Date With a Diva

by Joanne Rock

  He crossed his fingers that maybe she enjoyed their topic of conversation as much as he did. “The adult actress. And the director told me over breakfast that she likes doing love scenes with an audience. It enhances her performance.”

  “The director told you this?” She sounded part skeptical and part…interested.

  “Yeah. Right after he picked up his vegetable omelette made with imitation, cholesterol-free eggs. And right before he invited me to drop by the set this afternoon.” He wondered if Club Paradise’s diva-in-charge would be turned on by the movie preview. “What do you say? Will you go with me? The part they’re filming today doesn’t involve anything super-risqué. It’s more a prelude to a love scene.”

  “How is it you’ve been helping out here for all of twelve hours and you’ve already had breakfast with the hottest man in Hollywood and secured an invite to a movie set?”

  “It sure as hell wasn’t the vegetable omelette.” He would have blown off the question but she looked serious as she rocked back on her heels in front of a shelfful of flour bags. “It probably has something to do with my sports career. Most hockey fans know who I am, even if I’m not on the ice anymore.”

  And while it was cool to be recognized, it really sucked not to be skating.

  Her lips thinned, flattened. “I forgot you were famous in your own right.”

  “Is that a bad thing?” Stepping over a box of canned chicken broth, he inched closer, hoping nobody in the kitchen would need anything out of the pantry for a few more minutes.

  “Your celebrity status is of no consequence to me. I’ve had quite enough notoriety lately, thanks to my ex.” She shifted as he neared, as if she was making plans to bolt. “And thanks for the invitation to the filming, but I’d really better join Brianne to meet the first interviewee. They’ll probably be arriving in the kitchen any minute.”

  Curving his hands around her upper arms, he held her in place. She sucked in a gasp but didn’t tell him to back off. “Go with me.”

  “I just said—”

  “How often are you going to have a chance to see a movie in production in your life? And it’s set at your hotel. Shouldn’t you be kissing up to all these film people with deep pockets and good connections anyway?”

  He’d worry about making her stay longer once he convinced her to go in the first place. He had the feeling he’d need all the help he could get to make headway with this woman who’d been burned big-time by her ex. What could be better than to watch a love scene in progress? Maybe she’d be so inspired she’d unbutton that jacket of hers and give him a better glimpse at whatever she wore beneath.

  As if she could guess his thoughts, her breathing went shallow and quick. He caught the scent of her, dark and exotic amid the smell of sterilizing dishwater wafting in from the kitchen.

  “Maybe a few minutes would be okay.” Her nod was almost imperceptible, as if she hadn’t fully talked herself into agreeing. “I did want to offer to procure any necessary backdrops for their scenes if they need them.”

  It was his cue to slap himself on the back and accept victory graciously. He was ahead one-nothing with only minutes to go in the game. But all his years as a hockey goalie hadn’t done much to teach him good defense.

  To his way of thinking, the sooner he could score, the better.

  Cornering her against the shelfful of flour, he bracketed her body with his arms as he braced himself up against the metal racks. “And who knows? Maybe today’s scene will give you a few ideas.”

  “Really?” She was breathing every bit as fast as him as he leaned closer still.

  “I thought maybe you’d enjoy a little more steam and sizzle.” He was whispering the last few words by the time his mouth slanted over hers.

  Voices sounded outside the door, the din of lunch prep already beginning. Nico knew this wasn’t the time or place, but he had apparently forgotten to communicate as much to his lips.

  Lainie tipped her head back, exposing her long neck encircled by fat pearls, reminding him that she wore something really incredible under her suit.

  His hand sought out the smooth column of her throat, skimming over the warm skin as he tasted her. Palm bumping over the negligible barrier of the pearls, he continued south to her collarbone, beneath her jacket.

  Her heart galloped under his hand and she let out a small sigh. He was millimeters away from black lace when the slice of light from the kitchen widened into a bright band of obnoxious fluorescence.

  Busted.

  “And this is the food supply clos—” Brianne Wolcott, a statuesque redhead who co-owned Club Paradise, halted her narrative as she spotted them. “Whoops.”

  Nico swore he could feel every last one of Lainie’s muscles tense. Tighten.

  She didn’t meet his eye as she hastened forward to make excuses and slip away from Brianne’s kitchen tour with the chef candidate. But Nico didn’t need to see her eyes to know he’d made a bad play decision late in the game. He’d gone for broke when he should have been playing conservatively.

  Now Lainie was walking away, and every last twitch of her incredible hips seem to shout, “Game over.”

  SHE WAS NOT HYPERVENTILATING from Nico’s kisses. Lainie sat in her office ten minutes later, assuring herself her inability to catch her breath could very well be stress-related, due to the million and one projects she needed to juggle today. Or it could be embarrassment because Brianne and the new chef applicant had walked in on her and Nico engaged in the most pulse-racing moment of her entire life.

  Gripping the edges of her carved mahogany desk to keep herself steady, Lainie decided whatever had prompted the sudden attack of breathlessness, it was not the burning imprint of Nico’s hand spanning her collarbone and down to the top of one aching breast.

  Lainie had bolted from the kitchen under the pretense of a hotel emergency, but she’d heard Nico stay behind to introduce himself to the interviewee. Brianne could handle the chef candidate while Lainie got her head together. In fact, she needed to be better about delegating work now that the resort faced its biggest guest-service challenge yet. She should be actively freeing up time to schmooze the movie’s location coordinator. To go catch snippets of the crew in action while they filmed…

  Steam, sex and sizzle.

  Damn it, she should be there this afternoon whether she went with Nico or not. So what if it felt like a naughty indulgence to watch an actor and actress fog the camera lens with Nico by her side? It was part of her job, and Lainie had never, ever shirked her responsibilities.

  Allowing her head to fall to her marble-topped desk, she hoped if she closed her eyes for just a few seconds she would regain her equilibrium. Already her breathing had quieted.

  The cool marble felt good against her heated forehead. She folded her arms beneath her to give her a better cushion, but as she rearranged her head on the desk, her elbow scraped across a piece of paper out of place.

  Not a frequent occurrence for her since she normally kept her desk immaculately organized.

  Shifting in her seat, she sat upright to retrieve the stray sheet and return it to its rightful place. Yet as her eyes roamed over the crisp linen stock she realized she’d never seen it before. Two lines of neat penman-ship had been centered in the middle of the page.

  Guess your chef quit at an inopportune time. I sure hope it’s not the first of many troubles to come.

  The irreverent smiley face really irritated her. Why would someone leave such a smart-ass note on her desk?

  A rap at her office door startled her.

  “Come in.” She straightened, stuffing the note in her binder.

  The door opened and Nico stepped inside, his shoulders relaxed. His breathing perfectly normal, damn the man.

  “Ready to go?” He shoved his hands in his pockets and peered around her workspace. “Great office.”

  She rather liked the combination of black, red and gold decor herself when she wasn’t fuming over an anonymous stranger’s snotty insolence.
One wall of her workspace overflowed with black-and-white prints of Club Paradise throughout its renovation stages. Nico seemed to be studying the erotic theme rooms with special interest.

  “Thank you.” Standing, she put the note out of her mind. While those stark centered lines had read to her like a warning, they could also simply be taken as someone’s dopey attempt to commiserate with her on a tough day.

  Although it seemed even the dopiest of someones would at least sign their letter.

  “I missed out on a lot of the earlier renovations because of hockey season.” He bent to peer more closely at a photo she happened to know depicted the four owners conducting one of their early business meetings in an outdoor hot tub.

  It had been fun in those first few months, but Lainie thought it was even more fun to be operating in the black with a growing profit margin.

  She watched Nico move down the wall of photos, his gaze taking in the theme rooms from the Bordello Room to the Harem Suite. From the Vixen’s Villa to the Pleasure Parthenon.

  “Wow.” He tugged at the collar of his gray polo shirt. “You’ve got some spicy digs here.”

  “Didn’t Giselle ever take you on a tour of the theme rooms?” She just assumed he’d seen the whole hotel already.

  “Honestly, I never liked the idea of my baby sister working in someplace so risqué so I didn’t let her take me on the tour.”

  “Your baby sister who’s what—twenty-five now? No wonder she took off for a new continent if that’s how you treated her.” She stood, her whole body too restless to be in such close quarters with Nico after they’d just been plastered together in a supply closet.

  She would probably be better off with the camera crew watching a sexy love scene than standing all alone in her office with a man whose kisses made her toes curl.

  “Bad decision by me. I know that now. My sister wasn’t cut out for the convent, much as I may have hoped otherwise.” He paused as she was sidling closer to the door. “Is everything okay?”

  “Perfect. I’m ready to go when you are.” She forced herself to stand very still. In her days as a practicing attorney, her ability to stare a man down had won her more court cases than she could count, but her skills felt a bit rusty when she tried them out on Nico. He seemed more than ready to lock gazes with her.

  “You seem a little jumpy.”

  She sighed, frustrated. “If you’re expecting me to say I’m all aflutter because of one little kiss, I guarantee you’re talking to the wrong woman.”

  “Did you just refer to that kiss as little?”

  “Okay, here we go.” She rolled her eyes and reached for the doorknob. “Male ego at work, I suppose. So sorry for the slip.”

  Nico didn’t shut the door and argue the point about the kiss, and if she were honest she’d have to admit maybe she was just a smidge disappointed about that.

  Still, as they made their way down the hall toward the Fun & Games Chamber, she couldn’t deny the shiver that tripped through her when he whispered in her ear.

  “Remind me to move straight into the big kisses next time we find ourselves in a supply closet, okay?”

  “You should be so lucky, Slick.” Feeling marginally more in control now that she’d made it clear what happened between them had been no big deal, Lainie led them to the suite where the filming was scheduled to take place.

  She’d stay ten minutes, tops. Just long enough to make nice with the location director and offer the hotel’s services with anything the film crew might need. Then she and Nico could part company before her reawakened hormones got any ideas. Because no matter how hot their kisses, Lainie couldn’t handle a relationship right now. Not even the simple, sexual kind that her hormones screamed she should share with Nico.

  Men were a scary proposition in her experience. Before Brianne had gotten engaged to Aidan, she’d been stalked by a lunatic guitar player who’d been obsessed with her. Then there was Summer’s old beau—the megatattooed former restaurant manager of Club Paradise who’d cheated on her before he left town with the rest of his cronies. He was a low-level operator in the Rat Pack group, but he was one of the few original members of the crew who’d managed to elude police since they could never get enough evidence to convict him of anything.

  And then there’d been Lainie’s personal experience, which only further proved that a girl couldn’t be too careful when it came to men.

  Her life currently operated in big, fat rebound mode. In fact, she was so deep in rebound territory she’d probably bounce if she weren’t wearing spike heels at the moment.

  No men. No relationships. And definitely no big kisses.

  NICO DIDN’T KNOW WHAT he’d expected from Club Paradise’s Fun & Games Chamber, but it sure as hell hadn’t been this.

  After one of the set assistants admitted them into the huge suite and ushered them to a viewing area taped off for guests, he tried not to gawk at the wide assortment of what he could only assume to be sex toys and possibly S and M contraptions. There was an inverted, gravity-defying table for hanging people upside down. Only this didn’t look like the one at his old gym. This was padded in well-oiled leather and included velvet handcuffs for complete immobilization.

  Damn.

  The room also featured a net suspended from the ceiling. A hammock maybe. Or a swing. He didn’t have a clue. Was it somehow a turn-on to have sex while suspended? Sounded to him like a surefire way to fall on your ass. Did Ms. Sleek and Sophisticated Lainie Reynolds know what all these things were used for?

  This was her hotel, after all.

  He couldn’t decide if he should be jealous or turned on by Lainie having explicit carnal knowledge about such a wide range of intimate accessories.

  There were velvet shackles dripping from the ceiling at various intervals, so, in case you forgot to cuff your partner in the kitchenette, you could still find conveniently located restraints on your way to the bedroom. Or the bathroom. Or right in front of the plasma-screen TV. Pretty freaking convenient.

  He also spotted an oversize birdcage that perhaps wasn’t for birds, a piece of exercise equipment that probably wasn’t used for exercise as he knew it and a glass case holding a see-through mannequin outfitted in full-out S and M garb. And it looked so damn complicated with all its metal rings and leather straps that he figured it was just as well there was a model in place or horny couples would be there all night trying to figure out what strap went where.

  “So what do you think?” Lainie whispered as they settled on a pair of chrome bar stools someone had dragged over from the kitchen area. They were confined to the taped-off area with seven other people, but the only face Nico recognized a few feet away was Daisy, the fake waitress who’d caught Bram Hawthorne’s eye earlier that day.

  Apparently she’d wrangled an invitation to the filming, as well.

  “I think you’re running a damn kinky operation, lady.” Maybe she could be persuaded to give him a personal guided tour of the erotic haven after the movie finished filming here. A tour and a demonstration. “Is it legal to have all this stuff in a hotel?”

  “I assume so since this room is especially popular with several high-ranking city police officials. Though not at the same time of course.” She hugged her leather binder closer to her chest as the camera crew wheeled around lights on dollies. “I meant what do you think of the sneak peek at the movie business?”

  Who could absorb the drama of the movie business while surrounded by so much sex paraphernalia? Still, he tried to block out the erotic images that seemed to bombard him from every corner and focus on the small group of production and technical people debating how to stage the scene. Bram stood on the periphery of their conversation, offering occasional input.

  The adult-film star, Rosaria, lounged across a leopard-print divan, her well-known breasts clad in a halter top that had as much substance as a cocktail napkin. Her red leather pants were skintight, which was a good thing because her total lack of hips would have made it difficult for jeans
to remain on her body otherwise. She made notes on a piece of paper, rereading and occasionally crossing out what she’d written.

  “I think it looks sort of highbrow and glamorous just because it’s set in your hotel. Without the sex trappings as a backdrop, the actual movie-making equipment isn’t all that impressive.” He wanted to ask if she’d ever stayed in the Fun & Games Chamber, but thought better of it.

  A light snapped off beside the small crowd of guest viewers as the director called last-minute instructions to the actors to just keep going and ride out the scene to see how it felt. The area where the action would be staged was illuminated as bright as Christmas while the rest of the room remained in darkness. The effect was similar to viewing a movie in the theater. Private, anonymous, engaging.

  Nico resisted the urge to slide an arm around Lainie and draw her close while they settled in to watch the show.

  DAISY STEPHENSON TRIED very hard to ignore her nemesis a few feet away as she concentrated on the latest object of her affections prowling the perimeter of the set inside the Fun & Games Chamber.

  Bram.

  Top-shelf, first-class Hollywood royalty, the man could be her ticket to bigger and better things. After all, how long could she stick around South Beach just to make Lainie Reynolds’s life difficult? The men in Miami were beginning to bore her.

  And not just because she’d already slept with her fair share. No, she simply didn’t want to waste another Saturday night making small talk with some Brazilian polo player who barely spoke English or a French race-car driver who thought he was so much smarter than her just because she happened to enjoy discussing shopping more than fuel injection.

  So sue her for being just a smidge on the materialistic side. When you grew up with nothing, you learned to appreciate every something that came your way.

  And Bram Hawthorne…he was something.

  His good-old-boy accent had charmed her from the moment he’d opened his mouth in the kitchen. Of course, in all honesty she probably would have chased him whether he’d charmed her or not, given that he was an honest-to-God movie star. But it sure made the chase more fun when she considered how genuinely nice he’d seemed.