by Aiden Bates
“A month or so, yeah. Is that weird or something?”
It seemed like such a stupid thing to get hung up on—of course I’d been watched. I spent four nights a week parading around on stage wearing barely anything at all. Watching was exactly what the Ballroom’s audience paid for.
“No,” I finally said, shaking my head. “It’s just…Guess I’m just wondering what took him so long.”
“Maybe he’s shy.”
I laughed. “Shy is something that man has never felt in his life.”
“So? What should I tell him?”
I shifted my shoulders beneath my wings, testing their weight. They felt heavier tonight somehow—but it wasn’t a burden I was unable to bear.
“Tell him it’s the firefighter routine,” I instructed Carlos, a little smile forming on my lips. “And let him know that I’ll be making an appearance at table twelve after. He can buy me a drink.”
Carlos grinned, giving me a little salute. “I’ll let him know.”
If Duncan Rourke wanted to play ball, then who was I to deny him?
Only this time, I intended to win.
4
Duncan
The cowboy get-up suited Kieran, but I had to hand it to him—his firefighter routine was even better. There was something about the way he handled his prop fire hose to Foreigner’s “Hot Blooded” that had my mind roaming to something else I’d like to see clenched between his fists—
Which was the point, of course, but God. He did it with style.
I swirled the ice around in my glass as the audience applauded. Kieran left the stage like a star, with a wink and a blown kiss that he tossed to the audience with reckless abandon. My teeth ground against each other at even that—the idea of some other Alpha catching a kiss from Kieran tossed to the wind.
I couldn’t have felt more possessive of him if I’d tried. To my surprise, our time together in the champagne room the night before only exacerbated that fact. I had expected him to be as enchanting in person as he was up on stage, but I hadn’t fathomed what a mouth he had on him. He was clever, patient and restrained. He knew how flirtation worked, the back and forth of power, and he played the game well. Nearly as well as I did. It only doubled how badly I wanted to claim him. Get him on his knees for me. Stoke his cheek, massage his scalp and call him mine.
How much I wanted to put that mouth of his to better use.
Most of all, talking to Kieran had made me realize what a joke my other conquests had been of late. Sure, I enjoyed watching Omega models ride me in the back seats of limousines. I liked winding my hands around their firm hips at clubs and feeling their toes trace up my calf beneath the table at fancy restaurants as much as the next Alpha. But something had been missing in all of those fleeting encounters. I needed someone with brains. Someone who could give as good as they got.
In Kieran, I’d found that. Wouldn’t have sent him flowers otherwise—I didn’t believe in leading an Omega on.
As another dancer took the stage, I found myself checking my watch and counting the seconds. The waiter had told me to expect Kieran at my table after his dance, but at this rate, there was a good chance I’d grow old first. I had to close my eyes and remind myself to be patient for once in my life as I waited for Kieran to appear. I’d spent so much of my career jumping on opportunity like a lion on a wounded gazelle, patience wasn’t exactly a virtue to which I could lay claim.
But Kieran. Kieran was worth a little wait.
When I finally spotted him moving through the crowd toward me in that delectable little golden G-string, I felt my inner lion purr with satisfaction.
For a man who looked so fucking good wearing so fucking little like that, I could wait a very long time.
“I enjoyed you up there,” I told him as soon as he came into earshot, nodding toward the stage. “You move pretty well.”
“You just like watching me handle my hose,” he joked, positioning himself in front of the table then leaning over it toward me. He leaned so close, for a moment I was so sure he was going to kiss me—which, I realized when I saw his smile as he pulled away, was exactly what he’d wanted me to think. “Sounds like you’ve been enjoying me up there for some time now, Mr. Rourke.”
“Duncan. Please.” I motioned to the chair next to me, offering it to him. As he moved toward it to accept, I rose and pulled it out for him. My mother might not have been able to give me much, but at least she’d taught me manners. It was more than I could say for most of the Alphas on Manhattan these days.
“Mm. Duncan, please,” he cooed sensually, laughing as he parroted my words back to me. “Is that what you tell your partners to say when you take them to bed?”
“I don’t tell them to say anything,” I countered, sliding back into my own chair. “But when they do it anyway…”
“How naughty of you, Mr. Rourke.” He paused, obviously enjoying the little hint of annoyance in my eyes. “Duncan, then. What are you drinking?”
“Ice water and lemon,” I said, waving the waiter over for a refill and a drink for Kieran as well.
“How cheap of you,” Kieran was quick to tease. “And here I thought you were some kind of high-roller.”
“Don’t worry. I tip well.” I smiled up at the waiter as he came to the table. “Another water, thanks. And for the gentleman…”
“Seltzer and lime.” Kieran pursed his lips as he turned to me again. “Is that your thing, then? Just the tip?”
“Depends,” I said with a laugh. “Sometimes just the tip is all that fits.”
“Well, la-di-da, Duncan. Rich, handsome, and a massive cock. You’re quite the triple threat, aren’t you?”
I watched the waiter’s ears turn red as he walked away, casting a glance back over his shoulder as the banter at the table continued to heat up.
“Threats have never been my thing, actually. When you’re good enough, you quickly find you don’t have to make them.” I leaned back in my chair to get a better look at Kieran, then reached out to pluck at the feathers of his angel wings. “These look awful heavy. Are they?”
“Heavy?” He raised an eyebrow. “They can be. It’s hard work being an Angel.”
“Why don’t you take them off?” I suggested.
He sucked his lower lip beneath his teeth like he was tasting the temptation. “You’re a regular devil, aren’t you, Duncan? I’ve just barely had time to get my halo back on and you’re already trying to rid me of my wings.”
“You can leave the halo.” I eyed the little gold circlet hovering over his head. “It suits you.”
Immediately, he took it off and placed it onto the table.
“What’s that about?” I asked, my eyes narrowing with interest.
“If there’s one thing you should know about me, Duncan, it’s that I don’t like to take orders.” He looked me up and down like he was sizing me up—for what, I could only wonder. “Especially not from privileged rich men in overpriced suits.”
I laughed, curling my fingers beneath my lapels to straighten them. “Don’t be so quick to judge. There’s no such thing as overpaying a good tailor.”
“What about overpaying a dancer?” He leaned back, draping his arms over the back of his chair. “Feeling like dropping another two grand in the champagne room tonight?”
“The dancer’s worth it.” I grinned wolfishly. “But I hate overpaying for champagne. My dinner offer is still on the table, you know.”
Before Kieran could shoot something clever back at me, the waiter returned with our drinks.
“To keeping our wits about us,” he toasted, raising his glass.
I clinked it with mine and took a sip, letting the cool water wash down my throat. “Do you think you need to keep your wits about you when I’m around, Kieran?”
“A stiff drink wouldn’t exactly render me dumb just because you’re around, Duncan.” He winked at me, showing off the thickness of his auburn eyelashes. “My father just taught me that it’s rude to drink alone.”
“Ma
ybe you’re afraid of falling in love with me,” I offered with a shrug. “A few drinks in, inhibitions slipping away like sand through your fingertips—and here I am, hot and rich and ready to whisk you away for fettuccine and fine wine…”
He laughed—a loud, genuine thing that seemed to surprise him. Laughter suited him. He tossed his head back as he did it, baring his throat, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down his long, muscled neck. “Duncan,” he said, still chuckling as he recomposed himself. “Look, you seem like a lot of fun, and I don’t mean to be rude—”
“Your father wouldn’t approve of that,” I agreed.
“—but falling in love isn’t really my style. Especially not with a man like you.”
“There you go again. A man like me.” My tongue flicked out, wetting my lips. “You don’t even know what kind of man I am yet. I thought we established that last night.”
“You’re a lot of trouble is what you are.” He blinked at me handsomely while he took a sip of his own drink. “I don’t need to get to know you to know that much.”
“Mm. Trouble. I think I like that.” I inclined my head to him, choosing to take it as a compliment. “I could be a lot of trouble for you, Kieran—if it’s like you say and falling in love really isn’t your thing.”
He laughed. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
I swirled the ice around in my drink again, enjoying the little clinks it made against the glass. “I guess you could say I’m the kind of Alpha that Omegas like you usually fall in love with. I’d hate to cramp your style.”
He snorted, like falling in love with me was the most preposterous thing in the world. “If anyone’s ever fallen in love with you, I’m sure they’ve realized the error of their ways by the time the sun rose the next morning.”
I shrugged. “Maybe. But I only ever need one night.”
He stared at me for a long while after that, like he was seeing something in me that he recognized. Reassuring himself that I was exactly the type of Alpha he thought I was, maybe—or maybe, realizing that what I was saying applied to him just as much as it applied to me. Falling in love might not have been Kieran’s thing, but with a body like his that could move the way he did, I doubted celibacy was something that took up very much of his time.
“Are you a gambling man, Duncan?” he finally asked me, a dark glimmer lighting up in his eyes.
My smile crept further into the corners of my mouth. “You know I work on Wall Street, Kieran. What do you think?”
“I was thinking we might make this interesting,” he said, running his thumb idly around the rim of his glass. “I was thinking it might feel good to prove you wrong.”
“It’d feel better to prove me right,” I promised—but if he was suggesting what I thought he was, this night was proving even more interesting than I could’ve dreamed. “What kind of terms are we talking here?”
“I don’t think you can make me fall in love with you, Duncan,” he said simply. Clean and crisp and businesslike. “But I think I’d like to see you try.”
“And if I do?”
He laughed. “You won’t.”
I leaned forward, turning my body toward his until our knees touched. “Humor me.”
“I suppose I’ll have to give you what you really want,” he said, shrugging inconsequentially.
“Which is?”
He rolled his eyes, a smile blooming on his lips. “To fuck me, Duncan. I thought that much was obvious.”
To fuck me, Duncan. There was something in the way that he said the words that made the lion in my chest roar with hunger. I was glad it was obvious to him—if it hadn’t been, it would’ve meant I wasn’t doing something right. But that left one little loose end that I’d need to tie up before I was willing to shake on Kieran’s bet.
“And let’s say I fail. I won’t, of course,” I assured him. “But hypothetically speaking.”
“When you fail, you don’t get to fuck me.”
I laughed. “Seems to me that’s a somewhat one-sided bet. What do you lose?”
“Don’t be so hard on yourself, Duncan.” He looked me up and down again and tipped back the rest of his drink, setting it down on the table with a thump next to my glass. “Hasn’t it crossed your mind that I might want to fuck you, too?”
And there the lion was, jaws stretching open wide as it let out the triumphant roar of a lifetime. I found myself staring at up at him as he rose, a half-dumb smile plastered across my lips.
He wanted me, too.
What an absolute bastard.
I struck my hand out to him, rising as well. I was only a few inches taller than him, I realized. A good omen—I hated kissing down.
“You’re on,” I told him.
He shook my hand firmly, mischief dancing in his eyes. They were the color of seafoam, that frothy blue-green salted with little flecks of white.
“I’m always on,” he assured me. “Let me finish my shift—then, let the games begin.”
5
Kieran
I shoved my hands deep in my pockets as I came out the door, not so much because of the cold, but because I was suddenly all too aware of myself and didn’t know what else to do with them.
Duncan fucking Rourke. He was a scoundrel if I’d ever seen one—and I knew what they looked like, since I saw one staring back at me in the mirror nearly every morning. He was entitled and arrogant, sure—but there was that tinge of roughness around his edges that told me he probably wasn’t lying about not getting by on Daddy’s bank account. If he was as self-made as he’d suggested he was, maybe all that arrogance was somewhat earned.
It didn’t stop him from being an insufferable prick, but it made him interesting to me. More interesting than I wanted to admit.
And clever—he was more clever than I would’ve given him credit for at first glance. I wasn’t used to Alphas being able to match me when it came to battles of the wits—which was why it was such a shame that he’d made such a stupid bet with me.
As interested in him as I was, I’d have the upper hand in our arrangement the whole way through. Not falling in love with Duncan Rourke would be as easy as not falling into an uncovered manhole on the city sidewalk. I knew how to read warning signs. I’d been side-stepping them for years. Love was a silly fairy tale that people told themselves so they could stay together until the kids graduated high school. My own parents had taught me that while they’d spent the last ten years waffling back and forth on whether or not to get divorced. People like Ben who couldn’t seem to stop sleeping around even when they weren’t trying to reassured me of it nearly every day.
I scanned the parking lot, eyes searching for Duncan’s broad shoulders and tailored jacket. For a moment, I thought maybe he’d gotten cold feet. Maybe redirected his sights to some other Omega for the evening—one who would put out without playing any games. It would’ve been the clever thing to do, after all. If one night was all he was looking for, he had enough looks and charm to get it from someone who wouldn’t require so much effort.
But then, I saw headlights flick on in the parking lot and heard the soft roar of a Rolls-Royce purr to life. He brought the car around, showing off how smooth it drove even over the Ballroom’s pock-marked parking lot.
“Need a ride?” he asked, smirking as he rolled his window down.
I crossed my arms over my chest. “You know how silly it is to drive in New York, don’t you? We’ll hit traffic before you get any further than a block.”
He shrugged. “I’ve got my ways. Hop in—I put the seat warmers on for you.”
“As if my ass wasn’t already hot enough as-is.” I rolled my eyes as I went around to the passenger seat.
The restaurant Duncan had chosen for us wasn’t far away. With anyone else, it would’ve been just as fast to catch the subway—or even just walk. But true to his word, Duncan seemed to know his way around the city better than I expected. He pulled through slender alleyways with confidence, one hand on the wheel and the other resti
ng dangerously close to my thigh.
“Impressed?” he asked me, parallel parking in what should’ve been an impossibly tight fit with such ease, it felt like magic.
I laughed. “If I was the kind of Omega who was impressed by fast cars and slick driving, I might be.”
“And you’re not?”
“I’m not. Keep trying though, sweetheart. Maybe you’ll surprise me.”
Before I could get myself unbuckled and reach for my door, Duncan had already come around to open it for me.
“Careful on the curb,” he warned me, offering his hand.
His palm was broad, a hard callus running just below his fingers. I eyed it with suspicion—when was the last time I’d met a Wall Street Alpha with callused hands?—before ignoring it and getting out of the car, no help required.
As soon as my foot came down on the curb, I knew I’d made a mistake. A crack that I hadn’t seen rocked backward under my weight, forcing me off balance immediately.
But of course, there was Duncan, immediately wrapping an arm behind my back and pulling me upright before I cracked my skull on the hood of his overpriced car.
“Careful on the curb,” he repeated, his lips suddenly all too close to mine. I could feel the warmth of his breath on my lips before it was cut by the chill of the wind, the slightest hint of citrus kissing my nose before he helped me onto more stable ground.
“You’re good at this,” I admitted, gritting my teeth to fight back a blush.
“You have no idea,” he returned with a grin. “Why do you think I parked here?”
And then, I had no choice but to take his arm as he led me inside.
The restaurant was Italian, the cozy kind of place that managed to look high-end while completely capturing the spirit of Tuscany. The maître d' recognized him right away, smiling as soon as we came through the door.
“Your usual table, Mr. Rourke?”
He nodded, and I found myself whisked away to a private corner that seemed to be reserved especially for him. Hell—maybe he had reserved it. The flush on my cheeks started fighting its way back up again.
