Three Little Words (7 page)

Josie’s ripe mouth pulled into a solemn line, but a spark of amusement twinkled in her eyes. “Hello.”

Will stepped forward, a delight creasing his face as he peered around the edge of the door. “Hey, Josie.”

“Hi, Will,” she returned without missing a beat.

Shaking his head, Greg glanced over his shoulder, looking for a hidden camera or something. “This must be Blake Edwards’s room.” Josie’s pink cheeks made his heart thrum against his breastbone. He drew her out of the closet. “Is this a joke? Why are you hiding in the closet?”

She shrugged. “Because I have no coat, no money, and only one shoe?”

The beguiling twitch of her lips worked its magic on him again.

“Fair enough.” Oblivious to the man standing beside him, Greg stared deep into her eyes as he pointed out the obvious. “For a minute there you had both shoes.”

“Yeah, but by then I was already in the closet.”

Her explanation was so short, so direct, and so utterly rational it made absolute sense. “I’m glad you didn’t leave.”

“You are?”

Greg took a step closer, but the moment his hand landed on her waist, she stiffened and darted a glance beyond his shoulder.

Will didn’t cough or clear his throat. That would have been too subtle. “Ahem.” He spoke the word slowly and distinctly, his eyes alight with avid interest. “I hate to mention this because I know you’ll stop, but you do know I’m still here?”

Josie’s scoff made it perfectly clear she hadn’t forgotten the other man’s presence. A sharp surge of jealousy knifed Greg, twisting hard and deep as she stepped back out of his reach. He let his hand fall to his side, but not before he envisioned seven different ways of making his friend pay for his interference.

“Gentlemen, this has been an interesting evening and an even more mortifying morning, but I should be getting home.”

Torn between visions of Will’s vivisection and parsing the meaning behind Josie’s use of the word mortifying, Greg jumped when she plucked her shoe from his hand once more. A hot rush of panic-laced desire pulsed through him as she clutched his arm and bent like a pretzel to slip her foot into it. “Don’t go.”

“I’ll take you,” Will said at the same time.

Will’s quick offer stopped Greg’s heart. Betrayal tightened his throat. He fixed his oldest friend with an incredulous glare. “The hell you will.” He placed his body between Will and Josie’s. “I’ll take you home.”

“You can’t.” When Greg glared at his best friend, Will raised his eyebrows and shrugged. “You’ve got a brunch date, remember?”

Injustice clawed at Greg’s throat as he fixated on Josie’s curious expression. His fingers curled into his palm, and Will’s smirk made him want to use the fist they formed. A totally ridiculous reaction, he knew. Will had been his friend for four decades. He hadn’t even spent four conscious hours with Josie.

Jo. Josephine.

Whatever her name was. Hell, he didn’t even know her last name. The gaps in his knowledge didn’t stop him from stumbling all over the burning question.”Do you want to stay? With me, I mean.”

Will snickered, but Greg ignored him.

Instead, he searched Josie’s eyes. Swallowing his pride and stomping on his ego, he gave her hand a gentle squeeze. “You could go to brunch with me. You are Kaylin’s aunt after all, right?”

“Her Aunt Jo,” she confirmed, her voice raspy with some unidentifiable emotion. Her wry smile pulled the corners of her mouth down rather than up. “Doesn’t everyone have a spinster aunt stashed in a closet somewhere?”

Will chimed in. “God, if all spinster aunts looked like you, I’d go poking through people’s closets more often.”

Greg was busy shooting a quelling glance at his friend when she said, “I can’t go to brunch. Not like this.”

Ignoring her self-conscious tugs at her wrinkled dress, he took a half step closer, crowding Will out, and trapping her against the closet door as he made his case. “Stay. You don’t have to go to brunch. Just stay here. Take a bath or a nap. Order room service.”

“I should go,” she whispered.

“I don’t want you to.”

Josie held his gaze for one endless moment. Resolve tightened her jaw. Wariness shone bright in her eyes. “I don’t want to, either, but I should.”

Suddenly aware of his aggressive stance, Greg immediately fell back and cast a reluctant glance at his friend. “You’re only going to give her a ride home, right?”

Will eyed him closely then turned to give Josie a slow once-over. The glint in his eye was all too familiar to Greg.

“I mean it, Will. Just help her out, nothing else.”

“She’s standing right here,” Josie reminded them.

Will spared her an abstracted glance then tilted his head like a goddamn cocker spaniel. “Or what?”

“Just…don’t.” The word could be interpreted in a dozen ways.
Don’t touch her. Don’t mess this up for me. Don’t be you. Don’t make me have to punch you.

Will’s smirk softened.

Humiliation sizzled under Greg’s skin, but he refused to rise to the bait. Once again, he turned his body to block his friend from the conversation. “I’m sorry. I have to go to brunch.”

She nodded. “I understand.”

“They tell us they have your coat and purse downstairs.”

Josie grimaced. “Yeah. I heard.”

“Do you want me to try to get them for you?”

The twist of her lips softened. “Thanks, but that’s okay. My sister-in-law will get them to me.”

“Okay.” Steeling his spine, he shot Will his nastiest back-off glare. As usual, his pal was impervious. “Do you
want
Will to take you home?”

Her gusty sigh helped soothe his frayed nerves. “Yeah, it’s okay. If he doesn’t mind.”

“He’s standing right here,” Will said, mocking them both with his laconic drawl.

The realization she wasn’t any more eager to leave with his friend than he was to let her go seeped past his frustration. “I can get you a cab if you prefer,” Greg offered.

“Will’s fine,” she said with a resigned sigh.

The reluctance in her tone made accepting her decision a little easier. Jabbing his friend in the chest with his finger, he growled, “Try not to be yourself.”

The pause stretched between them, an acknowledgment of years of subtext. Finally, Will inclined his head. “Got it. Damsel in distress, white knight. Wrong story for a chick who keeps losing her shoe, but I’ll make it work.”

“You’re not the knight, you’re the….”

He trailed off, but Josie’s amused chuckle filled the void. “Chauffeur?” When both men grunted, she gestured toward the bathroom. “I’m going to duck in there.”

The minute the bathroom door closed behind her, Greg turned to face his friend. “Thank you.”

Will waved the sentiment away. “You can thank me later. Whatever you think about my motives, I like Josie. Always have.”

Casting a wary glance at the closed door, Greg asked the question he half-dreaded. “How long have you known her?”

“It was a long time ago.”

His friend’s oh-so-casual dismissal made the hairs on the back of Greg’s neck prickle. “How well did you know her?”

Will flashed a fist-taunting smile. “Better than you.” He ran his hand over his rumpled shirtfront. “Go say your good-byes to the happy couple. I’ll do my best to make sure poor, helpless Aunt Josephine gets home unmolested.”

The mockery in Will’s tone set off alarm bells in Greg’s already aching head. He narrowed his eyes in defense against the clamor. After all, the guy had only spoken the truth. Didn’t mean Greg had to like it. The silence stretched taut. Josie opened the bathroom door looking slightly less bedraggled. She stood framed in the doorway, smoothing her hands over her dress as her curious gaze traveled from him to Will and back again. “Everything okay?”

“Yeah. Everything is fine.” Will nodded and reached for the door handle. “I’ll wait for you out here, Josie.”

The casual diminutive set Greg’s teeth on edge. The only thing keeping him from bolting after Will was the expectant curiosity on Josie’s face. Shoving his hands into his pockets, he shrugged. “I’m kind of hating him right now.”

“You two have been friends a long time?”

Unable to refrain, he yanked his hands from his pockets and reached for her again. She fit against him perfectly. “Most of our lives, but that doesn’t mean much.” Holding her tight, he stared into wide hazel eyes. “If I’d seen you first, he wouldn’t have stood a chance.”

“You saw me first last night.”

“Lucky me.” Brushing her hair back from her cheek, he lowered his lips to her ear. “I want to see you again. Soon.”

“How soon?”

One breathy question and his blood heated to a boil. “Is two hours too soon?”

“I’d say too long, considering.” She ducked her head and a curtain of sleep-tousled hair hid her face. “You could come to my place when you shake free.”

The rap of knuckles against the door made them both jump. “If you guys are getting it on again, you should at least have the decency to let me watch,” Will called through the door.

Greg stared deep into Josie’s eyes. “I hate him.”

“He’s a pervert, but I think he’s a fairly harmless one,” she conceded.

Slipping his fingers into her hair, he tipped her head back, the need to brand her as his bubbling like a geyser inside him. “If it meant we could finish what we started I’d give the bastard a front row seat.” He captured her mouth in a hard, fast, plundering kiss. “I’d let him watch if I could be inside you right now.”

“Soon.”

“Not soon enough.” This time he kissed her slow and sweet, his lips clinging to hers as he pulled away. “Stay here,” he murmured. “I’ll book the room another night. We can hide from them all—pesky friends, demanding kids, nagging ex-wives.”

“Those are all on your side.”

“Don’t make me face them alone.”

Josie’s smile turned sultry as she slipped from his arms. “Think of me over your eggs benedict.”

“I prefer sunny side up, and you’re damn right I will.”

Her fine-boned wrist flexed when she turned the handle. The sassy jut of her hip when she gave the heavy door a heave added three more positions to his wish list. Black fabric swirled around creamy calves. The flash of her sexy red shoes captured his attention and held him in thrall. She paused, her fingers splayed wide on the paneled door as she turned back. “Eat fast.”

The scent of her arousal still fresh in his mind, he shook his head. “Not on your life. This time, I plan to take my time with you.”

“I meant brunch.” She yanked on the door handle. “I’ll be waiting.”

“Wait! Where do you live?”

Josie spared Will a sidelong glance. The other man feigned interest in the fire extinguisher mounted on the wall, but was obviously listening to every word. “I’m not quite as easy as you might believe given what happened last night.”

The mild accusation landed like a blow. He recoiled a bit then stood up straighter. Oh, hell no. Things may have been a bit fuzzy and out of character for one or both of them the previous night, but he wasn’t about to let her make him the bad guy. “I never thought you were easy.”

“Good.” One corner of her mouth lifted in a wince. “If I’m going to have to explain leaving my purse and coat behind, I think you should have to endure a little familial humiliation, too.”

“Humiliation?”

She wet her lips. The quick subtle flick of her tongue made his nerve endings stand at attention. Her pulse beat beneath her jaw but her eyes remained cool and clear.

“The way I see it, you have two sources of information—Will or Ben. I’m doing the walk of shame with a guy I slept with last century. I think you can exert yourself a little bit if you want information.” A coy smile curved her damp pink lips. “Think of it as sweat equity.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

“It means, if you want to pick up where we left off, you either make a deal with the devil,” she said, nodding to Will, who immediately broke into a mile-wide grin, “or, you can pump Ben and Kaylin for information on poor old Aunt Josephine. Pick your poison.” She stepped over the threshold. “Thanks for an…interesting night, Greg. I had fun.”

Before he could respond, Will stepped forward and offered Josie a gallant arm. “Your chariot awaits, milady.”

Her gaze lingered on Greg as she took Will’s arm. “Thank you, kind sir.”

Will nodded as they passed, steering Josie toward the elevators. “Don’t worry, buddy. I’ve got her.”

Greg stepped back, letting the door slam hard between them. Unfortunately, the reverberation wasn’t nearly loud enough to drown out Will’s rolling chuckle or the murmur of Josie’s soft-spoken rejoinder.

“Not for long, buddy,” he muttered. “Humiliation… Sweat equity.”

Stalking into the bathroom, he unhooked his tuxedo pants and let them fall. He stepped out of the pants and his boxers, avoiding the bloodshot gaze of the wreck of a man reflected in the mirror as he started the shower. Without testing the temperature, he stepped under the spray and ducked his head, letting the water wash away the last of the cobwebs.

When he raised his head at last, Greg tapped a long-neglected reservoir of resolve he found mired in the dregs of his hangover. “Not for long.”

Jo shivered when the elevator doors slid open to reveal the parking garage. As if it wasn’t bad enough for a woman of her age to put herself in the position of doing the one-shoed limp of shame, she almost set herself up for a fabulous case of hypothermia to boot. Score two big ones for old Aunt Jo.

Exhausted and hung over, she’d expended the last of her energy trying to get out of Greg’s room with some semblance of her tattered pride. Now all she wanted to do was curl up and sleep the day away. Asleep, she wouldn’t have to wait or worry. Asleep, she might pretend she didn’t hear his knock rather than know his knock probably wouldn’t come. Better to be passed out than stood up.

She blinked back a fresh rush of hot tears and stepped out into the garage. Will caught her elbow and drew her to a halt.

Humiliation burned hot in her cheeks when she raised her gaze to his. “I bet this is fun for you.”

“Well, it would be more fun if I had a white horse and a sword, but this isn’t too shabby.”