by Katy Connor
Five. Four. Three. Two—
The elevator suddenly shudders to a stop, and the movement jolts through my knees. The lights go out and the alarm starts to ring as the emergency lighting flickers on. It’s subdued, but there’s enough of a glow so we’re not in total darkness. I press a hand to my chest to still my accelerating heart but it’s too late, it’s already in my throat.
“The electricity must have gone out.”
He says it as calm and laid back as the rest of him, and I want to scream. I’m tired, I need my bed, and the bell is blaring like a freaking huge warning. To me, probably. I do not want to be trapped in an elevator with Mr. Going Down for an indeterminate period of time.
The man looks like he knows how to pass the time.
He pins me with his gaze, his dimples deepening as his slow, lazy smile grows. “Whatever will we do?”
2
DANNY
I don’t know why my very existence seems to annoy the crap out of Holly Vincent, but it does. Always has. Since that first day she banged on my door two months ago and yelled at me to stop playing my drums, I’ve had a hard-on for her.
She was covered up that day as well, in some kind of fluffy-looking dressing gown that went from her neck to her toes, and there’d been a blanket mark on her face. But her dark hair had tumbled all around her face and she’d glared at me with her weird amber eyes, and I knew I wanted her.
Knew I was going to have her, too.
Just maybe not today as she glowers at me from the back corner of the elevator, wrapped up like The Blob.
“I cannot be stuck in this elevator.” Her voice is one-hundred percent pissed off as she stalks towards me, the duvet she has swathed around herself sweeping the ground.
I love seeing that spark in her eyes. The spark she had that first day she yelled at me. It’s perversely pleasing to see Little Miss Cool all fired up, especially considering how much time I’ve spent wondering just how fired up she might get between the sheets.
“You’re not one of those panicky women, are you?”
I ask because I know it’s going to piss her off even further, and she doesn’t disappoint. She stops in front of me and glares. “Do I look like the panicking type to you?”
Her voice lowers an octave but is still vehement enough to be heard over the alarm. And there’s a vibrato to it, which I’m fairly sure comes from rage rather than panic.
I bet she’s awesome when she’s angry-fucking.
“I’m just sayin’.” I inject a little redneck into my accent because it seems to piss her off even more when I act dumb. She doesn’t need to know that I graduated summa cum laude from Northwestern. “There’s no need to worry. It’s a big elevator, and there’s only two of us. We’re not going to run out of air or anything.”
She rolls her eyes, and I suppress a smile. “I know that. I have a medical degree.”
I laugh. Some guys might be insulted by a woman lording it over them because she thinks he’s a little lacking in the brains department. Not me. I’ve seen her checking me out the times our paths have crossed, and I didn’t get to twenty-nine without knowing when a woman is interested.
She’s not as immune to me as she wants me to think.
Sure, she’s all haughty and brainy and you-can’t-touch-this and she looks at me like I’m too blue-collar for her. But sometimes a woman likes a bit of rough—any drummer can tell you that—and I’m happy to be that for her.
I’m happy to be whatever the fuck she wants.
“Of course, if the building catches on fire, we’re toast.”
She gives me a not-funny look. “Have I mentioned how tired I am?”
“Right.” I turn to the panel next to the buttons and pull open the door. There’s a phone with emergency use only emblazoned on the handle and a button for the alarm. I pick up the phone and push the button and the noise cuts off as abruptly as it started.
Silence falls and I swear I hear Holly sigh.
The phone is ringing in my ear as I settle back against the wall again, and I watch her surreptitiously out the corner of my eye. A female voice chirps a greeting and between the two of us we quickly ascertain that this elevator isn’t going anywhere in a hurry, given the demands on emergency services at present.
I hang up and Holly says, “Well?”
It’s impatient as hell and I try not to be either insulted or turned on by her eagerness to be out of here. I know she wants to be back in her bed. But I also know there’s more than that going on. I know she doesn’t want to be trapped in here with me because she has a thing for me. And she’s frightened she might act on it.
A situation I certainly wouldn’t object to. We do have several hours to kill, after all. My dick is already on board with the idea.
“They don’t know when they’ll be able to get here. Probably not for a few hours.” She opens her mouth to interrupt, but I plough on over the top of her. “Services are already badly stretched. There are actual real life-and-death emergencies going on out there.”
I don’t need to tell her that, of course. She’s an ER doctor. She’s probably been dealing with them all night.
“Two healthy people stuck in a large elevator for a few hours are not a priority.”
She huffs out a sigh. “Yeah.” It’s the most dejected yeah I’ve ever heard.
“But they know, and they’ll get to us when they can, and she’s going to keep us up-to-date. And if the electricity comes back on and the elevator starts working again, she wants to know so she can cross us off her list.”
Holly nods, then slides down the back wall until she’s sitting. She bends her legs up, or at least I think she does. It’s hard to tell under all that bulk.
“Sorry.” I don’t know why I’m apologizing. But she looks exhausted. Even in the dim lighting I can see the tautness of the skin around her eyes. I hadn’t slept last night either. But I’d just been banging drums all night, not saving lives.
She drops her head back against the wall. “It’s not your fault.”
“You have to work tonight?”
“Nope.” Her head rocks back and forth along the wall as she shakes it. Her eyes flutter closed. “Three days off.”
Which is probably just as well. I doubt she could get in tonight, anyway. For damn sure, Hardrock city officials wouldn’t want her out there on the roads trying.
Covering the distance between us, I too slide down the wall to sit beside her, leaving a few feet between us. Her eyes, big and amber, blink open and she startles. “What are you doing?”
“Sitting.” I smile because the answer obviously irritates her.
“There’s plenty of wall space.”
“I thought you might like to lie down.” I pat my thighs. “Horizontal is always better and I’m told they make a good pillow.”
She gives a soft snort and somehow, even though her head only comes to my shoulder, she manages to look down her nose at me. “I bet you are.”
I laugh. “Just sayin’.”
She shuts her eyes again. “I’m a doctor. I don’t need to be horizontal. I can sleep standing up. I can sleep at a desk or lying on a hard, cold floor. I could sleep hanging upside down like a bat if I had to.”
That’s an image I don’t need in my head right now. The things I could do to her in that position…
“Have it your way.”
But she doesn’t answer, and, when I look closer, her lips have parted and there’s a slackness to them that tells me she’s fallen asleep. Impressive. She really can go to sleep anywhere. Even, apparently, mid-conversation.
It only takes a minute, though, before she starts to sag and slide towards me. She jerks briefly awake a couple of times, muttering as she rights herself, but eventually even that’s beyond her and she slides all the way down.
I grab her before she face-plants into the floor and shuffle my ass towards her a little, sticking my leg under her head. She makes no protest, just squirms for a bit once she’s fully horizontal, her
head shifting around into my lap. My cock appreciates her subconsciousness trying to find the best position of comfort, but cracking wood is hardly appropriate in the situation.
I hold my breath and think of plunging my dick into a snow drift until she stops wriggling and relaxes into sleep. I have no idea why it’s so damn interested, anyway. She looks like a giant pig in a blanket. Not one curve or flash of skin exposed, just her pink little face amidst the lumpy duvet, a ratty pair of Uggs, and a pink pop-pom cap.
So I ignore my idiot dick—it definitely didn’t graduate summa cum laude in anything—and close my eyes, my head falling back against the wall behind. I could use some sleep too, and it’s that or get wound up about a sleeping woman I have no intention of touching anyway.
She wants me. I want her. And for damn sure I’m going to explore that a little more while we’re both stuck in here. But now, she needs to sleep and I’m going to be the perfect fucking gentleman and let her.
“Oh god, I’m so sorry.”
I’m woken by a whispered, scandalized apology, a quick intake of breath and a sudden lightness in my lap. Holly sits bolt upright and blinks at me owl-like from within her bundle of covers like she can’t remember how she ended up in my lap.
Her face is flushed. I’m not sure if it’s from sleep or embarrassment or heat. It’s stuffy in here now, the air warm. She must be overheating like crazy.
“What time is it?”
She looks around as I dig my cell out of my hoodie pocket. I can’t believe it’s not even been a full hour since she drifted off. “Nine-thirty.”
“Is that all?” When I nod, she seems to consider it for a few seconds, then pushes the duvet off her shoulders to reveal a puffy jacket and some sweatpants. “It’s hot in here.” She grabs the rail and hauls herself to her feet, walking to the door. “Is it hot in here or is it just me?” She turns back and looks at me for my answer.
“It’s a little stuffy,” I admit. “But you are trussed up like you’re about to head up a dogsled team to Alaska.”
She looks at herself and grimaces. “You’re right.”
She unzips her jacket and pulls the beanie off her head. I open my mouth to protest—she looks damn cute in that beanie—but then her dark hair tumbles down over her shoulders and the heat that left my groin when Holly removed herself from my lap surges back again.
Not content to stop there, she shrugs out of her jacket and tosses it aside. The sweater she has on also goes as she toes off her Uggs. Suddenly, she’s a lot less bulky. There’s just a ribbed Henley that molds to her tits and her stomach and maybe something else underneath but not a bra.
I don’t need to be an expert in boobs—although I am—to see that.
“That’s better,” she announces.
I concur. “Don’t stop on my account.”
She blinks like it’s just occurred to her she’s performed a bit of a strip tease. Color suffuses her cheeks and this time the flush has nothing to do with the stuffiness of the elevator. She folds her arms across her chest and does that looking down her nose thing again.
If she thinks she’s hiding her tits from me, she’s wrong—the pull of her shirt across them makes me salivate. I want to put my mouth on them so bad my lips burn with the urge.
“I think it’s far enough.”
Oh no. Not nearly far enough. But we’ll see. I laugh at her primness, though. I’m beginning to like how she condescends to me, which is about as fucked up as it gets. My balls ache with how much it turns me on.
She ignores my laughter as she gathers the duvet, gives it a shake, and spreads it over the floor. It takes up about half of the space, and she sits on top of it but against the opposite wall. Smart, smart woman.
“Why do you do that?”
Her question surprises me as she glares across the space between us, stretching her legs out in front of her. Her socks are stripy, her thighs, shapely. Her arms are crossed, and there’s a little v drawing her eyebrows together.
“Why do I do what?”
I know what she’s asking, but I really want to see if she’ll say it. If she’ll put it out there. Too many times these past couple of months she’s walked away from the invitation in my eyes. Is she going to tackle it now?
“Say suggestive things.” She raises her chin. “Look at me like you…know me.”
Okay. She is going there. My dick stirs at the thought, my pulse quickens. Does she think her forthrightness will scare me off? That I’ll back down now she’s telling me she knows my game?
“Because I do know you.”
She shakes her head. “No, you don’t.”
Her denial is swift and vehement. “Fair enough.” My pulse drums slowly through my groin, the blood thick through my veins as I raise my hands in surrender. “But I know some things about you.”
She looks away, her hands falling to her sides to smooth the duvet cover. Her tits shift nicely, and I look my fill while her attention is elsewhere.
“I know you don’t like me. I know that I annoy you.” She doesn’t say anything, just keeps working the duvet. “I know you don’t want to want me.” Her hands halt. “But you do, anyway.”
Her fingers pluck at the duvet now. Her breathing roughens, I can hear it from here. “That’s not true.”
She’s lying and we both know it, but I’m fine with a little denial. “It’s okay,” I soothe. “I understand. I’m not your type. But sexual attraction doesn’t always come in a neatly-wrapped box. Sometimes we want what we want and there’s no rhyme or reason to it.”
Her hands stop again and her eyes lift to mine. Our gazes lock. “I don’t have time for…dalliances.”
Christ, even the way she says dalliances makes me horny. So prim. I want that proper mouth wrapped around my cock doing improper things. “Doc.” I smile and shake my head at her. “You need to make time.”
“I’m fine.”
She tosses her head, and I almost groan as her boobs bounce to the movement. I quirk my eyebrow in mock inquiry, just to see her spark up. She does.
“I am.”
I shake my head slowly. “You’re wound so tight. You’re pissed off all the time.”
“Only at you.”
I laugh. Touché. But she bristles even more at my amusement.
“I’m only ever…cranky at you.”
“Cranky?” I laugh again—this woman is hysterical. “God I love your primness. You can’t even say the words. Can’t say Danny Colton pisses me off. It’s okay to say it, you know.”
“Gee.” She smiles at me, her teeth gritted. “Thanks for the permission.”
“It might even help.”
“Help?”
“Loosen you up a bit.”
“Why? So I can schlep around shirtless all day, keeping my neighbors awake with my drum practice.”
“I’m all for you schlepping around shirtless.”
She folds her arms. Her amber eyes glow in the low light. “You’re doing it again.”
I smile. “Pissing you off?”
“You think all this casual cussing makes you some kind of…cool dude?”
I throw my head back and laugh this time. Was she kidding? I’m a drummer. I’m already pretty cool. But I don’t point this out, I change tack. “Your momma teach you cussing was a sin?”
“Didn’t yours?”
I ignore her question. “I suppose she thinks the F word sends you straight to hell?” I wonder how sick it is on a scale of one to ten for me to want to hear such a dirty word coming from such a prim mouth?
Her eyes widen. Just a little, but I notice it. I notice everything about her. The slight roughness in her breath as it slides in and out of her magnificent mouth, the way her toes curl inside her socks. I definitely notice how she crosses one ankle over the other and slides a hand into the valley where her thighs meet, right up high, snuggled into her crotch.
Is she getting hot just from talking about cussing? From the mention of the F word? Is it starting to hurt between tho
se pretty legs?
“I’m pretty sure my momma doesn’t spend any of her time thinking about the F word.”
Her voice is high and breathy but she looks at me, her eyes glowing with defiance, her chin in the air. I say, “Like mother like daughter, huh?” just to rile her up even more.
Her lips flatten. “I told you before, I don’t have time for—”
“Dalliances.” I grin as I complete her sentence, then I shake my head at her. Such a waste. “How long’s it been since you had an orgasm, Doc?” She goes to speak, and I hold up my hand. “With another human being. Not one you’ve given to yourself.”
Her face flushes so fast and so bright its glow practically lights up the whole elevator. “Ah.” I nod. “You don’t do that either, do you?” I laugh, not out of callousness but out of wonder.
This woman…so much I can teach her.
“I told you already.” Her gaze drops to her lap where her thumb is brushing back and forth over the top of her thigh. “I don’t have time.”
“It only takes a minute.”
Her eyes flick up but not all the way—they come to rest on my crotch. It’s too dim in here to see I’m sporting full wood, but my dick feels the intensity of her gaze like a giant wet tongue licking it from root to tip. “For guys, maybe.”
Okay. That does it. Getting stuck in an elevator with this woman today has obviously been predestined. If anyone needs to learn the power of her own body, it’s Holly Vincent. If anyone needs a good orgasm, it’s her.
This is her lucky day.
“What if I told you I could give you one now? Fast and easy. No strings.”
Her breath hitches and she blinks. Her mouth drops open. I try not to think about all the things I could do to that mouth. She draws her knees up. “That’s…preposterous,” she splutters but it’s too late, I already heard that little hitch. “If you think I’m getting naked in here with you then—”
“You can stay fully clothed,” I interrupt.
“What?”
“So will I.”
She stares at me like I’ve gone crazy and for a moment I think maybe I have too. I want to see her naked so fucking bad.
“I won’t kiss you. Hell, I’ll barely even touch you. I just need my hand.” I hold it up and wiggle the fingers. “That’s all.”