Vegas, Baby

by Theodora Taylor

  He sat up and he looked as if he was expending his entire reserve of willpower as he sat back down in his own seat, moving as far away from her as possible.

  “Wha... Why...?” Sunny could barely form a coherent thought after their kiss. But she wanted to know, why had he stopped? Why?

  Maybe he could read her mind, because he then said, “I don’t have a condom.” His eyes focused on his window as if he couldn’t even bear to look at her in that moment.

  “Oh...” Sunny said, her voice small, and she sat up straight in her seat, tugging up the dress’s sweetheart bodice, when she realized it was down past her nipples, her breasts nearly entirely exposed.

  “Oh,” was all she said. She had no words left, none that could possibly explain why she melted like a stick of butter whenever he turned up the heat.

  The rest of the ride passed by in silence. Sunny was surprised when he spoke again, right after the car stopped in the hotel garage.

  “Are you on birth control?” he asked her, his voice a complete monotone.

  Sunny opened her mouth.

  “Just nod yes or no, Sunny. I’m not in the mood for questions.”

  Sunny nodded.

  He put his hand on the door’s latch. “You can stay in the hotel room tonight, but tomorrow I’ll be kicking you out. You won’t have access to that hotel room, or any other Benton room in the city. I’ll have Agnes arrange for you to get the necessary blood tests tomorrow. We’ll both prove we’re clean, and then...”

  Finally he turned to look at her. “And then you’ll come to me, Sunny. I don’t care what you agreed to before. You can name your terms and I’ll meet them, but for the rest of the summer you’ll share my bed. This is how it’s going to be between us.”

  “And what if I...” Sunny swallowed, trying not to react to the way her core tightened at the thought of spending the rest of summer in his bed. “And what if I say no?”

  His green eyes turned to her, and Sunny could have sworn they’d turned a few shades darker in the shadow of the back seat.

  “You won’t like what I do if you say no,” he answered, his voice cold.

  So cold, Sunny felt frozen to the spot.

  He let himself out of the limo, leaving her there in the backseat without another word.

  Chapter 12

  “You won’t like what I do if you say no.”

  The words still echoed in Sunny’s head, even though it had been over twelve hours since she had first heard them. Just like they’d repeated in her head while she was packing her large suitcase for the third time in just a few days and when she was driving back to her apartment in the four-door Mercedes Cole had lent her for the summer.

  What other choice did she have, but to return to her own place? She wasn’t a blow-up doll that Cole Benton got to decide when and where to use. She had her own will. And dignity! Of course she’d gone back to her own apartment. And she planned to stay there for the rest of the summer.

  In fact, if Cole came at her again with his outrageous demands, she planned to ask for an addendum of her own. No more time spent alone. The public dates she’d agreed to go on with him would take place entirely in public. No more intimate limo rides. They’d meet each other at the venue and leave in separate cars. No more kisses, and definitely no more hanky panky. She was done getting bullied by Cole Benton.

  So why couldn’t she stop thinking about him? The way he’d kissed her, the feel of his hands on her hips as he drove into her against the wall—even the way his eyes had darkened in the limo right before he’d given her his ultimatum.

  Why couldn’t she get him out of her mind no matter what she did?

  Her phone had rung less than five minutes after the official checkout time on Monday, the screen lighting up with Agnes’s name. Sunny sent it straight to voice mail, ignoring the ping and the tape icon that appeared on her screen a few seconds later.

  A few minutes later the phone went off again. This time from a Las Vegas number she didn’t know. She also let that call go to voice mail. But this time when the message icon appeared, she pushed Play.

  “Sunny, this is Cole—”

  She immediately pushed the delete option, knowing on instinct that she did not want to hear what he’d say after his curt introduction.

  The phone started ringing again fifteen minutes later. Sunny sent it straight to voice mail, only to have her phone go off again after another fifteen minutes.

  Sunny sent a text to both the phone number and the email address Cole had given her. If there’s a public event you’d like me to attend before our scheduled dinner at The Benton Golf Club on Tuesday, have Agnes email me.

  She then pushed Send. And shortly after her phone lit up with yet another call from Cole. Sunny decided this would be a good time to just turn off her phone altogether.

  Sunny looked at her wall clock. It was only 11:30 a.m. How could time pass by so slow?

  By twelve, she was beside herself with boredom and anxiety. Unable to focus on any task for too long or even to sit down for more than a few minutes at a time.

  Remembering what Nora had said about how much she regretted losing touch with Sunny’s grandmother, she turned on her phone and swiped past all the missed calls and voice mail notifications to ring up Pru.

  “Hey, girl, I was just thinking about you!” Pru said, when she answered the phone. “Wondering if we were still going to do our Monday Mani now that you’re working for Nora Benton.”

  “Of course we are,” Sunny answered with a laugh, happy that Pru hadn’t planned to treat her any differently now that they were no longer on the line together. They’d made a tradition of going in for “upkeep” every other week together. Stage dancers required what Sunny jokingly referred to as “regular maintenance.” And Rick was one to check. She’d seen him call out a dancer for leg stubble, although how he could have possibly known, considering she was wearing tights. A mystery still whispered about by dancers every week as they got their manis, pedis, and waxing done.

  An idea occurred to her. “Do you have anything planned for right after?” she asked Pru.

  “Nope. Just vegging out in front of the TV until it’s time to pick up Jakey,” Pru answered.

  “Then how about we get massages, too? My treat.”

  “Really? Oh, man, I could use one. I chaperoned a hike yesterday for Jake’s nature club, and all that walking. My back is killing me. But I wouldn’t want to put you out.”

  “It wouldn’t be putting me out,” Sunny assured her. “And believe me, I could use a massage, too.”

  It was true, though not for nearly as wholesome reasons. As it turned out, her session against the wall with Cole had worked out a few muscles she was no longer used to using.

  “But I wouldn’t want to make you pay. I know you’re still saving up for New York.”

  Guilt warmed Sunny’s cheeks. She wasn’t used to keeping things from Pru, but she’d signed a confidentiality agreement. However, she also really wanted a massage, and she knew Pru wouldn’t spend the money on herself. She put every extra penny she had into her younger brother, paying expensive rent on a one-bedroom in a neighborhood with a good high school, also keeping him in braces and a constant stream of things needed in order for him to play soccer after school. “You’d think it’d be cheap. It’s just kicking a ball around, right? But his team tells me like every other week, I’ve gotta pay this and that so Jake can kick the ball around with his friends. And so here am I, forking over all this money, even though I don’t even like soccer— The things I do for that kid...”

  It was true, and Sunny knew for a fact that Pru wouldn’t do something special for herself if Sunny didn’t both pay for it and insist she take it as a gift.

  “I’ve budgeted it all out,” she told Pru. “And I’ve got enough left over for a couple of massage
s. Don’t worry.”

  “How much is this new job as Nora Benton’s assistant paying you? And does she need a replacement when you leave town? Because Jakey’s got to be put through college, and I won’t be able to make a living kicking up my heels forever, you know.”

  Sunny did know. And she worried about how Pru would survive after she aged out of dancing. Yet another thing to feel guilty about as she lied, “The compensation’s pretty good, but it’s a temporary gig. I’ll be leaving in August for sure. So we only have a limited amount of girl time left. Please say you’ll come get a massage with me.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Please, Pru. I don’t want to go alone!”

  Pru laughed. “Fine, fine. I’ll come with you, but we’ll have to go to the spa at The Benton. That way at least I can pitch in by letting you use my employee discount.”

  “Ah...” Sunny racked her brain, trying to come up with a plausible excuse for why they shouldn’t get their massages at The Benton—the hotel she’d just vowed never to step foot in again. Yesterday.

  But there was no way to explain to Pru that Cole Benton did something to her that made her lose all sense of herself—really all sense of anything. Or how she didn’t trust herself to even be in the same building as him at this point.

  There was no way to explain that at all. Not without breaking her confidentiality agreement. So Sunny caved. “Okay, we can do it at The Benton. But can you meet me there sooner than later? Like in a half an hour?”

  “Sure!” Pru answered.

  Her easy answer caused Sunny to let out a small breath of relief. She didn’t want to be anywhere near The Benton when Cole got off of work.

  * * *

  It only took five minutes into her side-by-side massage with Pru for Sunny to stop regretting her decision to come.

  “I’m sorry, girl,” she told Pru, who was lying facedown on a table nearby. “You used to be my best friend, but now Helga is.”

  Helga chuckled softly and said, “I am glad you are enjoying it.”

  Sometimes more upscale spas had a limited color selection for manicures, but The Benton Spa wasn’t one of them. Pru chose a tasteful beige—that being one of the few colors Rick accepted on the line.

  But Sunny wasn’t on the line anymore, so she snatched up a bright yellow, one she knew would pop against her skin tone and go well with nearly everything in her wardrobe.

  “Ooh, look at you,” Pru said, when the technician started applying the second layer of yellow to her toes. Then she pulled out her camera phone and took a snapshot. “I’m sending this to Rick.”

  A few seconds later, the phone dinged with Rick’s reply and Pru laughed. “He says you’re lucky you’re not on the line anymore!”

  “Yeah, lucky....” Sunny let out a weak laugh. She was really starting to regret signing that confidentiality agreement. She wished she could confide in Pru, let her know how bored she was with nothing to really do but twiddle her thumbs all day and how she wished she could rejoin The Revue. At least then she’d have something to occupy her mind.

  Something other than Cole Benton.

  “Ooh, as long as you’re doing something new today, you should go ahead and get the fully baldy when we go in for our wax,” Pru advised. “Really give that new boyfriend of yours a treat.”

  Sunny’s mouth dropped open. “What? How did you...?”

  “Girl, did you really think you could go to an event with Cole Benton, get your picture snapped all over the place, and Rick wouldn’t send all of us the dirt, like it was the company newsletter?”

  Sunny’s stomach sank. She hadn’t taken that into account. So it was actually happening. Her fake relationship with Cole was public now, and soon everybody that she knew would think she was seriously dating Cole Benton.

  “All I have to say is good for you. You’ve been letting your breakup with Derek mess with your head for too long. It’s about time you got out there again. That Cole Benton cleans up nice, and the way he was looking at you in those pictures—like he wanted to eat you up. So tonight, let him!”

  The lady working on her toes looked up. “If you’d like I can change your requested service order. We give all the first timers to Marsha. She’s the best when it comes to full waxes. Very gentle.” She winked at Sunny. “But you have to wait at least twenty-four hours to have sex after getting it done.”

  “Um...” Sunny said.

  “So tomorrow night, let him!” Pru revised with a laugh. “Yeah, she definitely wants to go with the full baldy. A couple of the girls on the line say their boyfriends love it.”

  Sunny could not have blushed harder if an industrial heat lamp had been turned on her.

  Sunny ended up walking a little funny when she went to the front desk to pay for their services. Not because it had hurt too much—the technician had been as capable as claimed and gentle to the touch. But because she wasn’t used to being bare down below.

  “I don’t understand why women do that to themselves,” Derek had complained the one time she’d mentioned going with Pru to get a simple bikini wax. “You’re all victims of Big Cosmetics’ agenda,” he scoffed.

  However, Sunny liked the feel of nothing between her skin and her underwear as she walked. It was curiously tantalizing in a way that would’ve had her thoughts turning to Cole Benton if she hadn’t promised herself she wouldn’t think about him in that capacity any longer. And she hadn’t, except during the conversation with Pru, and during the massage, and okay, every time her mind wasn’t actively engaged in thinking about something else.

  But other than those errant thoughts, the spa afternoon had been exactly what Sunny needed, rejuvenating, relaxing, and most of all, distracting.

  She was more than happy to hand over her credit card to the attendant at the front desk.

  But the attendant shook her head with a gentle smile. “Oh, no, Ms. Johnson. There’s no charge for today.”

  Pru grinned and elbowed her in the side. “Ooh, it looks like somebody hooked you up.”

  Sunny did not return her smile. “Of course there’s a charge,” she insisted to the attendant. “The service was excellent and I want everyone to get paid, with a tip.”

  “I assure you they will all be compensated,” the attendant answered.

  “But how about the tip?”

  “Please don’t worry about that, Ms. Johnson. It’s all been taken care of.”

  “By who?” Sunny asked, though she could already guess. “Because I’m really not comfortable with anyone else paying my bills. Even if he is the head of this hotel. So if you could just put the balance on this card.”

  The woman lowered her eyes. “I really can’t take that from you. I have my orders,” she said like she was merely a soldier and the general had spoken.

  With a suck of her teeth, Sunny made the decision to put her card back in her clutch. Not because she wanted Cole to exert this kind of control over her, even when he wasn’t present, but because she sensed she would be making this woman’s job much harder if she insisted on paying for it herself.

  “Fine,” Sunny said. “But whatever tip you’re giving them, could you up it to fifty percent of the service? I’d be happy to put that on my card if it’s too much for whoever’s taking care of it.”

  The woman held up a finger and moved away to have a whispered conversation with her manager, who then picked up the house phone. After a short conversation with whoever was on the other like, he nodded at the attendant, who came back to the still unused register, her eyes delighted. “No, it’s not. Whatever you want in any Benton hotel, it’s all taken care of, Ms. Johnson.”

  “Wow!” Pru said beside her. “Does your guy have any friends who are dying to take on a woman with a brother-slash-ward?”

  Sunny turned to her with a pasted-on smile and said, “How about
if we go have some lunch, go see a movie, and then later on I can take you and Jakey out to dinner with the money I saved on our spa day?”

  Pru shook her head. “Oh, I was just kidding, you don’t have to—”

  “I insist,” Sunny said, pulling her friend away from the counter, and toward the door quickly. Very quickly. She had a feeling Cole Benton was already headed down there in his private elevator. “Lunch and dinner. Anywhere you like—as long as it’s not a Benton Group holding.”

  * * *

  Dinner at the Olive Garden was great and Sunny even managed to stretch it out to a little bit of TV afterward on Pru’s couch while Jakey did his homework at the table. The girlfriend time was terrific and long overdue, but when Jakey yawned and asked Sunny if she was planning on sleeping over, Sunny took that as her cue to get out of her friend’s hair and thanked her for putting up with her for nearly the entire day.

  “No, thank you, honey,” Pru insisted with a warm hug at her front door. “You know I don’t get out much, and that was seriously the best time I’ve had in a while.”

  Sunny began to say something else, about how maybe it wouldn’t be so bad if Pru started dating again. Jakey was nearly seventeen, and he was mature and kind. Sunny was sure he wouldn’t be upset if his pretty sister resumed the life she’d been living before she took over his care.

  But before she could say anything, Jakey called out to her that the water wasn’t warming up in his shower.

  Pru rolled her eyes. “I keep telling the landlord he needs to send someone over to look at our water heater, but he figures as long as the water gets lukewarm most of the time, it’s not anything he has to fix. I’ll see you in two weeks, girl.”

  Sunny was left alone again with nothing but the car Cole Benton had insisted she drive around town and a phone she didn’t dare to turn back on.

  But at least she’d made it through another day without any contact with Cole. Or another appearance from the rat who’d stolen her protein bar. So she congratulated herself as she got out of the Mercedes and headed to her apartment.