Touché. She dipped her head, hiding her smile. “Maybe I’m keeping my options open.” Vivienne looked up at him through her lashes, pouring it on thick. “Or maybe I was waiting for you.”
He, on the other hand, didn’t even try to hide his lopsided grin, and the flash of white teeth hit her veins like nitroglycerin. “I find that hard to believe.”
She shrugged in a way she hoped was mysterious. “Daddy issues. He never put me at the center of his world, so now I sit in the shadows, waiting for someone to notice me.” Viv shook her head melodramatically so that he’d assume it was a lie. “It’s all very tragic,” she assured him.
“Somehow I doubt that you wait around for much.”
“Oh yeah?” She reached for his beer, which he relinquished with a smirk, his eyes fixated on her mouth as she took a long sip of the slightly too-warm brew. When it was her turn to lick the foam from her lips, she milked it for all it was worth, reveling in the role of the daring seductress in the short red dress. “Why’s that?”
“Because you strike me as the kind of woman who doesn’t let anything stand in her way.” He tipped his chin to the beer she’d commandeered. “You take what you want.”
Oh, and she intended to.
“So?” he asked, taking the cup back from her. Her belly fluttered as he lifted it to his mouth, sipping from the exact same spot that she had. “Do I pass?”
The smile that curved her lips was genuine. He’d run her gauntlet with style and wit. It was exceedingly rare to encounter such advanced verbal chess moves at a frat party, let alone from someone with muscles like his.
“That was a very good answer. I haven’t heard that one before.” She lowered her voice just enough that he had to lean in to hear her. “Most guys just ask me what I want to drink.”
“Maybe that’s because you’ve been wasting your time with slick college douchebags who regurgitate what their textbooks tell them to think.” He cast a cursory glance over the drunken crowd. She’d forgotten they weren’t the only two people in the world. “Not a truly original thought among them.”
Vivienne reminded herself that it was ludicrous to fall a little bit in love with someone whose name you didn’t know. Then she gave him a pretty moue. “That’s not a very nice way to talk about my friends.”
He stepped closer. “Tell me they don’t bore you.”
“If I confess they do, will you whisk me away to somewhere that will delight and amaze?”
He reached up and set the half-empty beer on the trophy shelf a couple feet above her right shoulder. “I guess that depends.”
“On what?”
“On how much you value the artistic merit of tacos.”
It might have been the most sublime pickup line she’d ever heard.
“A fellow taco-lover, huh? With so much in common, you’d think we would have crossed paths before now. How come I’ve never seen you around?”
“Because I’m not a student here.”
Interesting. This big, beautiful man was just full of surprises.
“Then what are you doing crashing frat parties and luring co-eds off campus with the promise of delicious Mexican cuisine?”
“Jesse Hastings invited me.”
Vivienne grinned. Jesse Hastings was your typical narcissistic son of a senator, nice enough if you got past his penchant for schmoozing and name-dropping. The thought of Jesse hanging out with this guy was like imagining a chihuahua hanging out with a Doberman.
“And how do you know Jesse?”
“I landscaped his family’s estate.”
Well, that certainly explained the muscles.
“And he’s my business partner.”
Vivienne’s eyebrows shot up at the announcement. She hadn’t seen that one coming.
“I didn’t know Jesse knew how to handle a lawn mower.”
“He doesn’t. But I know how to bypass a lot of high-tech systems to siphon internet access from a senator’s mansion, and Jesse assures me that he has the kind of contacts who can fund talents like mine, if I choose to use them for good.”
Vivienne would be lying if she said she wasn’t a little turned on by his white-collar, bad-boy tendencies. It was just the right amount of disreputable.
“And do your talents extend beyond hacking into senators’ mansions?”
His slow grin made her knees weak. “I consider myself a man of many talents.”
And Vivienne was suddenly desperate to experience all of them.
“I’ll let you take me for tacos on one condition. You have to promise that you’ll never use your computer skills to find out anything about me.”
“Well, if I’m not allowed to hack your phone, how am I going to impress you with insider knowledge of all your favorite things?”
“Guess you’ll have to find out what I like the old-fashioned way.”
His gaze darkened in a way that unleashed a rush of heat in her abdomen.
God, flirting was fun. She sent him her best look of prim admonishment. “I meant with small talk.”
He leaned close again, and the world faded away. “No, you didn’t.”
Perfect. He was absolutely perfect.
She extended her hand and sealed her fate. “I’m Vivienne.”
“Wes.”
If she hadn’t known she was a goner already, she would have the second their palms met, and first contact jolted through her like she’d picked up a downed power line. A mere two hours of small talk later, replete with tacos and tipsy on cheap tequila and lust, they’d consummated their inability to keep their hands off each other in the bathroom at Señor Taco’s, before they’d kissed and groped their way back to her dorm room and had their way with each other until the sun rose.
A rather quixotic beginning for where they’d ended up, mired in the technicalities and intricacies of the law.
Vivienne tipped her chin up, examining the whisker burn that had marked up the underside of her jaw.
I didn’t hurt you, did I?
She ran her finger along the patch of reddened skin.
They’d hurt each other.
But things didn’t have to play out the same way they had. They were older now. Presumably wiser. And this was strictly business.
She’d do well to remember it.
With a reinforcing breath, Vivienne threw the makeup wipe into the trash bin and straightened the seams of her dress.
It was probably best they’d gotten this out of their systems, she decided, squaring her shoulders as she reached for the tube of lipstick.
She wouldn’t let it happen again.
CHAPTER FOUR
YOU KISS DIFFERENT NOW.
Jesus Christ.
Wes barely held back an eye roll at his idiocy.
Hell, she’d all but run from him the second she got inside, leaving him to wander around her place as though he gave a shit about home decor.
As though he didn’t still have lust coiling in his belly. As though his fingers didn’t itch to pull her close. Jesus. He was so wound up you’d think they hadn’t just screwed each other senseless. He wanted her all over him. Naked. Panting. Begging him for more. Or hell, he’d do the begging...
Wes raked a hand through his hair and did his best to focus on something less dangerous than his rekindled lust for Vivienne Grant.
Predictably, his mind turned to work. Or at least what he would have considered work before he’d become a disgraced cybersecurity specialist with nothing to his name.
The cameras in the hallway were almost undetectable, which impressed him, but the coverage pattern left a lot to be desired.
So far, he’d rate the building’s security as decent. Which wasn’t nearly good enough considering the caliber of vehicles in the parking garage. The elevator had been laughably easy to override, and the security panels on the doors they passed wou
ldn’t take much more effort to crack. A skilled burglar could clean up.
He’d shore up a few things while he was here. And change her goddamn password.
Christ. Dead mothers’ birthdays could get you into houses, safes, bank accounts...especially if the mark had lost hers young, like Vivienne had.
Not that he was that surprised by the reversion. Viv had always been sentimental—to the point of packrat-itis.
That was probably why he still hadn’t made it past the foyer.
“Make yourself at home,” she’d said, but the words struck a dissonant chord in his brain.
They’d shared a tiny apartment while she was finishing her undergrad at UCLA and he was still busting his ass landscaping, trying to get Soteria Security off the ground. Back then, when being with her had been his version of “home,” Vivienne had stuffed their space with nostalgia—framed photos of friends, mementos from trips, the blanket her mother had knit.
This place was sterile. Barren.
It had less personality than some hotel rooms he’d been in.
Wes ventured farther into the condo, reminding himself that she wasn’t his concern anymore. She hadn’t been for a long time now.
But the truth of that didn’t stop him from taking in her home through the lens of their past. To his left was a professional chef’s wet dream—way too much kitchen for a woman who used to pride herself on how many take-out places’ numbers she knew by heart. Straight ahead sat a spacious living room/dining room combo with a killer view of the city. Vivienne had always been a sucker for a view.
Dark wood floors, light taupe walls, an uninviting, high-backed cream couch. Nothing in the bold hues she used to favor.
Hell, even the meticulously hung abstract paintings that dotted the walls were drab. Which, he assured himself, was the only reason his gaze snagged on the single punch of pigment in the bland suite—a vase of wilted tiger lilies centered on the fancy dining room table.
It certainly wasn’t because he’d given her some before their first official date—Viv insisted that the night they’d met at that stupid frat party, which they’d bailed on to get drunk at a divey little Mexican joint before consummating their lust in the unisex bathroom and then groping their way back to her dorm room so they could love each other until the sun came up, didn’t really count as a date.
Either way, it still ranked as one of the best nights of his life.
So when he’d shown up the next night to take her to a movie, armed with a bouquet of orange blooms, it had been a joke, a callback to her taco-and-margarita-fueled rant about flowers being a cop-out gift. “The pinnacle of generic present giving,” she’d called them. “Little more than socially acceptable thoughtlessness.”
He’d been hooked on her right from the start.
The way she’d stared down her nose at them when she’d opened the door.
“Flowers?”
“The perfect flowers, yes.” He held them out to her, but she made no move to accept them.
“You’re pretty, but you don’t listen so good, huh?”
“Oh, I listen just fine. And what I heard is that the wrong guys have been giving you flowers.”
The unimpressed arch of her eyebrow stoked his competitive streak. “Because you’re the right guy to give me flowers?”
“No.” Wes stepped closer. “I’m just the guy who’s giving you the right flowers.”
Something subtle shifted in her eyes at the distinction. She finally accepted them. “And how come these made you think of me?”
Wes held up a finger. “Because they’re beautiful.”
She didn’t bother to temper her eye roll. “And the same color as cheese, apparently.”
Undeterred, he held up a second finger. “Because they’re named after a sleek, dangerous predator.”
She was adorable when she scoffed. “So I’m a tiger, and that makes you what? My helpless sex antelope?”
Smart and smart-mouthed. The desire to kiss her was overwhelming, but he couldn’t afford the distraction. Not when she was so close to being charmed.
“And last but not least—” Wes raised a third finger “—they’re ballsy as hell.”
Heedless of her present, she crossed her arms, and the cellophane crinkled as it got trapped under her elbow. “Oh, this I can’t wait to hear.”
“These flowers are cat-killers. Notoriously toxic for felines and yet they’re named after one. That’s some hard-core badassery, right there.”
She uncrossed her arms and looked at the flowers, as though reassessing. “That’s the story you’re going with? That I remind you of a sleek, dangerous, pet-murdering predator?”
Wes placed a hand on either side of her door frame and leaned forward, waiting until she lifted her gaze from the bouquet to him. “A beautiful, sleek, dangerous, pet-murdering predator.” He took a step closer. “Don’t forget beautiful.”
Something sparked in her chocolate-colored eyes, the heat of it turning them melty and inviting, and his blood picked up. “Is it weird that I’m kind of turned on by that description?”
God, this woman. Wes hoped his shrug looked casual, even as his knuckles whitened against the jamb, his restraint as thin as a razor’s edge. “I mean, I dared to hope.”
“Also, I have a very strong urge to donate a large sum of money to a local cat shelter.”
“We could stop on the way to the movie,” he suggested, his voice low and rough with anticipation born of the way she was sizing him up. Like a tigress.
“Definitely. We should definitely do that. But I have to take care of something first.”
Heat arced between them, and Wes dropped his hands to his sides. It took everything in him not to reach for her. “I’m pretty tall. You want help reaching a vase?”
Her answering smile was slow and naughty. “Not exactly.” She fisted a hand in his T-shirt and tugged him through the doorway. “C’mere, sex antelope. I feel an ambush coming on.”
They never had made it to that movie.
And they’d celebrated every birthday, every anniversary, every just because with tiger lilies and sex for the next two years.
Until it had all shattered under them...
The sound of Vivienne’s heels against the hardwood yanked him out of his reverie in time to see her striding toward him in pristine condition.
Her hair had been smoothed, erasing any hint that he’d had his hands in it, and the whisker burn he’d left on her jaw seemed less red, thanks to her stellar makeup skills, he assumed, taking in her precisely applied lipstick, no longer smeared from his mouth. In seven and a half minutes, she’d managed to erase the past.
He’d do well to follow her lead, he realized, as she stopped in front of him.
Instead, Wes gave in to the perverse urge to reach out and stroke a finger down the cold glass of the vase that contained the six drooping lilies, their orange petals limp and curling as they wilted in the murky, fetid water. Not unlike their relationship.
“Is this symbolism for my benefit?”
Something stark flashed across Vivienne’s face. “It’s been a long time since ‘your benefit’ played any role in my life decisions.”
Wes tried not to let it bother him when she slid the bouquet out of his reach. He shoved his hands into his pockets, but he ignored the warning to drop the subject. “And yet my presence here would suggest the opposite.”
Silence crowded the space between them, so thick that Vivienne had to punch through it. Unlike him, she’d never liked the quiet.
“Are you hungry? I think there’s some leftover takeout in the fridge.”
A slow, mocking smile tilted the corner of his mouth at the dodge, but he followed her as she retreated into the high-end galley kitchen. “So this is how it’s going to be now?”
She lifted her brows, feigning ignorance over her sho
ulder, but he didn’t buy it for a second. Vivienne was way too smart to play dumb.
“That might work on strangers, but I know you better than anyone.”
She froze with her hand on the refrigerator door, and a wry smile twisted her lips. “And you don’t know me at all. Not anymore.”
The stark truth of that settled around them, like ash. It was all kind of poetic, Wes decided. That they’d end up here, as fun house–mirror versions of themselves. Older and wiser but shoved back into the same constraints—her with some grand plan; him with nothing to his name. The first time they’d been alone together in years had ended up just like the last time they’d been alone together.
When she’d given him the your-business-or-me ultimatum and called him “a money-obsessed workaholic,” and he’d chosen his business over her and told her she was “so goddamn selfish,” and then they’d banged each other’s brains out up against the wall of their cozy apartment one last time. Before he’d walked out of her life. Before she’d hopped a plane out of his.
It had been a long time since he’d let himself think about their spectacular crash and burn, but today, he couldn’t stop thinking about it.
He realized, in that moment, with his body still buzzing from the contact high, what a colossal mistake elevator sex had been. Instead of getting her out of his system, it made him want things he’d thought he’d exorcised ages ago.
“Don’t do that.” Vivienne let her hand drop from the stainless steel handle and stepped away from the fridge. “Don’t reassess how we ended up here. This isn’t one of your security systems. You can’t work backward through the problem and figure out where it all went wrong. You can’t reset this. We were hot for each other, and it flamed out.”
Her shrug was insultingly dispassionate. “The experiment failed. It’s time to accept it and move on. We didn’t even last long enough to get to the part where we got bored with each other.”
“Is that what you think? That if we were this far in, I wouldn’t want you anymore?”
Something raw and painful crossed her face. “Please. By now we’d be scheduling sex. Every second Friday, like clockwork. I’d have to break out the sexy panties.”
Guilty Pleasure Page 4
