I whistled in admiration. The sound caught the attention of my sopping wet dog, who cocked his ears as he trotted to me.
“Guess what, Johnny Cash?” I asked, as the dog shook the chlorinated water from his fur at Mach speed. I stepped away, making sure the tablet screen wasn’t in the line of fire. “Seems I was wrong when I thought she was a movie star. The woman’s a retired Mark Zuckerberg.”
I chucked the disc into the pool again, and my dog raced after it, launching into the deep end.
But maybe that wasn’t the best comparison, because there was nothing unfeminine about Sophie. She was all woman, and all sex appeal, and I intended to find out tonight what made her tick.
Because my desire for the beautiful—and evidently brainy—blonde had nothing to do with the fact that she might be privy to things I wanted to know. Nothing at all. It had everything to do with how she looked in that dress, and how insatiably curious I was to learn how she looked out of it.
I was living for that moment, and that moment only.
4
Sophie
I was late.
I was often late.
Being on time was so hard when there was makeup to do and hair to blow-dry and stockings to pull on just so, inch by delicate inch, because you didn’t want them to rip.
Stockings took time to do right, with the garter attached at the thigh.
I’d be wearing them even if I didn’t have that fluttery little hope of a hot man in my near future. I wore them because I loved stockings. Stockings were sexy and fun, and after years of donning jeans and hoodies and knit caps—because as a woman in the tech field, I’d desperately wanted to look the part—I’d shed the old Sophie when I left the land of bits and bytes behind me.
Now, with my new focus on philanthropy, dressing up was not only embraced, it was essential.
The panties though . . . those were just for me.
Tonight’s panties were black like my dress and sheer, with a slim crisscross tie up the side.
I smoothed a hand over my dress, gave myself one more quick once-over in my full-length bedroom mirror, then snagged my purse from my bed. I headed down the hall, pausing in the living room, one hand on the back of the soft chocolate-brown couch, wondering if I’d remembered to put fresh pillowcases in the guest room at the other end of the condo for my brother.
A flicker of tension skimmed through my veins.
I knew I had. This was just a momentary bout of OCD making me doubt myself.
I stood stock-still, tapping my fingers against my forehead. I could recall perfectly having placed new linens on the bed just this morning. The gray-and-white striped ones.
I headed for the front door. But it was always better to be safe than sorry, right? Checking and double-checking, and then checking one more time in that final quality assurance test—well, that was what had gotten me far in life. I race-walked down the opposite hall, turned the doorknob, and breathed a sigh of relief as I took in the sight of the bed, as crisply made as a hotel room in the Bellagio.
Okay, I could go now.
I made my way to the front door and gripped the handle, when I was nearly knocked on the floor by the unexpected force of the door opening.
“Oh!”
“Shit. Sorry, Soph. I thought you’d be gone by now.”
I waved off John’s worry. “I should be. Running late.”
He narrowed his eyes. “Were you checking everything three times?”
“Only your room,” I admitted in a low voice.
He clasped a big hand on my shoulder. “Don’t worry about that stuff. Besides, I’ll happily sleep on the floor, or in an unmade bed. You don’t have to check to make sure everything is perfect for me,” he said softly, then gestured to my right ear. “But you might want to check on your earring. Looks like one is about to pop out.”
Lifting my hand to my ear, I felt the edge of the earring slipping from my earlobe. I peered into a small mirror by the door, catching the reflection of a framed photograph of my parents from across the room, my heart lurching briefly at the image, and how much I loved and missed them. “I thought you were working late,” I said as I repositioned the jewelry.
He shrugged. “Yeah, but I figured it’d be nice and quiet at your place, and you’ll be out, so I can work on the case here.”
“Close to solving it?”
He scoffed. “Not even remotely. Talked to some guy today who I’m sure knows something, but he won’t let on what it is.”
“What do you think he knows?” I asked, turning away from the mirror to face my brother, who was unknotting his tie and tugging it off.
“Something that would help me find the other guys I think were involved.”
“What kind of case is it?”
He laughed. “You’re not getting that out of me.”
“I know. I just like asking, because it’s funny to see how many ways you can say no comment.” John never gave up details. He always spoke vaguely about his work so I could never connect the dots. Not that I wanted to. I vastly preferred operating on my side of the world, entertaining the wealthy and privileged and encouraging them to dig deep into their pockets to help those who needed it most: the children, the ill, the underprivileged, the animals who needed a voice. I’d helped raise money for all those causes, and I intended to do just that tonight for the hospital.
Sometime later, after the silent auction of a painting by Miller Valentina, I walked to the podium in the ballroom and thanked the sea of glittering guests in shimmery dresses and crisp suits.
“I am so unbelievably thrilled to share the news that, thanks to your generosity, we’ve raised well over our funding goal for the new children’s wing, which will provide state-of-the-art care,” I said, surveying the tables in the ballroom as the crowd clapped in recognition of the good news.
The man in the green tie hadn’t made it. C’est la vie. I didn’t know anything about him, and it had been silly to want a stranger so badly. Better to move on, and besides, I had a busy agenda for the rest of the evening. “We would not have been able to do this without your generosity,” I said, beaming at the guests. My heart was full, bursting with joy over their willingness to give. “But don’t think I’m going to let any of you gorgeous people—and for the record, you are all my favorite people—slip away this evening. We have Heaven Leigh here with us, and if her voice doesn’t make you want to snuggle up to your date, then I don’t know what will. She’ll be on in five minutes.”
My assistant, Kelley Jeffers, caught up with me as I walked through a small section of the wings backstage. Ever efficient and always prepared, Kelley tapped her clipboard. “You have forty-five minutes until we need you on again to close out the event with the awards.”
“Perfect. I’ll grab a drink and mingle.”
“Be sure to be backstage at nine forty-five so we can stay on time.”
“Absolutely,” I said, then headed to the steps, ready to chitchat and socialize. As I reached the ballroom floor, though, I nearly froze.
I wasn’t sure if I saw him first or merely sensed him. I turned my head, and goosebumps rose on my bare arms as I drank him in.
In the distance, he leaned against the doorway to the ballroom, looking cool, sexy, and debonair, wearing a dark-gray suit that fit him like a glove—tailored and snug where it needed to be, revealing strength and tone. His light-brown hair was messy, but not sloppy. It was the type of hair that was too thick to be contained, that couldn’t be combed into submission, but instead simply invited fingers to run through it.
But then, if I was doing things right, my hands wouldn’t be free.
Across all the tables and chairs, past the dazzling chandelier lights, beyond the sea of designer dresses, he locked eyes with me.
His seemed to say, I’m here for you. I’m coming to get you.
I flashed a smile, aware that it was a high-wattage one, but then that was how I felt—bubbly, buoyant, and powered by the thrill of possibility. I hadn’t
misread the moment outside the municipal building. The chemistry had been electric and instant—and intense enough for him to come calling.
As I walked around the dance floor to find my way to him, a flash of gray hair appeared in the corner of my vision. Next came a phlegmy clearing of the throat.
Oh, dear.
Not now.
One of my regular donors placed a clammy hand on my bare arm—Clyde Graser, pushing eighty, sweet as could be, and more generous than virtually anyone.
He was also terribly out of touch with women.
“Sophie, how are you, my dear?”
He received one of my brightest smiles. “I’m very well, Mr. Graser. So good to see you.”
After a minute of small talk, he cleared his throat once more, a sign he had Something Important to Say. “My grandson Taylor is coming back to town. He graduated from Harvard Law earlier this year and has been hired into a corporate practice here. I have a hunch the two of you would get along swimmingly, and I would love to introduce you to him.”
A newly minted law school graduate was probably all of twenty-five. Divorced and thirty-one, I had a clear cutoff. You had to be over thirty to ride this ride. I simply wasn’t into cradle-robbing.
“I’m sure he’s lovely,” I said, doing my best to be kind but evasive.
Clyde’s matchmaking effort wasn’t the first I’d had to deflect. These sorts of offers had been happening with increasing frequency since Holden and I had divorced two years ago. With the money I’d socked away from the sale of my company—even after Holden’s cut of the profits—and the work I did now, many of the city’s old wealth wanted me for their sons.
I wanted no such thing.
“Wonderful. Then I’ll bring him to the Beethoven concert,” Clyde said. The law firm Clyde had founded was a lead sponsor of that upcoming charity event, and I hoped to convince him to pour even more of his corporate cash into a community center that was being refurbished in a section of town that had been a hotbed for a local gang many years ago—a street gang that had been rising up again, which made it all the more important to revitalize the neighborhood.
“I can’t wait,” I said as Clyde walked away.
Then my pulse suddenly quickened.
I knew.
Knew the sexy man had to be mere feet from me. The little hairs on my arms stood on end. This man and I were two elements smashing into each other and setting off sparks. There was no other explanation, because I’d never felt this kind of intense desire for someone I’d just met.
It was a riot inside my body.
He placed a hand on the small of my back—gentle, terribly gentle, and it unleashed an electric charge in me. “Can’t wait for what?” he asked.
Oh God, his voice. His deep, sexy voice was an aphrodisiac. It was the opening act in the seduction of me.
“For the evening to turn more exciting,” I said as I came face-to-face with the sexiest stranger I’d ever met—and he wasn’t going to be a stranger much longer.
“Looks like I arrived just in time. Because that’s exactly what I intend to do.”
I arched an eyebrow. “Excite me?”
The first notes of a sexy ballad sounded from the stage. “Yes. That’s why I came here. Right now, however, I’d like to monopolize you on the dance floor, Miss Sophie Winston.”
“You know my name,” I said, shooting him a look that said I was impressed.
“I do,” he said, holding me captive with his dark-blue eyes. “And I’d like to get to know more than your name.”
“That sort of intel might be obtained with a dance,” I said, clasping his hand and letting him lead me to the dance floor as the lights dimmed and the song wrapped itself around us.
5
Ryan
As the slinky, silky Vegas nightclub singer belted out a bluesy number from the stage, the lights in the ballroom dimmed. They turned the bright silent auction that I had caught the tail end of into a sultry nighttime affair. The chandeliers flickered, and violet lights shone on the dance floor. Men in tuxes and women in evening dresses moved and swayed, and the event reeked of old money and new money, mingling together. This was the cocktail mix of the Vegas built on the bedrock of Rat-Pack-era casinos, stirred up with the cool swagger of the sleek skyscraper crowds of today.
I led Sophie to the dance floor, my palm on her back.
Her skin was so soft. So bare. So fantastically naked in this backless dress as I pulled her near and we began to dance.
“So you made it,” she said.
“I would have been here sooner, but I had to walk my dog.”
She burst out in surprised laughter. “Really?”
“You don’t believe me?”
“It’s not that I don’t believe you. It just came out sounding like an excuse,” she said as we swayed in time to the jazzy number sung by the red-sequined woman on stage.
“He’s a very demanding dog. Have you ever met a border collie mix? They can be quite needy. And I like to make sure he’s happy.”
“How good of you to think of him.”
“I was thinking of you too,” I said, my eyes fixed on her as I spoke. “I couldn’t get you off my mind.”
“Is that so?” she asked, but her smile made it seem less like a question. “I figured I’d read you wrong.”
“You didn’t expect me to show up?” I spread my fingers across the bare skin of her back. Goosebumps rose on her flesh.
“One never knows if a man has it in him to respond to an invitation on the street,” she said coyly.
My spine straightened, and I stood even taller. “When a woman like you tells a man she wants him, that man should do everything in his power to show up.”
She moved closer, her sky-blue eyes sparkling with mischief. “I don’t believe I said I wanted you,” she whispered.
I bent my head to her ear, catching the faint scent of her perfume. Something vaguely tropical. Something that suggested hot summer nights. I wanted to run my nose along her skin and inhale her. A groan worked its way up my chest. “You didn’t have to say it,” I said.
She shot me a sharp stare, but she didn’t let go of me. “My, my. Aren’t we a little over-confident?”
“Am I?” I asked, letting go to spin her in a circle then tugging her back as the music rose to a crescendo.
“Perhaps I just wanted to make sure the ballroom was full,” she said, gesturing to the crowd. “Maybe that’s why I invited you.”
“Is that what you wanted? One more attendee at your event?”
She swallowed and parted her lips. “Maybe I want other things.”
She pressed her hand against my shoulder, and the pressure from that slight touch sent electricity flying through me. I stopped swaying and dipped her, holding her in that pose, her back bent in an arc, her body draped over my arm, trusting me. “Tell me, Sophie. What other things do you want?”
I watched her like that as I waited for her answer. Her eyes never wavered from mine. There was no shyness in her gaze, no nerves evident in her expression. Only confidence, which was so damn alluring. She licked her lips, then answered, “A man who can figure those other things out.”
Oh, hell yeah. This woman turned me on fiercely. She was direct and naughty at the same time. I raised her up. Her full breasts were flush against my chest, and I was sure I could spend hours worshipping them. Or biting them. Or fucking them. “I can figure out all those things you want. I can deliver all of them too. But right now? Here on the dance floor? I presume this is when you need me to role-play being a perfect gentleman,” I said, casting my gaze briefly at the crowds dancing alongside us.
“So you wouldn’t be a gentleman if we weren’t in front of all these people?”
“I would absolutely not be a gentleman at all,” I said, letting my hand travel along her back. “But for the moment, you have your donors here to entertain.”
She raised her chin and looked at me studiously. “You did your homework, Mr.—” Then she la
ughed and cut herself off, placing a finger over my lips. “Don’t tell me your name. I prefer to think of you as Mr. Green Tie. So we can pretend we hardly know each other. We can be strangers.”
“Strangers can make the best lovers.”
“Are you? A good lover?”
“I don’t really think you want me to answer that question.”
“Why on earth wouldn’t I want the answer to that?” she asked, toying with my tie, her voice a purr that lit up my organs, setting every last part of me on fire.
I shook my head, then pressed my lips near her ear and whispered, “I think you’d rather I show you.”
She gasped, an enticing sound that ignited me. My body was strung tight, like a snare drum. I was torn between wanting to pounce on her now and drawing out the anticipation. Making her want me. Making her beg. I was willing to bet she was a marvelous beggar, that she could get on her knees and say please in a voice that snapped all my restraint.
“Show me,” she whispered, then her eyes floated closed as I touched her, fingertips brushing her back. They traveled higher, and she arched into my hand, like a cat being petted. I reached her hair, winding a loose blonde strand around my index finger, cataloging the expression on her face, the way her features were so soft, so open—her lips parted, her eyes closed, her breath gentle.
I let her long curls fall through my fingers as she molded to me.
Then I showed her what else I liked. That I wasn’t soft. That I wasn’t gentle. With my fingers gripping her hair, I tugged.
Hard.
Her eyes snapped open, and they blazed at me. “That wasn’t gentlemanly.”
“I know,” I said, her hair still twisted in my fist. “And you liked it. Now, have you got any more questions about how I am in bed?”
She gulped. A touch of nervousness seemed to flicker across her eyes. “Not at the moment.” She blinked and seemed to rearrange her features as I let go of her hair, smoothing it out as it fell along her neck. “So tell me, Mr. Green Tie, what did you learn about me when you went hunting for information?”
My Sinful Desire (Sinful Men Book 2) Page 3