The elevator came to a halt on nine.
She didn’t know what to say. She was exhausted, sore and stupidly close to tears.
She swallowed. “Thank you.”
“I’m just treating you like one of the guys.”
“That’s all I want.”
“I know.”
The door slid open.
“Don’t sleep with him, Mila.”
“I won’t.” She stepped into the hallway, vowing to take that advice.
Vegas gave a sharp nod as the door slid shut.
Her stomach danced with nerves as she made her way to Troy’s front door. She knocked once, and he answered almost immediately.
When he didn’t say anything, her heart began to thud deeply in her chest. His stance was tense, his gaze penetrating, and his knuckles were white where he gripped the door. Her first thought was that she was about to be fired.
“Uh...” she started haltingly. “You wanted to talk about Kassidy?”
He blinked, as if her words weren’t making sense. Then his hand shifted on the door. “Kassidy, right.”
“Should I come back later?” She’d like to come back later. She’d rather come back later. Whatever Troy was thinking, she didn’t want him to say it out loud.
But he stepped back. “No. Come in.”
“Is Kassidy up?”
Company would be a good idea. Would he fire her in front of his sister? Hopefully, Kassidy would take Mila’s side.
“You have your laptop?” he asked.
“I do.” She wondered where this was leading.
Was he going to suggest she update her résumé? Maybe he’d offer her a letter of reference. Should she take it? Should she beg him to reconsider? Should she slam out of here in righteous anger?
She pictured herself marching out the door. Then she pictured herself begging him to keep her. Then, unfortunately, the image turned to him kissing her, holding her, reassuring her that—
That what? That they’d be good in bed together.
“Let’s do it in my office,” he said.
Her stomach contracted. “Excuse me?”
He looked annoyed as he shut the door. “Bring your laptop to my office. I want to run through your analysis.”
“On Kassidy?” she confirmed, still feeling as though she was changing gears.
“Of course on Kassidy. What is wrong with you?”
“Nothing.”
“Did you hit your head out there?”
“I did not hit my head.” She started for the office. “I bruised just about everything else,” she muttered as she walked.
She wanted to blame him for that. She did blame him for that. The obstacle course was impossible. It was going to kill someone. Probably her.
She entered the room and plunked her duffel bag down on the floor.
“You okay?” he asked, his voice unexpectedly close and unexpectedly even.
She turned.
“Are you hurt?” he asked, scanning her face.
“I’m fine.”
“Any falls this time?”
She shook her head. “Just the usual scrapes and bruises.”
“You made it farther.”
The statement took her by surprise. “You saw me?”
“Only on the monitor.”
Had he watched her struggle? Had he judged her performance? Or had he merely happened to glance at the security monitor as the buzzer went off? There was no way to guess, and she wasn’t going to ask.
“Did you laugh?” she asked instead, hoping to lighten the mood.
She was feeling better now that it looked as though she wouldn’t be fired today.
“Only the first time, when you...face-planted in the mud.” Then he sobered. “I didn’t laugh. I was pulling for you.”
“No, you weren’t. You’re going to hate it when I succeed.”
“I think you mean if you succeed.”
“I think I mean when.”
Instead of answering, he touched her collarbone, brushing gently across her skin. “You have a gash.”
“It’s nothing.”
He pulled on the neck of her T-shirt. “It’s minor.”
“Isn’t that what I just said?”
“I needed to see for myself.”
“Because you don’t trust me?”
“Because I worry about you.”
“I’m not made of glass, Troy.”
His fingers feathered across her neck. “I wish you were. It would be so much easier if you were delicate, feminine, and I could protect you and you wouldn’t challenge and protest every little thing I do.”
“Is that what you like?” she dared to ask. “You like helpless women?”
“I thought I did.” He was coming closer. “I thought I knew exactly the type of woman I liked. And then you came along. And now I have to question myself. I don’t like questioning myself.”
She told herself to back away, but she didn’t move. “Are you looking for sympathy?”
“No.”
“Good.”
“I’m looking for an answer. Yes or no.”
“To what?”
He took a step. Then he took her hand. He lined up their lips, canting his head to one side. “Yes or no?”
“No,” she managed to whisper, clinging to good sense.
“You sure?”
“No.” She wasn’t sure at all.
He brushed his lips lightly against hers, starting a trail of desire that warmed her brain.
He paused.
She waited, thinking of his kiss, desperate for his kiss.
“Yes or no?” he repeated.
She groaned in surrender. Her hands went to his waist, and she crossed the miniscule space between them, pressing her lips to his in a hungry kiss.
Troy immediately wrapped her in his arms, pulling her tight, holding her flush against him.
It felt good. It felt so, so good. She gave in to the sensations, running her hands along his arms, up to his shoulders, feeling the strength and mass of his muscles. He shouldn’t feel so overwhelmingly sexy. Sure, he was fit, and he was buff, but he was just a man. Why couldn’t she resist him?
She reached for his buttons, kissing him deeply while her fingers worked his shirt. She separated the fabric, touching his skin, feeling its heat, the play of his muscles, the ridge of a scar, then another and another.
She broke the kiss, gazing down. She kissed the white line that crossed his left ribs.
He gasped, and his hand tunneled into her hair.
The sound of the door swinging shut beside them should have given her pause. But she was beyond caring. She tugged off her T-shirt, then stripped off her bra, putting them skin to skin and tipping her chin for his kiss.
He rumbled her name, bringing his lips back to hers. His hands stroked her bare back. He gathered her close, flattening her against him, the heat and friction building.
He turned them both, lifting her to perch her on the edge of his desk. She widened her thighs so he fit between. She looped her arms around his neck, steadying herself, letting her nipples rub against his chest, the tingles from the contact shooting spikes of desire through her stomach and lower.
He kissed her neck, moving to her breasts, drawing her nipple into his hot mouth.
She grasped the lip of the desk, holding tight as her head tipped back. A moan escaped from her lips. Heat suffused her body. Passion ramped up, blocking out sight and sound as her world contracted to Troy.
She felt him pop the button on her jeans, draw down the zipper. She kicked her boots free, and her jeans came off, followed by her panties.
She reached out to him, getting rid of his pants, despe
rate to bring them together. His palms cupped her rear, lifting her up, pulling her to him, hot and hard.
She curled to his body, kissing his chest, tasting the salt of his skin, inhaling his musk while his rhythm drew her upward into a spiral of pleasure. He drove her higher, and she panted his name over and over.
He took her mouth, his kisses hot and deep, his tongue tangling with hers, while his hands kneaded her flesh and he thrust and withdrew.
The world seemed to pause and hover at the edge of paradise.
“So good,” he groaned, his body turning to heated iron. “Mila. Oh, Mila.” His hug tightened, his arms like bands of steel holding her safe.
“Faster,” she begged him, feeling the crescendo tingle its way through her limbs. “Please.”
“Yes,” he growled, increasing his speed. “Yes.”
Her hands tightened on his shoulders, struggling for an anchor as passion threatened to pull her apart.
“Troy,” she cried out as her body imploded.
His body shuddered in return.
Then his kisses grew gentle. He stroked her hair. He cradled her body, taking her weight against himself.
Reality returned to her.
She’d had sex with Troy.
This was bad. It was very, very bad.
They were naked. And he was still inside her. And heaven help her, it still felt fantastic.
“Oh, no,” she moaned. “Oh, no.”
He tensed.
She drew back. “We didn’t just do that.”
He glanced down to where their bodies were joined. “We didn’t?”
“No.” She slipped free, wiggling back on the desk. “It was an accident. We didn’t think it through.” Her brain was desperately scrambling for an out. “It’s not like we had dinner and wine, candles and lingerie, a big bed and a night together.”
“That was an option?” he asked.
She smacked him on the shoulder. “Work with me here. This can’t have happened.” She hopped off the desk, searching for her clothes. “You’re my boss. I’m one of the guys.”
She found her bra and her T-shirt. She glanced over her shoulder to find him perusing her backside. “Stop!”
“Mila, you’ve never been one of the guys.”
“You know what I mean.” She grabbed her panties from the floor and pulled them on, covering up.
She put on her bra and covered it up with her T-shirt. There, that felt better. Better still, she was climbing into her jeans.
Troy quickly got dressed, too, running spread fingers through his short hair, while Mila tightened the laces on her boots.
She came to her feet to face him. “This never happened.”
He looked more amused than upset. “You’re rewriting history?”
“It can’t impact anything we do or anything we think. We’re going to review my notes on Kassidy and discuss her case on its merits. We’re putting everything else out of our minds, and we are never, ever telling a soul.”
“You mean, we’re never telling anyone what didn’t happen?”
It took her a second to wrap her head around his statement. “Yes. Exactly. It’s like we both had the same fantasy, but it wasn’t real.”
He looked skeptical, and she didn’t exactly buy into it herself. But it was her only hope.
* * *
Sitting beside and slightly behind Mila at his office desk, Troy watched her scroll through her analysis of Kassidy’s last few performances. It was a struggle to understand the words. He was mostly listening to the sound of her voice, inhaling the wintergreen scent of her hair, and stopping himself from brushing the bare skin of her arm.
“So Edison checked the cell tower traffic for those exact times,” she said. “I like Edison.”
That got Troy’s attention. “What do you mean you like Edison?”
“I mean he’s a big help. So is Vegas. So is Charlie.”
Troy hated the surge of jealousy that rose in his gut. “What have you been doing with Charlie?”
“I work well with your staff, Troy. We cooperate. I’m a team player. You should think about that.”
“I am thinking about that.” He hated picturing Mila talking, laughing, doing anything with members of his staff.
“They originated from the same burner phone.”
“What? Who?”
She turned her head. “What’s the matter with you?”
“Nothing.” Unless you counted the fact that his brain was still reeling from having made love to her.
Yes, he’d made love to Mila. And it had been off-the-charts fantastic. He wanted to do it again. It was all he could do not to sit forward and wrap his arms around her. She was in fantastic shape, but also soft in all the right places. She smelled like paradise, and she tasted sweeter than fifty-year-old brandy. And she had about as much of a kick.
He couldn’t help but smile in satisfaction.
She gave him a look of disgust. “Like I said, the guy in the blazer. He was back on Saturday night. He was texting, and I wrote down the times.” She focused on the screen again, her voice going no-nonsense. “I jotted down as many as I could, then I correlated them to the information from the cell tower. I got a burner number. But the interesting thing is that some of the times coincided with posts to Kassidy from MeMyHeart and BluebellNighthawk. It’s one person.”
“Lots of people have two accounts.”
As far as Troy was concerned, all Mila had identified was a fan. Sure, she’d matched a face with two account names and a burner phone. But that didn’t mean the guy wasn’t a perfectly ordinary fan.
“He drives a black SUV,” she said.
“Did you get the plate number?” Now that would be useful.
“He was too far away.”
“So we have nothing.”
“We don’t have nothing. This is the guy who mentioned Drake. Charlie’s coming with us on Thursday. He’ll watch for the SUV. I’ll watch Kassidy, and Edison will monitor the electronic traffic.”
“Vegas is coordinating?”
Her shoulders tensed, and her voice went cold. “You can’t even fake it, can you?”
He didn’t know what she was trying to say, but he was sure he didn’t like it. “I don’t fake anything.”
“Yes, Vegas knows about the plan. But he’s not coordinating. This is my operation, Troy. I’m leading the investigation. I’m creating the strategy.”
“As long as Vegas is there for quality control.”
She pivoted the swivel chair. “You won’t give me a chance, will you? You won’t give me a single break.”
A break? She wanted a break, after all those speeches insisting she be treated like one of the guys? Now she sat there with her big green eyes, her rosy cheeks, that soft skin and kissable mouth, wanting special treatment?
His voice came out harsher than he’d intended. “What kind of a break would you like, sweetheart?”
Her expression went hard. “Go to hell.” She jumped to her feet.
He shot up with her, grasping her arm. “What makes you think I’m not already there?”
While he glared at her, his lungs labored, and sweat broke out on his brow. It didn’t matter that they’d made love half an hour before, he was desperate to do it again.
“You think you can hold me?” she asked.
He wanted to hold her. That much he knew.
She unexpectedly slammed her fist into his solar plexus. “I can take care of myself.”
The power behind her fist shocked him, and he staggered back.
She braced herself, stood ready, as if she thought he was going to hit her back.
He held up his palms to show her he had no intention of retaliating. He wouldn’t hit her. He’d never hit her.
Her eyes narrowed, and her face screwed up in obvious disappointment. “No,” she cried and took a menacing step forward.
“I am not going to fight you,” he told her.
“Defend yourself.”
“Stop.”
She made a fist, and he grabbed and held her hand. But she was quick, she’d obviously anticipated his move, and she pivoted, putting him off balance.
“Stop,” he shouted.
He wrapped his arms around her from behind, clamping down while she wiggled to get free.
The door suddenly swung open, and Kassidy appeared.
“Troy!” She gaped at her brother in obvious horror.
He immediately released Mila.
“What are you doing?”
“She attacked me.”
Kassidy headed across the room. “What did you do to her?” She put a comforting arm around Mila’s shoulders.
He was disgusted. Talk about having it both ways.
“I started it,” said Mila.
“Too bad,” said Kassidy, still glaring at him. “He’s the man.”
“No, he’s not the man.” Then Mila seemed to realize how that sounded. “I mean, he is a man. But we’re both...”
Troy couldn’t help himself. “Men?”
She glared at him. “Equals.”
“He’s got a hundred pounds on you,” said Kassidy.
“Almost,” Troy agreed.
“I’m faster,” said Mila clamping her jaw.
“No, you’re not,” he countered.
“What are you two fighting about?” Kassidy asked.
Mila blinked, looking momentarily confused.
He couldn’t remember, either.
“He’s stubborn,” said Mila.
“She’s opinionated,” he said.
“We were talking about your fans,” she added.
“Yeah. Your fans. And your gigs. And your security.”
“I have a plan.” Mila shrugged. “And he’s trying to give Vegas the credit.”
“I am not.” That wasn’t remotely close to what he’d told her. “If you were a man,” he said to Mila. “If you were, in fact, a man, I’d have Vegas sticking to you like glue.”
She folded her arms across her chest. “Because I’m incompetent?”
The Baby Contract Page 12