Jackson stood on the other side, just outside of a limo similar to the one we were in the night before. He had a look on his face I couldn’t identify as he watched me exit the building. We didn’t exchange words but when he reached for my hand to help me into the car, I let him. Electricity crackled as I took his hand and I balked at the sensation, willing it to stop. This didn’t ease my anxiety but ratcheted it up several notches and I took another deep breath, disguised as a sigh, to settle my rioting belly. I was angry at myself for my reaction to Jackson and this non-date, and surprisingly the anger helped to fizzle my nerves a bit.
When I was finally seated in the car, Jackson closed the door and walked around to the other side. I was thankful for the couple of seconds it afforded me, of alone time to get myself together. Now was not the time to let emotion or unease cloud my judgment. I had to make sure I stayed ahead of Jackson and whatever motives he may have towards me—because I knew there was something—and getting lost in my worrying wasn’t going to help anything.
Jackson slid into the car next to me and I sat up straighter, not letting on that I was feeling anything. I was getting pretty good at guarding my emotions around him. He gave me a sideways glance and a smirk, the same one that made me simultaneously want to smack and kiss him. I smiled back, not letting it waver any, and hoped for a good time. A night out with a millionaire as handsome as Jackson couldn’t be all bad.
“Are you ready?” he asked, his voice so deep and husky goose bumps broke out all over my body.
I suppressed a shiver, not reading too much into my reaction. “As ready as I’ll ever be.”
Jackson chuckled at my answer as the car pulled away from the curb and I tried to tell myself I was just being funny, that my answer wasn’t really the way I was feeling about the night ahead, though I knew better.
When I saw Liza walking out of the building, I got hard immediately. It wasn’t only the sexy, short, black dress or the red heels that made her bare legs look miles long, but the way she was carrying herself—in a way that said she looked good and she knew it. Her hair was in auburn ringlets around her face, like a fiery halo. I almost gasped with how beautiful she was but suppressed it because I was more confused by my reaction to her than ever.
Clearing my throat as she approached me, I turned to open the door but mostly to break eye contact. I could handle sexual attraction but whatever else I was feeling was foreign and it unnerved me.
By the time I turned back around, she was standing right next to me and I grabbed her hand, without saying a word, and helped her into the car. The urge to slide in after her, pushing my thigh against her bare one occurred to me, but I didn’t because I felt the get myself back under control; maybe to prove to her that I could keep my word despite the fact that I was tricking her into this whole dating charade.
Whatever the reason, I closed the door behind her and walked around to the other side to get in. I wasn’t going to say anything to her right away, but when I glanced at her again after getting into the car, she seemed nervous, for the first time since she walked out of the building. So, I asked her if she was ready, to gauge her level of anxiety, and her response made me laugh because Liza still refused to show me any of her emotions or feelings.
“Well, that’s good to hear,” I said, giving her a sideways glance.
She gave me a weak smile and immediately turned away, closing off from me again, either from nerves or something else. Insecurity, an emotion I wasn’t used to feeling around women, crept in and I shifted in my seat uncomfortably. It was possible I was reading her all wrong and she really didn’t want to be here, but I doubted it. She told me, in not so many words, she wanted to be rid of me but was having a hard time hiding her attraction to me. That could be why she refused to look at me.
Another thought struck me and I cursed in my head. She could know I was lying about the photos.
Panic seized me for a moment and I thought about coming clean, ripping off the Band-Aid. We were alone in the car, just the two of us in the back. I could tell her about it and we could still go to the event. But I knew that wasn’t likely to happen. The moment the words “I lied” came out of my mouth, she would probably insist I take her straight home.
I closed my mouth again because I almost ruined everything and blurted out the truth. I was a coward, I knew that much. The lie was already in motion now and I had to hope that once I had her in my bed again, I would get her out of my system and this whole thing would be over with. Then I could tell her the truth.
Discomfort with my train of thought began to make me feel claustrophobic and I cracked the window closest to me. I didn’t owe Liza anything, we had just met. I wanted sex. That was all. Though tonight, it felt different, and I leaned closer to the window to gulp in the cool, fall air to clear away this disturbing thought process.
Liza still wouldn’t look at me, her head turned towards the window as she pretended to watch the streets go by before her. I didn’t want this to be awkward and it was turning into that kind of situation as we both became lost in our own thoughts. The evening had to be steered back in the direction I intended.
“Those shoes are really something,” I said, trying to start a conversation around something I thought she wouldn’t be able to resist talking about.
Liza swiveled her head towards me before looking down at her shoes. I looked down too, my gaze going to her long legs, one crossed over the other, causing the hem of her already short dress to ride up precariously close to her ass. My heart hammered as I remembered the way she felt underneath me, her soft skin and feminine curves, and all thoughts of her shoes went out the tiny crack in the window. I couldn’t stop staring at the spot where her dress was centimeters away from showing me a part of her I remember intimately. I became instantly hard and shifting uncomfortably in my seat, I forced my eyes back up to her face.
“I just bought them today,” she said, and for a minute, I had no idea what she was talking about.
It took me a second to realize she was answering my comment on her shoes. Needing to be closer to her, I scooted over. While I wanted to respect her apparent need to keep me at arm’s length, I also couldn’t resist the pull to be near her. I tried to tamp down the panic over the admission, shoving it to the back of my brain and brushing it off as lust. Liza eyed me warily as I moved closer, stopping mere inches away from my leg touching hers. I leaned closer, lowering my voice just above a whisper.
“They make your legs look sexy as hell,” I growled out the words before I even knew I was going to say them.
My comment was rewarded with a sharp intake of breath and I could see her chest begin to rise and fall faster. I finally got to her, which meant she wasn’t completely immune to me the way she pretended to be. She was desperately trying not to look at me, pink creeping up the side of her face. I didn’t back up because I wanted to see her eyes. I knew if I did, I would see the way she really felt about me in their green depths.
“You can only ignore me for so long. We have at least another five minutes until we reach the hotel,” I said.
I didn’t want to play games, except I had lied to get her here, so maybe I did.
Liza finally looked at me, a frown marring her beautiful face. It was comical how she thought by giving me a nasty look she could deter me. Little did she know, the more she tried to pretend like I had no effect on her, the more I wanted to try to get a rise out of her. I smirked at her and the frown deepened, followed by an even deeper flush that crept up her chest and stopped at her hairline. In her eyes, I could see something else under the anger and embarrassment. She was uneasy. Something about the vulnerability of it made me back off a bit. I could deal with her anger or even the cold shoulder, but I didn’t want her to think she had anything to fear from me.
As if she could sense me back off, Liza sat up straighter and cleared her throat.
“I’m not ignoring you,” she said, and I noticed her voice had taken on that controlled, high tone she used when she wa
s trying to feign indifference.
“Ha! That’s only the third thing you’ve said to me since you got in the car.” I wasn’t letting her off the hook so easily.
She sighed, closing her eyes for a minute before opening them again. The vulnerability was there still, for a brief second, before it was replaced by the apathy she wore as a mask. It was intriguing to me the way she was really trying to keep me at a distance and it only made me want to try harder to break through the barrier. I also wanted to know why she felt the need to keep a space as wide as the Grand Canyon between us when the first night I met her, not only was there no space but I was the closest you could be to another person.
“I’m sorry. I was lost in thought,” she said, and I was surprised by the admission, so much so I was lost for a response for a minute.
“Well, get your game face on, because these people are relentless,” I said with a bit of contempt.
I never much cared for affluent Manhattan society the way the rest of my family did, and I tried to stay away from them as much as possible, especially because they drew the paparazzi.
Liza cocked her head to the side and narrowed her eyes at me for a second before nodding. “I can imagine. Nicolette has told me all about it.”
I kept forgetting that though Liza was good friends with someone who was a socialite, she wasn’t actually one herself. I found it appealing because usually there were only two types of women who chased after me—socialites who were looking to up their status and those seeking fame and fortune. Liza didn’t strike me as either of those types.
“Your friend doesn’t seem like she minds the scene too much though,” I said, trying to determine if I was right about which type of woman Liza was based on her associations.
She shrugged. “She has a love-hate relationship with Manhattan society.”
I wasn’t sure what that meant.
“In what way?” I asked because I didn’t want her to withdraw from me again, and she seemed like she was on the verge of doing just that. I had to keep her talking and opening up to me.
“Her father likes to push her to do events and charities, and set up blind dates with rich men he thinks will be suitable for her.” She waved her hand towards me as if to indicate the date we shared the night before was an example. “But Nic really only wants to be a regular person. I mean, she loves shopping and designer clothes and all the perks that come with having a father who is loaded, but hates the spotlight and living in a fishbowl.”
I nodded because I understood all too well how Nicolette felt. My mother’s money had bought me everything I could ask for, and more, and I was never left wanting for anything, except a mother. Her fame cost us her life and that was one thing I was bitter about. Being famous took my mother away from me but having all the money in Manhattan couldn’t bring her back or replace her.
“I can relate to that,” I said simply, unable to give away too much of myself to her just yet.
“You do a pretty good job of keeping yourself under the radar. I don’t think I ever heard of you before last night,” she said with a slight laugh.
I raised an eyebrow to that because the statement told me a hell of a lot more about Liza Deveroux than anything else she had said previously.
“Is that so?” I had to admit that my pride was hurt a little by what she said, even though under the radar was what I was going for.
“Yeah. I have heard of your aunt and cousin though, especially your cousin. He’s always all over the tabloids. Not that I read them,” she added the last part quickly with a look of chagrin.
I chuckled at that because she obviously did.
“My cousin is kind of famous for his playboy ways,” I said with amusement, though I wasn’t too happy about Henry and his reputation.
“That’s what worries me about his interest in Nicolette.” Once the words were out of her mouth, she clapped a hand over it.
“Don’t worry, I won’t tell him,” I said to reassure her.
What Henry did with women was his own business. He was a grown man and I wasn’t his father. He had one of those who chose to look the other way.
“I’m sorry.” Liza shook her head. “I don’t know why I said that. He’s your family.”
I waved away the comment. “Henry is like a brother to me, but I’m not his keeper. His choices aren’t necessarily the choices I would make but that doesn’t mean I haven’t made mistakes myself. I have no business telling him what to do.”
I had made many, many mistakes I hoped Liza never discovered.
“What choices have you made that you regret?” she asked me, her voice lower and more intimate than it had been before.
Suddenly, the conversation was taking a dangerous turn.
I almost wondered if she was asking me about what we did a month ago and trying to see if I wished it didn’t happen. That would imply she was worried about my answer, which it didn’t appear she was. I reminded myself she was very good at hiding her true emotions and I searched her eyes for the truth but didn’t see anything. She could also know about my lie.
I made so many mistakes in the past, which I was still paying for, but sleeping with her last month at my hotel wasn’t one of them.
“I don’t think we have enough time for me to get into that,” I said it with a slight chuckled but the sound was hollow.
Liza shrugged again. “I have the time,” she said and I could tell she wasn’t going to let this go.
How we went from having a lighthearted conversation about the price of fame to this, I didn’t know. I had no plans of telling her about any of my mistakes.
I turned to look at her, my whole body facing her on the seat. We were still really close together and when I turned, she turned too, uncrossing her legs and folding them modestly so she didn’t flash me as she did so. I wanted to look at her face as we spoke because I had a feeling she wouldn’t be able to hide her emotions from me if I was looking directly at her.
Liza’s expression changed as I sat there for a moment, staring at her, looking her up and down and taking in everything. She was beautiful, an observation I had made several times before, but as she sat before me, willing me to tell her about myself, something else stood out to me.
It wasn’t just her physical beauty, of which I was very aware, but that same sweet, vulnerability I noticed in her before. She wasn’t hiding it this time and I wasn’t sure if she was trying to be open so I would be, or if she was tired of pretending. The words to tell her about the lie were on my lips again but I pushed them back. Now was not the time. She would run because that was what I would do, and I had no plans of letting her go yet. This revelation took me back for a minute because it went against what I told myself earlier about wanting to get her out of my system for good. I shook my head to dislodge the thought.
“I don’t think I have the time,” I said because this whole thing was setting me on edge and I was beginning to worry it was getting too personal too soon. I was breaking all of the rules I set for myself with women and I wasn’t ready to give of myself just yet.
“Why?” she asked me. Her gaze was unnerving; those green eyes seemed to be delving right into all of my deepest secrets.
I had asked for this but now I was the one who wanted to look away because I couldn’t deal with the level of intimacy, an intimacy I never shared with anyone. It was getting too real too quickly. Instead of answering her, I did the only thing I could think to change the direction of things. I leaned down and captured her mouth with mine.
Liza let out a squeak of shock at the contact, which was quickly smothered by my lips. She didn’t pull away but sat rigid for a moment as I wrapped my arms around her waist and pulled her astride my lap. I slipped my tongue between her lips and a slight moan escaped her mouth, making me think of the way she moaned when I slipped inside of her. My dick ached with how hard I was but I didn’t push any further than having her across my lap.
After only a few seconds, she melted against me, her legs wrappi
ng around my waist. The tiny strip of dress that covered her was now up around her hips and I could feel the heat of her through the tiny bit of fabric that kept her from being completely bare to me. Things progressed quickly once she acquiesced to me and the heat in our kiss went from gentle to bruising, both of us nipping and sucking at the other’s lips with desperation.
Maybe it was all the pent-up passion since the kiss the night before, or maybe it was the fact I had caught her as she was about to open up to me emotionally and me to her, but it was as if the whole charade of the last two days fell away. The sexual tension of the last two days made my need for her ratchet up several levels and it was like I couldn’t kiss her enough or get close enough. I yearned to rip away the clothing that was blocking us from connecting in the way I had wanted since that night at the hotel.
We didn’t notice when the car stopped, or Monroe as he stepped from the front. It was only when we both heard the quick knock on the window that we paused. Frozen in her embrace, I knew we were seconds away from being exposed in a compromising position to paparazzi and prying eyes of the red carpet. I reached out, slapping the lock into place on the door as quickly as I could, catching it just in time before Monroe pulled it open.
The reminder we weren’t entirely alone and on the way to a very public event was like ice water on both of our libidos. Liza pulled away from me swiftly, sitting back onto the seat with a thud before rearranging her dress to cover herself, and wiped her mouth. It stung, the way she disengaged, even though I knew why she did it and was happy she did. We were trying to create an image of a relationship, not an illicit affair that was taking place in the back of limos.
A gentle knock sounded at the door, Monroe’s way of asking if we were ready. I looked at Liza.
“Ready?” I asked because after what just happened, there wasn’t really much else I could say.
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