At exactly four fifty-two in the afternoon, eight minutes before the agency closed and all calls went to voice mail, the whitewashing producer had rang Mickey on his direct line.
Cue the dramatic background music. Someone like John Williams would have a composer’s field day with this.
A dozen epic movie lines came to mind as Paige remembered that phone call. The moments before had been the like Gandalf’s, “Deep breath before the plunge.”
And after? Any damn quote that implied doom. They were all good.
Above her head as she thundered against the treadmill, a nighttime entertainment show was starting on the TV. She could have put in her earbuds and ignored the host’s witty repartee but hadn’t bothered. The sound of her heart pounding as she ran as if the devil was chasing her was enough to drown out most of the sounds around her.
Back to the phone call … when it was over, Mickey had looked at her with real concern in his eyes.
“He wants a meeting. Something private.”
He wasn’t talking in his normal, full-speed-ahead way, and that alone bothered her.
“Meaning?” she’d asked.
“I don’t know, but my gut tells me we have a bargaining chip. Thing is …”
Paige was on pins and needles waiting for his thoughts to form and finish.
With an expression that swung between shrewd and intrigued, he had shrugged slightly. “I have no idea why that’s the case or what kind of bargain is on the table. But this is big … whatever it is.”
And that was why and how she had ended up at the gym. Burning off the tension squeezing her into a twisted pretzel of anxiety was an absolute necessity.
It was either this or a fall off the ice-cream wagon.
Sweat soaked through her sports bra and a t-shirt, dampening the elastic band of her workout pants, but she powered through, chasing the limit of her endurance. Deftly reprogramming the treadmill, Paige downshifted to a less vigorous pace for her cooldown and refocused on her surroundings.
The stationary equipment zone was packed. All around her were bodies in motion under the bright lights of the fancy workout space. At that moment, she was just another gym rat trying to squeeze in a workout.
There were two women on elliptical trainers in the row in front of Paige, who were laughing somewhat loudly and gesturing between the push-pull of the moving handlebars.
“Oh lordy, he’s hot!” one chortled.
Her friend laughed. “I’d do him. No problem.”
Paige glanced at the TV and immediately stumbled when Gideon’s smiling headshot filled the giant screen.
Having lost her footing, she grabbed for the treadmill safety bar to stop from falling, but it was too late. Next thing she knew, as Gideon’s unseeing face looked on, the still moving machine ejected her, and she had landed like a bumbling clown on her hands and knees.
Immediately, one of the gym staffers came running over to see if she was okay. Distracted by the TV, she brushed off the help and got up with a groan. A knee had smacked the equipment on her way to the floor, tearing a hole in the thin pants that upon inspection showed a bloody gash.
Hobbling to a nearby bench, she sat down and shushed the attendant blathering on about getting the first aid kit because she needed to hear what the TV was saying.
Gideon’s headshot faded, and a clip from an interview began. A cute entertainment reporter was asking him questions, and the snippet they chose had to do with his professional name.
“So, the name Gideon Shaw. Many have said it’s the perfect marquee name. How’d you come up with it?”
Paige remembered this interview. The reporter had soft balled her questions and then offered up her phone number in the hopes of a personal one-on-one. There wasn’t any need to clarify what that meant, and she recalled having thought of the reporter as an idiot for being so blatant and unprofessional. No wonder it was damn hard for women to gain power and be taken seriously in this town when that kind of stuff was the norm.
Turning on the mega-wattage of his growing superstardom, he’d given as good as he got by smirking a little and grinning a lot.
“Actually, I was drunk when the name came to me, Alycia. So if it’s perfect,” he stopped and laughed for emphasis, “Captain Morgan gets all the credit.”
Paige rolled her eyes. Yeah, right. The truth was that the name had been a group effort that the three of them had come up with that had involved a PowerPoint but no swashbuckling alcohol.
The gym attendant returned with a tiny Band-Aid and a disinfecting wipe as if those two things would stop the blood trickling from the gash.
Not that Paige cared. She could just as easily have brought over a chainsaw and a stick for her to bite down on, and her disinterested reaction would have been the same. An important entertainment program was doing a story on Gideon and that almost always signaled fresh gossip building in the wings. Paying attention was her job, and if that meant she bled to death on the gym floor while she kept an eye on the TV, well … so be it.
The taped piece returned to the two hosts who immediately launched into a performance of raised eyebrows and subtle insinuations that made Paige’s blood curdle.
“Well, Avery,” the blonde with the obvious extensions tittered to her on-air partner, “it looks like our sexiest celeb has a bit of a PR nightmare on his hands. Sources close to his latest production, the much anticipated screen adaptation of Forward and Back, report that he’s been putting in extra time with one of his co-stars, the phenomenal Joann Jones. And that she might know more than anyone dreamed about his now famous sex tape.”
The styled to perfection hipster next to her picked up a stack of papers in front of him and arranged them with deliberate flair while murmuring a bitchy sounding, “Mmmhmm.”
Next, he fanned himself with the pages and made a couple of suggestive faces. “Shaw Me the Way,” he snickered as Paige held back a howl of anger.
Those assholes!
Story over, she picked up a gym towel, assured the staff that she was fine, and then limped to the locker room.
This really and truly was getting ri-goddamn-diculous.
“Want me to kiss your boo-boo and make it better?”
Making an exaggerated frown, Paige eyed Edward as he knelt in front of her to inspect her banged up knee.
“I don’t know,” she pouted. “It hurts, and it’s all your fault.”
The corners of his eyes crinkled from the effort of suppressed laughter as he gave her a lopsided grin.
“My fault, hmm?” he answered. “So … what? I’m a bad boy for making you fall?”
Paige squirmed. The gash hurt and his word games weren’t making it any better.
Pushing his hands away, she whined petulantly. “Maybe.”
His eyes, gleaming with amusement, bored into hers. “Would it make you feel better to give me a good spanking? For being bad.”
A spanking. Well, really, kids. How could she resist the challenge of his taunt? Dipping her head so he wouldn’t see the fire his teasing suggestion ignited, she thought, only Edward.
“Oh, right!” she hooted. “You’d like that, wouldn’t you? On your hands and knees, bare-assed …”
The minute she’d said it, Paige knew she’d played right into his hands. The knowing smirk on his face said it all.
“Is that how it works, then?” he mocked with a straight face. “Not exactly a ‘been there-done that’ scenario for me, but I sure am happy to learn you’ve already done the research.”
Done the research. Oooooh, that man! Coming back with a zinger was critical if she wanted to keep him on his toes.
Snorting with amusement, Paige scrunched her face. “Hardly my idea of a good time. Now, if there were a tied to the bed and blindfolded option, we’d be on the same page.”
Edward’s head jerked slightly. Ha! She’d shocked him. Good. Sometimes he needed a reminder of who he was dealing with.
“Who’s tied? You or me?”
This time, it
was her head snapping to attention. How the hell did he turn the table on her with such ease?
“Whaa-aat?” Her attempt at a dirty look failed when she saw his eyes narrow right before they went on an obvious balls-out inspection of her entire body.
When his gaze finally returned to her face, an unmistakable glint in those spectacular blue eyes made her tummy do some impressive somersaults.
As if having the big man on his knees at her feet wasn’t disconcerting enough, he reached for her wrists and turned her hands over, so the palms faced up, lightly stroking his thumbs over her pulse.
His gentleness was so electrifying that there was no way for her to stop the delicious shiver that his touch set off.
“You have such delicate wrists,” he murmured as he studied them.
What happened to all the oxygen in the room? Her mouth gaped open as she struggled to breathe in short, little pants that did nothing to alleviate the swimming sensation overtaking her senses.
“Something soft, I think,” he murmured. “Japanese silk perhaps. Definitely red.”
Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit. How had a bruised knee led to silk rope? Paige swallowed with eyes wide. She fell into his gaze and tried not to whimper.
“I know many types of knots,” he assured her with a deepening growl. “Army stuff mostly, but I did pick up a few bondage tips doing movie research.”
Yeah. She remembered. The movie he referred to was how she’d been blessed with the firsthand visual of a cock-socked Gideon Shaw in as near to all his naked glory as an R-rated film allowed.
“Um,” she croaked. “How does tying my wrists make up for my knee getting hurt?”
He leered at her and nodded. “Easy, babe.”
Keeping a firm grip on her wrists, he lifted her arms and pressed them into the back of the sofa in a silent demand to play along. With her mimicking being tied to an imaginary bed, her hands out of the way and completely at his mercy, she stared at his face while excitement built inside.
“Best way to take away pain is to replace it with pleasure.”
“Oh.” Was that her voice? Geez. It sounded so … small.
His big, solid hands swiped excruciatingly slow along a line following the sensitive skin from wrists to underarms bringing the sensual caress within millimeters of her breasts.
“Breathe, babe.” Edward chuckled as he continued to stroke down the sides of her torso until those strong, masculine hands stopped to span her waist.
With a quick jerk, he yanked her hips forward to the edge of the cushion and used his hips at the same time to wedge his beefy body between her spreading legs.
Her sharp gasp made his already wicked eyes glimmer with approval. Forceful, but not overly aggressive, and with just the right amount of Alpha sweetening the deal, he controlled every response, incited the reaction he wanted, and reduced her to a mass of overexcited flesh. Here was a side of her friend she’d only ever dreamed about until now.
His hands slid beneath her bottom until she angled them just right then squeezed hard until she whimpered.
“While the idea of having your incredible legs wrapped tight around my waist is appealing …”
He let go of her ass and put his hands under her knees, lifting and swiftly tilting her backward until her feet left the floor, and she dangled over his arms.
“This would be more pleasurable for you—to surrender your legs and be trussed to the bed, naked and spread-eagle.”
And then he settled his body in the curve of her open thighs. Paige closed her eyes and moaned.
She felt his warm breath against her neck and stilled … dangling precariously on a knife-edge of desire and arousal.
“That’s right, my beautiful girl. Moan for me. Let me hear your pleasure.”
His words set off a firestorm that tore through her with such force that any inhibitions she had were overpowered with a need desperate to be satisfied.
Shimmying against him, Paige took control by winding her legs around Edward’s hips with a fierce grip aided by her feet digging into his ass for leverage.
He barely had time to react with a heavy grunt before she arched off the sofa back and slipped her arms around his neck. From there, it was an off-the-hook full frontal assault meant to pave the way to carnal victory starting with her mouth desperately licking, sucking, and biting his corded neck.
He tasted like heaven mixed with sex—an aphrodisiac for her starved senses.
Reaching into his shaggy mane of hair, Paige gripped his head with both hands, sucking on his flesh while moaning and wiggling against him.
With his arms holding on to her, he stayed still, letting her feast wherever her mouth landed. His encouraging grunts were like the turn-by-turn voice commands on her GPS. She licked then bit. He grunted and angled to give her more room to maneuver. Before long, she’d practically mauled him alive from the collar of his t-shirt up to his chin. When she licked his Adam’s apple then nipped the edge of his jawline, they each let out a strangled groan.
They were both breathing heavily and hadn’t even kissed yet.
Before she achieved her aim of taking his mouth, he had palmed her bottom with one hand then taken her earlobe into his mouth. Following a skin-prickling nibble, he growled, “Bet that knee isn’t on your mind.”
Huh? What knee? Her knee? Whatever … she strained to take his mouth, but he held her at bay.
Yelping in frustration, Paige felt him loosening her arms from around his neck as he drew back. Her disappointment was brief, however, because he’d only moved enough for him to hook some fingers into the waistband of her stretchy workout pants and purposefully slide them down. He swept them off one leg at a time until she was spread wide before him wearing only some very sensible cotton panties that came in at a solid three on a sexy lingerie ten point scale.
Her mind went a bit fuzzy then. Especially when she searched his face and found his eyes glued to the area between her legs that felt like it was on fire. She worried briefly that a damp spot would be visible through her plain undies but quickly lost the thread on that thought when he spoke.
“Let’s have a look at that knee.”
Oh, right. Her knee. That was what had started all this.
Hooking one of her legs comfortably around him, he gently palmed her other calf then slid his hand to the underside of her knee, bringing it up for close inspection.
Sprawled on the sofa cushions, Paige flung her arms wide for anchor and observed him through hooded eyes.
His intense expression as he examined the gash turned to a deep frown. A harsh, guttural groan turned into a barked expletive once he had a good look at the injury.
“What the fuck, Paige!”
It was probably all kinds of wrong that the ferocity of his reaction made her private flesh pulse wildly and flooded her center with a rush of heat.
“That’s way more than a boo-boo.”
Really? Right that second she didn’t give a damn. The fact was, she’d have gladly taken six stitches without Novocain if he’d growl at her like that again. Probably not the best time to wiggle her ass but the lightning bolt of lust that hit her straight on also managed to scramble all her thoughts.
Shit got real when his mouth lowered to the banged up knee. Her leg jerked involuntarily as his lips touched her skin.
This time when she groaned, it sounded like a slow motion rumble that went on and on and on. Her back arched and she dug her fingers into the cushions, holding on for dear life.
If kisses were medicine, then his busy lips would have healed the most desperate of conditions as he covered her poor, bruised joint with the drugging caresses of his talented mouth.
Everything he was doing was deliberate and unhurried. Where one meaningful kiss would have been enough to communicate a desire to make her feel better, he countered with a masterful ambush of her senses that left Paige floundering. She was soaking wet and wanted to scream at him to touch her, but all she managed was a desperate croak followed
by another moan of pleasure.
“Stand up,” he demanded as her legs lowered back to the floor.
Was he kidding? Stand up? She barely had control over her body at this point, and standing didn’t seem like much of a possibility.
“Can’t,” she groaned when nothing worked. Her arms were useless and legs felt like jelly.
“Yes, you can,” he commanded firmly.
When she just whimpered and barely moved, he put a hand behind her back to urge her up. The help was great but only went so far.
With a meaningful snicker, his other hand slipped between her legs, cupped her mound, and then leveraged her lower body upward with a push that made his hand grind against her already sensitized flesh.
When she was on her feet, Paige involuntarily pressed her thighs together in an attempt to quiet the craving making her quiver. She didn’t miss the satisfied smile or hoarse grunt that gave away his pleased reaction to her response.
Sitting back on his haunches, he let her see his pleasure as he looked at her trembling body.
Smiling, he leaned forward and kissed her belly right above the elastic of her sensible undies.
“The top has to go,” he grunted then crossed his arms and waited.
Pulling a t-shirt off shouldn’t have been such an undertaking, but with her hands trembling like crazy and her brain muddied by the look of scorching desire in Edward’s gaze, Paige fumbled like a toddler, barely managing to haul the top over her head.
The way he devoured her with just a look came as a surprise. It was not as if she was dressed to thrill in some sexy lace and silk. Quite the contrary, in fact. The secret thrill that had started another heated gush came from seeing his expression turn lusty at the sight of her in the most boring underwear of all time. A plain, sexless, gray sports bra and some undies that were just this side of granny pants.
“Tits first.”
She didn’t pretend not to recognize a command when she heard one. She peeled the soft cotton off her modest breasts and flung it aside. The truth was, most of the time she could get away without wearing a bra, but that didn’t mean she had some secret yearning for more voluptuous boobs. Not at all.
The Gideon Affair Page 11
