In Her Defense

by Julianna Keyes

  “How long had you been dating? What’s her name?”

  “Stella. And a few months.”

  “How long have you known Kent?”

  “Twenty years or so.”

  “That’s messed up.”

  The new drinks arrive and we each take one. My fingers leave greasy prints on the glass, and I grip it tightly so it doesn’t spill. “What are we toasting?” Eli asks.

  “The people we hate,” I say. “May they burn in hell.”

  “Burn in hell,” he echoes seriously. We drink. We eat. “How many flights of stairs did you have to walk down?” he asks after a while.

  “Not telling.”

  “Why not?”

  “I don’t want to get my accomplice in trouble.”

  “What’d you promise him?”

  I don’t bother correcting his assumption that my helper was male. “What makes you think I promised anything?”

  He raises a brow.

  “Bulls tickets.”

  “Seriously?”

  I shrug. “Whatever. Better than hiking thirty-two floors.”

  “Lucky guy.”

  “No more questions. I won’t give up my source.”

  He smiles and licks mustard off his thumb. I can’t remember my last real date, but it definitely didn’t involve boatloads of grease, unwanted company and this many shots.

  “Did you really have an affair with Lee Haines?” he asks.

  “He was separated from his wife at the time. Are you really okay with Kent and Stella getting engaged?”

  “No. What were you planning to say to me earlier? When you came downstairs?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t know what you looked like.”

  “What does that have to do with anything?”

  I swallow a fry. “It’s easy to read people, usually. When I saw Varner’s picture, I knew how to handle him.” I dip an onion ring in ranch dressing and bite it in half. “He looked...nice. Like the kind of person who gets mugged and discovers the world is a terrible place.”

  “As opposed to?”

  “As opposed to the kind of person who gets mugged and isn’t surprised.”

  “You’re the mugger in this situation?”

  “So to speak.”

  “Why didn’t you ‘mug’ me?”

  “Well.” I polish off the onion ring. “For starters, you heard my first speech.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “And second, I thought you were going to be some pale, scrawny kid with pierced eyebrows and an anarchy T-shirt.”

  He laughs, long and loud. “What?”

  “I didn’t realize you were going to be so...you know. Tall.”

  “Tall.”

  “Yes.”

  “What else?”

  “Forget it. That’s it.”

  “Want to know what I thought about you?”

  “You told me already, remember? Coldhearted bitch? She-devil? And I’m sure you saw my picture on the website.”

  A smirk. “I saw your picture on the cover of Chicago’s Finest.”

  I seldom blush, but I do now. I’d had copies delivered to everyone on staff. “Whatever.”

  “And when I saw you ripping into Todd I thought, Holy shit. She’s the hottest, meanest woman I’ve ever seen.”

  I snicker, torn between feeling chastised and flattered. “Well,” I offer, “at least I didn’t fuck your friend.”

  He tosses his head back and laughs, sounding pained. “Jesus Christ. I guess there’s that.” Eli picks up one of the remaining shots and gestures for me to do the same. “To being brutally honest,” he says, touching his glass to mine, holding my gaze as he does.

  “Brutal honesty,” I echo, downing the shot.

  He leans out of the booth and waves down the waitress, ordering six shots of tequila. “When was the last time you did anything fun?” he asks, resting back against the seat.

  “Work is fun.”

  “Something that wasn’t work.”

  “I don’t know. I work a lot. What do you do that’s fun?”

  “Lots of things. I like to keep busy.”

  The tequila arrives, and Eli licks his wrist, sprinkles it with salt and holds the lemon wedge in his other hand. Then he extends both arms toward me, like I’m supposed to do something.

  “No way.”

  “Why not?”

  I hesitate.

  “Have fun, Caitlin.”

  I take a breath, then shift out of my seat so I can lean over the table to reach him. I’m fully aware he’s looking down my shirt as I grip his big hand and lick his wrist, hearing the soft catch of his breath as my tongue touches his skin. It’s been a while since I’ve been this close to somebody, and while Eli is nothing like the men I usually go for, it’s kind of...nice. His skin is warm and he smells like soap and French fries.

  I down the shot and bite the lemon as he holds it, his gaze on my tongue when it flicks out to catch the juice at the corner of my mouth. Then I drop back into my seat as though I’m not a little turned on by the interaction.

  “Tell me how they told you they were screwing,” I say calmly. “Give me details. Don’t be ashamed to tell me if you cried.”

  He does his own shot. “We’re going to need more tequila.”

  “Do your worst.”

  “What’s the deal here?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “If I admit I cried myself to sleep every night for a month, are you going to tell everyone in the building?”

  “You might’ve cried for a week,” I say, “but not a month. And no, I’m not going to tell anyone. Who would care?”

  He shakes his head. “Heaven help me.”

  “No one would believe me, anyway,” I add. “Just like they wouldn’t believe you. Who could picture this?”

  “I guess that’s true.” He picks up the saltshaker and we both dampen our wrists. “To tonight,” he says, when we clink glasses. “What happens in The Lonely Goat stays in The Lonely Goat.”

  “Deal,” I agree. And for the next several hours, it appears that what happens in The Lonely Goat will indeed stay there. Then Eli orders a banana split.

  Chapter Five

  “Want to see something?” Eli asks, plucking the cherry off the top of the ice cream half a second after the server sets down the colorful concoction.

  “Of course,” I say. And I mean it. I wasn’t planning to spend the evening here, but Eli’s turned out to be pretty good company. A little flirty, a little rude, but smart and entertaining. And sexy, if you go for that overgrown frat boy look, which I don’t.

  Maybe with a little less tequila in my system, I’d see where he’s going with this before he pops the cherry into his mouth, but in my current state I only look on curiously. He winks at me and I watch his jaw work for a moment, then he plucks the neatly knotted cherry stem from between his teeth and holds it out for me to admire.

  My thighs clench. This is the kind of thing that should arouse a drunk sorority girl, charmed by boys who make big promises about their sexual prowess. And though I’m years away from frat houses and naive faith in the opposite sex, I can’t seem to tear my gaze away from the cherry stem or the soft, full lips of the man who tied it into a perfect, tight knot in record time.

  “Interesting,” I say, striving for nonchalant and ending up at unconvincing. I pick up the banana, sliced in half lengthwise, and bite off the end as Eli watches.

  “When was the last time you had a banana split?” he asks, eyes fixed on my mouth.

  I know exactly what he’s asking. “A while.”

  He reaches across the table and uses the tip of his thumb to capture a wayward dot of ice cream from my chin, pressing his thumb into
the center of my bottom lip, watching when my tongue snakes out to claim it. His cheeks are flushed and his eyes are glazed with need and intention, and despite the cold dessert, I’m burning up.

  “You want another one?”

  I shake my head. “I’m not finished with this one.”

  He pushes the bowl to the far end of the table, out of my reach. “Trust me, you are.” He slips out of the booth and around to my side. He slides in next to me, but not before I catch a glimpse of the bulge at the front of his khakis. My body answers with a welcoming surge of moisture, like it knows what’s coming before my head has fully committed to the idea. Eli Grant is not the kind of man I fuck. He probably lives in somebody’s basement with a stray cat and a comic book collection. There’s no way he should turn me on like this.

  But he does.

  “Have you ever played Truth or Dare?”

  I blink. “No.” It’s true. Anything I’d wanted to do, I’d done, no dare necessary. And I’m more than willing to tell the truth, whether or not people want to hear it.

  “Let’s play,” he says. “Pick one.” I turn to face him, one knee lifting and bending to rest on the vinyl. The side of his hand grazes my exposed calf, from my ankle to the hem of my newly hoisted skirt.

  I may be drunk and turned on, and maybe the median age of the people in the bar is sixty-five, but I still have a brain. I’m not about to do something that could jeopardize my reputation. “I can’t,” I say. Or rather, I exhale, since the words just sound like heavy breathing.

  “Why not?”

  “Too many people.”

  “I’m not going to dare you to dance on the table.”

  “What do you want, then?”

  He glances down briefly at the secretly damp junction of my thighs, then over to the knotted cherry stem resting on the table like a promise of things to come. “What do you think?”

  “How does this work?”

  “You pick,” he replies. “Truth. Or dare.”

  My heart flutters in my chest. I can tell him no. I can stop things at any time. I’m an adult, I don’t have to do anything I don’t want to do. I can just play for a little bit. “Truth,” I say.

  Something flickers in his eyes that might be disappointment, but then he looks at me thoughtfully and asks, “Are you turned on?”

  I thought I couldn’t get any more turned on, but the directness of his question only ramps up my arousal. I nod.

  “Do you like it?”

  I can’t look away from the intensity of his stare. I’m not a wallflower; I’ve been with plenty of men. Nowhere near the hundreds my reputation suggests, but plenty. And Eli’s nothing like the practiced, smooth men I’ve been with. The slightly older, more experienced, more predictable men. He’s not wearing a three-piece suit with a car and driver waiting out front; this isn’t a five-star restaurant with a thousand-dollar bottle of wine resting on the table. This is a man in khakis, in the corner booth of some ancient pub, sitting at a table littered with shot glasses and a melting banana split. I know better than to ask questions I don’t know the answer to, but even though I have no idea what Eli will say or do tonight, tomorrow, or next week, all I know is that right here, right now, I want him. And I like it.

  “Yes,” I tell him.

  “Truth or dare?”

  “When do I get a turn?”

  A smile. “Whenever you want.”

  I want to echo the challenge, ask him to pick, but for some reason, I like that he’s in control. It’s like a trip to a foreign land, where I don’t know what’s around the corner, or what the customs are, or what will happen next. “Dare.”

  When he speaks, his voice is scratchy. “Touch yourself.”

  My breath freezes in my throat. “What?”

  He leans in and lowers his voice, speaking directly into my ear. “Reach under your skirt, inside your panties, and run your finger through your pussy. Then show me.”

  He sits back and our eyes lock.

  “I can’t.”

  “Why not?”

  I look over his shoulder. No one is watching, and even if they were, it’s too dim and they’re too old to see anyway. Still. “Because.”

  “Do you want me to make you come?”

  He’s so close I can smell the lingering scent of the detergent on his clothes, the tang of alcohol on his breath and, beneath that, something stronger, more potent, more promising. The words, the nerve it took to voice them—it turns me on, saturating my entire body with the most unexpected yearning. Twelve hours ago I’d have laughed at the question, but right now there’s only one way to answer.

  I nod.

  “Then do it.”

  Some tiny part of my brain comes to life, wondering fleetingly if this game is more than Truth or Dare for Eli. If the man I’d faced off with on the seventeenth floor is getting the better of me, if this is a story to tell his friends. I don’t do vulnerable. I don’t do exposed. Yes, it may be lonely at the top, but there’s comfort in that, even if it runs the risk of leaving you so alone you wind up in a dingy pub with a virtual stranger whispering filthy things you really, really want to hear.

  “You do it,” I counter.

  His eyebrows raise but to his credit, he never hesitates. He holds my gaze as he lifts one finger to his lips, licks the tip and drops it between us. I follow his progress as he slides his big hand along my calf and up my thigh until it disappears beneath my skirt. After a second I feel his knuckles brush the sticky gusset of my silk panties, and his breath whooshes out. “You’re wet,” he grunts.

  “I know.”

  He rubs his hand over me, slight nudges against my clit and swollen lips that have my hips desperately wanting to slide forward for more. “Christ. Caitlin.” He shakes his head as he remembers the dare—his own—then hooks a finger under the wet material and drags it through my aching core.

  “Oh. God.” My head falls back against the paneled wall and I try to remember why I shouldn’t be doing this. Why it’s a huge mistake. I’m not an idiot. I’m a smart woman. I know how to...how to...

  Eli pulls back his hand and holds it under the light so we can both see his index finger glistening. He uses it to tap the cherry stem. “I’ll do anything you want,” he promises, voice hoarse.

  “What happens in The Lonely Goat...” I whisper, throat dry.

  “We’re going to need a second location for what I have in mind.”

  “You know I’m... I can’t...” He waits for me to gather my thoughts. “I want you,” I say finally. “But I can’t...be more.”

  “Than what?”

  “Tonight.”

  His brow furrows as he gets my meaning. “Caitlin, I can’t think much further than my finger right now.” He lifts the hand that had touched me so intimately moments before. “I’m not going to show up in your office and ask you to marry me.”

  “I didn’t think—”

  “And I’m not going to brag to my friends.”

  “Okay.”

  “Now you have to promise me the same.” He’s trying not to laugh.

  “I promise not to propose, Eli.”

  “Good. Truth or dare?”

  “It’s my turn.”

  “Fine. Ask.”

  “Truth or dare?”

  He reaches over for a spoonful of melting ice cream and considers me as he eats it. “Dare,” he says.

  “Show me your cock.”

  He drops the spoon. “Jesus. Seriously?”

  I hold his stare until he’s the one checking over his shoulder for witnesses. Finding none, he undoes his belt, unzips his fly, and reaches into his boxers to free his erection. He fists it quickly, just the head peeking out, hard to see in the shadows under the table. I reach up to tug the lamp over and he snags my arm. “Don’t ev
en think about it.”

  “I can’t see.”

  He brings my captured hand between his legs and wraps it around his cock, so hot and smooth and thick I forget whatever I had planned to say. How many times have I been in this situation, expected to ooh and ahh over the hardware as though it was the Holy Grail? But Eli’s not waiting for praise. He’s got his head pressed back against the seat, eyes glued to the ceiling, struggling for control. I milk him experimentally, wondering how far I can take things, forgetting, for a moment, where we are.

  “That’s enough,” he growls, pushing my hand away and carefully tucking himself in and fastening his pants. He digs his wallet from his back pocket and hands a credit card to the passing server, who returns a minute later with a receipt. Eli scribbles his signature and puts the card away, standing and offering me a hand. It’s remarkable that I’m at all steady on my feet, given that I haven’t stood for hours and have never consumed this much alcohol. But for the time being arousal is overriding the inebriation, and Eli takes my suit jacket and uses it to cover his crotch as he tugs me out of the bar.

  “Where do you live?” he asks when we reach the street. It’s dark and quiet despite the hour, everyone worth seeing opting to hang out in much better parts of town.

  I tell him my address and he frowns, scratching his jaw. “I’m closer.”

  “Good. My feet hurt. I don’t want to walk too far.”

  “Come on.”

  He leads the way down the street, our footsteps and labored breathing alternating in the warm night. This is probably not what the partners had in mind when they suggested I relax, I think, smirking to myself. I utter a prayer that my feet hold out until we make it to Eli’s place, and distract myself from the pain in my toes by trying to remember the last time I made this much effort for sex. I mean, I like sex, and I’m an active participant, but the foreplay was usually some sort of show, followed by a late dinner, then the return to somebody’s well-appointed apartment. The sexy shoes made sense. Now they’re a nuisance. I glance down at Eli’s Converse sneakers. I shouldn’t want them, but I do.

  “How much farther?”

  “Eight blocks.”