by Karin Tabke
Look at him, Izzy thought. He has to bat them off with a stick. Guys like him were cut from the same cheating cloth as her father, Lord Humps-A-Lot. Too damn good looking, too damn superior, and too damn arrogant. He was just the kind of guy Izzy wanted to sink her claws into and shred.
She had just found her mark.
Putting her best strut on, Izzy moved into the room, her eyes on the prize. The closer she got to him, the more her body warmed. He stood there, blatantly giving her a long leisurely up-and-down. He was a magnificent specimen. At least six four. Thick black hair, cropped short on the sides, a little longer on top. Blue eyes that snapped, crackled, and popped with all kinds of hidden wickedness.
Her breath grew heavier, as if the room was suddenly losing oxygen. Her nipples tightened and she knew, as his eyes dropped to her chest, they were clearly defined against the thin pink material of her bikini. The inexplicable urge to fling it off and shove her breasts in his face overcame her.
If she listened to the warning bells ringing in her ears, she’d turn left or right and pick another mark. She ignored them, too intrigued by the man with the taunting smile to give the warnings bells serious credence. When his blue eyes meandered back to hers, holding her gaze, his full lips slowly rose at the corners and she knew she was going to regret every minute spent in his presence. He was something she had never allowed herself to experience before: a mature, confident, red-blooded male who oozed sex appeal and who, she instinctively realized, knew his way around a woman’s body.
Yeah, she was positive that if she let him, he would make her feel things she’d only dreamed about. And she’d want more.
Danger, danger, her brain screamed. Her heart, the one that yearned for the information she needed, trumped it.
She might get hurt by this man, but it could never hurt as much as finding out you had a sister one minute and losing her the next.
He was a means to an end. Seduce him. Drug him. Video his badness, then hand it over for information.
Chapter Three
“I’m not like the rest of them,” the hot little number in the pink bikini said as she virtually floated toward Flynn. Her voice was soft and breathy, a paradoxical mix of innocence and sexy that went straight to his dick. She didn’t have to tell him what his eyes and instincts plainly knew.
Flynn grinned, resisting the urge to slam her against the wall and drill into her. “No, you’re not,” he answered. “You’re in a league of your own.”
Her vivid sea green eyes flashed. “I don’t fuck my customers.”
The minute she said the word fuck, his dick leapt aggressively against his jeans. Without blinking he asked, “What constitutes a customer?”
“Someone who buys me a drink or pays for a lap dance.”
“Then I won’t buy you a drink or pay for a lap dance.”
Her smile widened, the gesture tugging at his swelling groin. She had straight white teeth and luscious lips. She smelled like bubble gum. Suddenly he was craving bubble gum.
“I’m still not going to fuck you.”
“Why not?”
“Because guys like you think you can fuck any girl.”
Flynn grinned and moved into her, backing her into the corner. He put his arms on either side of her head, liking just about everything about her, including her potty mouth. “I don’t think I can fuck any girl, I know I can.” He dipped his head down and inhaled the sweet warmth of her. “But I only pick girls who want to fuck me.” He laughed softly. “And, tiny dancer, your ‘fuck-me’ pheromones are screaming loud and clear to my ‘I-want-to-fuck-you-back’ receptors.”
He had the pleasure of watching a rosy blush erupt across her plump cleavage.
“Is that any way to talk to a lady?”
“You are not a lady. You’re a wildcat I want to tame.” He lowered his lips to hers. “I want to feel those nails in my back.”
She gasped, making her lips brush against his. The contact was electric. They started as if they’d been shocked. Unmoving, they stared at the other. “You need to back off,” she said breathlessly, trying to duck under his arms. He body-blocked her.
“You came on to me first, tiny dancer. Can’t handle the heat?”
Throwing her head back, she narrowed her eyes. “I’ve handled men like you before.”
Abruptly, Flynn was pulled away by Justin, one of Jack’s old Army buddies who was also an LT at SFPD. Flynn had worked with Justin a few times over the years. Mostly case info sharing. “Dude, you’re obstructing the view,” Justin said.
Justin slapped Flynn on the back and waved a hundred-dollar bill under the saucy little dancer’s nose. The gesture and what it implied pissed Flynn off. He didn’t want her dancing for anyone but him.
“What’s your name, sweet thing?” Justin asked.
“Wild Style,” she said in the breathy voice that shot straight to Flynn’s dick. It jerked. He bet she was.
“Wild Style,” Justin said, making a deep sweeping bow. “How about you get your wild style over there by our bachelor and give him a dance that’ll make him wish he’d never met his fiancée?”
The blue-haired, bubble gum-lipped little dancer smiled and said, “It would be my pleasure.”
Justin grinned and slid his hand around her tiny waist and led her off to the opposite side of the room. Flynn stood scowling after them, trying to understand the anger swirling in his gut.
Izzy swallowed hard. This was it. Showtime. She was twenty-four years old and had never shown skin on purpose. Well, not intimate skin. There had been a few hot make-out sessions in her dorm room, but she had purposely stayed away from men, concentrating on surviving and not going down the same miserable road as her mother. Izzy worked part-time as a research assistant to a law professor and went to school full-time. That had been her life. Now she was wearing six-inch heels and a micro bikini in a room full of testosterone-laden cops and she was expected to give them a tits and ass show.
Deep breaths, Izzy, deep breaths.
“Earned It” by The Weekend pounded in a slow seductive beat from the speakers. Perfect to bump and grind to.
It was just skin, Izzy told herself. Everyone had it. No big deal, right? Just her top had to come off. No bottoms. Surf’s Up wasn’t a full on nude club. Not that Boris wasn’t working hard for that license. She’d be long gone by the time he got it.
Keep it cool, she repeated in her head. Just own it. Loosening up some, she shifted gears and to her surprise and relief, Izzy got her strut on.
“Which one of you is the guest of honor tonight?” she asked her escort.
He smiled mischievously at her but before he could answer, a tall Adonis, standing in the background, called to her. “Let’s see how good your ‘That’s-the-sucker-who’s-getting-married’ meter is!”
Izzy stopped, as she considered the request. Putting her finger to her pursed lips, she said, “Hmmm, maybe I’ll have to check each one of you out for myself to make the ultimate determination.”
She was answered with wide grins and eager encouragement.
Slowly, she approached the tall blond in the back who had suggested it. He was smiling good naturedly, his blue eyes bright. Placing her finger beneath his chin, she asked, “Is it you?”
He grabbed her finger as she dragged it down his hard chest. “I wish.”
Izzy winked at him and gave him a pretty pout. “Me, too.”
The guys laughed as she made her way to the next one. He was tall, too, dark-haired, smokin’ hot, and his green eyes danced with lively fun. He held his left hand up and wiggled his fingers, showing off the gold wedding band. “Oh, now that’s a travesty.” She pouted again and moved on to the next man.
One by one she made her way around the room. Each man she passed grinned, but shook their heads. When she came to the one who had turned her world inside out, she didn’t touch his chin the way she had with the others. Instead, she placed her fingertip at the base of his throat. His pulse beat thick and hard. “Is it…” Sh
e traced her finger slowly down his hard chest to the waistband of his trousers. Then ever so slowly, with barely any pressure, she slid her palm down the growing rise in his pants. “You?”
The men in the room whop whopped, urging her on. Her mark’s warm breath puffed across her face. His lake blue eyes snapped with an emotion she couldn’t put her finger on. Desire but also irritation. Did their crazy chemical reaction bother him as much as it bothered her? He grabbed her hand and held it still for several seconds before he moved it away from the rising swell. But he didn’t let her go. “Unfortunately, no.”
He turned her to face a tall, handsome man who stood safely behind several chairs and who looked like he was ready to run.
The man put his hands up and shook his head. “Stevie will geld me. Go for it, Flynn. She’s all yours.”
Flynn’s fingers tightened around her wrist. Pulling her toward him, he sat down on a nearby chair. Grinning wide, he spread his knees and pulled her between them. “I guess tonight’s my lucky night.”
Izzy laughed as she swayed erotically to the slow, thumping beat of the music. “You have no idea how lucky.”
Call him a dog, but Flynn found himself riveted to his seat with a raging hard-on for this sexy little stripper. He couldn’t turn off his reaction any more than he could not draw a breath. She did something to him no other woman had ever done: captivated him. The cheers of the guys became white noise as he watched her slow, sexy moves, teasing him as she ran her fingertips along her thighs, up her slender waist, tugging at the thin golden waist chain attached to the tiny crystal belly button ring he wanted to tug with his teeth, to her voluptuous breasts. She had great tits. They moved with her body, the sway telling him they weren’t store-bought. Her nipples were hard beneath the thin fabric of her suit. It wasn’t cold in the room. Hell it was blazing hot.
She turned and thrust that sweet ass of hers at him, doing a slow air grind, her fingers sliding the edges of her bikini bottom down, giving him a glimpse of her lush cheeks. She turned slowly and as she did, she slipped her thumbs along the edges of the fabric and shimmied the bikini bottom down, teasing him with a peek at the smooth rise of her mound. He wanted to drop to his knees and bury his face there. Her soft bubble gum scent teased him. She turned with the panties drawn taut, her butt crack peeping at him. She glanced over her shoulder and gave him a look that speared him right in the dick. Her big sultry eyes closed, her full pink lips parted in invitation. Her hands trailed from her bottom to her top. Cupping her breasts, she slid her fingers beneath the sliver of a strap and slowly lowered it. Just when he thought he was going to view what he knew was a set of knockout tits, she raised the strap.
His muscles clenched tight, his breathing shallow, and damn it, he wanted to take this tiny dancer somewhere private and lay her down. Mentally, Flynn shook himself. Then he actually shook his head. He didn’t do women like this. She was the complete opposite of his “type” and he sure as hell didn’t do strippers!
He didn’t move. Hungrily, like every other guy in the room, Flynn imagined what she looked like beneath that skimpy piece of fabric.
Turning her back to him, but facing the majority of guys, Wild Style swayed to the seductive beat of the song and untied her top. He knew the moment her tits were revealed because there was a collective groan born of lust from every man in the room.
Flynn pushed out of the chair and swung it around for one of the other guys to take. Angrily, he strode from the suffocating heat of the room into the main club. The music slammed into his ears like a baseball bat. The scent of sweaty bodies and cloying perfume choked him. He hurried to the front door and finally made it out into the cool night air.
Swiping his hand across his clean-shaven chin, he shook his head. “What the hell?” What was wrong with him? He felt like an antsy, horny teenager.
He’d come reluctantly tonight and only because Jack was one of his closest friends. Frankly, he was surprised Jack went for this kind of gig. Jack wasn’t the guy who got off on this stuff, and his fiancée, Stevie, was not the calm, “sure, honey, go sow your wild oats,” type. She knew what was up tonight, no way would Jack have not told her, but the guys had insisted on a traditional send-off. They were big boys. Might as well, right?
None of that was bugging Flynn. What riled him was that bubble gum-lipped little stripper who called herself Wild Style. He wanted her like he’d never wanted a woman before and that bothered the shit out of him. He wasn’t like his father and his brother. The women Flynn associated with were class acts. Polished and educated. He bet Wild Style hadn’t made it past tenth grade. And that potty mouth of hers… “Jesus.”
“Can’t stand the heat, Slick?”
His blood warmed at the sound of her husky voice. Her bubble gum scent wafted across his nose, testing his resolve. Dragging his eyes from the busy street, he turned to look at her. She was wrapped in pink silk, but held out a glass of water to him.
“Here, looks like you need to cool off.”
He took the glass, but didn’t drink. Instead his eyes raked from her spiky blue wig across her full featured face, where he noticed the tiny diamond nose ring for the first time, down the pink wrap to her shapely legs and six-inch open-toed pink heels. His dick thickened. She was a beautiful exotic promise of nail-scratching, sheet-tearing, sex.
“Your friends are in there making fun of you for running out like a scared little boy. Drink up and go defend yourself.”
“I don’t need to defend myself.” He raised the glass to his lips. “Least of all to the guys in there.” As he tipped the glass to drink, the light from the flashing Surf’s Up neon sign shot like a laser beam through the bottom of the glass and in the blink of the flash, he caught sight of what looked like the remains of a roofie dissolving in the bottom. His cop antennae shot up. Why the conniving little—had she marked him from the get-go? Sucker fool, he’d fallen right into her trap. Anger slithered through him. He should arrest her right here. Damn if he was going to let this scam artist play him.
He lowered the glass and looked down at her, catching the desperate look in her big ocean colored eyes. Color had leeched from her previously rosy cheeks, and a thin sheen of perspiration gave her skin a sultry glow. She looked scared. No, scratch that; she looked terrified. What was she up to?
A war waged within. The cop part of him, the part that swore to protect and serve, was ready to haul her in, but the man part of him was intrigued. If he arrested her, he doubted he’d ever learn her motives. If he went along with her scam…
He sipped the water and as he did, he moved past her and pretended to chug the rest, but actually poured it into the trashcan in front of him. He turned with the empty glass and handed it to her. “Thanks.”
Her eyes widened and as she took the glass, she looked like she wanted to say something. A warning? Having second thoughts about drugging him? Anger swept through him again. He was nothing more than a mark. His ego stung and it pissed him off that she’d gotten under his skin in there. He thought he’d gotten under hers, too. He should arrest her.
Sweeping her with a long disapproving look, he would have thought knowing what he knew combined with her career choice would temper his physical reaction to her. That wasn’t the case. The ache in his groin hadn’t waned. The opposite occurred. His desire for her had become painful. “Why do you like flashing your tits for strangers?”
“Why are you such an ass?” She threw back.
He smirked. “You disappoint me.”
Her brows rose. “You don’t know me.”
“Maybe not. Even based on our brief acquaintance, I think you’re better than what you do inside the club.”
She shrugged, the edge of the wrap falling off a bare shoulder. His dick flared.
“I don’t have a problem with my chosen profession,” she said. “I’m not being forced to work here, I chose to. So take your snobby cop attitude and go home.”
Flynn didn’t let it go. “You’re not like them. There’s somet
hing different about you. Stay here long enough and you’ll end up like every other stripper in the Tenderloin.”
She cocked her head to the side and graced him with a brilliant smile. “You’re right, I’m not like the rest of them, but you’re wrong about the second part of your statement. Because I’m not like them, I won’t become one of them.” She nudged him in the chest with her shoulder. “But thanks for looking out for me.”
What a paradox. One minute she was telling him to hit the road and the next she was all smiles and flirty. He moved closer. Her scent engulfed him. Damn if he didn’t want to lay her down and—he stopped thinking about what he wanted to do.
Flynn had never minced words when it came to what he wanted. He wasn’t about to start now. Especially when he wanted the little girl standing in front of him in a bad way. Never mind he should arrest her for trying to drug him. His dick wanted what it wanted. “I want to fuck you six ways to sundown, Wild Style, and that doesn’t make me happy.”
Her lips parted, exposing her white teeth. The tip of her pink tongue touched the bow of her top lip. “Not happy about it because you’re a by-the-book cop and I’m a stripper who showed her tits to your friends in there? Or not happy about it because you know I won’t let you fuck me six ways to sundown? ”
Flynn growled and pushed her against the side of the building. Pulling his hands off her because she felt too good and he might do something stupid, he placed his hands on the wall, palms flattened on either side of her head, and leaned into her. “Because the guys I work with have seen your tits and I haven’t.”
Without missing a beat, she dropped the pink wrap down around her elbows and stood like Venus in the surf before him, her fucking luscious tits sitting way up high, the pink nipples hard, begging for his lips to stroke them. Breath whooshed from his chest as if he’d been hit. Setting his jaw, he fisted his hands against the concrete, fighting the painful urge to ravish them.
