Authors: Janelle Denison
She was beginning to feel relaxed and tingly, and decided there was no harm in enjoying a fast song with John. It would certainly keep her mind off of whatever Steve and Trixie were doing upstairs. And it wasn’t Steve she was worried about; it was Trixie Lane and her feminine wiles and how she chose to wield them that concerned her the most.
“Sure, why not?” She finished off her Chardonnay and let him pull her into the crush of gyrating bodies.
As she moved to the beat of the music, her body grew hot, her skin much too tight and sensitive. Her nipples tingled, and an insistent throbbing gathered low in her belly, between her thighs, the pressure gradually building with every second that passed. She felt sexually charged, feverish, needy in a way she couldn’t seem to control.
John smiled knowingly, and he was suddenly reaching for her, pulling her to him, his eyes heavy-lidded with lust as his hands began to roam over her curves. Lost in a sea of bodies, with her mind spinning and her
nerves prickling with too many stimuli, she seemed helpless to resist him. Helpless to stop the urgent hunger building, building, building within her.
Confusion and a strong sense of foreboding mingled, making her heart beat fast in her chest. God, what was happening to her? Then the answer came to her in small degrees … her drink, she realized. Someone must have put something in her wine.
Another person aligned himself behind her, and it took her fog-induced mind longer than normal to register that she was deliberately sandwiched between two hard, undeniably aroused male bodies. The two men rubbed against her, grasping her hips, stroking up her thighs. A tongue touched her shoulder, and she shuddered in revulsion. She felt frantic and out of her element, her inhibitions slowly being stripped away by whatever she’d consumed.
“Let’s take her up to one of the playrooms,” she heard John say to the other man, and she shook her head and uttered the word, “No,” but her small voice was lost in the loud music.
Then she was being tugged through the crowd of dancers. Apprehension and fear welled up in her when she realized what these two men intended. She tried to pull out of their grasp but knew she was no match for their strength, not with her mind and body feeling so hot, so lethargic, so hypersensitive.
They cleared the bar area and were brought up short by Steve, who was coming down the stairs from the upper level. Liz could have wept with relief … until she caught sight of the red-haired beauty who was standing by his side, an extremely smug and satisfied expression on her face. Vaguely Liz wondered what was worse—seeing Steve and Trixie together and imagining all the things they’d done together upstairs, or being groped by two strangers intent on slaking their own lust with her.
Steve’s gaze narrowed on the two men flanking her, each of whom was holding one of her arms. “Where are you going with her?” he demanded.
“It’s none of your business,” John said, and started past him.
Steve planted a hand in the center of the man’s chest, stopping him midstride. His smile was positively feral. “I’m making it my business, buddy,” he said in a low, dangerous tone of voice that immediately loosened the man’s grip on her arm. “I paid for the night with her, and unless she’s consented to accompany the two of you, she’s mine.” His gaze shifted to Liz, and beyond the protective, possessive emotion, she detected his contrition for leaving her alone and so vulnerable to someone else’s advance.
Liz shook her head wildly, which only made her dizzier. “No. No, I didn’t consent to anything,” she croaked, her mouth feeling as dry as dust.
“Find yourselves another playmate, boys,” Steve said, and both John and the other man let her go.
The two men backed away, not happy with the turn of events but obviously unwilling to test Steve, either. Seconds later, they disappeared back into the bar area, most likely to find themselves another woman to enjoy.
Steve’s gaze searched hers, silently asking if she was okay, but before he could verbally express his concern, Trixie stole away his attention.
“You were the easiest money I’ve made in a long time, sugar,” Trixie murmured seductively, and caressed a hand down Steve’s chest, all the way to the waistband of his slacks. “It was a pleasure doing business with you.”
Liz glared at her, tamping down the impulse to claw the other woman’s eyes out with her bright-red nails. Unfortunately, her furious mood was lost on Trixie, whose gaze remained on Steve.
The smile Trixie bestowed upon Steve was just as
intimate as her touch. “If you and your date are interested in a threesome, come to me first and I’ll show you both a good time,” she said, then sauntered away and mingled her way back into the party atmosphere.
The emotions rippling through Liz ranged from indignation and jealousy to the more prominent sexual sensations still vibrating along her nerve endings. She tried to ignore the latter, even though her blood felt on fire, her sex aching for release, her nipples hard and peaked.
Despite her physical condition, she managed to say to him, “If that’s what you’re into, count me out.”
“I’m a one-woman kind of man,” he said, and shrugged. “I’m old-fashioned that way.”
Swallowing hard, she took a step back, out of his reach, feeling raw and insecure and provoked. “Oh, really? So old-fashioned that you’d slip off with the redhead
upstairs
and leave your date behind?”
He lifted a brow at her cutting tone and uncalled-for remark, but she turned and walked away before he could reply. With her body buzzing and her head in no better shape, she had no idea where she was headed, but that didn’t seem to matter when Steve curled his fingers around her upper arm and guided her into a lounge area next to the bar and dance floor.
The music from the bar drifted into the room, and the lighting from the fringed Tiffany lamps made the room dim and sensually shadowed. Everything was decorated in velvet: the heavy drapes, couches, chairs, pillows, and even the artwork on the wall.
“The Velvet Room,” it was appropriately named. The couples around them, and what they were doing, ended up being a blur as Steve led her to a secluded corner of the room, turned her around, and pressed her up against the wall, which was textured with velvet wallpaper, too.
He flattened his hands on either side of her head,
leaned close so she could see the heat in his eyes—and the frustration, as if he couldn’t understand her reaction and was hurt that she’d doubt him. She opened her mouth to apologize, to tell him that whatever kind of drug she’d been slipped was making her irrational, as well as making her feel incredibly aroused and needy, but he cut her off before she could explain.
“What I just did upstairs with Trixie was all business,” he said gruffly. Skimming his lips along her jaw, he pinned her hips to the wall with the slow grind of his and said into her ear, “I haven’t so much as thought of another woman since I laid eyes on you. You give me everything I need sexually, and then some.”
She closed her eyes and moaned, his words escalating her desire. The hard, long length of his shaft pressing against her mound increased her hunger to have him filling her full, stroking her, giving her the orgasm her body was beginning to scream for.
“Do you want to know what Trixie and I did in that room upstairs?”
She shook her head and slipped her hands to the waistband of his pants, her breath quickening at the thought of releasing him from the confines of his slacks and taking him in her hand, her mouth. “No, I don’t want to know.” She trusted him. She really, truly did. It was her state of mind that was playing tricks on her, making her imagine the worst. She felt as though she were on an emotional and physical roller coaster ride with no end in sight.
“I’m going to tell you anyway,” he said, and lifted his head to stare into her eyes. The room was dark, but their gazes had no problem connecting. “I gave Trixie two hundred bucks, and all she gave me was Rob’s last name and a bunch of other information that’ll go a long way in tracking him and your cousin. Trixie was Rob’s last lover, and she apparently knows him well.”
Okay, she was eternally grateful for that assurance,
and now that Steve had eased her insecurities, there was something more pressing she needed to attend to, no matter that there were other couples in the room with them. Most were too busy with their own pleasure to pay attention to anything else going on around them.
Reaching between their bodies, Liz unbuckled his belt, but before she could pull the tab of his zipper down, he stopped her.
He sucked in a startled breath. “Damn it, Liz, what are you doing?” he growled huskily.
She nipped at his jaw and cupped him in her palm through the fabric of his slacks, massaging the impressive length of him with her fingers. “Someone put something in my drink, and I’m burning up. I need you inside me. Here.
Now.”
He swore beneath his breath, his body tensing protectively, possessively, and she knew he was thinking about hunting down those two men and beating the shit out of them.
Right now, Liz had something else in mind for those wonderful hands of his. Catching his wrist, she slid his palm beneath the hem of her dress and determinedly guided his fingers upward, past the lacy band of her stockings. “Steve … touch me.”
She groaned and trembled when he slipped two fingers beneath the edge of her panties and into the hot, wet folds of her pulsing sex and stroked her engorged flesh. She came immediately, biting her bottom lip as her release slammed through her in a pounding rush of sensation that nearly overwhelmed her with the pleasure of it.
But that one orgasm wasn’t enough. Not when she could already feel a second one waiting in the wings, another wave of heat building, slowly cresting to a peak of desire.
“Steve,
please,”
she begged.
He lifted his dark head and stared deep into her eyes as his fingers, wet from her, skimmed up to her hip and tugged on the side ties of her panties. “Please what?” he asked, his tone low and rough.
This particular fantasy had turned dark and forbidden, a naughty, shameless tryst that surprisingly turned her on, beyond the stimulant she’d been given. There was no reason to couch what she wanted and needed in a flowery request. Right now, she needed a hard, fast coupling for the pure sake of satisfaction.
“Fuck me,”
she whispered. A plea. A dare.
His restraint shattered, and instead of releasing the second tie on her panties, he ripped them off her hips, then shoved the scrap of fabric into his coat pocket. In a heartbeat, he released his shaft, plucked a foil packet from the bowl on the table next to them, and rolled the condom on.
Then he was back, curling his fingers under her bare bottom, pulling her forward, spreading her legs, and lifting her all in one smooth motion. Her thighs clamped against his hips, and he shoved forward, entering her in a long, hard thrust that impaled her to the hilt. The cry that escaped her throat was lost in the pulsating beat of the music drifting into the velvet room from the bar area.
With Steve standing in front of her, and with the dim lighting, all anyone could see was a couple in an erotic embrace, if they could see anything at all in the dark corner Steve had chosen. Anyone could imagine exactly what they were doing, but they were completely and decently covered—by her dress and the jacket he wore.
Which made the encounter that much more exciting.
She anchored her arms around his neck, locked her ankles against the small of his back, and felt the powerful muscles in his arms, along his shoulders, and in
his buttocks flex as he pumped into her. She welcomed this primal side to Steve, the way he could so easily lose control with her.
Burying her face in the curve of his neck, she inhaled his hot male scent. She bit his earlobe, dipped her tongue into his ear, and felt the clench of her inner muscles around his shaft as another orgasm beckoned.
“Oh, God,” she rasped into his ear, poised on the brink of tumbling over yet another exquisite peak. “I’m going to come again.”
“Yes.”
His breathing was hot and moist against her throat, labored; and with a hard, convulsive shudder, he let go and went over himself.
When the tempest was over, she sagged against him, felt him shift with her still in his arms, then gently lowered her feet back to the floor.
He met her gaze and tenderly brushed tendrils of hair off her cheek. “We got the information we came for, so let’s get the hell out of here.”
She couldn’t agree with him more.
T
hey took a cab home instead of using the company limousine, and as soon as they were inside Steve’s place and made their way up to his bedroom, Liz was worked up all over again. She couldn’t seem to get enough of him—a fantasy in and of itself, despite how furious Steve was at whoever had given her a sexual stimulant. But now all he could do was give her more of what she needed, and in the private haven of his bedroom, without an audience, he could do just that.
Heat against heat.
Flesh against flesh.
Heartbeat to heartbeat.
But she was going too fast, her movements anxious and aggressive as she pushed his coat from his shoulders, then began unfastening the buttons on his dress shirt. That came off in a frenzy, too, and then she was attacking the front closure on his slacks, trying to get those off him as well.
This was not how he’d imagined that their night together would end. Oh, he’d anticipated that they’d end up in his bedroom, but she was taking charge and aiming for mindless physical pleasure, and he meant to make this night one she’d remember emotionally. Because
now that he had the information he needed to trace Rob, he instinctively knew this was his last night with Liz. Tomorrow would bring answers and possibly a firm lead on Valerie’s whereabouts, and once Steve gave Liz the assurances she was searching for, she’d most likely end their affair, because she believed she wasn’t ready for a relationship, that other responsibilities and obligations were more important than her own happiness.
And if tonight was all he had left, he damn well intended to make it a memorable one, in every way that mattered.
Gently grasping her wrists, he pulled her hands away from the front placket of his slacks. “Liz, slow down.”
“I want you,” she said urgently, and kissed his chest, ran her tongue up to one rigid nipple, and grazed the tip with her teeth.
He drew in a shuddering breath, tried to keep his thoughts from straying to her shameless attempts to distract him. “I want you, too.” But his longing for her went deeper than surface sensations. He wanted her heart, her body, and her soul.
She looked up at him with eyes bright with desire, her skin flushed and feverish. “Steve, I need—”
He pressed his fingers over her warm, soft lips, cutting off her demand. “Shhh. I know what you need, and I gave you what you wanted back at the mansion.” A hot, fast, wild coupling. “Now it’s my turn to be in charge, and I’m going to make love to you. Slowly, leisurely, thoroughly.”
Wrapping an arm around her waist, he brought her body up against his, holding her securely in his embrace. He caressed her cheek with his palm, felt her tremble with a renewed urgency, and lowered his mouth to hers. He calmed her jitters with a lush, deep kiss, tamed
her frenzied passion with the slow, lazy stroke of his tongue against hers. Despite her attempts to quicken the pace, to devour him, he controlled her response until she softened against him.
When he finally felt that she was more relaxed, he loosened his hold and unfastened the top part of her halter dress. Letting the two panels of bright-red material fall open, he bared her from the waist up, except for the glittering diamond heart choker around her neck and the matching earrings winking in the room’s lamplight.
“You’re so, so beautiful,” he whispered reverently.
He glided his lips along her jaw, and her hands landed on his chest, her nails lightly grazing his taut flesh. He swirled his tongue down the side of her neck and filled his palms with her generous breasts, and she released a long, blissful sigh. Dipping his head, he laved her nipples with his tongue, drew them into his mouth, sucking first one, then the other stiffened crest.
She cried out hoarsely and moved restlessly against him in a silent plea for more. Her fingers threaded through his hair, holding him in place, encouraging a deeper pressure of his mouth on her breast. He gave her everything she wanted, but at his own leisurely pace, which increased her excitement, her need for him, just as he intended.
Slipping his hands into the waistline of her dress, he pushed the outfit over her hips and let the silky fabric fall to the floor at her feet. His large palms passed over her bottom, smooth and naked since he’d ripped off her panties earlier, and traced one of the straps of her garter belt down to the stocking hugging her thigh.
He pushed her back toward the mattress, made her lie down in the center of the bed and watch as he took off his shoes and socks, and stripped out of his slacks and briefs. Her gaze took in his erect, jutting cock, and she licked her lips and touched her fingers to her belly,
teasing him, testing his restraint. Her green eyes were hungry, eager, and her body moved restlessly against the covers, as if her skin was too prickly to bear.
With a seductive smile, he crawled up onto the mattress from the foot of the bed and took off one of her strappy red shoes, then the other, and tossed both to the floor. He rubbed her feet and arches until she moaned with gratitude; then he unclasped her garter belt and slowly, leisurely rolled her stockings down her legs and off. Wanting to pamper her, he stroked her supple skin and caressed and massaged her thighs, her calves, and felt the tension drain from her limbs. Finally, her body grew pliant, her breathing deep and even.
He looked up the length of her, taking in her sweet, feminine curves, the sparkling entwined hearts she still wore around her neck and which claimed her as his, and the way she trusted him so implicitly with her body and her pleasure. If only she’d grant him that much trust with her heart and emotions.
He’d managed to mellow her for the moment, to decrease that rush of sexual adrenaline she’d been riding on, and when she opened her legs in invitation and whispered his name like a prayer, he felt something fierce and tender clench inside his chest and knew without question what that emotion was.
Love.
He moved over her, fitting his hips between her spread thighs, crushing her breasts against his chest, and braced his arms on either side of her head so that they were face-to-face. Refusing to let her look away, he stared into her eyes, watched her expression as he slowly pushed inside her. Without the barrier of a condom, she enveloped him in a tight, slick heat that made him suck in a quick breath at the exquisite sensation of being one with her, without anything to separate flesh from flesh.
She gasped, startled, and with her palms braced against his shoulders, she struggled beneath him. “Steve …
wait … stop.” Panic laced her voice. “You didn’t wear a condom.”
He caught her pushing hands, stretched her arms above her head, and entwined their fingers so she was pinned beneath him. “You’re on the Pill,” he reminded her huskily, but knew that wasn’t her main concern. She knew the significance of this joining, understood the sacrifice he’d made to forgo any protection on his part. “You feel so good with nothing between us. So hot, so silky soft and tight.”
She closed her eyes and moaned as he thrust into her—long, slow strokes that increased the building pressure, the incredible, delicious friction. He kissed her lips, chased her tongue with his, and arched his hips high and hard, forcing her to wrap her legs around his waist as he rocked against her sex. Then he stopped, lifted his head, and captured her gaze with his.
“Can you feel that?” he murmured, keeping his chest pressed to hers.
He watched the pulse at the base of her throat flutter, and knew she’d try to evade the answer. “Feel …
what?”
“The beat of our hearts. Yours and mine. Together.” He waited, letting her absorb their mingling heartbeats before laying his emotions for her out in the open. “And the love. Can you feel that, Liz?”
He expected her to deny her feelings for him, but the tears gathering in her eyes stunned him as much as her reply did. “Yes,” she said in an aching, wistful voice, as vulnerable as he’d ever seen her before. “I can feel it.”
It was time he offered her the ultimate commitment, and the declaration came much easier than he’d ever expected, and felt incredibly, perfectly right. “I love you.”
He didn’t wait for a response, because none was needed. He knew how she felt about him even if she didn’t verbalize those emotions, and he’d left no doubts in her mind how much he cared about her.
He continued making slow, sweet love to her, letting his body worship hers, and gave her every reason to stay with him. For the night. Forever.
But by morning, Liz was gone, leaving behind the diamond heart earrings and necklace on his nightstand—one of many gifts she refused to accept from him.
Steve rubbed a hand over his unshaven jaw, more disappointed than surprised that she’d left sometime in the middle of the night without waking him or saying good-bye. It was a clean break, with no messy emotional issues or any argument for her to deal with—just as she’d spent years avoiding that same kind of confrontation with her cousin. And now she was living a solitary, one-dimensional life as a result.
The case was over. By one o’clock that afternoon, after speaking briefly with Liz on the phone and giving her his final report on her cousin, Steve closed the file he’d started on Valerie Clark and Rob Easton, satisfied with the knowledge that Liz’s cousin hadn’t been kidnapped or taken against her will. She was off enjoying a week-and-a-half-long holiday in Paris with a client she’d met through The Ultimate Fantasy.
With the personal information that Trixie had shared with him the previous night at the party, tracing Rob had been ridiculously easy. The tidbits the other woman had offered had been invaluable. Steve now knew that Easton was the CEO of a software company based here in Chicago, and that he lived in a very exclusive area of Lake Shore Drive. According to Trixie, Rob had a penchant for pretty women, indulging in phone sex and attending the fantasy parties to satisfy his numerous fetishes. Rob also enjoyed vacationing in exotic locales with the ladies he met through The Ultimate Fantasy. Valerie wasn’t the first woman he’d taken abroad, and she most likely wouldn’t be the last.
According to the itinerary he’d been able to outline from the bits and pieces of information he’d discovered this morning, he’d learned that today was Rob and Valerie’s last night at a high-dollar Paris hotel, and they were due to check out and fly back to the states tomorrow. Their international flight was due to arrive at O’Hare in the early evening.
There was nothing to indicate foul play, or that Valerie was in any kind of danger, and that had relieved Liz the most when Steve had spoken to her. Yet he couldn’t help but wish that Liz would embrace a bit of anger when it came to Valerie and the way she continually manipulated her emotions and, on some level, her life. But that was the heart of the problem with Liz—she was too caught up in doing the responsible thing, too intent on pleasing her aunt and uncle causing her to sacrifice her own happiness in the process and give up any chance at a future: with him. That had been abundantly clear when she’d sneaked out of his bed last night.
Her withdrawal had also been evident in her tone when he’d talked to her on the phone a while ago. She’d been all business, as if they’d never been intimate. She never strayed beyond their conversation about Valerie, never acknowledged the fact that he was in love with her and had told her as much the night before. He supposed it was easier for Liz to ignore that fact, to pretend it didn’t exist, than to deal with all the emotional repercussions that came with such a deep, heartfelt revelation.
Releasing a long exhale, he pulled another case file to follow up on, determined to move on to the best of his ability. He spent the next couple of hours making calls on another missing-persons case, tracing leads, and searching Internet files for information he needed in another state.
The speaker on his phone buzzed, followed by his
secretary’s efficient voice. “Steve, Liz Adams is here to see you.”
An odd sense of déjà vu washed over him. It had been a week ago that she’d come to his office seeking his services, which had been the beginning of an affair that had turned into so much more for him. While her visit this afternoon was unexpected, from all the signals she’d sent out thus far, he doubted she was here to continue their relationship or profess her love in return. But he was curious to know what had brought her by his office when they’d pretty much wrapped everything up with Valerie and the case over the phone.
“Go ahead and send her back to my office.” Standing, he rounded his desk just as Liz entered the room.
He smiled at her, and she smiled in return, though the gesture didn’t completely erase that damnable wariness that was back in her eyes, shining like a beacon and warning him to keep his distance. So he did, no matter how much he ached to reach out and touch her, to pull her into his arms and hold her.
They were beyond polite pleasantries, and there was no sense skirting around the reason why she was there, so he jumped straight to the heart of the matter. “What brings you by?”
She absently adjusted her purse strap over her shoulder and straightened, her demeanor much too formal considering how informal they’d been with each other the past week. “I just wanted to thank you for everything you’ve done for me, and for finding Valerie. It’s a huge relief to know that she’s okay.”
And what about the fact that your self-centered cousin doesn’t give a damn that you’ve been overwhelmed with worry and concern for her welfare?
He bit back the sarcastic remark, knowing he’d only get a defensive explanation from Liz in return. One that would undoubtedly involve that never-ending promise she’d made to her aunt and uncle, feeling guilt over her past
actions, and trying to make up for her disappointing marriage to Travis.
“If I remember correctly, finding Valerie was a joint effort,” he pointed out instead, doing his best to keep a tight rein on his frustration. “I couldn’t have gotten the information on Rob as quickly as I did without you getting invited to one of The Ultimate Fantasy parties.”
“Regardless, I appreciate your advice and guidance along the way. I can’t imagine going to that party last night without you being there.”