Downtown Devil: Book 2 in series (Sins in the City) (3 page)

That was good, as she’d not exactly dressed for a sophisticated soirée—denim skirt and a sleeveless patterned tee. “I didn’t bring anything,” she said as she realized it.

“That’s fine—drinks are on them, and I’ve got a load of snacks and stuff in the car. We won’t be empty-handed. I’m driving, by the way.”

“He’s not much of a drinker,” Mica added.

“Not when I’ve got work in the morning. I’m ready when you guys are.”

“Lemme grab my shit,” Mica said, and disappeared down the hall.

After an empty pause, Clare asked Vaughn, “And what are you getting up for tomorrow? What do you do?”

“I drive an ambulance. I’m an EMT.”

“Oh yeah. That
would
require a clear head.” And it explained the capable build and the whole cool-and-calm vibe.

He nodded. “I don’t know how I did it when I was younger—work through a hangover.”

“No kidding. I feel like I hit twenty-eight and suddenly my bedtime went from two a.m. to ten thirty.”

“Exactly.”

Mica reappeared, slipping a wallet in his back pocket and threading his arms into the sleeves of a green hoodie. “Ready.”

Vaughn switched off the TV and lights and led them all down to the street, where his car was parked—a modest black sedan, maybe five years old, with a few minor dings. Mica offered Clare the front seat, but she declined.

“The back’s better. Room for all my crap.” She slipped her bulky camera bag and her tote from her shoulder.

“So,” Vaughn said as he pulled away from the curb, “Mica told me you’re doing a photography show. Something about ethnicity?”

“Yeah. I’m trying to find subjects to shoot who’re like me—mixed. I’ve spent a lot of my life getting asked, ‘So, what are you, exactly?’ And that’s the theme of the show.”

“Is that annoying? People always wanting to know?”

“It used to get to me when I was younger, but now I trust that most people are just curious. Tactless but curious.”

“It’s not the most polite way to word it, huh?”

She laughed. “No, not really.”

“You get that much?” Vaughn asked, turning to Mica.

“Back home? Constantly.”

“It bother you?”

“Fuck yeah, it bothered me. I grew up in gang territory. Standing out doesn’t do you any favors.”

“What’d people think you were?”

“Fucking everything. Native American, Korean, Brazilian. They had no clue. Then you say
half-Malaysian
, and it doesn’t mean anything to them anyway.”

A pause from Vaughn. “I ever ask you that?”

“Probably.” He shrugged. “But we were teenagers.”

As they made their way down the quiet residential streets, Vaughn passed a three-decker house where a man was sitting on the ground-floor porch, reading a newspaper by the light coming through a front window. Vaughn gave the horn a quick beep and raised his hand. The man did the same.

“That’s my dad,” he told Clare, and turned a corner.

“Oh, cool. Did you grow up there?”

“I did. And I see him a lot. Sunday dinners, and usually lunch on whatever weekday I’m not working.”

“You must be close.”

“Yeah. Very.”

“He’s a good dude,” Mica tossed in. “I just met him over the weekend. Explains how you ended up such a pillar of the community.”

Vaughn made a skeptical noise, but Clare was willing to bet his friend had him pegged about right. You could sense steadiness and reliability on a person the same way you could sense sheistiness. Vaughn was also infinitely easier to talk to than Mica . . . though much of that was surely down to the fact that making eye contact with Mica took her breath clean away.

“Are you from around here?” Vaughn asked Clare.

“Yeah. Arlington.”

“Your parents still down there?”

“My mom is. They split up when I was five. My dad moved to Steubenville for a job, then all the steelwork dried up. But he’s still there, managing a warehouse.”

“You see either of them much?”

“I see my mom most weeks, and my dad’ll drive in and meet us for dinner maybe once a month. He remarried about ten years ago and has three stepkids, so he’s busy, but I see him.”

“Nice that your folks still get along enough to hang out,” Vaughn said.

“They’ve always gotten along. I get this feeling like they can’t figure out why they ever thought getting married was a good idea, but they obviously
like
each other. They crack each other up. They just couldn’t handle living together.” Clare’s parents had taught her what friendship could look like between exes, but not modeled any kind of marriage she’d like to one day find herself in. They’d fought a lot when she was little and the noise and chaos of it had frightened her, so when she grew up and met a guy who was stoic and responsible, she’d tried like hell to be happy with him. Respect was important, and so was steadiness. Davis had offered those things in spades, and they’d never fought once.
But there were other things she’d needed that he just wasn’t giving, in the end. Spontaneity, for one. Excitement and desire—some heat in her lover’s gaze when he looked at her. To be treated like a lady, sure, but also like a piece of meat on occasion, as it turned out.

Clare was dying to toss the conversational ball to Mica, to find out what the deal was with his family, and why he’d referred to his parents in the past tense at the coffee shop. She’d just found the nerve when Vaughn eased the car to a stop on a crowded street before a long yellow-brick four-story. Clare swung her door out. Music and chatter spilled from the open windows of a third-floor unit on the end.

“Bet I can guess which apartment is your friends’,” she said to Vaughn, shouldering her totes and slamming the door.

He opened the trunk and pulled out a couple of shopping bags. One crinkled and one clinked, and he shut the hatch with his elbow.

“So whose party am I crashing, exactly?” she asked as they made their way up the stairs. It was a nice building: newly remodeled, the habitat of young professionals.

“My friend Linnea and her fiancé, James,” Vaughn said.

“Nice building.”

“No kidding, right? I’m starting to wonder if maybe I should have gotten myself a degree, after all.”

“Not necessarily,” she said. “Mine’s not exactly paying the bills.”

Vaughn knocked when they reached the unit, and a pretty, curvy woman opened the door and engulfed him in a hug. This was Linnea, Clare found out when introductions were tendered. She welcomed them all inside and told them to help themselves to anything they saw.

Funnily, Clare bumped into someone she knew barely ten feet from the door—an old college classmate. They chatted for twenty minutes, until the topic of how Clare had come to be here arose, and she realized she’d better find her subject. Who knew what sort of a
partygoer Mica was? She’d be smart to get some early shots, in case he was inclined to get wasted or disappear with a girl. The latter thought stung more than she wanted to admit.

She found Vaughn first, chatting with a small group in the living room. “Have you seen Mica?”

“Fire escape, I think. Through the kitchen.” He nodded the way. “I’ll come with you. I could use the air.”

Air quality wasn’t exactly on the menu—the fire escape was long and broad, accessed through a propped-open door past the fridge, and Clare could smell the smokers before she and Vaughn even stepped outside.

A half dozen guests were chatting and joking in the cool night air. Mica sat on the corner of the railing, talking with a slim white guy. Someone had draped strings of Christmas lights from the metal slats above, and their glow and the smoke lent the scene a curious ambience.

Clare would’ve about died of a heart attack if someone had told her to sit as Mica was, but he looked perfectly oblivious to the dangers of his perch. He spotted her and Vaughn and beckoned them over.

He smiled, holding her in thrall as his gaze dipped down her body and back up. He blew smoke over his shoulder, then said, “I wondered if maybe you’d found a better offer.”

“That guy in the kitchen? No, we just went to school together. Small world.” She glanced around them. “This light is actually pretty great. Would you mind if I took some shots out here?”

“Go crazy.”

As she got herself positioned, Clare imagined how nice the contrast would be—pitch-black background; soft, sexy light; points of white from the bulbs; the atmospheric veil of smoke. Both the yoga studio and kitchen shots she had were dominated by bright light, and these would break up all that white nicely.

Her shutter clicked and clicked as she captured him. His face and body were pulsing with energy, eyes always moving, hands restless, expression cycling from bemused to intrigued to what she could only describe as seductive. Even with her shooting rapid-fire, every single frame would be unique.

He was charismatic with his eyes averted and the cigarette at his lips. He was engaging when he turned at another partygoer’s comment, offering her his profile and a broad grin. But when those eyes met hers, boring into the lens, and the smoke painted his exhalation milky white . . . Christ, he was
sex
. Sex in a hoodie.

Through the viewfinder he asked, “Getting what you’re after?”

I’m not in a bed with you yet, so not entirely.

“I can’t say I know you,” Clare offered, adjusting the settings, clicking away, “but this all
looks
very you. Do you feel at home on fire escapes?”

He smiled, shrugged. “I like heights.”

“No lie.” This from Vaughn, loitering at Clare’s back.

She lowered the camera, thinking she’d captured more than enough photos out here. Many would be blurry from the low light, but there’d still be dozens of stunning ones to choose from. She half wished she could run home now and glue herself to her computer, curating.

Mica snuffed his cigarette on the railing, then flicked it to the alley below. “Think I’ll grab a drink.”

“Good idea,” Clare said.

A backward glance told her Vaughn had gotten drawn into another orbit. She tailed Mica into the bustling kitchen, where she poured herself a glass of red wine. Mica took the bottle when she’d finished, eyed its dwindling contents, then tipped it to his lips.

“Hang on,” she said, laughing, and set her glass aside to lift her camera. His eyes met hers through the lens and she snapped fresh shots of him, drinking from the bottle, rings glinting, throat working.

“Vice suits you,” she told him, then captured his resulting smile, her body flushing warm and curious. She lowered the camera when he did the same with the bottle.

“Get all the pictures you need?” he asked.

Clare nodded, though her stomach tightened at the words. Was he getting tired of her shooting him? Was she about to be dismissed?

Mica didn’t know it, but it was her thirtieth birthday, and she was spending it doing the thing she loved best, in the company of one of the most stunning men she’d ever seen. If he shut this night down now, she’d be lying if she said it wouldn’t sting.

“Do you want me to run the final shots by you, before I choose one to use in the show?” Normally she wouldn’t be so confident that she had a winner after just one session and only three hundred frames, but she knew she did. This time, the challenge would lie in narrowing down the choices and picking just one. The boy was a diamond—startling from every angle.

“It’s your show,” he said.

“Text me your e-mail all the same, and I’ll send you the finals.”

“Does this conclude our professional relationship, then?” Mica asked, his gaze hot and pointed.

She swallowed. “I suppose it does.”

His attention dropped to her waist, and slowly, he reached out one long, toned, tattooed arm and hooked two fingers into the belt loop at her hip. Her heart stopped.

“So now I can ask you something I’ve been wanting to all night,” he said, tugging playfully.

“I suppose you can.”

But he didn’t ask her a thing. He simply tightened his hold on her belt loop and said, “Come home with me.”

Her heart was pumping again in a blink, all that blood rushing, sending heat and heft and the hum of alcohol to her fingertips, her
cheeks, between her legs. Fuck, when was the last time a man had looked at her like that? She’d forgotten how good it felt, feeling somebody’s crosshairs on her.

It was a bold move, considering they’d not kissed—nor even really flirted, explicitly. But he had to sense that she wanted him. Even with the camera between them, he’d surely felt the heat of her stare on his face and body. And she knew her answer, after all. Thirtieth birthday presents like this one didn’t come along every day.

She nodded. “Okay.”

He smiled that devil’s smile, eyes crinkling, and set the wine bottle on the counter behind him.

Clare’s body was hot and buzzing, like she’d emptied that bottle herself. She’d never been propositioned by a guy so shamelessly before. Some unsolicited
DTF?
messages from a couple of half-assed attempts at online dating, sure, but nothing quite like this.

Coming from most any other man, she’d have been put off by such bluntness, but she’d been fantasizing about this chance from the minute she’d first laid eyes on Mica. This was a birthday wish granted, and she wasn’t about to waste it by playing coy. Now all she wondered was how quickly she could get herself alone with this man.

“I haven’t seen Vaughn,” she said, scanning the kitchen.

“We can walk. It’s not far.”

And, mentally blessing herself for having worn practical shoes, Clare agreed.

I
t was one of those nights that smelled of magic—unseasonably warm and with spring on the breeze, cherry blossoms and damp grass blending with the city’s harder smells. About a block into their journey, Mica took Clare’s hand without a word.

She’d been saying something—answering some question he’d had about the gallery or the show—but the second his fingers twined around hers, all coherent thought fled. Gone like a snatch of music from a passing car, gone like the bones in her legs, it felt.

His hand was as rough as she remembered—from the climbing, surely—and it felt just as she’d fantasized it might, holding hers this way. Dry and cool and strong. He’d made the move without even seeming to have glanced at her, yet another effortless gesture from this man who seemed so natural, so fluid in every way.

“So the end of August?” Mica prompted, catching her gaze. His eyes were black in the streetlight, the planes of his face sharp and thrilling.

“Yeah. If I get it—which I think I will—the opening is going to be the last weekend of the month, and it’ll be up until mid-September.
I forget the exact dates. I forgot what I was saying just now, actually,” she admitted, lifting their hands. “Got distracted.”

“I’ve been distracted all night, waiting to see if I’d get to take you home.”

Something inside her lit up at the possibility that he might feel even a fraction as eager for all of this as she did. It gave her a little edge, a little confidence, made her feel just a little mischievous. “Poor baby,” she teased.

His thumb stroked her palm, something needy or hungry in the contact. A tiny bit pushy, like he couldn’t wait for them to get where they were going. He was a forward guy, Clare was discovering, though she wouldn’t have expected it, considering she’d been the one to approach him. What would he be like in bed? she wondered. Pushy there as well? The thought gave her an unexpected thrill. Clare didn’t consider herself especially kinky, though she knew that strong, outspoken men excited her, and that something inside her was wired to respond to male confidence.

Then again, tonight was the ushering in of an era. She was turning the calendar page on a new decade; perhaps thirty would be the year she discovered she was freakier than she’d given herself credit for.

She asked Mica what the biggest differences were between LA and Pittsburgh, enjoying the sound of his voice as he told her about his old neighborhoods, enjoying the warmth of his hand, enjoying the promise of sex that had her body winding up tighter and tighter with each block they put behind them. Enjoying this anticipation and this daring version of herself, one she hadn’t indulged in far too long.

They reached Mica’s building and she missed his hand when it dropped hers. He let them in and led her back up to his apartment.

Though she’d stood in this kitchen only hours before, it felt
almost unrecognizable. She set her camera bag on the table, thinking how the last time she’d been in this room, she’d been nervous to simply see him again. Now she was a far different flavor of shy, a far richer, darker persuasion of uncertain.

“Drink?” he asked, unzipping his jacket.

“What have you got?”

Mica opened the fridge. “Beer . . .” He perused the freezer next. “Vodka.” He shut that and looked in the cabinets. “Cheap merlot.”

“Cheap merlot, please.”

He set two nice wineglasses on the counter and filled them generously. Though white was usually her scene, Clare liked a glass of red to set the mood, and the way it multiplied all that heat and buzz of a flirtation. She tapped her glass to Mica’s, then followed him into the den.

“Where’s the bathroom?” she asked.

“Down the hall, first door on the left.”

She set her wine on the coffee table. “Be right back.”

When she returned, Mica was crouched in front of the stereo, flipping through a nylon binder of CDs before sliding one out. It was some kind of jazzy, soulful R&B, an artist Clare hadn’t heard before. All she knew was that it was good make-out accompaniment, and she gave Mica a mental check mark in the Decent Taste in Music column.

They settled on the couch, close, sipping their wine and exchanging eye contact—bold on Mica’s part, a little less so on Clare’s.

“Get what you needed tonight?” he asked, and goddamn if his voice didn’t make that question sound
filthy.
It occurred to her, perhaps naively, that maybe he’d only agreed to let her shoot him with the hopes that he’d get in her pants.

Funny how that possibility didn’t offend her in the least.

She nodded, toeing off her shoes. “Yeah, I think I’ve got plenty to work with. And don’t let me leave without giving you your fifty bucks.”

He waved the notion aside. “I would’ve gone to that party anyhow. No hardship on my end.”

“Oh, well, if you’re sure.”

He smiled, reaching out to slip her glass from her fingers. He set both on the coffee table, then angled his legs, cupped her far elbow. Tingles chased up her arm from the touch, and then he was leaning close, his gaze on her mouth.

She welcomed him, no hesitation, and he was bold. His lips toyed and taunted only a moment before his tongue delved to stroke hers, slick and sensual. Her fingers found his hair, thumbs pressing into his cheeks as he took more. His kisses were a perfect mix of masterful and aggressive, riding that sharp edge between brazen and overwhelming but never crossing over.

Everything about this man was so nearly too much, yet it felt like she couldn’t possibly get enough.

She tasted wine in his kiss, the same vintage lingering on her own lips. She smelled his cigarettes as well, though it wasn’t a scent she minded. Tobacco smoke had always triggered nostalgia in her, and she knew there would be new memories attached to that fragrance after tonight.

Goddamn, he could kiss. He made Clare feel things she hadn’t in ages, and ruined a budding theory she’d been cultivating about younger men being nicer to look at than to actually fuck.

She matched what he gave, his energy generating the same inside her, the aggression humming in her belly feeding off his tense muscles, hungry mouth. She felt wild, overheated, crazy. Their breathing grew heavy and hot, two panting mouths turning ravenous.

Bossy hands palmed her waist, urging her to move, to get in his lap. She did as they asked, thrilling as her skirt rose to her hips and
she felt his jeans and belt against her naked inner thighs. The position broke their mouths apart, but any heat lost from the kissing Mica made up for with his voice, his words.

“I’ve been thinking about this all week,” he breathed, lips teasing her throat.

“So have I.” Since the moment she’d laid eyes on him.

“You’re so fucking sexy.”

You’re one to talk.
She slid her hand under his collar to feel his back muscles flexing. Everything about him was lighting her up. His smell, his voice, the power of his taut and trim body, the strength his hands promised in the way they held her jaw and waist.

Clare wasn’t a prude, but she’d only had a single one-night stand in her life and only once slept with a guy on the first date. Still, if ever she was going to go a little slack in the self-control department, this was the man to go there with, and this was the night.

Happy fucking birthday.

“Should we go to your room?” she whispered. She couldn’t say it any louder—it felt as though he’d stolen her breath.

“Soon.”

With his mouth on her skin as it was, she wasn’t going to argue. She memorized the faint, needy moans warming her neck, felt her palm growing damp against his skin, and imagined the both of them naked, grabbing, grasping, writhing. Imagined his weight on her and imagined sliding her palms all the way down his long back, over his hips and his ass. Imagined the view if she could peek between their two bodies, imagined what his cock might look like, and how he might take her. Quick, rough? Slow and explicit? Whatever the case, she had no doubt he’d fuck the same way he seemed to move through the world—with perfect, fluid instinct. No hesitation and no shame.

One of his hands slid south, palming her ass and urging her
closer. She was right up against him now, tight enough to feel his excitement. A silent gasp hitched her chest, a head rush chasing when his kisses dropped lower, warming her collarbone. She needed him. Deep inside, as soon as possible. Needed this excited, strong body against hers, needed the lights on so she could watch, needed the low humming in his throat to turn to grunts and groans in her ear. Hell, if not for the annoying formality of protection, she’d want his fly open and her panties ripped to shreds and his cock inside her right here, right now.

“Let’s go to your room.” She was near to begging and didn’t care if he knew it.

He made a warm noise against her neck—a chiding sound, like he found her desperation amusing. He whispered, “Okay.”

Clare got to her feet, and he led her by the hand down the hall to the room at the very end. A string of Christmas lights outlined a single tall window and were already lit—white, just like those that had lit him on the fire escape and in her photos.

His room was small and sparsely furnished. The bed was full-sized, made up hastily with a red comforter. Beside it sat an IKEA-looking little table, strewn with a couple of books, a phone charger cord, an empty glass, and some change. No lamp, as the bed was positioned under the window and its halo of tiny lights. Across the room sat two mismatched dressers with a hamper between them. A shirt was draped over the lip of the latter, but other than that, it was a tidy scene. And good—Clare didn’t trust guys past college age who couldn’t be bothered to keep their rooms clean. What did her mom like to say?
A woman’s home is a reflection of her head.
Messy brain, messy house. That went for men, too. Clare remembered her dad’s dumpy apartment in the wake of her parents’ divorce, and how she’d done endless loads of dishes and tried to make it homey, nagged him
to get his dirty clothes organized so they could go to the Laundromat together, because, frankly, he’d smelled kinda nasty. She hadn’t registered for another fifteen years or so that he’d been depressed, not lazy.

What did Mica’s room say about him, then?

That he traveled light and didn’t mind blank white walls. That he could pack his life up in less than an hour and be on his way.

She didn’t know him well, but the assessment resonated. Clare was a nester. Mica was migratory. Didn’t bother her a jot, though, because all she was after was a night in his bed, not forever. Not even next week. Maybe a coffee in the morning and some dirty text exchanges if the sex went well. Some fond X-rated memories, but nothing more.

He sat on the edge of the bed and she shut the door and joined him. He’d never look more right than he did in this particular light, bathed by the pale golden glow of three dozen miniature bulbs. She lay with him, both on their sides, kissing, legs locking.

“You have condoms, right?” she whispered against his lips.

“Yeah.”

“Not to be presumptuous.”

He laughed, and his smile lit her up.

With a guy she’d known for a couple of dates and not yet gone to bed with, she might’ve felt candid and familiar enough to ask him what he was into, sex-wise. But this was all so spontaneous, the question didn’t feel quite right. What felt right was instinct and impulse. She slipped her arms from her jacket and let it flop to the floor. Under it she had on a tee and her bra, and little else. The cool air tensed her skin, making his palm feel all the hotter when it stroked its way up her bare arm.

“Fuck,” he muttered. “You’re sexy.”

She blushed, thinking she couldn’t hear that too many times from this man. “Thanks. So are you.” She studied him, memorizing his face—his long and regal nose, his stubble, the tilt of those gorgeous eyes and the planes of his cheeks. He let her touch him. She traced his lips, his ears, touched the thick-gauge silver hoops he wore in both lobes, toyed with his dreads. The whole of him was bathed in that calm, warm glow, so perfect she couldn’t help herself.

“Could I photograph you again?” she asked. “Now? Just like this?”

He smiled, white teeth flashing. “Sure.”

She left him to pad down the hall and fetch her bag from the kitchen table. Back in the bedroom, she knelt between his ankles and lifted her camera out, adjusting the exposure, taking a light reading, getting comfortable. She framed the composition, and snapped. Snapped and snapped and snapped, one shot after another as his expression shifted from amusement to curiosity to something altogether seductive. She captured the furrow of muscle between his pecs, framed by the unbuttoned collar of his henley. The color of his skin, set off by the black of the leather cord around his neck and the bright white glint on the silver beads. The shade of his lips, darker than his face, paler than his stubble. Every contrast, every shadow. Every detail, while they were still hers to peruse.

She set the camera aside at long last, and he drew her against him, touching her hair. She let him free her pom-pom of curls from its headband, watching his eyes darting as he played with them.