arm and yanked me away.
“Holiday Buzz is most definitely my business.” His eyes cracked with bloody lightning strokes.
“Oh, crap. Are you Ric Holiday?” Sick dread thickened my throat. Had I offended the guy I’d come to impress? One of the Piggies called him Little but it might be a nickname. My cousin said Holiday was good-looking in a blond business-y way, attractive enough to be a playboy, but it wasn’t clear if the attraction was looks or money. She hadn’t acted particularly impressed, but she liked her men a little darker and a lot more dangerously dominant.
Dammit, if Chicken Little was Ric Holiday, I’d royally fucked up.
Snatching both my wrists, he cinched me in until his sour breath cascaded over my face. “Would you like that? Would meeting a filthy rich ad man make you so hot you’d melt into a puddle of come?”
Eew. I gave up trying to be subtle and punched both hands down. He resisted, yanking up. I reversed with him, adding my own velocity, and swept my arms up and out. My wrists tore from his grip with such force that he stumbled back. For good measure, I gave him a chest pop, smacking his pec with the heel of my hand, putting my shoulder behind it. With an
oof
he hit the Piggies behind him. I noted with relief that Straw Piggy was standing again. Mostly.
I glared at Chicken Little. “Hands off.”
“Bitch.” He pushed away from the Piggies and came at me like Frankenstein, slow-slow-slow. I pivoted away, too scornful to block.
Mistake. He grabbed for me and managed to get his fingers hooked on the edge of my cousin’s low cut blouse.
I went one way. The blouse, in Chicken Little’s fingers, went the other. It tore, revealing Twyla’s red lace push-up bra underneath. I stared down in shock.
Click
. Pine-scented air flowed over me. My eyes lifted. The penthouse door had opened.
A man filled the doorway.
Everything—the scuffling, arguing,
time itself
—stopped. Even seeing extreme trauma during my ER rotation didn’t freeze me like that. At first I only saw a broad chest in a tailored navy suit and snowy white shirt, a blue-black tie lining the valley between mountainous pecs. Eventually I’d have to get around to looking at his face. Eventually I’d have to start breathing again too.
“What’s going on here?” The male voice was soft but the anger in it carried.
The Piggies shuffled their feet and stuttered.
“We were kidding around.” Chicken Little’s tone was pleading, almost whiny. “Just playing, honest. Roughhousing.”
“Your roughhousing went too far, Charles.” The chest peeled out of the suit coat, spinning it off with ethereal grace, revealing shoulders wide as a four-lane highway and a body exuding enough power to run the CTA train system.
I fell back a step. My gaze landed on his face and I finally sucked in that breath. Strangely, all the oxygen had been siphoned out of the air.
Razor-straight nose. Sensual mouth, now the slash of an uncompromising line. Carved jaw, cheeks like knife blades. Spiky, tousled blond hair. He was good-looking like an F-22 Raptor. That face made my eyes hurt.
My lovely cousin, who’d done the research and so must have known what he looked like, had sucker-punched me, a ha-ha-gotcha-back ten years after that high school incident with the cat and the water balloons in the principal’s office that wasn’t my fault exactly.
Naturally that’s when I caught sight of his eyes. My lungs imploded.
Ever been in a dark movie theater contentedly munching popcorn, and suddenly there’s a close-up of an actor’s eyes so blue they spike you straight in the brain?
Ric Holiday’s eyes were blue like that. Azure, spelled s-a-b-e-r. He was glaring at Chicken Little—or actually Holiday Buzz VP Charles Little if I’d heard the name right—or I’d have had a complete meltdown. Once he’d drilled through Little’s skull he bored into Piggy brains. “You three. I don’t tolerate drunken rowdies. Didn’t I make myself clear when I tossed you out?”
Trotters shuffled. Little said, “But Ric, they’re my posse…er, my friends.”
“I’m not impressed with your choice of friends. My word is final. They’re not welcome until they sober up. Why do you think the door is locked?”
Then those azure eyes switched to me.
My breath stopped again. My hand landed on my throat. Beneath my fingertips my pulse was drumming
Stars and Stripes
, thundering away at 120 beats per minute or more. I scrabbled for something, anything, to say to those
eyes
. “Did you know the average resting heart rate is between sixty and one hundred and blood pressure is normally 120/80 although mine has skyrocketed to maybe 170/110…um, yeah.”
Who needed the brain surgery now?
Focus
.
The glare warmed to an amused, appreciative gleam. I braced myself for a snide comment or a drop of drool on hastily and inadequately covered DDs.
But to my surprise, he draped his suit coat over me. For as big as it was, it was feather light, falling around my shoulders like a gentle hug. The fine fabric of the lining slid along my skin like butterfly wings.
“You must be Synnove.” He pronounced my name with a Scandinavian lilt, S’
noehh
-veh. “I know what you’re here for, and while I’m sorry I can’t help you, that’s no reason you can’t enjoy the party—after we find you something to wear. Come in.”
I opened my mouth to ask how he knew who I was. He waved me inside with the effortless grace of one strong hand. The force of his personality was such that I stepped inside at the gesture, the question dropping from my head. Chicken Little, minus his sidekick bacon, slunk through behind me.
A spacious living room pulsed with colored lights, music and glittering people. Holiday, head and shoulders above the crowd, glided through with the same effortless grace. The man was even sexier walking away.
Arousal is marked by increased heart rate and genital swelling as blood rushes to erectile tissue
… I groaned and ground to a halt, pinching his coat closed at my neck.
Blood-rushing idiot
. I was here to negotiate, which meant getting him to take me seriously. Lust would only get in the way.
Holiday half turned, cocked a smile at me and gestured that I should come along. Again the force of his personality towed me along.
I tripped after him like a happy puppy.
What was going on? I was never instantly attracted to a man’s mere looks. Substance drove me, not image. Although in my defense, I’d never met anyone whose image made as much of an impact as Holiday’s.
As I followed him I stirred air filled with exotic perfumes, intensified by the heat of packed bodies. Tangy notes underlay the perfume, strawberry and chocolate and shrimp sauce. Long buffet tables were visible to my right through gaps in the glittering men and women enjoying champagne in crystal flutes and nibbling exotic canapés from molecule-thin gold-rimmed china in every shape but round. The central buffet table was lit by a bubbling fountain sparkling with both seasonal lights and cheer, and the tables were draped with expensive, brightly colored cloth.
Even the tables were wearing silk. And here I’d thought my cousin had overdressed me.
Only one woman wore anything like my simple skirt and top, a round-faced twenty-something in an unsophisticated A-line, her hair a sleek auburn bob.
But for the rest? Talk about conspicuous consumption. Holiday must have one heck of a credit card bill. I’m not unused to money—I had some very rich classmates. I just didn’t grow up rich nor did I expect to get that way, because a medical degree without three years of residency and a license was only a title.
Holiday led me to the head of a hallway, where he stopped and turned. Beyond him was a knot of people whose smiles and nods for Holiday cooled into stares for me. I pulled his coat tighter.
As if he could see my thoughts, my trepidation, he smiled reassuringly. Those azure eyes said that, despite the stares, I was safe here. “My study is down that hall, first door to the right. Why don’t you wait there while I find you something to wear?”
“Take this first?” I offered him the wrapped present, awkwardly clutching his coat to keep it from slipping off my shoulders.
“Ah, yes. Thank you for the shelter gift. I’ll send someone along with a fresh blouse.” He considered me, his gaze filled with warm appreciation touched with a hint of concern. “And perhaps a glass of champagne. Relax in my study. Then—shall we take a few moments to chat, you and I?” His smile heated.
Chapter Two
A shiver hit me at that hot, promising smile.
Testosterone plays a starring role in sexual arousal in males, but in women its purpose is less clear…
Argh
. What was wrong with me? No lusting, especially after the opposition. My cousin had charged me with a job, and while I wasn’t against sex overlapping with work per se, I’d seen it cause aggravated stupidity too often. Extended bathroom breaks and three-hour lunches, sneaking around like nobody knows when in fact
everybody
does and resents the extra work.
Holiday’s smile sharpened, a wicked glint of teeth edging it like a knife. Pure lust shimmered through me.
Oh yeah.
Lubrication is followed by vasocongestion of the vaginal walls
…fuck.
I had to escape that promising smile, stat.
But the path to the study was clogged with people. I was screwed, and not in the good way.
Then Ric “Moses” Holiday extended one elegant hand toward his study. The sea of black, gold and silver miraculously parted. “Off you go now.”
All that, with just the force of his personality.
Ooh
.
Before I got too girly over it, I paused to wonder if he had any real character to back it up. I heard sizzle. Didn’t mean he had the steak.
His smile broadened. His eyes twinkled with an
I have all the steak you need
.
I gasped and escaped into Holiday’s study.
It was an upscale man cave—walnut wainscoting, leather couches and recliners, a leather-and-oak wet bar, and a seventy-inch smart TV, the ultimate in flickering fires. Its impressiveness was kicked stratospheric by the 7.1 surround sound, eight speakers’ worth of movie-quality goodness.
But an upscale man cave is still a man cave, and I’m not much into sitting on skinned cow. I crossed the room to a set of French doors cracked open to an evening breeze.
My breasts tightened. Not arousal but simple chill; I’d let go of the suit coat. I pulled it closed. Maybe Holiday made a habit of loaning articles of clothing to women. None of my business, but strangely, the thought bothered me. As if, for some reason, I wanted to be special to him. Had to be hormones making my brain mushier than normal. Stupid norepinephrine. I shook it off.
Nudging the French doors wider, I inhaled. The air, lightly scented with petunias, reminded me of home, back before my mother and father sold the house to travel the world, currently in Turkey or Abu Dhabi or something. Under the floral odor was a darker scent, mellow wood smoke with the tang of something spicy, elusive but mouthwatering. Unconsciously I turned my head to take the scent deeper—and buried my nose in the shoulder of Holiday’s suit jacket.