He studies me for a long moment, and it’s a matter of pride that I meet that intense, penetrating gaze, even though it reaches too deep, trying to uncover things a one-night stand should have no access to.
“Goddamn, I want to take your mouth right now,” he admits with a frown, his scrutiny dropping to my lips. They tingle as if he’s followed through on his desire, and it requires every bit of discipline I possess not to brush my fingertips over my mouth. Or not order him to do it.
Inhaling, he steps back, doing that chin hike thing that seems to be a universal form of communication for men that translates to everything from okay to fuck off.
“Where’re you parked?” he asks, shifting back again, inserting more space between us. Space I both appreciate and resent. Hell. Just the idea of having sex with him is obliterating brain cells.
“Down the street.” I turn, headed in that direction. “I’ll follow behind you.”
“Hold up.” His fingers wrap around my bicep, drawing me to a halt. I glance over my shoulder, and that frown from seconds ago has darkened into a scowl. “You’re not walking alone to your car.”
“It’s fine,” I assure him. “It’s pretty safe over here, and I do it all the time.”
“Pretty safe isn’t a ringing endorsement for the neighborhood watch, sweetheart,” he snaps. Then he presses his lips together in a grim line, his thick, unfairly long-for-a-man lashes briefly lower. When they lift, anger gleams in his eyes, but his voice is softer. Though no less irritated. “This is Chicago. The bouncer let you out, and I haven’t seen Ben leave yet, so that means there are two grown-ass men in there fully capable of walking a woman to her car so she’s not alone at two-fucking-o’clock in the morning.”
The edge returns to his tone, slicing his words into sharp edges. But the fury isn’t directed at me, and God, doesn’t that detonate an eruption of more flutters.
More freaking flutters.
“C’mon.” He jerks his head in the direction of his ride. “I’ll drive you, and then you can follow me.”
He doesn’t wait for me to comply, but then again, my feet are obeying before my brain delivers the message. Shock that he actually gives a damn when no one else does has me trotting alongside him like a meek little lamb.
Another sign that I should call this whole thing off before it goes any further.
I don’t do meek, and I’m nobody’s lamb.
And yet…yet I’m still following.
I tail Jay through the North Side neighborhood of Andersonville. It’s been years since I’ve been over here, but I remember enough to know that during the day, Clark Street—a quirky, eccentric, and diverse community—is packed and bustling with people and traffic.
But tonight, or rather, this morning, it’s quiet, and I’m more focused on the muscle car in front of me rather than the boutiques and eateries. Minutes later, we pull up to a multi-unit brick and wood building. Bay windows arch out from the right side, while a wide, columned porch wraps around the front of the second level, and a set of steps lead up to the bottom-level patio. A building similar in size and architecture borders it on the left, a small, empty corner lot on the right.
Jay appears at my door just as I open it and step out of my late model Mercedes Benz. Just like the first time he glimpsed my ride, his gaze trails over it, no doubt wondering how a dive-bar waitress could afford this luxury car. He’d pretty much voiced that when he commented on the quality of my coat in the alley.
But like then, I pretend not to see the speculation in his eyes. I could say,“See, my coat, clothes, and car are the remnants of the formerly well-off life I used to have. The life I abandoned and sold off piece-by-piece after I quit my job because I dared to object to being sexually harassed.”
But that would be a serious mood killer.
And besides, explanations about the scorched-earth state of my life aren’t meant for one-night stands. They’re barely meant for family. Only my half sisters Dara and Jesse know the truth. My mother couldn’t handle it, and my father—a pull-yourself-up-by-the-bootstraps kind of person—wouldn’t understand or sympathize. And my stepmother and stepbrothers…? Well, I barely spoke to them when I lived in Chicago before.
So, there it is. The few trappings of wealth I have left are my story, and I’m not sharing it with a man I don’t plan on ever seeing again after a night of, hopefully, multiple orgasms.
“You good?” he asks the same question he did outside the bar. Checking in to make sure I’m still in this, still willing. Has a woman ever said no to him? I can’t imagine who that brain-dead chick would be.
“Yes.” Glancing down, I press the lock button on my key fob, the headlights flashing on and off.
When I turn back to him, it’s to an extended hand, palm up. For a second, I contemplate ignoring the gentlemanly gesture that is odd to me but, then again, isn’t. It fits this particular man. After a moment of hesitation, I slide my hand over his, and his fingers immediately enfold mine. A shiver trickles through me—a promise or an omen?
We climb the steps to the patio, and within moments, he’s opening the outside door. I follow him inside and up a flight of stairs to the second level. My nerves pull taut like a thin cord of wire, then coil in a hopeless tangle. The wide expanse of his back fills my vision, and I concentrate on it like a spot of light at the end of a long, increasingly narrowing tunnel.
Curling my fingers inward, I squeeze my fists tight, and the bite of nails into my palms centers me enough to fight back the dimming edges of panic. It can’t quell the nagging barrage of worries, though.
What if he doesn’t find me as sexy once he gets me naked?
What if I can’t reciprocate the pleasure he’s already shown me?
Did I shave?
