by Audra North
He glanced over some of the other tables as they walked, hoping to see the brown sequined dress his mom was wearing and the shiny pink that meant Kelly. He’d been friends with Ben for so many years the entire Davis family had been invited to the wedding. But something caught his eye up around the head table—a flash of black satin buzzing around, camera bulb lighting up periodically over place cards and floral arrangements and all the other crap that made weddings one of Warren’s least favorite activities.
Beatrice. Again.
She shouldn’t have been so noticeable, wearing black and blending in with the shadows, but he’d never been more aware of a woman in his life.
Hire me. Not to take photographs. Not to create a story in pictures that would inform the city’s half-million readers even as it called them to action. Not to do what she did so naturally, so beautifully, that he had every issue of the Tribune her work had appeared in, stored in the filing cabinet next to his desk at home.
Hire me. To tie him up and make him obey. To make him do things he’d imagined doing to her for a year now, ever since he’d first met her. After Ben and Nina had gotten together, he’d met most of the people who worked at the media station with Nina. But Beatrice had been the only one he remembered, even after several barbeques, brunches and garden parties—fucking garden parties—at their place.
There was no way he could forget her.
After all, it was her face, her body, her laugh and her wit that he thought of every goddamn time he wrapped his hand around himself and stroked it up and down. He’d been attracted to her forever, it felt like. And she’d offered him a chance to have something he’d wanted for so long…
He watched as she bent forward, arranging something on the table, and that black dress pulled tight over her round ass. Warren’s seams strained again. In his pants.
“Damn,” Brewer muttered softly over his shoulder. “I always thought Beatrice was pretty, but I never realized she was hot.”
Warren’s fingers twitched. “Well, you’d better unnotice it immediately unless you want a fist to the face.”
Brewer stopped so abruptly Warren almost ran into the other man’s back.
Fuck. Did he say that out loud? Brewer was never going to let this one go.
Brewer turned around. “Are you trying to tell me—”
“Forget about it.” Warren scowled.
“Yeah, like that ugly face of yours is going to deter me. What’s going on between you and Bea?”
That was the problem with being frustrated all the time. People started taking your anger for granted.
“Don’t call her Bea. She doesn’t like it.” Damn it, shut the fuck up, already. He needed to get ahold of himself before he confessed to something shocking. Like, he wanted to smell her hair and roll around on top of her and possibly even marry her.
Brewer whistled. “Oh man. Something big. When did you two start getting together?”
“I told you, forget about it. Nothing’s going on, so don’t spread shit about her.”
“I wouldn’t—” Brewer gave a sigh. “If you guys were actually dating, it wouldn’t be shit, you know. I might even be happy for you. I know that’s a foreign concept to you, but, fine, if you say so. Nothing’s going on. Could have fooled me.”
Great. The funny look was back. Warren was beginning to suspect it meant something he absolutely hated: pity. But before he could snap at Brewer and tell him not to waste the effort, light flashed in his peripheral vision, and Warren turned to see Beatrice, camera aimed at them.
“Now, how about one where you two are facing the camera?” Beatrice offered, smiling as though she hadn’t caught them in the middle of talking about her. As though she hadn’t tempted him with thoughts of her commanding him. Taking control.
He had to fight the temptation.
If he hired Beatrice, yes, he’d have something he wanted, even if she didn’t do a damned thing to him that remotely resembled domination. She didn’t seem the demanding type, anyway.
But did he really want her that way? As part of an agreement? A contract? Would he want her even knowing she didn’t really want him? Though why would she have made that offer if she didn’t want him too?
He hoped it wasn’t out of pity. Warren started to shake his head, in response to both his own question and hers, but Beatrice’s smile fell, and she lowered her camera just enough to look him in the eye and say, “Face the camera, Davis.”
At the tone of her voice, one that brooked no argument, a shudder of arousal ripped through him. His nostrils flared and his collar felt tight, and fuck—there went those seams again.
Shit. Maybe she was more demanding than he’d realized.
And God help him, he did as he was told, while his body felt hot and full of the motherfucking need that was going to kill him if he didn’t get more of this. More of her.
Next to him, Brewer gave a quiet cough that sounded suspiciously like, “Liar.”
* * * * *
After dinner, Warren was doing a slow circuit of the room, pretending he was casually making the rounds, until he got close to where Beatrice was standing on the periphery of the dance floor. Then, he sauntered over to stand next to her, both of them watching the crowd shimmy and shake to an old disco song.
“I need to talk to you.” His lips barely moved when he spoke, his voice pitched low. He didn’t want anyone to think he was trying to hit on her. People would whisper about it.
The coarse, perpetually angry Davis trying to flirt with shy, refined Beatrice? Out of his league.
No doubt Dad and Mom would see too, and Kelly and Nathan, and then they would shake their heads and remind him of what had happened with Jen.
Brewer would never leave him alone.
But he did need to talk to Beatrice. He’d lost the battle against temptation when she’d ordered him to face the camera. He’d been unable to stop thinking about how good it made him feel every time she commanded him to do something. He was fairly certain that had a lot to do with the fact that it was her, more than the way she bossed him around so beautifully, but either way…he liked it. Enough to ignore how off-kilter it made him feel to think she couldn’t possibly want him the way he wanted her. Enough to do anything—anything—to get more of her. The possibility of taking that kind of control to a new level with Beatrice was making his body practically break apart with anticipation.
She smiled even as she positioned the camera and hit the shutter button. “Goodness, Davis, do you ever get out of SWAT mode?”
He didn’t like when she called him that—Davis—even though everyone else did. He didn’t think she’d ever said his first name before. He would have remembered something like that.
Did she even know what it was?
He wanted her to know.
She moved the camera slightly to the right and clicked it again. “This is a wedding, you know. Not a sting operation. You’re allowed to be seen talking to me.”
No, I’m not. He shrugged out of his jacket and hung it over a nearby chair, talking out of one side of his mouth all the while.
“I can’t talk to you about this here.”
At that, Beatrice paused. She had to know exactly what he was referring to. Just because they’d both been acting like nothing happened back in the corridor didn’t mean it was forgotten.
He shoved his hands in his pockets. “Can you meet me at the batting cages over on D Street tomorrow? Eleven a.m.?”
“Should I wear dark glasses and bring a briefcase full of unmarked bills?” He could hear the laughter in her voice, but he noticed her hands were shaking.
Was that a good thing? It seemed like a good thing.
She lowered the camera and nodded. “Yes, fine. I’ll be there.”
It felt like the greatest victory of his life.
He inclined his head. “Tomorrow, then,” h
e murmured, and wandered away.
Chapter Two
“Uncle Quinn, watch this!”
Warren nodded, his face relaxing into the half smile he made sure to wear whenever he was watching Nathan. His nephew dropped a token into the slot and took up his stance in the cage, waiting for the first ball to come flying.
Smack! Nathan swung hard, sending the ball to the back of the netting, where it dropped to the edge of the inclined pavement and started rolling back toward the cluster of pitching machines.
Damn. The kid was getting good. At thirteen years old, Nathan was already showing signs of being as tall as his uncle, and the hard, ropey muscles of the kid’s forearms were looking more like a man’s every day.
“Nice job, Nate,” Warren called.
Nathan beamed and lobbed another ball into the outfield. Warren lifted his arms and threaded his fingers through the links of the fence surrounding the cages, letting the sun warm his back through the cotton of his T-shirt.
The hair on the back of his neck prickled a second before he heard her voice, close to his ear.
“Your name is Quinn?”
He whirled around to find Beatrice standing behind him, looking like the sun itself in a bright yellow dress that buttoned down the front. He loved dresses like that, the kind that invited a man to unwrap a woman like some kind of sexy present. The fabric was so thin he could see the shadow of her bra where the dress hugged her breasts. Her dark hair was down, the brown strands shining gold, and he had to shake his head, feeling like it might float off his shoulders.
Shit. If he thought such crazy things from simply looking at her, what would happen if he actually touched her? If she touched him?
He’d be fucking useless.
The thought made him even more surly than usual. “My name isn’t Quinn. It’s what my family calls me.”
She ignored his curt tone and remained silent for a moment. He watched her eyes flick past his shoulder, taking in Nate behind him before looking back at Warren. He had the feeling he’d made a strategic error, but he wasn’t sure whether this was a game or a war.
She cocked her head to the side. “What should I call you, then?”
A hundred possibilities crowded into his brain. Something dirty. Something sweet. Darling, love, fucktoy. Mine.
Christ, he was insane. Years of sexual deprivation had made him unfit for anything but the weirdest of relationships.
Which, he supposed, fit this particular arrangement.
“Call me Warren.”
She raised an eyebrow, her mouth pursing, and he could feel shivering need take hold.
“It’s my name,” he added.
“Believe it or not, I was able to figure that out,” she retorted, but she immediately tsked at herself. “I’m sorry. I’m usually not rude like this. I must be tired after the reception last night. Please, forgive me.”
He nodded. Not because he was offended, but because she was right. She wasn’t usually rude. Every time they’d all gotten together at Ben’s—the guys from the team with Nina and her friends from the office—Beatrice had been friendly and quietly funny, if a little reserved. But never rude.
The remark she’d made had to be his fault. She’d probably been responding to his own brusque manner.
Everything seemed to be his fault these days. His fault, his responsibility, his burden…
“So why do they call you Quinn?”
“Because I’m Warren Davis the fifth. Hence, Quinn.”
She was frowning at him now. God, she must think he was some kind of pompous asshole, pretending at some regal title when he was really a blue-collar, thirty-two-year-old man who’d never even left the state, still lived with his parents and was doomed to die alone. While she…
No matter how tempting she was, he didn’t deserve her, even temporarily.
He huffed out a breath and ran a hand through his hair. It was his turn to apologize. “Beatrice, I’m sorry. Thanks for coming out, but this was a mistake. I hope I didn’t take up too much of your Sunday.”
He started to turn back around so she could walk away before he grabbed her and hauled her against his body and mashed his mouth to hers—
“Warren.”
It sounded so good when she said it.
“Stop.”
Muscles in his legs pulled tight and he stopped, waiting. Anticipating. And at the same time, he felt oddly proud of her. She knew why they were meeting today.
He tried not to hope his fantasies of her over the past year were about to come true.
“I’m not finished with you yet,” she told him.
He could hear the amusement in her voice, but it barely registered over the arousal those words spiked in him. God, yes, Beatrice. Never be finished with me.
She gave a soft, low laugh. “In fact, I think we’ve only just begun.”
* * * * *
On the walk from the bus stop to the batting cages, Beatrice had fretted.
What had she been thinking last night, to propose such a thing? Even if there was no sex involved, would it matter? What if he thought she was the most reckless idiot on Earth, offering herself up for money without even seeming to care what she had to do for it?
She’d almost decided not to show at all and let him think she’d been a coward, all talk and no action. But politeness had won over preserving her sanity. She at least owed him the respect of not standing him up.
Keep telling yourself that and maybe you’ll manage to forget how much you want him too.
She shook her head. Recognizing that kind of want—giving in to it—was dangerous.
But when she’d seen him standing there, so much sexy man leaning into the fence, his broad back and tight ass showing to full advantage in a fitted T-shirt and worn jeans, she’d wanted to launch herself at him and wrap her legs around his tight waistline. And then he’d turned around, and she’d seen it in his eyes, for only a fraction of a second, but it had been there.
Heat.
For a moment, she hadn’t been able to think. Did he want her too? It seemed impossible, given the way he was always scowling at her. And yet he’d scrambled her brains so effectively, with merely a look. If he actually touched her, she’d probably moan and shamelessly whine for more. She’d press her body into his and gasp his name.
Warren.
Or, more accurately, Warren Davis, the fifth. Talk about shouldering responsibility. It was one thing to be a Junior, or even a Trey. But number five?
If there was one thing Beatrice understood all too well, it was the heavy weight of familial expectations.
Which was why, when he’d started to dismiss her and turn away, something had pushed out from deep inside of her and she’d told him she wasn’t leaving until he talked to her. She’d remembered the way he’d stared at her last night at Nina’s wedding, when she’d ordered him to face the camera, and the fact that he’d been on the phone with Queen Dommes, and she’d gone for it.
She’d commanded him to stop. Told him she wasn’t finished with him yet. She’d shocked herself with her own audacity. But she must be better at pretending than she’d thought, because even though she didn’t feel confident enough to be ordering a man like this around, he’d obeyed.
The resulting surge of power she felt when he’d done as she’d demanded was heady. Almost overwhelming.
She’d never felt in control of anything like that. So fully and completely powerful…
Girls who grew up the way she had, never even dared to dream of such a thing.
“Warren,” she said again, loving the way it rolled off her tongue, part sigh, part growl. She’d never heard anyone else call him that. The other officers that hung around at Ben and Nina’s only called him Davis.
She hadn’t even known his first name until two minutes ago.
She reached out her han
d to him.
He ignored it, and her heart dropped.
But then he yelled over his shoulder at the big kid who had been talking to him earlier. “Nate! Practice again with the medium pitch and then go to fast pitch for a bit, okay? I’ve got to take care of something.”
The boy didn’t look over, just nodded in agreement as a baseball flew out of the machine toward him and he cracked it all the way to the back of the bowl.
“Whoa,” Beatrice breathed.
Warren shrugged. “Yeah. And he’s only thirteen.”
He was acting casual, but she didn’t miss how his shoulders pulled back and his lips lifted slightly, when he said it. He was proud of his nephew. As proud as any parent would be.
She’d heard a few things, here and there, about how he’d had to give up his dreams of becoming a military policeman for the Army so he could stay home and help support his little sister when she became pregnant at only fifteen years old, but it was clear he’d done much more than pitch in financially.
“Why don’t we sit over there?” He gestured at a park bench along the sidewalk that bordered the cages.
She nodded and headed toward the bench, smoothing her dress beneath her before she sat. She usually didn’t wear dresses unless she was shooting a formal event, since skirts restricted the way she could move around while taking photos. Besides, she’d grown up not being allowed to wear pants—the first pair of jeans she’d owned had been in college—and it was hard to look at skirts and dresses as anything special.
But she had been thinking of him when she’d bought this one on sale a few months ago. It had been the day after a barbeque at Ben and Nina’s place in the burbs, when she’d overheard Davis—no, Warren—telling Donahue he thought those dresses that looked like long guys’ shirts were sexy.
She wanted him to think she was sexy. She’d happily slip into the skin of someone she wasn’t—commanding and confident and dominating—and wear dresses she wouldn’t normally wear if it meant a chance with this man.
She didn’t think he’d want the bland nothingness that was the real her, anyway.
He settled on the bench next to her, his big body taking up so much space on the slats it was impossible for the rough denim of his jeans not to rub against her bare knee. Beatrice shuddered at the friction.